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In just one day, Begin had rammed through a legislative measure that normally would have required at least three days of deliberation. He had opportunistically decided to use events in Poland, which preoccupied Washington, as a cloak for his action, in much the same way that in 1956 the Hungarian crisis offered Israel a convenient distraction when it joined Britain and France in an attempt to seize the Suez Canal. Indeed, Begin's legislative blitzkrieg came less than a day after Secretary of State Alexander Haig had been forced to cancel a seven-nation tour that included a brief visit to Tel Aviv, in order to attend to the Polish crisis.
The difference with Suez was that in 1956 the U.S., which had not been consuited, brought pressure to bear on the aggressors to give up their territorial spoils. This time around, it looked as if nothing similar could be achieved. The U.S. joined in a unanimous U.N. Security Council resolution that declared the Israeli action to be "null and void" and demanded that Begin's government rescind its legislation. The resolution was not expected to have any effect, but the Council will take up the matter again no later than Jan. 5, at which time a Syrian push for more definite sanctions is likely. Most observers feel that the U.S. is unlikely to support such specific measures.
There is no denying the strategic importance of the Golan Heights to Israel or, for that matter, to Syria (see map). Rising to 7,297 ft. above sea level, the heights overlook the fertile Galilee Valley, one of the country's principal breadbaskets. On the Syrian side, they merge into a level plateau—ideal tank country—that stretches 50 miles to Damascus. In 1967 the Syrians used the heights to rain fire on the Israelis at the onset of the Six-Day War. Since Jerusalem's military occupation of the heights, some 6,000 Israelis in 31 settlements have joined the 13,000 Arabs still living there.
Israeli extremists have argued for years that the heights should be annexed. A bill to do so was initiated more than a year ago by firebrand Knesset Member Geula Cohen. But in December 1980, Begin's Cabinet voted 15 to 2 against promoting the measure for fear of adverse world reaction. After the Prime Minister's cliffhanging election victory of last June, however, the Cabinet's mood began to change in a hawkish direction. Golan annexation had been one of the planks in Begin's election campaign, and, to fashion his two-seat majority in the 120-seat Knesset, Begin included in his coalition right-wing and religious nationalist elements that could be expected to lobby strongly for such action. Begin was finally provoked, or so he told the Knesset, by external factors. One was Begin's feeling that U.S. Special Envoy Philip Habib had failed to make further progress in defusing the seven-month armed stalemate between Israel and Syria over the presence of Syrian SA-6 missiles in eastern Lebanon's Bekaa Valley. Another was the failure of last month's Arab League summit in Fez, Morocco, at which Syria led the hard-line attack on the eight-point Middle East peace plan proposed by Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Fahd.