Olmert's attempt to `negotiate' with Syria and what's behind it

There have been a number of reports claiming that Israeli PM Ehud Olmert sent what's described as secret messages to Syria's Thug-In-Chief Basher Assad offering to give up the strategic Golan Heights in return for a peace agreement.

The IDF paid in blood top capture those fortified heights in the `67 war.

Nothing Olmert might do surprises me any more, but as always, there's the front story and the back story.

While he might want to give up the Golan, I think that if he tried,we'd see the first actual public lynching of an Israeli head of state.

Effi Eitam, (NU-NRP) the almost universally respected ex-general who kindly helped Olmert extract his head from his posterior during the Lebanon War said:

"The Olmert government that failed in Lebanon, is behaving as failed regimes have acted throughout history, and in an attempt to hide his responsibility for the failure he is embarking on a dangerous political adventure."

The personal advantage for selling out his own country for Olmert if he could pull it off would be to try and resuscitate a coalition to cling to power among the far Left and maybe the Arab Parties and keep himself out of jail as long as possible. However, if he tried it, Israel Beiteinu and other parties would would probably bail out of the coalition post haste.

At the very least,he'd be forced to do a referendum and the numbers simply aren't there; A Ma'ariv-TNS poll showed that only 10% of Israelis supported a full withdrawal from the Golan and upwards of 74% don't trust Assad.

So, aside from saving his personal skin, why would Olmert try to shove such an obviously unpopular policy down Israel's throat?

Actually, I sense George Bush and Condi Rice channeling James Baker behind this.

President George Bush apparently gave Olmert the green light for negotiations with Syria in an hour-long phone conversation last month, according to the report(Yediot and Army Radio), and the two of them are supposed to have a sit down and discuss the matter further when Olmert comes to the White House for their scheduled meeting on June 19.

The Bush Administration is having major problems with the Iran/Syria axis, and right now is on the losing end of two proxy wars in the region.In Lebanon, Bush proxy Fouad Siniora in Lebanon is having major problems defeating the Iranian/Syrian backed uprisings in the Palestinian `refugee' camps of Nahar al-Bared in the north and Ein al Hilwa in the south. Lebanese troops have been unable to decisively defeat Fatah al-Islam and the pro-Syrian Palestinian fighters commanded by Ahmad Jibril and Naif Hawatme.

What's more, Hezbollah could openly come into this anytime, especially if the UN continues to try and enforce the tribunal over the murder of ex-Lebanese PM Hariri.

In Gaza, Hamas, so far, has been victorious over Bush's preferred terrorists, Fatah, in spite of all of the money and weapons we've lavished on Abbas to try and keep him afloat. And Israel's strikes against Hamas have not been decisive enough to tip the balance.

What Bush is trying to do, I think, is to try to bribe Syria away from Iran at Israel's expense, since Olmert is weak, easy to manipulate and has a personal motive to try to go along with this charade.

The US military is having notable success in Iraq against al-Qaeda, but the Shiite militias, armed and trained by Iran are just as powerful as they were before, and just as pervasive when it comes to their influence with the Maliki government. Our military is even partnering up with Iran backed thugs like Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army to help with security in Baghdad in areas like Sadr City.

President Bush and Secretary Rice are apparently still under the delusion that bribing Syria via Israel will help stabilize the situation in Iraq, mollify the Sunni autocrats Bush is so enamored of and aid in that `comprehensive Middle East settlement' so-called Middle East `Realists' like James Baker keep pushing.

Of course, the proof of how wrong they are lies in Lebanon and Syria, where the Syrian military, their Iranian allies and Hezbollah are refurbishing their arsenals and busily preparing for war.

In Lebanon, for instance, the IDF Head of military intelligence research Brigadier General Yosi Baidatz briefed the Knesset foreign affairs and security committee that Hezbollah is busy restoring its fortified positions south of the Litani an dhas pretty much refurbished its rocket arsenal without the UNIFIL international `peacekeepers' doing a thing to interfere.

According to General Baidatz, UNIFIL has gone beyond merely not stopping the free flow of arms to Hezbollah from Syria and Iran - UNIFIL has allowed them to take positions along the Israeli border....both of which UNIFIL was supposed to prevent according to UN Resolution 1709.

Olmert may be typically clueless, but most of the Israelis know the fallacy of trying to `negotiate' with someone like Assad..as with Iran, it's a case of baksheesh (bribery), with a virtual guarantee that anything you'd give up will merely lead to more `negotiations' and eventual war.

The Gaza retreat accomplished one thing, if nothing else...it will be difficult to sell that particular used car again so easily.

It remains to be seen how much pressure President Bush and Condi Rice can bring to bear on the hapless Olmert to give away the store. Meanwhile, the Israelis had best hustle Olmert, Tzipi Livni and the rest of the gang out the door before it's too late.