Tel Aviv, Damascus regimes to hold meeting in Baku: Report
Tel Aviv, Damascus regimes to hold meeting in Baku: Report
M.U.H
30/07/202564
Senior officials from Syria's HTS regime and the Israeli regime will hold talks in Azerbaijan in a bid to address a dangerous flare-up in southern Syria, says a report.
Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani of the HTS regime and Israeli minister of strategic affairs Ron Dermer will meet in Baku on Thursday, AFP reported, citing a diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The meeting will focus on “the security situation, particularly in southern Syria,” the source said.
The upcoming talks follow a similar meeting between the two ministers in Paris last week—reportedly mediated by the Trump administration—to address the situation around the southern Druze-majority city of Sweida.
The city has recently seen fierce clashes between Bedouin tribes and the Druze community. Israel has intervened in the conflict, striking military facilities in Damascus and targeting Syrian troops in Sweida province, claiming the attacks were meant to protect the Druze population.
Syria holds Israel responsible for the escalation and demands the immediate withdrawal of Israeli forces from the points they had recently advanced into during the fighting.
While the Paris meeting did not yield any concrete agreements, Syrian media said it included preliminary discussions aimed at “reducing tensions and opening channels of communication amid an ongoing escalation since early December.”
Following the collapse of President Bashar al-Assad’s government on December 8, 2024, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered his forces to push deeper into Syrian territory and seize several strategic locations.
In February, Netanyahu said that southern Syria must remain fully demilitarized and warned that his regime would not tolerate any military presence near the Golan Heights.
Under the 1974 ceasefire agreement between Israel and Syria, Israeli forces are prohibited from crossing the so-called Alpha Line into the UN-monitored Area of Separation (AoS).
