The disclosure that Israel and Syria are engaged in peace talks mediated by Turkey suggests that both sides see benefits to at least giving the impression they are prepared to make the tough compromises required to resolve their differences.

Syria would like to end its isolation and distract attention from its ongoing alliance with Iran in support of Hezbollah and President Bashar Assad’s continuing effort to destabilize Lebanon.  Israel has long sought peace with Syria but Prime Minister Ehud Olmert also needs a diversion from the corruption allegations against him. He also may want to put pressure on the Palestinians by showing that Israel is prepared to focus on the Syrian track if they are not more forthcoming in their bilateral talks.

A peace treaty has been sitting on the table for a decade awaiting the Syrian president’s signature. Several Israeli prime ministers have expressed a willingness to meet the Syrian demand for a return of most, if not all, of the Golan Heights, but only in exchange for a full peace. To date, Assad has not been prepared to make that commitment.

Rather than prepare for peace, Assad has been building up his arsenal. Most worrisome was the revelation that Syria was working with North Korea on what most analysts now believe was a nuclear weapons program before it was destroyed in an Israeli raid. Though that attack, and the subsequent disclosures related to the facility came as a surprise, intelligence reports suggesting that Syria was engaged in nuclear research have circulated for several years. Now, even as the reports of peace talks leaked, Syrian officials are reportedly planning a trip to Moscow to discuss the acquisition of advanced weaponry, including submarines, anti-aircraft missiles, the latest model MiG fighter jets and advanced surface-to-surface ballistic missiles.

Syria now has more troops and tanks, and nearly as many aircraft as Israel. The Assad regime fields armed forces totaling more than 300,000 men, with another 350,000 troops in reserve. Syria’s arsenal is by far the largest in the Arab world (roughly double that of prewar Iraq), and includes more than 4,700 tanks and 611 combat aircraft. Syria also has stockpiles of chemical and biological agents.

Israel’s attack on the nuclear facility temporarily raised tensions along the Golan Heights where Syrian actions had already provoked concern about the possibility of conflict. In March 2007, it was reported that Syria has positioned along the border with Israel thousands of medium and long-range rockets capable of striking major towns across northern Israel. A division was added to the Syrian army’s forward deployment on the Heights and the production of Scud missiles has been accelerated. Russia provide the Syrians with advanced anti-aircraft missiles and recently announced plans to sell new MiG fighter planes capable of flying at nearly three times the speed of sound and simultaneously shooting several targets more than 110 miles away.

These developments are hardly signals of a shift in Syrian policy. Nor does the agreement Syria signed in 2006 with Iran for military cooperation against what they called the “common threats” presented by Israel and the United States. Even with its Iranian patron, Syria cannot feel too comfortable after the Israeli raid.

Israel would very much like to reach an agreement with Syria and even though past Israeli leaders have laid out the basis for a treaty, it will still require a great deal of confidence building on the Syrian side to persuade the Israeli public that Assad is sincere about peace.

In the last 40 years, Israel has developed the Golan Heights economically, and anyone who has ever stood on Mt. Bental immediately can see the strategic value of having its forces looking down on Syria rather than the other way around, as it was for the prior 20 years. Less visible, but no less important is the access to water that comes from this area. Roughly one-quarter of Israel’s drinking water comes from the Sea of Galilee and it would be endangered by a return of the Golan Heights. It is no wonder that opinion polls after news of the secret talks leaked showed a majority of Israelis opposed to trading this land for peace.

To overcome this opposition, Assad will have to make the type of psychological breakthrough that King Hussein of Jordan and President Sadat of Egypt achieved by their words and, more important, their deeds. Assad will have to stop supporting Hezbollah, expel the terrorists from Syria, close their headquarters in Damascus and sit down for face to face talks with the Israeli prime minister. This would demonstrate his sincerity. As was the case with Hussein and Sadat, such gestures would undoubtedly be met with enthusiasm and conciliation by Israelis.

Perhaps you recall listening to Jimmie Dodd sing these words:

  Proverbs, proverbs, they’re so true.
  Proverbs tell us what to do.
  Proverbs help us all to be
  Better Mouseketeers.

And perhaps you’ve wondered, as I have, if that’s really true. Let’s have a look at some proverbs.

“Seeing is believing.”

That means, I take it, that visual evidence is particularly persuasive. When you actually see something, rather than merely hearing a second-hand report of it, you are very apt to accept the reality of what you see. Of course, one problem is that there are such things as mirages and optical illusions. Thus,

“Appearances can be deceiving.”

That’s certainly true. For one thing, as  St. Paul put it, “We see through a glass, darkly.” For another, there are so many people out there whose business it is to deceive us. The deception may be more or less benign, as when we see Fred Astaire dancing with a vacuum cleaner in a television commercial, or it may be quite otherwise, as when pictures from a war zone are fabricated in order to make a political point.

So where does that leave us? Taken together we are advised to trust our senses, but only to the extent that the things we conclude are true are, in fact, true. Hmmm.

“If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, etc., it’s a duck.”

Thus are we cautioned against claims made by individuals or groups that are contradicted by the plain evidence of their behavior. Seems like good advice. But then,

“You can’t judge a book by its cover.”

So the saying goes, and Bo Diddley confirmed it. You don’t argue with The Originator. And anyway,

“All is not gold that glitters.”

And once again, where exactly are we? A thing that appears to be X may well be X but, on the other hand, it may not be. Okay, then.

“Look before you leap.”

This seems wise but, on reflection, incomplete. Look – and then what? I suppose it means to imply that, having looked, we will make some sort of judgment as to whether leaping will be, under the observed circumstances, well or ill advised. But is it enough simply to imply this? Isn’t what we actually need some guidance on how to make that judgment? Conceding that it is surely the case that without that first look, no niceness of judgment is likely to avail us much, still the looking is by far the easy part of the process.

A similar difficulty crops up in an adage popularized by an iconic American hero, Davy Crockett:

“Be sure you’re right, then go ahead.”

This pretty much amounts to “look before you leap,” minus the alliteration. It’s more nearly explicit about what is truly in question – not simply the looking but the being sure. But what we want to know is how exactly to assure that we are right. The motive to proceed might just as well be assumed; we hardly need to be reminded why we were bothering to inquire into the matter.

I can’t find an adage that teaches how to be sure. This is strange, considering how many people are sure. Or at least they seem so; are they really? Perhaps they’ve tired of seeking assurance and have simply decided to go ahead without it. You know, because

“Time and tide wait for no man.”

I think maybe Jimmy was just trying to impress Annette.