Benjamin Netanyahu says the Golan Heights will never be returned to Syria

During a trip to the Golan Heights on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the region will "remain forever under Israeli sovereignty."

Israel seized the Golan Heights from Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War, and in 1981, Israeli civil law was extended to the sparsely populated territory. With talks underway in Geneva about Syria's future, representatives of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said they wanted to discuss returning the Golan Heights to Syria, The Washington Post reports, but Netanyahu said that's not an option. "The time has come after 40 years for the international community to finally recognize that the Golan Heights will remain forever under Israeli sovereignty," he said, adding that "the border will not change."

Netanyahu was joined in the Golan Heights by members of his cabinet, a meeting that Syria's Foreign Ministry told the UN Security Council was "reckless" and "provocative," The Associated Press reports. In an interview with the al-Mayadeen news channel in Beirut, Syria's Deputy Foreign Minister, Faisal Mekdad, said his country believes "all options are on the table for getting back the occupied territory from Israel. We are prepared to do anything in order to return the Golan to the Syrian motherland, including using military force."

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