Word: syria
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...swearing-in ceremony, Netanyahu's Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, sent aggressive signals, renouncing some of the relatively dovish positions of outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert - whose government spent its final year in office negotiating indirectly with Syria and directly with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Lieberman rejected the Bush Administration's Annapolis peace initiative, under which Olmert and Abbas had talked about the parameters of a Palestinian state. And he insisted that Israel would never withdraw from the Golan Heights, captured from Syria in 1967. "Whoever thinks that he will achieve something by way of concessions - no, he will only...
...Still, Netanyahu is experienced enough to know that his success as a leader of Israel will depend substantially on his ability to manage the peace process - and to at least appear to be making progress. And that may make him more open to pursuing the Syria option...
...Publicly, Netanyahu continues to take a firm stance, rejecting the idea of an Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights in order to achieve peace with Syria. Lieberman talks only of "peace for peace," rather than land for peace. But Netanyahu knows that no peace deal is possible without returning the Syrian territory captured in the war of 1967, and he may be ready to find a formula for its return if Syria is truly ready for a peace deal. Syrian President Assad, having established firm control of the often opaque regime he inherited from his late father Hafez al-Assad...
...Obama recently sent two senior officials to Damascus to test the waters, signaling Washington's willingness to end its campaign to isolate Syria. And early success on the Israel-Syria track would do wonders for the Administration's wider Middle East ambitions. Not only would it formally cement the 40-plus years of relative calm on the Israeli-Syrian frontier, it would potentially detach Syria from its alliance with Iran and enlist Damascus in moderating or eliminating two key radical elements - Hamas and Hizballah - on Israel's borders. Iran's resulting loss of influence in the region could, in turn...
...pictures of what may be Syria's nuclear reactor...