Syria poses no threat to anyone, including Israel, FM tells CNN

Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani said on Sunday that Israeli attacks on Syrian territory "make any path to normalization difficult," amid weeks of talks to reach a security agreement between Damascus and Tel Aviv.

Al-Shaibani told CNN that "Israel responds to our efforts for peace with raids and threats."

Since the fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime on December 8, 2024, Israel has violated Syria's sovereignty through bombing and expanding its occupation of territory in the south, although the Syrian administration has not shown any hostile attitude toward Tel Aviv and has announced this on several occasions.

The Syrian Foreign Minister noted that "Israel is obstructing the building of the Syrian state and fueling sectarian violence," stressing that "Syria does not pose a threat to anyone in the region, including Israel."

Al-Shaibani said that "Israel has supported outlaws" in Syria, and "this has prevented us from resolving the problem between the Bedouins and the Druze," referring to the clashes that occurred months ago in the Sweida province, where Tel Aviv intervened to support the Druze.

He added that Israel's actions "only complicated matters and put the Druze in a very difficult and embarrassing position," noting that Israel "obstructed our efforts when we faced an escalation in sectarian violence in the south of the country."

Last July, Sweida, in southern Syria, witnessed a week of armed clashes between Druze groups, Bedouin tribes, and government forces, leaving hundreds dead. A ceasefire agreement took effect on the 19th of the same month.

The Syrian government has been making intensive efforts to maintain security in the country since the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad's regime, after 24 years in power.

Al-Shaibani said that the Israeli strikes on Syria after the fall of the Assad regime "were shocking to us," emphasizing that "a strong and unified Syria will benefit regional security, and this will benefit Israel."

The Syrian Foreign Minister praised "Washington's position toward Damascus since Liberation Day," describing it as "very positive and widely accepted by the Syrians."

Last Wednesday, President Ahmad al-Sharaa told the UN General Assembly that his country had transformed from a crisis-promoting state into a historic opportunity to bring stability, peace, and prosperity to the entire region.

Since 1967, Israel has occupied most of the Syrian Golan Heights. It exploited the new situation after the fall of the Assad regime by occupying the Syrian buffer zone, declaring the collapse of the 1974 disengagement agreement between the two sides.

Two days ago, Reuters quoted four unnamed sources as saying that efforts to reach a security agreement between Syria and Israel had stalled at the last minute due to Israel's demand to allow it to open a "humanitarian corridor" to the southern Syrian province of Sweida. Damascus rejected this demand, considering it a violation of its sovereignty.