Secret indirect talks between Syria and Israel could lead to a return to negotiations within the next few weeks. And once negotiations resume, a final agreement could be worked out in a matter of "just a few weeks", Beirut's English-language paper, the Daily Star, has reported.
Resumption has been delayed because the Syrian Foreign Minister, Mr Farouk al-Sharaa, the key Syrian figure in the talks-about-talks phase, has been recuperating from heart surgery performed last month in Beirut. Although he has returned to his office, he is still not well enough for a full workload, a source involved in the mediation told The Irish Times yesterday.
During September, Mr al-Sharaa held more than 40 meetings with intermediaries in New York and Washington, including the US President, Mr Clinton, who discussed Israel's position with the Prime Minister, Mr Ehud Barak, during this week's Organisation for Security and Co-operation summit in Turkey. Both Mr Clinton and Mr Barak are apparently eager to reach a deal with Syria before the US president leaves office in January 2001.
Jordan's King Abdullah is said to have transmitted a message from the Syrian President, Mr Hafez al-Assad, to Mr Barak last week. The king spoke of an early breakthrough on this issue during his visit to France this week. Jordanian informants agree that a settlement between Syria and Israel would resemble that between Egypt and Israel.
"The Syrians will get all their land back like Egypt did and Israel will get peace," stated an authoritative Jordanian source.
In explanation he quoted the adage, "The Arabs cannot make war on Israel without Egypt or make peace with Israel without Syria".
However, the source involved in the mediation said Washington had so far failed to put together proposals which would satisfy both sides and lead them to resume negotiations at the point where the talks were broken off in March, 1996.
Syria demands that Mr Barak recommit to a proposal for a full Israeli withdrawal from the Golan put forward in July, 1994, by the slain prime minister, Yitzak Rabin.
Israel denies that Rabin made such a commitment and insists that Syria should provide a detailed description of the arrangements for security, water-sharing and normalisation Damascus would make in exchange for withdrawal.
