Syrian Transitional President Ahmed al-Sharaa said the Golan Heights are Syrian land and that Syria is seeking to restore them “through negotiations, peace agreements, or any path that secures Syria’s right to this territory, which the international community still recognizes as Syrian.”
CBS published on Wednesday, October 15, the full interview it recorded with al-Sharaa for the “60 Minutes” program. The interview was filmed on September 21 and covered Syrian-Israeli relations, the ongoing negotiation track, and Damascus’ position on repeated strikes inside Syria.
Israel must pull back
Al-Sharaa added that Israel must withdraw from any point it advanced to after December 8, 2024, calling that “the natural state of affairs.” He said Syria “has undertaken no provocations toward Israel since the current government came to Damascus,” and explicitly declared that it “will not be a platform for threatening any neighboring state, including Israel.”
Despite that, Israel has carried out more than a thousand airstrikes on Syrian territory since the fall of the former regime, targeting “military and security sites and civilians,” along with “more than 400 incursions and arrests inside Syria.” He described these actions as having “caused major disruption in the country.”
Al-Sharaa said Israel bombed the Presidential Palace twice, calling the strikes “not a political message, but a declaration of war,” and asked, “What if the White House’s backyard were bombed, wouldn’t America enter a 20-year war?”
He argued that Israel is trying to drag Syria into a cycle of conflict through “repeated provocations based on military force,” calling this policy “mistaken and a threat to regional stability.” Its continuation, he added, could push US allies to “look for alternatives because of the risks Israeli actions create in the region.”
Comparing Israel’s stated security concerns with its conduct on the ground, al-Sharaa said, “It is Syria that should fear for its security, not Israel,” pointing to “daily violations of Syrian airspace and attacks on military and civilian sites.” He called the pretext of “protecting the north or south” a “laughable justification despite the pain these policies inflict.”
He continued that Israel is “moving away from the language of dialogue and diplomacy, flexing its muscles to achieve its aims,” warning that “any country that relies on bombing to protect itself will lead the world into chaos.” He asked: “If any state had the right to bomb another simply because it felt anxious, would Russia be justified in entering Ukraine, or China in entering India? The world does not work so simply, there is international law and norms that must be respected.”
Al-Sharaa revealed he was inside the Presidential Palace during one of the two Israeli strikes, noting the compound “includes civilian employees, children, and some families,” and calling the targeting “a dangerous act of aggression that cannot be justified under any circumstances.”
Israel previously struck the General Staff headquarters in central Damascus and the People’s Palace on July 16, in the context of fighting in As-Suwayda (southern Syria) between the Syrian army and allied tribal factions on the one hand and local factions in the province on the other.
We do not want war
Al-Sharaa stressed that Syria does not want to enter a new war, despite having the capacity to defend itself. “We faced great powers dozens of times stronger than Israel, but today we want construction and reconstruction, not war,” he said.
He pointed to Syria’s urgent need for reconstruction and the return of refugees and internally displaced people, adding, “Rebuilding Syria should not alarm Israel, if it does, the problem lies in its way of thinking.”
He also disclosed that Damascus was close to concluding a new security arrangement with Israel under US auspices, within a negotiating track to amend or renew the 1974 Disengagement Agreement. Syria, he said, “expressed its readiness to host the UN Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) again,” but “Israeli bombing postponed the talks,” which nevertheless continued thereafter.
According to al-Sharaa, Israel refuses the return of UN forces to the old disengagement lines and is trying to impose “a new format for the security arrangement.” Damascus, he stressed, “seeks a peaceful solution that guarantees Syria’s territorial integrity and its right to the occupied Golan, which the international community still recognizes as Syrian land.”
On the recent events in As-Suwayda (southern Syria), al-Sharaa said they were “an internal dispute between Druze and Bedouins that dates back more than 150 years,” and that “government forces intervened to protect all sides after around 150 dead and wounded.” He questioned Israel’s connection to internal Syrian affairs: “What does Israel have to do with the Druze of Syria? The Druze have lived in Syria for thousands of years.”
