President Trump has recognized Israeli sovereignty over areas of the Golan Heights it currently controls. In doing so, Trump effectively formalizes something that everyone already knew. Namely, that the Golan Heights, which Israel seized following a 1967 Syrian-Egyptian-Jordanian effort to annihilate it, were unlikely to be Syrian again for a very long time.

If you lament that, you have one person to blame: Syrian dictator Bashar Assad. Trump hinted at as much in his Thursday announcement, clarifying the “critical strategic and security importance” that the Golan provides to Israeli security.