Word: golan
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...student asked if he would be able to visitthe Golan Heights, an area in northern Israeldisputed by Syria and Israel, in the near future...
That perception was not lost in Jerusalem. Already torn over the wisdom of engaging in a negotiation that will require Israel to give up most or all of the Golan Heights at a time when Israelis are still digesting territorial concessions to the Palestinians, the government of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was looking for a bolder, plainer statement of Syrian intentions. The usually optimistic Foreign Minister, Shimon Peres, found the public remarks "too positive to be disappointing, but too general to be satisfactory...
...Rabin was also deeply concerned that Assad had offered no new assurances about security arrangements if Israel does withdraw from the Golan Heights. Rising in a steep escarpment to a height of 2,970 ft. on the Syrian-Israeli border, the Golan commands all the low ground that constitutes northern Israel. Syria repeatedly shelled Israeli kibbutzim from the Heights in the 1960s. Not a shot has been fired there since Henry Kissinger brokered a troop- separation accord in 1974, but poised on both sides are thousands of tanks, a bristling reminder of the state of war that has existed between...
Despite his unease with Assad's vague linguistics, a realistic Rabin has put Israelis on notice that an agreement on the Golan is coming nearer -- and they're not sure they like it. The 13,000 settlers who live on the Heights, supported by many other Israelis, have mounted noisy protests denouncing Rabin's plans to give back territory. In the hours after the Geneva meeting, Rabin felt he needed to defuse a fresh outcry and abruptly called for a referendum on the future of the Golan. Whether or not a plebiscite would ever be accepted by Syrians -- or Israelis...
Syrian President Hafez Assad, meeting with President Clinton in Geneva, said his country seeks "normal, peaceful" relations with Israel -- under certain conditions. Among them is the complete return of the Golan Heights, which Israel captured in 1967. Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin said that before a substantial Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights could be considered, his government would hold a national referendum on the subject. Israel plans to resume peace talks with Syria this week in Washington...