Syrian President Bashar Assad said Tuesday that his country will stand with Iran “on all the major issues,” and denied that Syria was negotiating with Israel. Syria's contacts with Israel do not qualify as negotiations, he said in an interview with local media that was reported by Israel's Channel 10.
The only way Syria would break its ties with Iran would be “if Teheran sided with Israel and America sided with the Arabs,” Assad joked. Senior Israeli politicians, including Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, have suggested that Israel must negotiate with Syria in order to lure it away from Iran and other terror-supporting states.