WarSclerotic

Syria: Latest ‘Day of Rage’ could be largest yet.

  Gunfire rang out Thursday in Deraa, residents of the besieged southern town said, after Syrian President Bashar Assad sent tanks into the coastal city of Latakia in an increasingly violent uprising now heading into its seventh week. With the estimated death toll exceeding 500, protesters have called for another “Day of Rage” after weekly prayers on Friday, one that could prove to be the largest yet.

Two hundred Baath members from southern Syria resigned late Wednesday after the government sent in tanks to crush resistance in Deraa. A witness told AP six tanks rolled into Latakia on Wednesday night and security forces fired on pro-democracy demonstrators, wounding four.

High-ranking Syrian officials said that should war break out between Israel and Syria’s Hezbollah allies, Assad would not hesitate to use his “strongest cards” in southern Lebanon against the Jewish state, Israel Radio reported. In the event of renewed hostilities, Syria and Hezbollah would “compete over who could fire missiles first” at Tel Aviv, the station reported, quoting the Kuwaiti daily Al Rai.

Diplomats and rights activists, however, have told Western news agencies that signs were also emerging of differences within the army, where the majority of troops are Sunni Muslims but most officers belong to Assad’s minority Alawite sect.

The dearth of foreign journalists in the country means independently verifying reports is virtually impossible. Al Jazeera television said Thursday it had suspended some operations in Syria, a move which a media watchdog said was the result of restrictions and attacks on Jazeera staff.

Also Thursday, the head of the UN atomic watchdog, Yukiya Amano, said for the first time that Syria had tried in the past to secretly build a nuclear reactor, which was destroyed by Israeli warplanes five years ago.  Syria denies that the bombed building contained any nuclear facilities.  For over two years, Syria has refused IAEA follow-up access to the remains of a complex being built in the Syrian desert when Israel bombed it to rubble in 2007.

“The facility that was … destroyed by Israel was a nuclear reactor under construction,” he asked in response to a question from AP, repeating afterward: “It was a reactor under construction.”

As the crackdown persists, pressure both domestic and external continues to mount. “Considering the breakdown of values and emblems that we were instilled with by the party and which were destroyed at the hand of the security forces … we announce our withdrawal from the party without regret,” Baath Party members said in their resignation letter, quoted by The Guardian newspaper in London.

Turkey’s intelligence chief met Assad Thursday as part of a senior delegation sent to Damascus to suggest reforms that could help end the uprising. “The delegation will share with Syrian officials Turkey’s experiences in the fields of political and economic reforms,” Turkish authorities said ahead of the meeting.

Turkish officials said events in Syria were “very troubling” to Ankara, and that sanctions would not help the situation. One official told AFP that if Assad’s regime falls, Ankara would be forced to reconsider its close relations with Damascus.
Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem was expected later Thursday to convene a meeting with ambassadors from the United States and several European countries to show them what Syrian officials are saying is evidence of an organized conspiracy to destabilize the government, Israel Radio reported.

Britain has withdrawn the royal wedding invitation to Syria, with the support of Buckingham Palace, a Foreign Office spokesman said Thursday.  Britain summoned the Syrian ambassador Sami Khiyami to the Foreign Office a day earlier to condemn the “unacceptable use of force.”

Under intense media pressure, it rescinded the wedding invitation saying the Foreign Office and Buckingham Palace shared the view that it was “not considered appropriate” for the ambassador to attend. Syrian ambassador Sami Khiyami told BBC radio: “I find it a bit embarrassing but I do not consider it as a matter that would jeopardize any ongoing relations and discussions with the British government.”

Australia also called for international sanctions and said the United Nations should send a special envoy to investigate events there. “We believe the time has come for the international community now to consider the use of sanctions against the Syrian regime,” Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd said after a meeting at the Commonwealth headquarters in London.

In Deraa, a Syrian mother of six who opened the door to a secret policeman in the border town just had time to scream “Israelis are more merciful than you” before he shot her dead, relatives told Reuters Thursday.

A resident of Homs took a different view. “They have emptied pharmacy shelves so that people do not find anything to treat their wounded. They are lions against us, but lambs towards the Israelis,” he said as gunfire crackled nearby.

Reuters contributed to this report.

U.S. to Turkey: Don’t let Iran exploit your growing trade ties – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Last year, Turkey and Brazil became the only two UN Security Council members to vote against a U.S.-backed measure to impose new sanctions on Iran because of its disputed nuclear program.

By The Associated Press

Iran could try to exploit growing trade ties with Turkey, a neighbor with a booming economy, in order to circumvent international sanctions aimed at forcing it to stop its suspected efforts to make nuclear weapons, a U.S. Treasury Department official said Wednesday.

