WarSclerotic

DEBKA.

Ofek 9

The launch of Israel’s Ofek 9 spy satellite from its Palmachim Air Base on the Mediterranean coast Tuesday night, June 22 had two unusual features of especial interest to DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s intelligence sources:

A. The previous six launches of the Ofek series were kept well-hidden from the public and from the prying eyes of foreign intelligence agencies; only when they proved successful were they officially announced and a few photographs released. This time, the Israeli Air Force and Ofek’s manufacturers, Israel Aviation Industries went to great lengths to make it highly visible to Israelis living along the densely-populated coast.
The three-stage ballistic missile boosted the advanced remote-sensing satellite, weighing about 650 pounds (300 kilograms) in such a way that instead of flying west over the Mediterranean, it first flew north, leaving a huge, 150-kilometer trail of fire and smoke in the night sky above all of Israel’s coastal cities. Only when it was over Netanya, did it swing west, gain altitude and go into orbit at a 40 degree angle to the equator. There it began performing its function of upgrading Israel’s intelligence-gathering and monitoring in the entire Middle East, including Iran’s nuclear sites, and the southern hemisphere.
The launch was therefore witnessed by millions of Israelis and West Bank Palestinians before the official announcement was released.
B. DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s intelligence sources report that Ofek 9 was moved up four months before its scheduled launch in the fall of 2010 for five reasons:

Stopping an intelligence breach revealed by the Turkish flotilla

1. Israeli intelligence was found seriously wanting on May 31, when what should have been an uncomplicated commando raid of a Turkish Gaza-bound civilian vessel went badly awry. It ended in an unforeseen battle on deck with nine Turks dead and six Israel soldiers wounded and the most damaging diplomatic fallout Israel had experienced in years.
2. The conclusion reached was that hostile Iranian undercover entities had managed to breach or find a hole in Israel’s intelligence system. This was brought to light by the failure to detect the preparations in Turkey for the blockade-busting flotilla for Gaza. Clearly, Israel intelligence, while maintaining a close eye on Iran, its nuclear facilities and Revolutionary Guard bases, was missing out on other parts of the Middle East.
This oversight enabled Iran, Syria and Hizballah to hide military preparations for attacking Israel in remote and unforeseen locations such as Turkey, keep it unawares and then pounce unexpectedly.
Israel’s pretext that it did not engage in undercover surveillance of “friendly” nations who were NATO members did not wash with Western intelligence experts because, as they all know, even friends often spy on each other
3. The May 31 debacle shocked Israel into the realization that the smallest port or air facility tucked away in the Middle East that were never before of interest to its intelligence services must now be brought under its purview. In Turkey, local informers could not longer be relied upon. A system was vitally needed for obtaining intelligence data by the fastest and most direct route, i.e., by satellite.
Some of these considerations were candidly revealed on Thursday, June 24 by Israeli Knesset Member Maj. Gen. (res.) Yitzhak Ben-Yisrael, who prior to entering political life headed the Israel Defense Forces’ Weapons Development Division and is an authority on missiles and satellites.
He said: “Now, after the launch of Ofek 9, no Middle East country will be able to perform covert operations at moments when our satellites are somewhere else, because there will be no more such moments. We’ll be there at all times. Neither Iran nor any other country will be able to move any type of material without our knowing.”
DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s intelligence sources say that Ben-Yisrael’s comments will be spot on when all Ofek 9’s systems are fully functioning. But this will not happen for another at two to three weeks, i.e., in mid-July.

Ofek 9 shows Tehran Israel does not need air corridors to bomb its nuclear sites

4. The Turkish flotilla episode produced another unpleasant shock: Parts of Middle East air space were abruptly slammed shut to the Israeli Air Force.
On Wednesday, June 16, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Recep Erdogan convened his Defense Industry Implementation Committee, known as SSIK, for a series of decisions. One was to freeze 16 defense and military agreements signed between Israel and Turkey, including permission for Israeli military jets to use Turkish air space, the sharing of intelligence and cooperation in counterterrorism.
Tehran and Damascus could now breathe easy, rid of their fear of an Israeli air strike coming from the direction of Turkey.
Much encouraged, Tehran and Damascus began leaning on other governments to follow suit, thereby generating a plethora of news reports in the world media about the air corridors Israel needs for its Air Force to attack Iran.
The most prominent was a London Times report on Saturday, June 19, according to which Saudi Arabia had practiced standing down its anti-aircraft systems to allow Israeli warplanes to fly overhead on their way to attack Iran’s nuclear installations through a narrow air corridor left open in the north.
This leak had one purpose, DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s intelligence sources report, and that was to embarrass Riyadh into following in Ankara’s wake and declaring its skies closed to Israel.
It worked like a charm. Before the end of the day, the Saudi princes declared Israeli bombers would never be permitted to cross its airspace to bomb Iran.
Certain, too, that the Obama administration would not let Israeli bomber jets have an air corridor through Iraq, Tehran was patting itself on the back for succeeding by dint of the Turkish flotilla episode in closing off all of Israel’s air routes to Iran.

