Assad: Chances of peace with Israel low, Syria will 'free' Golan

Syrian President Bashar Assad has said that the chance of achieving a lasting peace with Israel is low, adding that Syria planned to "liberate" the Golan Heights, which the Israel Defense Forces captured in the 1967 Six-Day War.

Assad was quoted in the Egyptian newspaper al-Osboa on Monday warning Israel not to attack Syria. "If Israel goes out on an adventure and attacks Syria, it will begin paying a very high price," he said.

Assad praised Hezbollah and other pro-Syria groups, accusing Lebanese officials opposed to Syrian influence of having "demanded to remove Syria from Lebanon in order to weaken the national forces there. What happened? Syria left and the national forces became much stronger."

Syria, whose army was expelled from Lebanon in April 2005 after nearly two decades, is accused of supplying Hezbollah with weapons, along with Iran. Assad said Syria had an excellent relationship with Iran, "a high political momentum."

The Syrian president also said Syria had decided to set its sights toward the East, "in order to emerge from the complex lies that tie us to the West, in which there is no alternative to the United States."

The Syrian army intervened in the Lebanese civil war in 1976, with Israel's tacit consent. The United States, Israel and Syria had a mutual interest in preventing the victory of the Palestinian-left coalition, and in diffusing the danger of a Syrian-Israeli war.

In 1984, two years after Israel entered Lebanon to push Syria out, Syria managed to thwart both Israel and the United States, and to reestablish its domination of Lebanon. Syria kept a quiet border in the Golan Heights and chose to conduct its conflict with Israel by aiding the Palestinian resistance organizations and Hezbollah.