An Israeli official let the world know the truth about his country’s intentions when he said on Friday that Tel Aviv would not withdraw from the Golan Heights for the sake of peace with Syria.

The statement by Uzi Arad, who is considered one of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s closest aides, is among the many Israeli policy moves which have come one after another in a bid to sabotage President Barack Obama’s Middle East peace initiative. It has made known to the world that the Israeli leadership does not believe in the ‘land for peace’ formula. In fact, the reasons given by Mr Arad for Israel’s con-tinued occupation of the Golan are shockingly self-serving.

Israel needed the Golan Heights, the Netanyahu aide said, for ‘strategic, military and settlement reasons … [and for] water, landscape and wine’. Apparently, truth, justice and peace — the principles in which humanity believes and which form the basis of the world’s three major monotheistic faiths — have been ditched to quench Israel’s insatiable thirst for other people’s lands.

Golan is not the only issue where Israel has defied Mr Obama. During his last visit to Washington before the American president embarked on his Middle East tour for the epoch-making June 4 speech, Mr Netanyahu displayed an appalling rigidity in his policies and during the joint press conference with the American president made no mention of settlement activity which Mr Obama wanted halted. In his address to the Muslim world Mr Obama again called for a halt to all settlement activity. But, according to press reports, Israel and America have struck a deal under which Tel Aviv will go ahead with the construction of 2,500 more houses for settlers.

Israel has already annexed Jerusalem and the Golan Heights in violation of international law and various UN resolutions and it has decided to continue settlement activity irrespective of what America wants. It is apparent that Israel believes in the law of the jungle. It is sure in the knowledge that the power of the Israel lobby in America is on its side, and what Mr Obama wants is of little consequence.