Damascus's top diplomat Asaad al-Shaibani is set to meet an Israeli minister on Thursday in Paris to discuss recent sectarian violence in Syria's south that had drawn in Israel's military, a senior diplomat told AFP.
The US-brokered talks would be the first ministerial meeting between the new Syrian authorities and Israel. The two countries have technically been at war since 1948, and Israel has occupied the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967.
"There will be a Syrian-Israeli security meeting in Paris today, and Tom Barrack will facilitate it," the diplomat said, referring to the US special envoy for Syria.
The diplomat said that Shaibani and Israel's Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer are expected to discuss "the topic of southern Syria", where deadly sectarian violence earlier this month prompted Israeli intervention.
Dermer was already in Paris, according to an airport official.
The senior diplomat, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, said that Shaibani was due to arrive in the city later on Thursday.
Barrack, Washington's ambassador to Turkey, was also due to meet Paris's top diplomat Jean-Noel Barrot, according to a French foreign ministry source.
Israel launched several air strikes on Syrian government positions in Sweida, a Druze-majority province in the country's south, saying it wanted to protect the minority community after sectarian clashes had erupted.
The Israeli strikes also reached Damascus, hitting the area of the presidential palace and the army headquarters, in a bid to force government troops to leave Sweida city -- which eventually happened under a ceasefire announced by the authorities.
Before the violence in Sweida, Syrian and Israeli officials had met in Baku on July 12, according to a diplomatic source in Damascus, coinciding with a visit to Azerbaijan by Syria's interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa.
After the overthrow of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December, Israel carried out hundreds of air strikes in Syria to prevent key military assets falling into the hands of the new Islamist-led administration.
Israel also sent troops into the UN-patrolled buffer zone that used to separate the opposing forces in the strategic Golan Heights, from which it has conducted forays deeper into southern Syria, demanding the area's demilitarisation.
AFP
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