Global Markets
Home›Global Markets›Europe›US envoy retracts comments on Israel’s status in Golan…
US envoy retracts comments on Israel’s status in Golan Heights
The envoy said his earlier remarks were a description of historical status, not an endorsement of the UN position, and reaffirmed that Trump’s 2019 policy remains unchanged.
The US special envoy to Syria and ambassador to Turkey walked back earlier comments suggesting Israel still occupies the Golan Heights in violation of UN resolutions, a stance that ran counter to President Donald Trump’s position on the disputed territory, according to the Associated Press.
The envoy, Ambassador Tom Barrack, said the interview remark two days earlier was intended to describe the territory’s historical status, not to endorse the UN view. He added in a statement that US policy on the Golan, set by Trump in 2019, is unchanged.
The move comes against the backdrop of Israel capturing the Golan from Syria in the 1967 war and annexing it in 1981, which the United Nations and most of the international community do not recognize. Barrack said he planned to explain why he does not anticipate annexation in Lebanon, amid Israeli forces occupying parts of the south after the latest Israel-Hezbollah war.
He also argued that negotiated agreements, rather than territorial maps, are more durable, saying he had cited the Golan as an example that territory taken by force remains contested for generations.