Syria\u2019s Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani has met with Israeli intelligence officials in Jordan, according to Syrian state media, as the two sides work to de-escalate tensions following an Israeli attack on a Syrian airbase near the Turkish border.<\/p>\n
Syria\u2019s Sana news agency, citing a diplomatic source, said the talks were mediated by the United States and involved a \u201chigh-level Israeli delegation\u201d.<\/p>\n
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The AFP news agency reported that al-Shaibani met the head of Israel\u2019s Mossad intelligence agency, Roman Gofman.<\/p>\n
According to Sana, the discussions \u201cfocused on establishing practical mechanisms to halt Israeli attacks, arrests and targeting operations\u201d as well as\u00a0\u201creviving negotiations for a lasting security agreement between the two sides\u201d.<\/p>\n
They also\u00a0discussed efforts to ease tensions between Israel and Turkiye and to prevent their rivalry from spilling onto Syrian \u200cterritory, Sana reported.<\/p>\n
The US has sought to broker a security agreement between Israel and the government of Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa for more than a year. Israel has launched hundreds of strikes on Syria since the fall of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December 2024 and sent troops into a United Nations-patrolled buffer zone that had long separated Israeli and Syrian forces in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.<\/p>\n
It also bombed the Abu Duhur airbase in northwestern Idlib on Thursday, claiming the attack was to prevent Turkish troops from deploying at the base, a claim Syria and Turkiye have denied.<\/p>\n
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan have also traded barbs since the incident, with tensions high between the two leaders.<\/p>\n
According to Sana, the Syrian side stressed during Sunday\u2019s talks \u201cthat Syria is a sovereign state with the full right to rebuild and develop its national army and determine its alliances and partnerships in line with its national interests\u201d. The Syrian side rejected \u201cany arrangements or mechanisms that would restrict these sovereign rights,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n
Syria\u2019s immediate priorities in the talks \u2060remained an Israeli withdrawal to positions held before al-Assad\u2019s overthrow and the full restoration of a 1974 disengagement agreement, Sana reported.<\/p>\n
The Syrian officials also reaffirmed Damascus\u2019s sovereignty over the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, it added.<\/p>\n
Israel\u2019s \u2018red lines\u2019<\/p>\n
Israeli media reported that the talks were \u201cpositive\u201d and said Israeli officials had adopted a number of red lines going into talks.<\/p>\n
These include preventing Turkish military activity in Syria, keeping the Syrian side of the Golan Heights demilitarised, \u201censuring the security\u201d of Syria\u2019s Druze community and preventing the Syrian army from acquiring certain strategic weapons systems.<\/p>\n
They also conditioned any withdrawal from Syrian territories occupied by Israel on \u201cdiplomatic achievements\u201d.<\/p>\n
During previous rounds of US-mediated talks, Syria and Israel had agreed on a joint mechanism<\/a>\u00a0to share intelligence and defuse tensions. But the\u00a0negotiations froze at the end of February, when the US and Israel launched their war on Iran, without a date set for resumption.<\/p>\n