It's heartening to hear that Syria and Israel are in peace talks. From Israel's point of view, a stable peace agreement with Syria that reduced the flow of weapons to Hezbollah would be much more valuable than the Golan Heights. And for Syria, accomplishing something concrete like regaining the Golan Heights would be much more valuable than maintaining complicity in the killing of some Jews. A deal of this sort would also, it seems to me, help Syria regain more freedom of action from Iran which I assume is part of the appeal to Damascus.

It's interesting that Turkey is serving as the intermediary, a minor coup of Turkish statesmanship and perhaps more to the point a reflection of the United States bizarre abandonment of the idea of trying to play a constructive role in the region.