Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa said Syria and Israel had nearly reached 90% agreement in negotiations on a security framework before Israel pulled back or introduced additional conditions.
"There were several sessions of negotiations with Israel, and we almost reached 90% of agreements," Sharaa said Tuesday at an Atlantic Council panel in New York, adding that Israel at that point withdrew from the agreement for "different reasons."
"Since the fall of the former regime, Israel is repeating its attacks and aggressions against Syria. It is occupying new territories," he said, adding that Israel continues to carry out incursions, arrests and bombings inside Syria.
"Syria still chose to go through diplomacy and to solve that problem through talk and negotiations," he added.
"We are still engaging in this track," he said, "but we need to protect the security and the rights of the Syrians. Before that, we can't talk about peace."
Sharaa said direct talks with Israel started around a year ago, with Damascus first demanding that Israel withdraw to the lines it held in 1974 before any discussion of security arrangements.
"If those arrangements succeeded, then we can get into discussions about lasting peace," he said.
"The Golan Heights is Syrian territory under the recognition of the United Nations," he said. "So there is no discussion about that territory and to whom it belongs."
He also proposed an international committee to assess Israel's security concerns and "verify what is only a perception, what is genuine concerns."
Responding to an audience question on the Trump administration's recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan, Sharaa recounted a joke he made to US President Donald Trump at a White House meeting: "Why don't you give New Jersey to the Israelis? You don't own the Golan Heights to give it to them, but you own New Jersey."
Sharaa visited the White House last November, the first visit by a Syrian head of state since that country's independence in 1946. He previously met Trump in the Saudi capital Riyadh in May 2025, shortly before Washington lifted Caesar sanctions.
'I was 13 years old'
Asked about the foreign military presence in the country, Sharaa said Russia's bases in Syria had shrunk from around 170 to two, which have been "transformed" into training bases for the Syrian army. He said Türkiye's bases in the northwest are also moving toward "a legal status" under the endorsement of the People's Assembly.
Brett McGurk, former US President Joe Biden's Middle East coordinator, asked Sharaa a question about the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.
"I had nothing to do with that. At the time, I was 13 years old," Sharaa replied.
"Of course, I am sorry for all the victims who perished in the United States, or those who had fallen in the Middle East because of the policies that were pursued there that victimized a lot of people," he said.
"We are completely disengaged from what happened then."
