The US should recognise Israel’s sovereignty over the occupied Golan Heights, President Donald Trump said yesterday, reversing half a century of US policy and handing a fillip to Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu ahead of elections next month.
Israel seized the Golan Heights from Syria after a decisive victory in the 1967 war and applied Israeli law to the region in 1981, an annexation that was rejected by the international community.
Mr Trump wrote on Twitter: “After 52 years it is time for the United States to fully recognize Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which is of critical strategic and security importance to the State of Israel and Regional Stability!”