Israel is now interested in the PKK

For this reason, the launch of Ofek 9, DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s military and intelligence sources report, had to take place now and produce a big bang. It was necessary to show Tehran as graphically as possible that Israel does not need air corridors to attack its nuclear sites, because its launchers and missiles can insert satellites or warheads 400 kilometers into space and from there accurately pinpoint any location in Iran.
Tehran went to extreme lengths to close Middle East skies to Israeli bombers, only to be shown that Israel has the answer: the free use of space.
5. Another of the low-priority areas in which Israeli intelligence, goaded by its break with Turkey, is taking a fresh interest is the triangle in northern Iraq between Turkey and Iran, where the Kurdish PKK rebels maintain bases for their cross-border raids in Turkey.
The Turkish prime minister is using the upsurge in PKK attacks to justify his campaign against Israel, accusing its covert agents of secretly aiding rebel operations against Turkish military targets.
However, Erdogan’s opponents, especially his critics in the Turkish military and intelligence community, accuse him of neglecting the war on the PKK because of his over-preoccupation with slamming Israel.
In these circumstances, the Kurdish rebel movement and its tactics are too important for Israel to ignore. Here, too Ofek 9 has a mission to perform.

Senate approves tough Iran sanctions.

Matt Hooper: Israel, Iran and Our Unsettling Global Future.

In the wake of last Tuesday’s announcement that Israel has launched “Ofek 9”, a spy satellite which will, among other things, be able to keep an eye on the expanding Iranian nuclear program, it is clear that Israeli-Iranian tensions have reached an all-time high. Israel, one of the strongest allies of the United States for over sixty years, faces an uncertain future with regard to Iran’s emergence as a player on the nuclear field, and while Iran continues to assert that there is no evidence their nuclear technology will be used to specifically construct bombs, Iranian governmental officials, chief among them current president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, consistently condemn the actions of Israel and the United States and regularly deny the legitimacy of Israel’s nationhood. On the heels of a May 31st attack upon an aid flotilla, where nine pro-Palestinian activists were murdered during an Israeli raid, Israel finds itself at the apex of controversy, surrounded by enemies and, in the eyes of much of the global press, shifting further to the right with regard to their military policies under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s leadership.

My grandfather, Robert K. Lifton, served as President of the American Jewish Congress, Chairman of the Israel Policy Forum and Co-Chair of the International Board of the Middle East Project of the Council on Foreign Relations, so given my familial credentials, the subject of Israel has long fascinated me. The piece below was written by Mr. Lifton last week, and keeping in mind Israel’s perennial place as an international news item, I think it is at once a reality check and a must-read for various governments, organizations and private citizens involved either directly or peripherally in the ambiguous and ever-evolving Middle East peace process. It is, as Mr. Lifton wrote, “…the speech we can expect at some point from a Prime Minister of Israel to the United Nations General Assembly”.

“Leaders of the World Nations,

In the first century CE, the people of Israel saw their temple destroyed by the Romans and in later years many Jews were forced into exile from their homeland. During the years in the Diaspora, we Jews were driven out of country after country and suffered continuing assaults physically and economically as well as on our religion. This culminated in the Nazi plan to destroy the Jewish people, resulting in the horrors of the Holocaust and the murder of six million Jews in Europe. We survivors vowed to ourselves and other Jews throughout the world: Never again will we allow such attacks to decimate the Jewish population!

In 1948, this body voted to establish a Jewish homeland in our historic land of Israel and the nation of Israel was born. Despite attacks on our fledgling nation in 1948 and wars with the surrounding Arab countries in 1967 and 1973, the Jewish people built a great nation. We made our arid land green by developing advanced agricultural technology that is also helping large parts of the world. Without oil or other natural resources, we developed commerce and industry that created increasing prosperity for our people. We made great contributions in science and health to be shared by the other nations represented here today.

