While Israel is awash with ancient artifacts of significance to Jewish history, there are many fewer in America. Thus it was an unusual event when U.S. authorities handed over a nearly two-millennia-old coin to Israeli officials. The Associated Press reports:

American authorities have returned a rare, 2,000-year-old Jewish coin to Israel nearly two decades after it was looted, smuggled, and put up for auction in the United States, the Israel Antiquities Authority announced Tuesday.

The quarter-shekel silver coin, made in the year 69, is one of just two confirmed to exist. The other has been in the British Museum’s collection for a century. It was minted during the fourth year of the first Jewish Revolt against the Roman empire in the 1st century CE. Several other examples of the coin are believed to be in private collectors’ hands.

According to the Israel Antiquities Authority, the coin was one of a hoard stolen by Palestinian looters from the Elah Valley west of Jerusalem—the site of the biblical battle between David and Goliath—in 2002. It was then smuggled to Jordan and on to Britain, where it received false documentation and was sent on to the United States.

It was slated to be sold at an auction in August 2017 but was seized by Homeland Security agents before it went on the block.

In a momentous meeting with the Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh, President Trump announced that he is lifting sanctions on the beleaguered and war-torn country. On the one hand, Sharaa is an alumnus of Islamic State and al-Qaeda, who came to power as commander of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which itself began life as al-Qaeda’s Syrian offshoot; he also seems to enjoy the support of Qatar. On the other hand, he overthrew the Assad regime—a feat made possible by the battering Israel delivered to Hizballah—greatly improving Jerusalem’s strategic position, and ending one of the world’s most atrocious and brutal tyrannies. President Trump also announced that he hopes Syria will join the Abraham Accords.

This analysis by Eran Lerman was published a few days ago, and in some respects is already out of date, but more than anything else I’ve read it helps to make sense of Israel’s strategic position vis-à-vis Syria.

Israel’s primary security interest lies in defending against worst-case scenarios, particularly the potential collapse of the Syrian state or its transformation into an actively hostile force backed by a significant Turkish presence (considering that the Turkish military is the second largest in NATO) with all that this would imply. Hence the need to bolster the new buffer zone—not for territorial gain, but as a vital shield and guarantee against dangerous developments. Continued airstrikes aimed at diminishing the residual components of strategic military capabilities inherited from the Assad regime are essential.

At the same time, there is a need to create conditions that would enable those in Damascus who wish to reject the reduction of their once-proud country into a Turkish satrapy. Sharaa’s efforts to establish his legitimacy, including his visit to Paris and outreach to the U.S., other European nations, and key Gulf countries, may generate positive leverage in this regard. Israel’s role is to demonstrate through daily actions the severe costs of acceding to Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ambitions and accepting Turkish hegemony.

Israel should also assist those in Syria (and beyond: this may have an effect in Lebanon as well) who look to it as a strategic anchor in the region. The Druze in Syria—backed by their brethren in Israel—have openly expressed this expectation, breaking decades of loyalty to the central power in Damascus over their obligation to their kith and kin.