Mubarak: Israel should give up Golan to make deal with Syria

March 27, 2000
Web posted at: 10:54 p.m. EST (0354 GMT)

In this story: Egypt helps keep diplomacy moving 'The masks have effectively been removed' RELATED STORIES, SITES

From staff and wire reports

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is urging Israel to return the annexed Golan Heights to Syria to cement a peace agreement, saying slain Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was ready to do so.

INTERACTIVE MAP Golan Heights: A tug of war for peace    VIDEO CNN's Walter Rodgers summarizes the meeting and talks about what's ahead. Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K CNN's Bernard Shaw spoke with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak about Israeli-Syrian peace talks. QuickTime Play Real 28K 80K Windows Media 28K 80K     ALSO     MESSAGE BOARD Mideast peace

"He told me personally -- I didn't release it at that time -- that he is ready to give back the Golan Heights, but he would like to know what is he going to take back in return," Mubarak told CNN on Monday during a visit to Washington.

Israel captured the Golan in the 1967 Mideast War, held it through another war in 1973 and annexed it 1981.

Rabin was assassinated in 1995, and peace talks between Israel and Syria remained stalled until after Ehud Barak's election as prime minister last year. As the first Arab state to make peace with Israel, Egypt has tried to serve as a broker between Israel and Syria's President Hafez al-Assad.

"So I asked him, 'What do you want to take back in return?' He told me exactly like this -- open borders, diplomatic relations, security measures and all these things, exchanging ambassadors," Mubarak said. "When I tackled this problem with President Assad, he didn't say no."

Mubarak said he told Barak that because of the political realities in Syria, Assad could not agree to give up territory to the Israelis.

"I think if Barak, or if Israel, really wants peace and wants to solve this problem, you should make sure that they are going to give back all the occupied territory as Rabin promised them before," Mubarak said.

Talks between Israel and Syria broke off in January over Syria's demand that Israel make a commitment to quitting all of the Golan Heights.

The close relationship between Egypt and the United States has proven critical in maintaining the momentum toward achieving a comprehensive peace in the Middle East. In recent months, Mubarak has kept diplomatic wheels turning to prevent the peace process from stalling yet again.

"America finds in Mubarak one of the rare leaders in the Middle East who lives up to what he says," Egyptian political analyst Tahsin Bashir said. "What he says is what you get."

Mubarak will meet with U.S. President Bill Clinton on Tuesday. Clinton is expected to brief Mubarak on his Sunday meeting with Assad, which failed to reach a breakthrough.

During his weeklong visit to the United States, Mubarak is also seeking to bolster economic ties between the two countries. He is particularly interested in information technology and other high-tech areas.

Since coming to power 19 years ago, Mubarak has visited the United States nearly 30 times to talk about economic issues, military cooperation and regional peace efforts.

Clinton and Assad met for three hours Sunday in an attempt to jump-start the talks, but no breakthrough was reported. On Monday, Barak accused Syria of not being prepared to make peace at present.

"The masks have effectively been removed," Barak said.

"President Clinton's meeting with Assad highlighted that Syria, as things seem now, is apparently not ready to take the type of decisions necessary to reach a peace agreement," he said. He added, "Israel had not closed the door."

Many Middle East analysts had hoped that the 69-year-old Assad, whose health is failing, had agreed to meet Clinton in Geneva to reach a breakthrough. Sunday's lack of progress "means the chances to reach peace with Syria now are very little. There is a failure," Israeli Cabinet member Haim Ramon said.

Syrian presidential spokesman Jubran Kourieh said that during the talks Assad stressed the importance of Syria's longstanding demand for an Israeli pullback to the country's 1967 borders.

The stalled talks, however, may give Barak the breather he needs to shore up his shaky governing coalition, which survived another vote of confidence in Israel's parliament on Monday -- this time over the future of Jerusalem.

The measure, backed by the right-wing Likud opposition, accused Barak's peace policies of aiming to partition Jerusalem into Israeli and Palestinian sections.

Cairo Bureau Chief Ben Wedeman, Jerusalem Bureau Chief Walter Rodgers and Reuters contributed to this report.

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Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Syrian Arab Republic Ministry of Information
Office of the Israeli prime minister
CIA World Factbook: Israel
CIA World Factbook: Syria

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