{"id":185598,"date":"2019-03-22T07:02:11","date_gmt":"2019-03-22T07:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=185598"},"modified":"2019-03-25T07:34:58","modified_gmt":"2019-03-25T07:34:58","slug":"trump-says-us-will-recognize-israels-sovereignty-over-golan-heights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=185598","title":{"rendered":"Trump says US will recognize Israel’s sovereignty over Golan Heights"},"content":{"rendered":"

Julian Borger \u2013 Guardian.co.uk March 21, 2019<\/h1>\n
\"\"<\/a>

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, center, talks with Israeli soldiers at a military outpost during a visit at Mount Hermon in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights overlooking the Israel-Syria border on Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2015. Click to enlarge<\/p><\/div>\n

Donald Trump has announced that the US will recognize Israel<\/a>\u2019s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, captured from Syria in 1967, in a dramatic move likely to bolster Benjamin Netanyahu<\/a>\u2019s hopes to win re-election, but which will also provoke international opposition.<\/span><\/p>\n

Previous US administrations have treated Golan Heights as occupied Syrian territory, in line with UN security council resolutions. Trump declared his break with that policy, in a tweet on Thursday<\/strong><\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

He said: \u201cAfter 52 years it is time for the United States to fully recognize Israel\u2019s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which is of critical strategic and security importance to the State of Israel<\/a> and Regional Stability!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

By defying a 52-year-old unanimously adopted UN resolution on \u201cinadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war\u201d, Trump has also broken the postwar norm of refusing to recognise the forcible annexation of territory \u2013 which has underpinned western and international opposition to the Russian annexation of Crimea.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe United States relies on these core principles regarding peaceful dispute resolution and rejecting acquisition of territory by force,\u201d Tamara Cofman Wittes, the former deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, wrote on Twitter.<\/a> Wittes, now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, added the move \u201cyanks the rug out from under US policy opposing Russia\u2019s annexation of Crimea, as well as US views on other disputed territories\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Netanyahu, the Israeli PM, quickly tweeted his gratitude<\/a><\/strong><\/span> for Trump\u2019s gesture.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAt a time when Iran seeks to use Syria<\/a> as a platform to destroy Israel, President Trump boldly recognizes Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights,\u201d the Israeli prime minister wrote. \u201cThank you President Trump!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The Syrian state news agency issued a statement saying Golan Heights remained Arabian and Syrian regardless of Trump\u2019s comments.<\/span><\/p>\n

The announcement came as Netanyahu was hosting the US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, in Jerusalem.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPresident Trump has just made history,\u201d Netanyahu said. \u201cI called him. I thanked him on behalf of the people of Israel. The message that President Trump has given the world is that America stands by Israel.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Pompeo said: \u201cPresident Trump tonight made the decision to recognise that hard-fought real estate, that important place is proper to be sovereign part of the state of Israel.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He added: \u201cThe people of Israel should know that the battles they fought, the lives that they lost on that very ground, were worthy, meaningful and important for all time.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The announcement marks a diplomatic coup for Netanyahu, less than three weeks before a close fought election, and four days before he is due to visit Washington.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trump denied his announcement was intended to help Netanyahu hold on to office, even suggesting he had been unaware the election was imminent.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t even know about that. I have no idea,\u201d Trump told Fox News. He said he had been thinking about recognising the Israeli annexation \u201cfor a long time\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis is sovereignty, this is security, this is about regional security,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Continues \u2026<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Trump has not only promised to recognise Israel\u2019s sovereignty over territory it captured in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, he has also just helped boost Netanyahu\u2019s chances of returning to office in tightly-contested forthcoming elections <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-185598","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-Israel_Anti-Semitism_Zionism_and_US-UK_allies"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=185598"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185598\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":185602,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185598\/revisions\/185602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=185598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=185598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=185598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}