Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa arrived in New York Monday for the UN General Assembly, expressing cautious optimism about a potential security agreement with Israel, while firmly rejecting normalization.
Sharaa, who led the rebel forces that ousted Bashar Al-Assad last December, is scheduled to meet US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and deliver Syria’s first address to the General Assembly in decades.
Speaking at the Concordia summit and quoted by France24, Sharaa said, “I hope that that will lead us to an agreement that will keep the sovereignty of Syria and also resolve some of the security fears of Israel.”
However, Sharaa dismissed the possibility of joining the Abraham Accords, which saw the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco normalize ties with Israel.
“Syria is different as those that are part of the Abraham Accords are not Israel’s neighbors. Syria has been subjected to more than 1,000 Israeli raids, strikes and incursions from the Golan Heights into Syria,” he stated.
He further accused Israel of violating peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan and questioned its intentions in Syria. “There is also huge anger over what’s going on in Gaza, not only in Syria but in the entire world, and of course this impacts our position on Israel,” Sharaa added.
His comments come a day after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel’s recent military campaign against Hezbollah had opened a “new window of possibility” for peace with Syria and Lebanon.
Netanyahu also stated that Israel is in discussions with Syria, but emphasized that “there is still a long way to go” in efforts to reach a peace agreement.
Last week, Sharaa told reporters in Damascus that ongoing negotiations with Israel on a security pact could lead to results “in the coming days”
Sharaa stated that if the security pact is successful, it could lead to “additional agreements”, but also clarified that a normalization or peace deal with Israel are not on the table at this time.
A recent report stated that the Trump administration is actively working to broker a preliminary security understanding between Israel and Syria ahead of the United Nations General Assembly meeting this month.
However, US envoy to Syria Tom Barrack later clarified that Israel and Syria are not close to signing a security agreement, adding that “there is still more work to do.”
(Israel National News’ North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Rosh Hashanah in New York. The time posted automatically on all Israel National News articles, however, is Israeli time.)