Syria’s engagement in US-mediated talks with Israel marks more than a technical security discussion. It signals a change in direction. While no agreement has been signed and formal relations remain distant, Damascus is now engaging in sustained dialogue with a state it once refused to acknowledge in any form. That alone places Syria on a path that increasingly resembles early-stage normalization.
The talks, hosted outside the region and facilitated by Washington, are focused on border stability and military arrangements. Yet the political significance lies less in the agenda than in the willingness to sit at the table, a step the former Syrian state treated as unacceptable under any circumstances.
For decades, Syria’s posture toward Israel was defined by absolute refusal. Official rhetoric framed Israel as a permanent enemy, and engagement was portrayed as betrayal. Even indirect contacts were denied publicly, despite long-standing arrangements that kept the Golan front largely quiet after 1974.
This approach served a dual purpose. Regionally, it anchored Syria within a camp defined by resistance. Domestically, it reinforced legitimacy through confrontation rather than compromise. The refusal to talk became an identity, not merely a policy.
The emerging Syrian leadership is operating under different constraints. After years of war and institutional collapse, the priority has shifted toward stabilization, sovereignty, and reintegration. Engagement with Israel, once unthinkable, is now treated as a practical necessity rather than an ideological concession.
By participating in US-mediated talks, Syria is not recognizing Israel or abandoning territorial claims. What it is doing is redefining how those claims are pursued. Dialogue, rather than denial, has become the chosen instrument. This marks a move away from symbolic hostility toward managed coexistence.
The United States has become the central intermediary in this process. Washington’s role is less about brokering peace than about reducing risk, preventing escalation, and anchoring Syria’s transition within a more predictable regional framework.
For Damascus, the American channel provides political insulation. It allows engagement with Israel without formal normalization, while still testing the ground for what a postwar regional posture might look like. This kind of indirect normalization, procedural rather than declarative, mirrors early phases seen in other long-standing regional rivalries.
Normalization, in this context, is not a treaty or a handshake. It is a process marked by incremental changes in behavior. Syria is now acknowledging contact, participating in structured talks, and accepting mediation rather than rejecting it outright. These steps fall short of peace, but they move decisively away from permanent confrontation.
Crucially, this shift does not erase core disputes. Territory, sovereignty, and the legacy of conflict remain unresolved. What has changed is the assumption that refusing engagement is itself a strategy. That assumption is quietly being set aside.
Syria’s talks with Israel reflect a broader pattern common to post-conflict transitions. States emerging from prolonged war often abandon rigid doctrines in favor of flexibility, not because old narratives disappear, but because survival and recovery demand adaptation.
Whether this path leads to formal normalization remains uncertain. What is clear is that Syria has crossed a threshold it once insisted could never be crossed. In the long space between war and peace, normalization rarely begins with agreements. It begins with conversations that were once forbidden.