Today, Explained - The Golan Heights

Episode Date: March 26, 2019

President Donald Trump has signed a proclamation recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, breaking with decades of United States policy. The move could alter the Middle East forever. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A quick note about KiwiCo before we start the show. KiwiCo wants to give you today Explained listeners a chance to try their educational projects out for free. You can redeem the offer and learn more about the projects for kids of all ages at KiwiCo.com slash Explained. That's K-I-W-I-C-O dot com slash Explained. You might have noticed there's a lot going on with Israel right now. A new round of fighting just broke out between the country and Hamas in Gaza. The AIPAC conference is wrapping up right now in our backyard here in D.C. Pompeo, Pence, Netanyahu, Schumer, they've already spoken. And yesterday, President Trump made last week's

tweets official. He is breaking with decades of U.S. policy on the Golan Heights. In a moment, I will sign a presidential proclamation recognizing Israel's sovereign right over the Golan Heights. It's a very big deal. It's the first time in the Middle East that the United States government issues such a unilateral declaration, giving sovereignty over an occupied land. Joyce Karam covers Washington for The National, a large English daily based in Abu Dhabi. Even though the Golan Heights is a small piece of territory, home to only 50,000 or so people, Joyce says this move by President Trump might fundamentally change the Middle East. throughout the last few decades on the Golan Heights, and it's breaking with all past U.S. presidents in recognizing an occupied area without negotiations, without a due process, without even going to the United Nations.

Where do we begin with that history? We could begin when we talk about the Golan Heights in the 1967 war. War preparations were stepped up in the Middle East today, even as the diplomats worked to try to preserve peace. In Cairo itself, Muslim preachers declared today that it is Allah's command that Arabs destroy Israel. The sound you hear is the Cairo rally in early June 1967 as Gamal Abdel Nasser asked the Arab nations for vengeance and victory

in a holy war against Israel. The Arabs were planning the first strike. It was Syria, Egypt, Iraq, and Jordan believing that they could go to war and liberate Palestine. But Israel took a preemptive move and bombed Egyptian air force. On Monday, the Israelis took the Gaza Strip and started their push into the Sinai Desert. They also began encircling old Jerusalem. On Tuesday, the Israeli army had carved out a large area of the Sinai. On Wednesday, the Israeli drive was almost complete in Jordan. And tonight, the Israeli army stands on one shore of the Suez Canal. It has increased its hold on the Sinai and remains triumphant in Jordan and Jerusalem.

After that war and the aftermath, Israel occupied the Golan Heights and Syria, Sinai in Egypt, the West Bank, and Gaza. So following the war, UN issued resolutions 242 and 338 calling for withdrawal from those lands. Syria went again to war in 1973 to get back the Golan Heights. They failed. Israel annexed the Golan Heights in 1981. And since then, Syrian nationals who lived in the Golan Heights were offered Israeli citizenship.

How does the world react to that annexation? Nobody was happy with it. Even the Ronald Reagan administration condemned it. But Israel stayed there. Was annexing the Golan legal? No. I mean, annexation is not legal off occupied territory, whether it's in the Middle East, whether it's in Crimea.

This is a red line, and that's why yesterday's order is very controversial. From a regional stability perspective, from a geopolitical, from an international law perspective, this decision just doesn't fly. Why was this piece of territory so strategic for Israel or for Syria? Was it more than just a piece of territory? It's definitely more than a piece of territory. I mean, the Golan Heights, when you look at it, it's not that big. It's the size almost of Oklahoma City.

So not huge. It's not huge. However, it's high up, so you've got elevation that's important for security. It's a very green, fertile area, and it's mountainous. There is ski resorts, actually. Okay. It's also very rich in water. You have the Sea of Galilee there, and then you have the Jordan River. The negotiations between Syria and Israel

over the last few decades over the Golan had a lot to do with the water resources there. Also, Israel, you know, wanted to have extra territory to be able to negotiate a larger peace deal with Syria that would include Syrian support for Iranian groups or Hamas or others. And President Trump brought in the defense element into that order that he signed. The state of Israel took control of the Golan Heights in 1967 to safeguard its security from external threats. Okay, so you've got security, huge, important water resources, and this sort of critical bargaining chip for future peace deals between Israel and various other countries in the Middle East.

What about the people there? Who lives in the Golan Heights? It was mostly Syrians before the 1967 war. And it's small towns, small villages, mostly inhabited by Druze, which is a small minority in the Middle East. After the annexation, more Israelis came in, more settlement building. So it became a mix. And who are the Druze, the community of people who live there? So the Druze are a very interesting minority in the Middle East. They're an offshoot of Islam, although some Muslims don't consider them Muslim. They don't fast Ramadan, for example, but they celebrate Adha. They're more a mix, their literature between Hinduism and Islam and Christianity.

But they have their own traditions. They have their own holidays. They just were able to craft a path of their own when we talk about cultural heritage or even religious and political in the Middle East. And there's only something like 50,000 people there. How many of those are Druze? The numbers I've seen say 20,000. But overall in the Middle East, I think that the minority is around a million. Are they Israelis? Are they Syrians? Are they neither? Well, because of the instability in Syria, because of the conflict there, it added to those people's dilemma. A lot of the Druze

inside the Golan Heights, when they talk about their heritage, they view themselves as Syrian. Do they want to return to Syria and be in the middle of clashes? Not really. Do they see themselves as Israeli? The new generation more so. But the elders, the people who've been there, you know, before 67, they see themselves very much as Syrians. They see their territory as Syrian. So that adds to the dilemma over Monday's decision. We've been seeing protests against Trump's tweet. At the same time, we've seen higher numbers of the Druze in the Golan Heights seek to become Israeli citizens because of the instability inside Syria. So even the Druze themselves are divided on this decision? Yeah. I mean, it's a dilemma.