The president accused Israel of exploiting “the state’s weakness after the fall of the former regime,” saying Tel Aviv “seeks to keep Syria weak and fragmented,” a stance he called at odds with US policies as expressed by former President Donald Trump when he lifted sanctions on Syria in pursuit of the country’s unity and strength.
Al-Sharaa added that “Israeli policies in Syria contradict the positions of the US, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey,” arguing that Israel is working to weaken Damascus rather than enable it to play a balanced regional role, which “threatens the security of the entire region.”
He said the “current Israeli government is extremist and guided by expansionist doctrines,” believing “Israel has the right to establish a larger state than it is now and seeks to expand into Gaza and the West Bank and then north and south.” Such expansion, he warned, would affect Jordan, Iraq, Turkey, and Egypt and redraw regional alliances.
Al-Sharaa further said that “Israel’s bombing of Doha, which plays a mediating role in conflicts, is a dangerous historical precedent,” arguing that “striking the mediator does not serve security but weakens US alliances in the Middle East.”
He concluded that the current phase will test Israel’s credibility in reaching a security arrangement with Damascus, saying “the difference will soon be clear between a party seeking its security and another pursuing expansionist ambitions.”
Israel destroyed 80% of the Syrian army’s capabilities
Coinciding with the December 8, 2024 announcement of the ouster of deposed President Bashar al-Assad, the Israeli army launched hundreds of airstrikes on Syrian military sites, destroying around 80% of the Syrian army’s ground, naval, and air capabilities, according to local monitoring groups.
The Israeli military said its operations were part of a campaign dubbed “Bashan Arrow,” referencing a biblical term, which targeted sites used to store advanced weapons, air-defense systems, and guided missiles, in addition to aircraft, helicopters, tanks, and warships.
According to the same sources, Israeli ground forces advanced several kilometers into the buffer zone in the occupied Syrian Golan, while the strike tally by the fourth day after the president fled exceeded 352 air raids across 13 Syrian governorates.
At the time, an Israeli military source described the seizure of the buffer zone in Syria as a “temporary” move following “militia threats,” according to Israel Army Radio on December 8.
Channel 14 quoted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as saying then, “In coordination with the defense minister and with the full support of the cabinet, I instructed the army yesterday to seize the buffer zone and adjacent command sites. We will not allow any hostile force to entrench on our borders.”
Who is President Ahmed al-Sharaa?
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in 1982, where his father worked as an engineer in the oil fields. He spent his early childhood in the Kingdom until age seven, then returned with his family to settle in Syria.
With the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, al-Sharaa went to Baghdad and joined “al-Qaeda in the Land of the Two Rivers,” becoming close to its leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a US airstrike in 2006.
Al-Sharaa was detained by US forces in Camp Bucca in southern Iraq. After his release in 2011, he joined the “Islamic State of Iraq” led by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who tasked him with returning to Syria to establish the group’s branch there.
Al-Sharaa founded “Jabhat al-Nusra,” which became one of the group’s most prominent branches in Syria.
“Jabhat al-Nusra” fought Syrian government forces across multiple provinces and also battled Free Syrian Army factions in Idlib to impose control over the entire province. The group later changed its name to “Jabhat Fath al-Sham,” then to “Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.”
On November 27, 2024, “Tahrir al-Sham” launched the “Deterrence of Aggression” campaign led by Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa. Forces participating in the campaign took Aleppo, Hama, and Homs, with the last battles in Homs after the deposed president fled and the regime fell.
Following the announcement of Bashar al-Assad’s ouster, armed opposition factions convened on January 29 at the People’s Palace in Damascus and declared al-Sharaa president of Syria for the transitional period, dissolving the People’s Assembly and suspending the 2012 constitution.
In his speech after the meeting, al-Sharaa said, “Syria’s priorities are to fill the power vacuum, preserve public order, build state institutions, and lay the groundwork for an economy.”
On September 24, al-Sharaa addressed the UN General Assembly at its 80th session in a speech described as “historic,” the first by a Syrian president since 1967.
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