At first glance, it all looks like a tempest in a teapot, since a report that the Biden administration was going to reverse the US recognition of the Golan Heights as Israeli, was quickly denied by the US State Department. Still, a deeper look at the official language of the statement makes the obfuscation around the issue thicker.
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Biden has dragged former President Obama's tactics out of the ashes. Obama tended to link separate regional issues, using them as leverage to promote a broader Middle East policy. The Obama administration created a link between the goal of solving the Israel-Palestinian conflict to the no-less-lofty goal of strengthening diplomatic and strategic ties with the Sunni Arab bloc.
This time, we are talking about linked between different regions and areas of policy – the Golan Heights and US relations with Iran. Specifically, and even though the first two weeks of the Bennett government were marked by a thaw in and re-forging of US-Israeli ties, the "American denial" that anything was about to change when it came to the Golan Heights indicates that behind the new, empathetic screen, the "special relations" are still simmering with a threat and various disputes that could erupt and sour bilateral ties while Bennett is prime minister.
Indeed, the fact (even if not expressed in the conciliatory rhetoric) that the new government has continued that of its predecessor on Iran and not hesitated to allegedly strike a uranium enrichment facility on the outskirts of Tehran, even as talks about a second deal with Tehran are nearing conclusion, could wind up not only interfering with Iran's nuclear program, but also holding up negotiations in Vienna. This would be contrary to Biden's desires and aspirations.
Given all that, we cannot rule out the possibility that despite both sides' declared goal of turning over a new leaf of closer partnership in the book of Israel-US "special relations," an American spotlight turned toward the Golan Heights at this particular time was not a random occurrence. The State Department's response to the leak proves how far the current president's stance is from former President Donald Trump's.
Supposedly, the laconic message that American policy on the Golan Heights has not changed says just that, but this is misleading, because it could sound as if it backs Trump's decision to recognize Israeli sovereignty on the Golan Heights. In effect, the reality is completely different, as Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in February 2021 when he said the US supported continued Israeli control over the Golan Heights "in the current situation," but justified that stance in light of the serious security threat to Israel posed by Iran's military activity and that of its satellites from the region.
Still, Blinken made it clear that he was talking about temporary circumstances, and did not give legitimacy to permanent Israeli presence on the Golan. He said that the issue of the permanent status of the Golan Heights was a separate one that would demand a legal evaluation of both sides' claims to the territory when the security situation in the region changed.
The conclusion to be drawn is a clear one. At a critical stage of the negotiations under way in Vienna about a new nuclear deal between western powers and Iran, that would include and US, and given Israel's alleged ongoing activity against Iran's nuclear program (which could stick spokes in the wheels of the nascent deal), the US administration decided to withdraw to the tradition position of US administrations (Trump's being the exception) when it comes to a broad peace agreement on Syria that would be anchored in interpretations of UN Security Council Resolution 242 from November 1967.
This stance, which was between the lines of Secretary of State Blinken's remarks, is based on the principle of a near-full Israeli withdrawal from all fronts (including the Golan Heights) to the borders of June 4, 1967. Therefore, it is clear that the State Department message, according to which the US stance on the Golan Heights has not changed, does not refer to trump, but rather the decades before he took office. If this is how things stand, we are looking at a kind of "yellow card" being waved at Israel by an American referee, one that signals that it intends to make another nuclear deal with Iran in the near future. This means that the US will not be deterred from revisiting issues that are inconvenient for Israel (such as the nature of a future deal about the Golan Heights), unless Israel's government takes a more cautious tack when it comes to Iran.
This sums up the link that Biden wants to create in the spirit of former President Obama's theory, albeit in a different context. We should ask ourselves whether this is indeed the beginning of a future relationship that will be based on carrots and incentives, which would be designed to ensure that Israel limits its actions on the Iranian front, but also includes a stick – even a hinted one – that could be wielded if Israel opts to continue to act independently against the threat from Iran.
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