What Israel thinks Donald Trump’s priority in Syria should be
Golan Heights — Plenty of young Israelis still go hiking through the Golan Heights, even though there’s a war next door. From the trail, which winds through vineyards, lush grazing meadows and sleepy Druze villages, you can hear the thump of artillery from Syria as Bashar al-Assad’s army fights to dislodge rebels from a sliver of land in the country’s south. As the path approaches the Sea of Galilee, you can see the small enclave held by Islamic State (IS). The jihadist group, in other words, is effectively a neighbour of the Jewish state — but it’s not the one that most concerns Israeli leaders. That would be Assad’s ally Hezbollah and its backer, Iran. Donald Trump has argued that defeating IS should be the US’s overwhelming priority in Syria. When the US president arrives in Israel on Monday, he is likely to be urged to take a different view of the conflict — and maybe to help protect Israel from its fall-out. IS "is being decimated," said Avi Dichter, chairperson of the Israeli ...
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