Israel grips the Golan

Its 150 members were chosen equally by the regime, the opposition and the un. The effort has gone as expected. It took two years of bickering for members to agree that they should start writing.

If a document does emerge from this process, no one expects Mr Assad to follow it. The current constitution, after all, begins by declaring Syria a “democratic state with full sovereignty”. In fact he runs a bloodthirsty dictatorship in which he allows his foreign backers to run amok. Later articles guarantee freedom of expression, which may come as a surprise to thousands of protesters languishing in squalid dungeons. For Mr Assad, the committee is a way to pretend he is serious about political reform; for his opponents, it is a way to pretend they are still relevant.

Where they enshrine the rights of citizens, constitutions are routinely ignored. Egypt’s also guarantees freedom of speech, which has not stopped judges from jailing countless critics of the regime. On December 20th a court sentenced two bloggers and a lawyer to five years in prison on nonsensical charges of “spreading false news”.

The political elite seem to think constitutions are there to protect them. Take Lebanon, where citizens are meant to vote for a new parliament in May. The election comes amid a punishing economic crisis that has seen much of the population pushed into poverty. There is widespread fury at the political class. Campaigners have urged the sprawling diaspora to register, hoping expats will feel less loyalty to traditional parties. Almost 245,000 Lebanese abroad signed up, compared with 93,000 in the previous election.

Michel Aoun, the president, worries this may hurt the Free Patriotic Movement (fpm), the Christian party he founded. Under the current electoral law, expats vote like any other Lebanese, in their home districts. The fpm sought instead to carve out six seats for the diaspora, limiting their votes to a small corner of the 128member parliament. When lawmakers rejected the proposal, Mr Aoun turned to the constitutional council, arguing that the system deprived the diaspora of its right to representation. (His appeal failed.) He has shown rather less concern for other constitutional rights, like freedom of expression. Over the summer he endorsed criminal penalties for people who insult politicians.

Then there is Libya, which spent much of 2021 debating whether to write a new constitution or elect a new president first. It decided on the latter, with the vote scheduled for December 24th. After months of uncertainty, the election was delayed at the last minute—in part because it is hard to have a proper electoral law without a constitution. Having too many charters is bad, but perhaps having none at all is worse. n

Israel and the Golan Heights There to stay

J ERUSALEM A quiet annexation encounters little resistance

Mevo hama has magnificent views of three countries. On its western side is a sheer cliff dropping down to the Sea of Galilee and northern Israel. To the south is another steep drop, into Jordan. And across the mountain plateau to the east is Syria (see map). The kibbutz was established shortly after Israel seized most of the Golan Heights from Syria during the SixDay War in 1967.

On December 26th the Israeli cabinet posed in front of the stunning views after a special meeting in Mevo Hama. The government, led by Naftali Bennet, the nationalist prime minister, had just approved a plan to spend 1bn shekels ($317m) on thousands of new homes and infrastructure in the Golan, with the aim of doubling its population (currently 52,000) by the end of the decade.

The Golan is one of four territories grabbed by Israel during the sixday war. It handed the Sinai peninsula back to Egypt after agreeing to a peace deal in 1978. It withdrew from the Gaza Strip in 2005 (though it occasionally returns in force). And the final status of the West Bank has not yet been determined.

But Israel has long justified its position in the Golan by claiming selfdefence. Syria had sometimes used the high ground to shell Israeli farms in the Galilee below. After Israel took over, it expelled some Syrians, established Jewish settlements and built army and intelligence posts. In 1981 it formally annexed 1,800 square kilometres of the strategically valuable territory. Nevertheless, there were negotiations to return it to Syria, as part of a broader peace deal, in the 1990s. They went nowhere.

Most of the world believes that Israel’s annexation of the Golan is illegal. Yet only the Syrian regime of Bashar alAssad and Israeli environmental groups, concerned about the region’s flora and fauna, loudly objected to the new development plan. Few countries want to see the Golan returned to the murderous Mr Assad, even if they are uncomfortable with the precedent being set. Ministers from Labour and Meretz, leftwing parties that in the past supported a deal with Syria, voted in favour of the building plans.

About half of the Golan’s population are Druze Arabs, who receive Israeli services and can request citizenship. Still, most have retained their Syrian identity, often as an insurance policy in case Israeli rule does end. Ordinary Israelis tend to view the Golan as a holiday destination. It is home to the country’s only ski resort. And whereas many Israelis fear going to the occupied West Bank, terror attacks in the Golan are rare. Attempts by Iran and its proxies to enlist the Druze in their fight against Israel have had little success.

Mr Bennet said the development plan was prompted, in part, by America. In 2019 it became the first big country to recognise Israeli sovereignty in the Golan. Donald Trump, the president at the time, justified the decision using Israel’s logic of selfdefence—though it also seemed timed to benefit Binyamin Netanyahu, then Israel’s prime minister, who was in a tough race for reelection. In gratitude, Israel named a settlement in the Golan after Mr Trump.

Messrs Trump and Netanyahu have since been voted out of office, and most of the golden letters on the sign for “Trump Heights” have been torn off, probably by vandals. But the Biden administration shows no signs of reversing Mr Trump’s decision. Whether Mr Bennet plans to spend a few of those billion shekels on new lettering is less clear. n

Sea Me diterranean LEBANON

Haifa

Sea of Galilee

ISRAEL

Jordan River

Damascus Mount Hermon

SYRIA

GOLAN HEIGHTS (under Israeli control) Mevo Hama

JORDAN Area under UN control

Golan Heights ISRAEL

West Bank Jerusalem

Gaza Strip In the Heights