Israel, offering Golan, awaits Syria proposals

By Adam Entous and Alastair Macdonald

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel has told Syria it is willing to trade land for peace and is waiting to hear whether President Bashar al-Assad would cut ties with Iran and hostile guerrilla groups in return, Israeli officials said on Friday.

One said Syrian officials had so far indicated a willingness to conduct discreet contacts that might lead to a resumption of formal peace talks after a seven-year hiatus. In two weeks, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is due to meet President George W. Bush, who would play a crucial role in any such process.

Two days after Olmert confirmed Israel had sent conciliatory messages to Damascus, Israeli media widely reported a leak to a newspaper that quoted a senior diplomat saying Syria had been reminded that Israel was ready to discuss returning the Golan Heights, captured 40 years ago this week, if peace talks resume.

A former Israeli diplomat who has taken part in efforts to revive dialogue said Olmert -- deeply unpopular after last year's inconclusive war with Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon -- was preparing his voters for possible concessions to Syria in a process that will probably need strong U.S. support to succeed.

A senior serving Israeli official told Reuters that Syrian officials appeared open to discreet dialogue and Israel was now trying to determine what concessions Damascus might be willing to make, notably in severing alliances with Israel's enemies in Iran, Hezbollah and Palestinian militant movements like Hamas.

"Nobody knows the answer," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity and has been involved in the discussions.

"We don't know what is the Syrian definition of peace -- if Syria will really position itself with the U.S. and its Western allies or stay with Iran and Hezbollah and Hamas?

"There are no preconditions for the beginning of the negotiations. But (Assad) will have to send an indication."

He and a second Israeli official confirmed that Turkey, which maintains good relations with both Syria and Israel, had helped promote dialogue, resuming a role that diplomatic sources have said it played in behind-the-scenes discussions in 2004.

A senior aide to Olmert was in Turkey recently, the two officials said. A spokesman for Olmert declined comment.

Israeli spokesmen also declined to be drawn on Friday's widely splashed report in the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper that Olmert had passed Assad the message through Turkish and German channels that Israel was ready to give up the Golan Heights.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev noted, however, that Israel has long been willing to negotiate on the future of the strategic territory, captured in the Six Day War of June 1967.

There was no immediate comment from Damascus.

Polls show about half of Israeli voters would be ready to give back some of the Golan but few would give up all of the land. That poses a challenge to a leader as unpopular as Olmert.

Some analysts believe, however, that with little prospect of progress on peace with divided Palestinians or on the Lebanese border, talks with Syria could bolster the premier's standing.