The warning reflected U.S. concerns that Turkey might become a vulnerable link in the effort to isolate Iran, which is under four sets of UN Security Council sanctions, primarily for defying council demands to stop uranium enrichment. Turkey has pledged to abide by U.N. resolutions, though it has differed with the U.S. stance on Iran and is eager to develop energy and other business ties with its neighbor.

	Turkey’s Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu (R) and his Iranian counterpart Ali Akbar Salehi in Ankara on Jan. 17, 2011.
	Photo by: AP

As trade relationships expand, the risk of abuse by Iran expands at the same time, David S. Cohen, acting undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, said at a news conference at the U.S. consulate in Istanbul. Iran has a track record of using deceptive practices to facilitate its proliferation activity, and it tries to hide within a broad stream of commerce those transactions that they need in order to continue their nuclear program and their ballistic missile program, Cohen said.

Cohen delivered his message to senior government officials and banking sector leaders on a two-day visit. He did not offer a direct assessment of Turkey’s implementation of sanctions, but he noted that its financial sector ws working to protect itself from allegedly illicit activities by Iran, and that authorities last month seized an Iranian plane bound for Syria that he said was carrying weapons.

In that incident, Turkey said it seized the cargo of an Iranian plane because the shipment violated UN sanctions. Turkish media said the aircraft was carrying light weapons, including automatic rifles, rocket launchers and mortars.

Turkey, the biggest Muslim ally in NATO, has worked closely with Washington in Iraq and Afghanistan. But it has also sought closer ties with Iran, which says UN sanctions are illegal and that it has the right to develop peaceful nuclear power. Last year, Turkey and Brazil became the only two UN Security Council members to vote against a U.S.-backed measure to impose new sanctions on Iran because of its disputed nuclear program.

The two countries had brokered a fuel-swap agreement with Iran that was cast as an alternative solution to Western concerns about Tehran’s uranium enrichment. Low-enriched uranium can be used to fuel a reactor to generate electricity, which Iran says is the intention of its program. But if uranium is further enriched to around 90 percent purity, it can be used to develop a nuclear warhead.

The council vote hurt relations between the United States and Turkey, which hosted an unsuccessful round of talks between Iran and world powers in Istanbul in January.

Turkish President Abdullah Gul said in February that annual trade with Iran had reached $10 billion and the aim was to reach $30 billion in the next few years. However, a Turkish business group said the sanctions were taking their toll on cross-border trade.

Al-Jazeera Program Host: ‘Israelis Are Very Much Less Brutal [Than Arab Regimes]… Israel Can Always Claim It Is Facing An Enemy, Whereas Arab Dictators Are Facing Their Own People’.

IAEA chief: Syria tried to secretly build nuclear reactor.

  The head of the UN atomic watchdog, Yukiya Amano, on Thursday said for the first time that Syria tried in the past to secretly build a nuclear reactor, which was destroyed by Israeli warplanes five years ago, The Associated Press reported.

Syria denies that the building which was bombed actually contained any nuclear facilities.

For over two years, Syria has refused IAEA follow-up access to the remains of a complex that was being built at Dair Alzour in the Syrian desert when Israel bombed it to rubble in 2007.

The IAEA carried out an agreed inspection of another Syrian plant earlier in April as part of a long-stalled probe into suspected covert nuclear activity.

“The inspection is being conducted as planned,” an official of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said, giving no further detail.

The visit to the Homs facility in western Syria was part of a wider IAEA inquiry into US intelligence suggesting Syria at another location tried to build a nuclear reactor suited to producing plutonium for atomic bombs.

Syria, which denies any nuclear weapons ambitions, agreed with the IAEA early last month that its inspectors could travel to the Homs acid purification plant, where uranium concentrates, or yellowcake, have been a by-product.

The IAEA saw it as a possible positive step, even though the United States said the gesture would not be enough to address allegations of covert atomic activity.

Kerry’s softer stance on Syria scrutinized – The Boston Globe.

Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad and Senator John Kerry met in November, one of Kerry’s four trips to the country. (SANA/ Reuters) By Farah Stockman

Globe Staff / April 28, 2011

WASHINGTON — Senator John Kerry has emerged as an outspoken champion of change in the Middle East, among the first in Washington to demand that Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak step down and that the US military prepare to intervene against the forces of Moammar Khadafy in Libya.

Yet as Syrian government forces advance with tanks and rifles against masses of protesters and attack mourners at funerals for dissidents, Kerry’s comments have been far more muted about a dictator he has worked with the past two years: Syria’s Bashar al-Assad.