We brought to Israel millions of Jews who were forced to leave Arab lands with nothing but their lives or who left the former Soviet Union and other countries to find a place where they would be treated with dignity and respect. Despite the hardship of absorbing so many people in a small country, we managed to settle them, find them homes and jobs and send their children to school. We promised those new citizens a safe and secure haven in Israel.

During all those years since 1948 we have sought to make peace with our Arab neighbors. Under Prime Minister Menachem Begun, we signed a peace agreement with Egypt at Camp David. We gave back the Sinai Peninsula, even with its valuable property, and moved thousands of our citizens from their homes in settlements. Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin made peace with King Hussein of Jordan. He signed the Oslo Agreement with Yasser Arafat representing the beginning of a peace process between our two people. Prime Minister Ehud Barak, with the intense efforts of President Bill Clinton, tried to bring about a peace agreement with the Palestinians at Camp David, but to no avail. Prime Minister Barak withdrew our troops from Lebanon but that only brought an attack on us from Hezbollah that forced us into a war we did not seek. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon pulled our troops out of the Gaza Strip, but that resulted in control of Gaza falling into the hands of Hamas, a terrorist organization that has vowed to destroy the state of Israel. That move brought no peace but only multiple attacks and missiles that rained down on our citizens from Hamas and other Palestinian terrorists. Nevertheless, we still support a two state solution with the Palestinians with secure and defensible borders. We attempted to reach out to Syria, time and again, most recently with help from the Turkish government, but we have not found a willing partner for peace on the other side. Instead, Syria has supported Hezbollah and Hamas in their nefarious activities. Still, we seek peace with Syria as well as with all of the other nations in our region with full social, economic and cultural relationships. We believe that together we can make this region economically more competitive and improve the lives of the people who live there.

The greatest concern to us is the government of Iran, which has vowed to destroy Israel and wipe us from the face of the earth. Iran is well along in its program of developing nuclear weapons, including missiles that can readily reach our major cities. The world has attempted to dissuade Iran from this course. It has cajoled and threatened. Under the leadership of the United States, the UN Security Council has imposed ever stronger sanctions against Iran to stop its development of nuclear weapons. But the government of Iran has scoffed at these efforts and committed itself to continue its nuclear program.

In the past, when Arab states that threatened us attempted to develop nuclear weapons, we took action to stop that development. We reserve the right to take action against Iran to bring a halt to its efforts. But more than that, we want to make our position totally clear. Until now, we have followed a policy of what political analysts termed “nuclear ambiguity” about our own capabilities. Now, we are prepared to announce that, in fact, we have a substantial nuclear weapon capability of every size and variety. Israel has committed that we will not be the first nation to use nuclear weapons and we will adhere to that commitment. But we want to make it completely understood by both the government and the people of Iran that a full array of our weapons is pointed at Iran from a multitude of resources. If the Iranians develop nuclear weapons and if any weapon from any source, whether Iran, or its satellites — Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria or any other source — strikes any part of our land we will launch a massive attack on Iran. The safest way for Iran to assure that this does not happen is to renounce the development of nuclear weapons and stop their efforts to produce such weapons. But if Iran refuses to halt its nuclear weapon development, we will hold it responsible for the use of any nuclear weapons against the state of Israel. We understand the gravity of what we are announcing today. We are sad that at this time in our history we still must take such a course. Yet, our land is a center of the Jewish people, their culture and their heritage. This time, we are publicly avowing before the whole world of nations that never again will we allow any nation or group to threaten the survival of our people without paying the maximum penalty of its own survival.

Rocket explodes in south; none injured – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Eight mortar shells also fired at Israel from Gaza Strip Thursday, causing no damage or injuries

Shmulik Hadad

Jon Voight to Obama: You are harming Israel and promoting anti-Semitism – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

In an open letter in The Washington Times, staunch Republican actor writes: You will be the first American president that lied to the Jewish people, and the American people as well, when you said that you would defend Israel.

By Haaretz Service

American actor and staunch Republican Jon Voight has submitted a public letter to The Washington Times, in which he accused President Barack Obama of putting Israel in harm’s way and promoting anti-Semitism across the world.

