Syrian President Bashar Assad told the parliament in Damascus on Tuesday that he will only enter peace talks if Israel guarantees that it will return the Golan Heights, seized in the 1967 Six-Day War and annexed in 1981.

"There must be guarantees to return the whole land. We cannot enter negotiations without knowing what they're going to be about. They must present a word of trust or something written," Assad said in a speech to the Syrian parliament after he was sworn in for a second seven-year term.

"For us peace is tied with the word 'land'. We're with the resumption of talks... to achieve the main principle of land for peace and the return of the whole Golan," he said.

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He said that if Israel is serious about peace, then it should publicly say so.

He gave as an example "Rabin's pledge," referring to understandings reached between Israel and Syria in the 1990s, before the 1995 assassination of then-prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.

"The Israelis should remember that the cost of peace is lower than the cost of war," he said, noting recent mediation efforts.

Asked about Assad's speech, Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said Syria's support for Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah stood in the way of peace talks.

"The problem is that Syria is the only Arab state that has a strategic partnership with Iran and the only Arab state that has structured collaborative relationships with extremist groups like Hamas, Hezbollah and the Islamic Jihad," Regev said.

"It is very difficult to take the Syrian leadership seriously as a credible partner in peace," he said.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon offered Monday to facilitate any future peace talks between Israel and Syria, in which the United States has declined to participate.

Ban, was responding to comments by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert last week that he was "ready for direct talks" with Assad.

The UN chief also said he was involved in efforts to free Israel Defense Forces soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev abducted by Hezbollah last July, and IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, who was seized by Hamas last June.