Netanyahu denies that Israel considered ceding Mount Dov area in deal with Syria

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office denies as “fake news” a report by the Kan public broadcaster that Israel seriously considered ceding the Mount Dov area in exchange for Syria giving up its claim to the Golan Heights in security talks with Damascus weeks ago.

“The claim that Israel supposedly considered handing over Mount Dov is absolute fake news,” the PMO says in response to the report.

The report concerned the Mount Dov region, an area on the Golan’s border also known as the Shebaa Farms, which is claimed by Israel, Lebanon and Syria.

According to Kan, Israel examined the possibility of transferring the area in return for Damascus suspending its sovereignty claim to the Golan, which Israel captured in the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed. The report said officials explored the “political feasibility” of the move, which would require approval from 80 Knesset members, during talks that were suspended following sectarian violence in Syria’s southern Sweida province earlier this month.

The report notes that Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa told Arab journalists this week that Damascus cannot join the Abraham Accords while the Golan remains under Israeli control. At the same time, Sharaa confirmed that his government is in “advanced” talks with Israel to pursue a security deal based on the 1974 UN-brokered disengagement lines following the Yom Kippur War, which created a ceasefire zone between Israeli- and Syrian-held territory on the Golan Heights.