“You will be the first American president that lied to the Jewish people, and the American people as well, when you said that you would defend Israel, the only Democratic state in the Middle East, against all their enemies,” wrote Voight, who last year called Obama a false prophet.

	American actor Jon Voight
	Photo by: Archive

“You have done just the opposite. You have propagandized Israel, until they look like they are everyone’s enemy – and it has resonated throughout the world,” he wrote. “You are putting Israel in harm’s way, and you have promoted anti-Semitism throughout the world.”

“You have brought this to a people who have given the world the Ten Commandments and most laws we live by today. The Jewish people have given the world our greatest scientists and philosophers, and the cures for many diseases, and now you play a very dangerous game so you can look like a true martyr to what you see and say are the underdogs,” he wrote.

“But the underdogs you defend are murderers and criminals who want Israel eradicated.”

“You have brought to Arizona a civil war, once again defending the criminals and illegals, creating a meltdown for good, loyal, law-abiding citizens. Your destruction of this country may never be remedied, and we may never recover. I pray to God you stop, and I hope the people in this great country realize your agenda is not for the betterment of mankind, but for the betterment of your politics,” he added.

Voight signed off his letter by writing: “With heartfelt and deep concern for America and Israel.”

WPR Article | World Citizen: Saudi Arabia, Israel Share Common Enemy in Iran.

A recent headline in Britain’s Sunday Times must have sent blood pressure readings soaring on both sides of the gulf known on one side as the Persian Gulf and on the other as the Arabian Gulf: “Saudi Arabia gives Israel clear skies to attack Iranian nuclear sites.”

Had Riyadh really struck a deal with the Jewish state, making it easier for Israeli jets to pound Iranian targets?

The Times quoted anonymous “defense sources in the Gulf” who maintained that the kingdom had gone as far as to conduct practice drills in which its air defenses would stand down, allowing flights over its airspace without a response. The agreement between the House of Saud and the Israelis, the article claimed, would grant passage to Israeli fighter planes across a narrow corridor in the north of the country, without Saudi jets being scrambled. After the overflights, Saudi defenses would quickly return to full alert, presumably in preparation for an Iranian response to the Israeli attack.

Reaction to the article was rather curious. One would expect Saudi Arabia to forcefully deny the reports, which is precisely what it did. The Saudi Press Agency issued a sharp denial by an unnamed official saying the kingdom rejects “the violation of its sovereignty and use of its airspace by anyone to attack any country.” The official added acidly that the policy would apply to “the Israeli occupation with which [Saudi Arabia] has no relationship in any way.”

In the larger region, some commentators attributed the report to a campaign of “disinformation, lies and deceit” by Israeli authorities.

Interestingly, however, Israel jumped to Saudi Arabia’s defense, also issuing a denial. The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a terse statement saying, “The Sunday Times report is fundamentally false and completely baseless.”

While it seems unlikely that the two countries have suddenly reached a new deal on the issue, there is general agreement over the notion that Saudis and Israelis have found a common enemy in Iran. That provides fodder for speculation in a region that gave the world the concept of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” And while the Saudis and Israelis probably wouldn’t go as far as to call each other friends, facing a common enemy makes for the basis of an irresistible alliance of convenience, no matter how quiet – and deniable — as it must remain.

It is no secret that Saudi Arabia, other Gulf states, as well as Arab leaders in more distant locations, are extremely concerned not only with Iran’s nuclear program but with the Obama administration’s efforts to stop it.

Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic have called each other names since the day Ayatollah Khomeini took power in Tehran and declared that “Mecca is now in the hands of a group of infidels.” Radio Riyadh delivered the Saudi response, sparing little venom. It labeled the new Iranian leaders “a corrupt bunch of thieves.” The two countries, epicenters of the rival Sunni and Shiite branches of Islam, have eyed each other nervously over the years and may have even fought a proxy war in Yemen recently.

Like leaders of other Muslim countries from Bahrain to Morocco, Saudi rulers worry about Iranian efforts to spread its populist revolution and its encouragement of Shiite minorities to rebel. In broad strokes, Arab regimes worry about Iran’s efforts to obtain regional supremacy, which many believe would be greatly enhanced if it acquired nuclear weapons.