Some Middle East specialists say Kerry’s work behind the scenes represented the best chance of changing Syria’s behavior and nudging alliances in the vital region toward US initiatives.

“I don’t think John Kerry looks foolish,’’ James Zogby, president of the Washington-based Arab American Institute. “It’s not a question of whether Assad is capable of being a reformer or was interested in being a reformer. At the time that Kerry was as engaged as he was with travels back and forth, engagement with Syria was the only option.’’

The Obama administration has also declined to call on Assad to step down. While White House spokesman Jay Carney urged the Syrian leader to heed the protesters’ demands, State Department officials said US diplomats in Damascus would continue communications with Assad in an attempt to influence his decisions.

WPR Article | World Citizen: For Syria’s Allies, Attacking Israel Could Pay Off.

The worsening crisis battering Syria threatens more than the regime of President Bashar al-Assad. It also carries with it the potential to recast the balance of power in the Middle East, with damaging results for Iran and conceivably disastrous consequences for its allies — Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. Given the magnitude of the stakes for these players, one can argue that it would make strategic sense from their perspective to try to lure Israel into a more intense armed conflict: not an all-out war, but clashes powerful enough to garner headlines and capture the attention and emotions of the Arab world.

The wars Israel fought against Hezbollah in 2006 and against Hamas in 2008-2009 showed that a conflict with Israel all but ensures a passionate groundswell of support in the Middle East. The players could then leverage that intensity of emotion to turn the tide of events in their favor. The battlefield experience, however, also showed that a sustained military encounter with Israel can take a costly toll in lives, ammunition and infrastructure. Hamas and Hezbollah, not to mention Syria, would rather not see their arsenals destroyed. But they could benefit enormously from the resurgence of support that would follow a dramatic news-making, face-to-face dust up with what they call the “Zionist entity.”

Achieving such a delicate balance — somewhere between serious clash and war — requires a degree of calibration that is all but impossible in the unpredictable dynamics of armed conflict. And yet, there is ample evidence that segments of Hamas, probably encouraged by Iran and Syria, have already begun to deploy this push-and-pull of provocation and restraint.

For the Syrian regime, it probably comes too late. Now that the Assad government’s heavy handed methods against protesters have left a reported 400 dead, it is much less likely that the Syrian population will be distracted by Israel. If Syria is to win this test of wills with the opposition, it will not do it by drawing attention to an external enemy.

For Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah, however, the tactic could still produce results.

Iran has struggled with its response to the Syrian uprising, because it undermines Tehran’s narrative of the events unfolding in the Middle East. Tehran has expressed support for Arab uprisings in places such as Egypt, Bahrain and Yemen, arguing that the uprisings mimic the Iranian revolution of 1979. But Syria’s Assad is Iran’s closest ally. So while Iran has praised pro-democracy activists everywhere in the Arab world, it has berated Syria’s anti-regime activists, claiming they act at the behest of Israel and the U.S. Tehran would be well-served by images of heavily armed Israeli forces firing on Palestinians. Rather than being cast as the protector of a dictator like Assad, Tehran could again take the stage as the defender of the Palestinians.

Hamas could also gain from renewed fighting with Israel, but it also stands to lose the most. The risks it faces highlight the divisions within the Palestinian group, with the Damascus-based leadership inclined to push harder than its counterparts inside Gaza, who would bear the brunt of the clashes.

Assad has given support and sanctuary to the Hamas leadership in exile. His fall would deprive the Gaza-based Hamas of key support, and it would likely upend the exiled part of the organization, including Khaled Meshal, Hamas’ top leader who lives in Damascus under Assad’s auspices.

In addition to perhaps forestalling the loss of Assad’s patronage, renewed battles between Hamas and Israel would also raise Hamas’ standing among Palestinians, who have been pressuring the two main Palestinian political organizations, Fatah and Hamas, to reconcile. Indeed, Hamas and Fatah announced Wednesday that they have reached a preliminary agreement that would pave the way for an interim unity government and subsequent parliamentary and presidential elections.

Nevertheless, Hamas has reason to fear reconciliation, because in the years since it won Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006, it has steadily lost support among Palestinians. Of course, the two sides have made deals before, only to see them collapse before being implemented. But should this agreement hold up, it will lead to elections, and Hamas would likely lose those elections. That makes any further loss of domestic popular support even more worrisome to Hamas. The Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority appears to be making diplomatic headway toward recognition of a Palestinian State, while Hamas’ policies have not achieved much. Clashes with Israel would engender popular sympathy and support.

