Azerbaijan, Baku, 10 July / Trend corr U.Sadikhova, E.Tariverdiyeva/ The governments of Syria and Israel do not seem to sit down at the negotiating table in near future. The key reason is the impact from the United States, in particular of current Bush Administration. "During George Bush's tenure, United States many times impeded any endeavours for negotiations between Syria and Israel," independent Syrian political scientist Hosni Mahali said to Trend .
"Syrian President Bashar Assad stated that whilst George Bush is heading the White House, Syria and Israel will not directly negotiate and an armistice is out of the question," Associated Press reported on 9 July. Assad added that the negotiations between Damascus and Jerusalem would not reach any progress until Washington stops financing of Israel's occupation policy.
According to Syrian expert Salem az-Zuhayri, by his sharp statement Bashar Assad wants to weaken United States' role in Syrian-Israeli negotiations for the sake of the dialogue's success. "Bashar Assad has his own terms for this peace process. Damascus will let neither Israel nor United States push itself around until they accept Syria's terms," az-Zuhayri said to Trend in a telephone conversation from London on 9 July.
According to az-Zuhayri, neither of the sides can facilitate full-fledged negotiations due to United States' constant interference in Middle East policy. " Syria supports United States' presence in the negotiations, but only participation of Russia, UK, China and France is provided, i.e., the process must go on at international level," Syrian political scientist said.
The US-Israeli relations are based on full cooperation. "It means that if US observes international law, Israel will lose Palestine and an independent state will be established there," Mahali said.
According to the Syrian expert, the Jewish lobby of US influences Bush Administration to a great extent. The Jewish lobby hinders Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese to get into the international community, thereby, there is monotonous view on policy of the Near East shaped in West.
"The representatives of the Jewish lobby of US understand that the truce between Israel and Arab states will put and end to their influence on US policy concerning Near East," Mahali said.
According to expert, the Jewish lobby in US takes advantage of all powers and opportunities to maintain positions off Israel and it is sure that they will be able to impede the truce between Israel and Syria, Lebanon and Palestine with the help of Bush's policy.
Thanks to the strong confidence of Israel, US consolidates its role in the Near East, Mahali said. Bush Administration employs all methods to stay in the region, for example, war in Iraq and intervention to Lebanon in 2006, he said.
The professor of San Francisco University Stephen Zunes believes that the truce with Israel will enable Syria to integrate to the world community and to lift diplomatic blockade.
"The Syrians are understandably skeptical of a U.S. role, fearing that even if Israel was willing to compromise on some key points, the Bush administration would attempt to prevent the talks from succeeding," Zunes said to Trend by electronic mail.
According to Zunes, US has repeatedly denied support to Israel in restoring talks with Syria. "The worse thing we could do is contradict the United States, the most important ally of Israel," he said.
Bashar Asad has great hopes for the upcoming meeting with Nicoal Sarkozi concerning direct talks with Israel, Sana new agency of Syria reported. According to the Foreign Ministry of Syria, the meeting will be held on 14 July in Paris. The Syrian President rejected the offer of Asad to meet with Ehud Olmert.
The talks between Syria and Israel were resumed 8 years later. The main demands of Syria are the return of Golan heights occupied by Israel in 1967.
The third round of the indirect talks held in Istanbul in June with Turkey's mediation did not yield results.
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