Early in the Obama administration, as the U.S. policy of engagement began, Gulf states expressed worries that the new diplomacy would come at their expense and would ultimately result in what some described as their “worst nightmare”: a nuclear-armed Shiite superpower living next door. More recently, as it became clear that the engagement policy had failed to persuade Iran to stop enriching uranium, those concerns have only increased. Writing in the influential Asharq Al-Awsat, the respected journalist Abdul Rahman Al-Rashed expressed what may well be the view of the Saudi leadership. He blamed delays in achieving results on “Obama and his refusal to use the threat of force in a genuine manner, and this has made everybody — not just Tehran — believe that nothing will stop the Iranian project, whether this is its nuclear weapons project or its conventional weapons project.”

Al Rashed may have also been speaking for the Al-Sauds when he said that the Times report made no sense. And yet, the report of an agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia was no accident.

It is highly unlikely that the two countries have made a new deal. That’s because, though all sides would vehemently deny it, a Saudi-Israeli agreement was probably concluded a long time ago. Recent tensions between Israel and Turkey make the Saudi corridor more critical for an attack, but Israel probably wants a series of options.

What is quite clear though, is that the United States is currently putting on a show of force against Iran, and Israel is a part of that performance. Just last weekend, the U.S. Carrier Strike Group 10, with the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman, crossed the Suez Canal. Arab media reported that Israeli warships crossed the narrow passage along with the U.S. ships, while thousands of Egyptian soldiers guarded the strait.

Crossing the Suez takes the ships into the Red Sea, within striking distance of Iran, just after the U.N. passed a round of mild sanctions against Iran, which are soon to be fortified with much stricter unilateral sanctions from the U.S. and Europe.

The best bet is that the Times story came out now, not due to any new developments on the Israeli-Saudi front, but because the Obama administration is trying to correct its earlier failure to show a willingness to use force against Iran if necessary.

It’s unlikely that Saudi Arabia or any of its neighbors want to see a war. But they definitely do not want to see a nuclear Iran. And they will do what it takes to prod Washington to keep that from happening, even if that means making secret deals with Israel.

Frida Ghitis is an independent commentator on world affairs and a World Politics Review contributing editor. Her weekly column, World Citizen, appears every Thursday.

Is Israel Staging War On Iran Through Saudi Arabia? | AHN.

The World’s Deadly Obsession With Israel – Forbes.com.

The real reason the country receives so much attention–and condemnation.

The simple solution for peace in the Middle East may be for Israel to change its name to Norway. Israel’s diplomats discovered this trick in 1952, when an Israeli initiative at the U.N. for a cease-fire in Korea–put forward by representative Abba Eban–encountered serious opposition, only to pass easily once Norway replaced Israel as the sponsor. (These experiences led Eban to later quip: “If Algeria introduced a resolution declaring that the earth was flat and that Israel had flattened it, it would pass by a vote of 164 to 13 with 26 abstentions.”)

Israel is treated differently than other nations. If any other country had acted in the same way as it did with the recent Gaza aid flotilla–for example, Britain in stopping an IRA-supporting convoy from reaching Northern Ireland–the condemnation and attention would not be at the same level.

We saw this in 2006 as well, when Israel was warned that its response to Hezbollah’s repeated firing of rockets into Israel had to be “proportionate.” Did a chorus of foreign ministries warn Turkey to be proportionate in 2008 when it sent 10,000 troops into Iraq to attack PKK fighters? Or the U.S. in 2001 when it invaded Afghanistan to go after al Qaeda? Of course not. But with Israel it’s different, both in the condemnation and the coverage of its actions.

A common justification given by Israel’s critics for their obsession is the supposed David vs. Goliath nature of the conflict. Beyond the obvious flaws in the analogy–Hamas is no David, it’s a terrorist group supported by big states like Syria and Iran, and people don’t side with the Taliban because the U.S. is the Goliath–a look at history shows the weakness of this claim.

In the years following its rebirth in 1948, the small state of Israel faced regular deadly raids from marauding groups (called “fedayeen”)–sponsored by Jordan, Syria, and Egypt. When Israel responded to protect its citizens, condemnations from the United Nations followed. Even the U.S. often told Israel that it expected it not to retaliate.

This was long before 1967–when Israel gained control of Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza, and at a time when those areas were ruled by the Egyptians and Jordanians–and when, by most standards, Israel was the David. The focus and disproportionate criticism on Israel is clearly not new. It’s as old as the state itself. So what’s the reason?

