Last update - 00:00 21/01/2008
No peace without Damascus
By Marek Halter
Peace in the Middle East will only happen with the involvement of Damascus. I realize that saying this will surprise some and probably offend others. I have been convinced of this since my first visit to Syria under the regime of Bashar Assad. My visit itself was criticized by several French politicians. Isn't Syria, after all, part of what President George W. Bush calls the "axis of evil"?
It seems obvious that peace can only be reached through negotiating with one's enemies. Unfortunately, this common-sense statement is not shared by all. It is mostly a matter of knowing when to start the discussions. The issue is political rather than moral. I believe Syria is now ready for peace.
The presence of the Syrian deputy foreign minister side-by-side with Israeli and Saudi Arabian delegates, the sworn enemies of its Iranian ally, at the Annapolis conference, is an important sign. It is a mistake for the West to continue to isolate Syria, a country with extensive borders with Israel, Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan, particularly at a time when the United States is wallowing in the Iraqi quagmire and struggling to find a peace agreement between Israel and Palestine acceptable to both sides.
The western policy of exclusion is making Syria increasingly dependent on Iran and its leader, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It results in abandoning Lebanon to the power of Hezbollah. It may even, in the long term, provoke the disappearance of Lebanon as a state, and lead to a war between Syria and Israel in the not too distant future.
"Politics and theology are the only two big questions" the British prime minister, William Ewart Gladstone, declared over a century ago. In the case of Syria, the only secular country in the Arab world, one can still engage in politics and leave theology aside.
The Syrians value their secular society. Even the Syrian Grand Mufti, Ahmad Badr Al-Din Hassoun, prides himself on his secularity. According to him, such a position implies respect for other religions. He invited me, a Polish Jew and French writer, to speak to the congregation during Friday prayers in one of the most famous mosques in the Muslim world, the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus. The reason for my invitation, according to him, was that I am what he calls a khakham, which, both in Arabic and Hebrew means an "erudite."
A few hundred Jews still live in Syria. Almost eighty live in Damascus and own 20 synagogues in the city, but due to a lack of attendance, only one actually functions. There is one restriction, however: all relations with Israel are forbidden. Syria and Israel may as well be at war.
I visited the community center with Michel Duclos, the French ambassador to Syria. When we got out of the car, the entire Jewish population of Damascus was there waiting to greet us, and applause broke out. Both Albert Cameo, the president of the Jewish community and I were deeply moved. It is rare for anyone to come and visit them.
As a leader of a country in which eighty percent of the population is Sunni, there is no point for Assad in developing ties with Shiite Iran. The Syrian population observes with fear the thousands of Iranian pilgrims, amongst them women dressed from head to toe in black, imprisoned in their garb, who come to pay their respects to the reliquary that traditionally encases the head of Hussein, the son of Ali, the first Shiite Imam assassinated in Karbala in 680. The influence of Islam in Syrian society could lead to the end of the Assad clan and the end of the supremacy of the Ba'ath socialist party. For Bashar Assad, it is a race against time. It is imperative that he begin negotiations with Israel and through Israel, with the West.
It is no coincidence that the latest speech the Syrian president delivered before the leaders of the Ba'ath party dealt almost exclusively about peace with Israel. Unfortunately, as far as I know, neither the Western media, nor the Israeli press, mentioned anything about this.
"We want to resume negotiations," Bashar Assad said, "The Israelis must realize that lasting peace is preferable to any other form of temporary solution." The Syrian president went on to say that if it was not possible to publicly discuss the issue of "the return of Syrian land in exchange for peace", then at least "they should do as Yitzhak Rabin did, and state his position clear in a letter of engagement."
He was referring to a written promise by the former Israeli prime minister to pull back from the Golan Heights in exchange for a comprehensive peace deal with Syria. This letter, the exact contents of which remain unknown, included, according to our sources, several dispositions meant to test the goodwill of its fiercest opponents in the two nations. The Golan Heights were to be repossessed by the Syrians over a period of 10 years. But Rabin was assassinated, and Assad's father, who negotiated the deal, also died.
It is obvious that the Syrian president is not a democrat. But then again, are there many democrats at the head of Middle Eastern or African countries? Should we really impose our political views on Syria militarily, as President Bush did in Iraq? Raymond Aron quite rightly stated that "the choice in politics is not between good and evil but rather between what is preferable and what is detestable."
Peace in the Middle East is inconceivable without Syria, not because Syria is a great power within the Arab world, but because its national pride must be taken into account. Its nuisance power must also not be underestimated. The aggressive stance of the international media toward Syria, accusing the country, rightly or wrongly, of being involved in the assassination of Rafik Hariri and of several other Lebanese deputies, participates in closing the gap between the Syrian opposition and those in power.
To open up the European market to the Syrians would be a step toward freeing them from the economic shackles of Iran. Should Israel agree to negotiate with Syria, it would weaken all terrorist groups who have their headquarters in Damascus, including Hamas. In the present situation, only a strong government, such as Bashar Assad's, can take that first step toward peace with Israel without fear of creating havoc in the streets of the Arab world.
The writer is an author.