DAR AL HARB / ISLAM - ISRAEL / SYRIA: ISRAEL & SYRIA HOLD UNOFFICIAL TALKS

Israelis, Syrians held “unofficial” talks: report

JERUSALEM - Unofficial negotiators from Israel and Syria drafted in secret talks from 2004 to 2006 a document they hoped could serve as a framework for a future peace accord, Israel’s Haaretz daily said on Tuesday.

Israeli officials said neither Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert nor his predecessor, Ariel Sharon, had known of the discussions, which Haaretz reported were held in Europe.

“This is the first we have heard of the talks, we have never sanctioned anybody to speak to the Syrians and the prime minister first learned of these conversations through the newspaper report this morning,” said Miri Eisin, an Olmert spokeswoman.

In Damascus a Syrian Foreign Ministry official said: “No negotiations took place, the Haaretz report is completely false.”

Syria has been pressing publicly for Israel to renew official peace talks, last held in 2000, on the future of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Those negotiations broke down largely over Syria’s demand for access to the Sea of Galilee, Israel’s main reservoir situated at the base of the heights.

Haaretz said the so-called “non-paper” that emerged from the two years of unofficial discussions proposed an Israeli pullout from the Golan to lines Israel held before the 1967 Middle East war in which it captured the strategic plateau.

Under the proposed understandings, Israel would retain control over the waters of the Sea of Galilee, but both the Jewish state and Syria would have joint use of a buffer zone—a park—along its shores.

According to the document, Israel would gradually evacuate Jewish settlements on the Golan Heights and the territory would be demilitarised, the newspaper said.

...

***UPDATE***UPDATE***UPDATE***UPDATE***

This story may be bogus, both Syria and Israel have denied it and I have been told that Ha'aretz is moving away from what has been reported by them...

Pertinent Links:

1) Israelis, Syrians held “unofficial” talks: report