The answer for many is anti-Semitism. New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman wrote in an oft-quoted line that: “Criticizing Israel is not anti-Semitic, and saying so is vile. But singling out Israel for opprobrium and international sanction–out of all proportion to any other party in the Middle Eas –is anti-Semitic, and not saying so is dishonest.”

An alternative way to look at it is through the realpolitik that guides most foreign ministries. They act on crudely defined national interests rather than values and principles. They’ll quickly abandon a friend if it serves a perceived strategic interest. And when their outlook controls policy, Israel is the loser.

Russia in the 1950s, for example, went from supporting Israel to fiercely opposing it (and even suspending relations) in just a few years because Kremlin strategists saw opposing Israel as a way to frustrate the U.S. It was a (cold) Cold War calculation. And after Israel was attacked by neighboring countries in 1973, Edward Heath’s British government (urged on by the British foreign office) refused to even supply Israel with spare parts for weapons that it had previously sold–because of Arab threats of an oil boycott.

Even in the U.S., since Israel’s birth, State Department officials–with Arab desks far outnumbering the one for Israel–have agitated against Israel. Truman memorably told Eban in 1950 that most of the “striped-pants boys in the State Department are against my policy of supporting Israel,” but they’ll “soon find out who’s the President of the United States.”

But foreign ministries have the upper hand. Day-to-day relations are decided without consultation from the top. And everyday conversations (especially off-the-record) with journalists give officials a chance to both keep Israel in the news and tilt coverage against it–with the hope that domestic uproar and editorial comment will push the principals against Israel. For the last 60 years this has been working, and journalists now instinctively prioritize foreign news from Israel.

The first casualty of the Israeli obsession is Israel’s citizens, as its government is often pressured into taking actions contrary to its security needs. The casualties don’t end there, however. The Israel obsession comes at the expense of a focus on real tragedies: Putting most of their attention on Israel, the world did next to nothing while the genocides and mass murders in Cambodia, Rwanda, Yugoslavia and Darfur took place.

Last month 600 people were killed in Darfur according to the U.N. And yet nine deaths in the flotilla incident is considered more newsworthy– and more worthy of demonstrations and condemnations. Now that’s something that deserves to be attacked as disproportionate.

Daniel Freedman is the director of strategy and policy analysis at the Soufan Group, a strategic consultancy. His writings can be found at www.dfreedman.org. He writes a weekly column for Forbes.com.

Ignoring the tsunami – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

The superpower under whose patronage we shelter is becoming increasingly weak and increasingly distant, and the Middle East is becoming unstable.

By Ari Shavit

Things have never been better: The number of millionaires in the country soared by 43 percent between 2008 and 2009, with 2,519 new ones joining the 5,900 we already had, for a total of 8,419 Israeli millionaires. Their total net assets rose by about 41 percent, from $30.1 billion at the end of 2008 to $42.4 billion at the end of 2009. No wonder it’s impossible to find a luxury apartment to buy or to reserve a table at a top restaurant in Tel Aviv, or that tickets for “Nabucco” were so hard to get. Never was so much owned by so few Israelis. Never has life been so good here for so wealthy an elite, as the country is poised at the brink of the abyss.

Things have never been worse. The superpower under whose patronage we shelter is becoming increasingly weak and increasingly distant. As a result of these two mutually amplifying processes the Middle East is becoming unstable. There is no one to stop Iran’s rise or Turkey’s growing extremism, or to provide security for the moderates in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Palestine. The states to the east fear the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, while those to the north are building up their forces in anticipation of a nuclear Iran. And a firestorm of hatred for Israel raging throughout the world. Israel’s legitimacy as well as its deterrence are eroding. It’s no wonder that the national security adviser is nostalgic for the first term of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, or that the army chief of staff pines for the days when Ehud Barak was chief of staff. The geostrategic situation is grave. And we are partying on the beach while ignoring the tsunami already visible on the horizon.

Never has the gap between our economic and international situations, or between the state of our consciousness and our security situation, been greater. Not even in the days leading up to the Yom Kippur War were we in such a deep state of denial. Everything’s great: Inside Israel the economy is booming, there is general jubilation – la dolce vita at its sweetest. But all around, the siege is tightening. No reasonable remedy is in sight for the twin threats of missiles and of a nuclear Iran, nor does an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict appear imminent.