It's people who, you know, like many in the Middle East, they don't choose their political circumstances. They end up where they are most of the time because of wars. For these people who are in the Golan Heights, they just want peace. However, I mean, if you think about the decision itself on Monday, there is fear, there is concern that this would trigger the reaction that nobody wanted, that this could destroy the cold peace that we've known for decades between Syria and Israel, and that could bring the Golan Heights, where these communities live, to the center of an Israeli-Arab conflict or between Hezbollah and Israel. Knowing what you know, knowing Hezbollah's presence is there, knowing that this is an area that's been stable for so long, why go ahead and trigger something like this. All right, so a quick note about KiwiCo and their educational projects before we return to the show.

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That is one more time, KiwiCo.com slash explain. So why did President Trump recognize the Golan now? or is it related to the Israeli elections we're going to see in two weeks? I would think for now it's the latter. It's, you know, Mr. Trump's ally, Netanyahu, is facing a close election, and he's been a steady ally for the U.S. president. I mean, he called him my friend Donald on Monday. Our dear friend Donald. It was odd also, Netanyahu, in his remarks,

he referenced biblical Israel. And the Jewish people's roots in the Golan go back thousands of years. And that's just an odd reference when you're talking about politics, when you're talking about communities who live there, when you're talking about the modern Middle East. But that, again, makes it more about the Israeli election. Is it enough to give Bibi Netanyahu a win and have him form the next coalition? We'll find out on April 9. But it's unprecedented in how much Trump has gone to help Bibi Netanyahu, the Jerusalem embassy decision, sanctioning the Palestinians. Right.

That's a new precedent. How does Trump recognizing the Golan as, you know, firmly Israeli territory help Netanyahu in this upcoming election? It would help him with voters in the Golan Heights. It would help him with the far right and the right wing who believe in greater Israel, who want more annexation. But it also shows, given Donald Trump's popularity inside Israel, that the two are close friends, buddies almost. I mean, they were wearing the same tie. I saw that.

There's been billboards from the Netanyahu campaign showing Trump and Bibi together. Donald Trump has capitalized on, you know, how Barack Obama was perceived in Israel. How is Barack Obama perceived in Israel? Not so popular because he called for a settlement freeze because he did the nuclear deal with Iran. Donald Trump reversed all of this. So he's seen, you know, as Bibi said, the best friend of Israel and the White House now. So it makes complete sense for Netanyahu to want this, for Netanyahu to ask for it. Why is Netanyahu in such need of help from Trump in Israel? What's going on with his popularity there? Because of the polls, I mean, as you know, he's facing indictment over corruption, over bribery.

Police accused Netanyahu of accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts, including cigars, champagne, jewelry, and flattering media coverage in exchange for backing legislation to help wealthy businessmen. Yet he could still win. He's also been a prime minister since I think 2009. So many would like to see a change. We've seen his main rival, Benny Gantz, address AIPAC in Washington. His lead is not as comfortable as his party would like. It would be a big defeat if he is actually defeated on April 9. It would be a defeat also for the U.S. that has put all of its chips in Netanyahu's basket. So what's Trump getting out of it? Good question. I don't know. Maybe a hand from Netanyahu in the 2020 elections, maybe cornering the Democrats on the Jewish vote. We've seen more references from U.S. Secretary of

State Mike Pompeo. While he was visiting Israel, he criticized Ilhan Omar on the accusations that she made anti-Semitic comments. Sadly, we in the United States have seen any Semitic language uttered even in the great halls of our own capital. This should not be. Another thing that's important in this equation is the evangelical community, the evangelical vote in the United States. Very much like moving the embassy to Jerusalem, recognizing the Golan, just confirms this biblical view of Israel. And they should all go well with the evangelical vote.

And all he gave away in return for that potential boost is recognizing an illegally annexed territory. That seems like a big trade-off. It's a huge trade-off. I mean, and that's why I don't really understand the geopolitical reasoning behind it. When you look today, even U.S. allies in the region, you know, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, they're all condemning.

Turkey, Iran, people who are, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, they're all condemning. Turkey, Iran, people who are, you know, rivals in the Middle East have come together in condemning this decision. It damages the U.S. standing by just, you know, putting them in one camp in the Middle East. And I'm not entirely sure how that would help the peace process. I mean, will Arabs now come and embrace the so-called deal of the century that the administration will put on the table? This makes it much more unlikely. And the U.S. has sanctions against Russia for the annexation of Crimea. Do those sanctions carry less water? Because in the Golan, they're saying, hey, it's yours.

Oh, it's very hypocritical. You can't go and sanction Russia for annexing Crimea and then go and recognize Israel's sovereignty over annexed Golan Heights. Given that that's exactly what the United States just did, what does this move by the U.S. mean for the peace process between Israel and its neighbors? I mean, no matter how you look at the Trump administration strategy, it's a complete reversal of all past administrations. You've never seen anything like this. Okay, you want to recognize the Golan Heights? How about go to the UN? Yeah. Seek a resolution. You want to move the embassy to Jerusalem? How about also open talks about it, like discuss with the Palestinians?

Right now, you don't have any U.S.-Palestinian talks. Past U.S. administrations, the way they made peace in the Middle East, for example, Jimmy Carter, he pressured Israel. And he did get the Camp David Agreement. The first Arab-Israeli open talks were under George H. Bush. And how did he do it? He also pressured Israel. So right now you have a team in place that they believe that they could do the complete opposite in achieving peace, which is pressuring the Palestinians. It's a big gamble, and we'll see if it actually will lead to peace or to more regional instability. Joyce Karam reports on U.S. politics for The National. I'm Sean Ramos-Firm. This is Today Explained. Thank you.