Al-Sharaa: I told Trump, why not give Israel New Jersey instead of the Golan?

Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa revealed on Tuesday that he had jokingly suggested to U.S. President Donald Trump, during a previous visit to the White House, that the United States grant Israel the state of New Jersey instead of the occupied Syrian Golan Heights, to express his objection to the notion that the Golan is territory that can be ceded.

Al-Sharaa added, during a dialogue session at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, “I told him: Why not give them New Jersey? Why give them the Golan? You don’t even own the Golan to give it to Israel.”

Al-Sharaa explained that he proposed New Jersey because it is a U.S. state with a Democratic majority “that does not elect Trump,” emphasizing that the Golan “has its people” and that no Syrian or U.S. president, or anyone else, has the right to cede it.

The Syrian president affirmed his respect for Trump, noting that the latter made what he described as a historic decision to lift sanctions on Syria, and that a very special relationship exists between them.