While 8,419 millionaires increase their own capital using Israel’s uniquely excellent human capital, millions of Arabs and Muslims wondering whether the Jewish state will last. They see a declining West that turns its back to Israel and a rising East that challenges Israel. They see an Israel that repeatedly demonstrates shortsightedness. Many of our neighbors are starting to have secret, dangerous thoughts.

Israel is not weak. If any of its neighbors makes a mistake, it will receive a knockout punch. But if there is a government in Jerusalem it must make every effort to stop the decline, to revive the peace with Egypt and with Jordan, to leave no stone unturned on the Syrian track, to expedite the territorial division, to create a common forum for cooperation with the United States and with the moderate Arab states, and to create a stabilizing process to counterbalance the destabilizing process that threatens the Middle East. The government understands everything but does nothing. Its inaction constitutes negligence, as does Kadima’s unwillingness to let the government change its shape and its course. Netanyahu’s foot-dragging on the one hand and Tzipi Livni’s pettiness on the other perpetuate a catastrophic paralysis.

The Israeli public will not take to the streets. It is exhausted and confused and despairing. But the economic elite, the 8,419 Israelis who became so much richer last year, can bring about change. If they were to use their wealth and influence to demand that Netanyahu, Barak and Livni join hands, they would very likely succeed. It’s time for those who have benefited greatly from living here to accept responsibility. Given the gravity of Israel’s situation, wealth is not only privilege, but also obligation.

Infrastructure Minister warns Hezbollah: Israel will fight for its gas fields – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Israel will not hesitate to use force to protect its gas fields from being claimed by Lebanon, Infrastructure Minister Uzi Landau said Thursday.

Lebanon parliament speaker Nabih Berri earlier this month urged his government to start exploring its offshore natural gas reserves, claiming that otherwise Israel would claim the resources.

	Drilling for gass off the coast of Acre
	Photo by: Yaron Kaminsky / Archive

“Israel is racing to make the case a fait accompli and was quick to present itself as an oil emirate, ignoring the fact that, according to the maps, the deposit extends into Lebanese waters,” Berri said. “Lebanon must take immediate action to defend its financial, political, economic and sovereign rights.

Hezbollah weighed in soon after Berri submitted a bill to launch exploration of potential offshore reserves, warning Israel not to touch what it called Lebanon’s resources.

In response to the warnings, Lebanon declared that Israel “would not hesitate to use our force and strength to protect not just rule of law, but also international naval law.”

“It doesn’t matter what is found, they will always have something to say about it,” Landau said, emphasizing that the off-shore fields were in Israeli territorial waters. “They consider our very existence to be occupation.”

Lebanon’s former PM and current member of parliament Fouad Siniora also urged the Lebanese government to take the issue of offshore gas reserves in the Lebanese territorial waters very seriously on Saturday, and said he had looked into the matter when he was finance minister and prime minister.

The Lebanese complaints are not new. They arose last year as well with the Dalit and Tamar natural gas discoveries.

The the head of petroleum and natural gas exploration in the National Infrastructures Ministry, Dr. Yaakov Mimran, called the claims “nonsense.” He said they were just trial balloons and that the latest offshore discoveries in the Leviathan field, as well as the earlier Tamar and Dalit finds, are absolutely within Israeli territory.

Mimran explained that the Israel-Lebanon border is not perpendicular to the coast and Israel’s exclusive offshore economic zone includes all the fields. “Those noises occur when they smell gas. Until then they sit quietly and let the other side spend the money,” he added.

Senior Israeli officials said it was Lebanon that set the limits on its own territorial waters after it had given out exploration licenses exactly along these borders. “What are they complaining about now?” asked one official. “That is how Cyprus acted, which set the border of its exclusive economic zone between countries at a distance of 200 kilometers from Israeli shores and sold the [licenses] for exploration to private entrepreneurs along this line,” said an official.

Israel still has yet to declare its exclusive economic zone, though this usually applies to what is in the sea, such as fish, and not what lies under the continental shelf. Problems may arise when the continental shelf is shared by more than one country, such as can occur in the Mediterranean, explains Prof. Moshe Hirsch of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, an expert in international law. He said the gas is under Israel’s continental shelf, so there was no need to declare an exclusive economic zone.

When one country’s continental shelf is within the 200-kilometer zone of another nation, the countries must agree to the boundaries, he said.