Syria is considering a proposal to give Lebanon sovereignty over the Shib’a farms (Mount Dov) on the Israeli-Lebanese-Syrian border, as part of its new border agreement with Lebanon, reports the Israeli daily Haaretz.
If Syria decides to go ahead with the plan, then Israel might have to withdraw from the Shib’a farms. If it does not, then Hizbullah would have justification to continue its operations in southern Lebanon against the “Israeli occupation.”
Control over the Shib’a farms – an uninhabited region of 10 square miles (26 square kilometers) in northern Israel – has been in dispute since the Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon in May 2000. Shib’a is recognized by the U.N. as part of the Israeli-occupied region of the Syrian Golan Heights since 1974, and not as Lebanese territory. Therefore, the U.N. announced back in 2000 that the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon was complete. Israel will have to withdraw from the region only as part of a comprehensive agreement with Syria.
The U.N. told both Syria and Lebanon, that in order to recognize the farms as part of Lebanon, the two countries will have to sign a formal border deal. This is probably the background to the new initiative.
Israeli sources told Haaretz they believe the Syrians are thus trying to ease the international diplomatic pressure on them, and “roll the ball to the Israeli court.”