Fighting Israel could also bring about a change in Egypt’s position regarding Gaza’s southern border crossing into Egypt. With Hosni Mubarak, the staunchly anti-Hamas former Egyptian president, now out of power, Israel can no longer be sure that Egypt will keep Gaza’s southern border sealed, as it has during past outbreaks of fighting. This time, Cairo, which brokered the announced reconciliation deal, might just help Hamas, at the very least by making it easier for weapons to flow from the south into the Gaza Strip.

The troubles in Damascus are also causing Hezbollah’s leaders in Lebanon to lose sleep. Like Iran and Hamas, Hezbollah has praised the revolutions in Egypt and elsewhere in the region, while condemning the one in Syria. Assad’s Syria has not only been the key conduit for delivering Iranian weapons to Hezbollah but also a vital strategic supporter. If Assad loses, Hezbollah loses. And there is no question that changes in Syria will have a powerful impact in Lebanon.

Without Syrian support, Hezbollah would have a much more difficult time preserving its dominance of Lebanon. If Hezbollah is perceived as weakened, its support in Lebanon will erode. Fighting against Israel would help to maintain popular support.

In recent weeks, attacks from Hamas-controlled Gaza have reached levels not seen since the last war. And there are indications that Hezbollah, too, may be planning an attack.

The tactic clearly puts Israeli leaders on the spot. They know that starting a war at this crucial moment in the history of the Middle East could be grievously counterproductive. Israeli strategists are familiar with all the reasons that Iran, Syria, Hamas and Hezbollah have for wanting a confrontation. From Israel’s perspective, they constitute the very reasons to prevent such a conflict from flaring up. But the recent series of attacks against Israeli civilians showed how political pressure can build on Israeli officials when the population is under fire.

Rocket attacks from Gaza create enormous anxiety in Israel even though they usually — though not always — miss their target. In recent weeks, attacks have left a trail of blood. Rockets have started landing closer and closer to Tel Aviv, adding to the concerns of military experts. When a rocket from Gaza smashed into a school bus, killing a 16-year-old Israeli boy, the pressure on the government to take action grew. For now, Israel’s deployment of the new Iron Dome missile defense system, combined with a limited military response, seems to have achieved the desired results: a lull in attacks from Gaza and a quieting of domestic pressures. But a new assault from Gaza or from Hezbollah, one with more deadly results for Israelis, could quickly change the equation.

While anti-regime protesters in Syria keep their focus on unseating the Assad regime, their uprising could end up causing explosions far from Damascus.

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

Israel rejects Fatah-Hamas agreement as Iran hails it as ‘triumph’.

Thursday, 28 April 2011

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman of Israel spoke a day after Hamas and Fatah announced a unity-government deal in Cairo. (File photo)

Asia Times Online :: Middle East News, Iraq, Iran current affairs.

By Victor Kotsev

TEL AVIV – “Let Obama come and take Syria,” a resident of the city of Daraa told the BBC in despair on Tuesday in reference to United States President Barack Obama. “Let Israel come and take Syria. Let the Jews come – anything is better than [Syrian President] Bashar Assad.”

Nobody acquainted with Arab rhetorical traditions would take this quote at face value, even though it speaks volumes about the post-Arab uprisings of 2011 in the Middle East, where the tall story of Israel being the source of all evil was among the greatest casualties. It also speaks volumes about the dire situation in Syria and the American predicament there.

From the point of view of the White House, it all seems to come down to leverage. “The view inside the administration is that Syria

is a particularly complicated problem because the United States does not have good relationships with either the government or the opposition and lacks the leverage to affect events in the country,” writes Josh Rogin in Foreign Policy.

In Egypt, the United States had leverage. In Libya, less so, but it felt that the stakes were low enough to put on a half-hearted (and so far vain) attempt to gain it by brute force. In Syria, it is too scared to do much and embarrassed by its former attempts to gain leverage.

The Obama administration tried very hard to obtain leverage in Syria, in fact. It even sent an ambassador there by circumventing congress in what was considered by many a dirty trick. [1] It made an effort to restart the Israeli-Syrian peace track, which can also be regarded as a way to get closer to both, and to gain additional traction with Syria. “For both Syria and Israel, the ‘secret peace talks’ between them have proven to be the best button they can press to reset their relations with Washington. The trick has always worked,” writes the website Now Lebanon.

Now, however, the administration is caught in a bind – between the conflicting interests of its allies, but also between ideological forces that govern American political thought. In a sense, it is a manifestation of what American think-tank Stratfor calls “the relation of the American Empire to the American Republic and the threat the empire poses to the republic” – [2] it juxtaposes the need for foreign policy expansion (or at least prevention of contraction) with the democratic ideal that teaches that sovereignty rests with the people, both at home and abroad.

For all his goodwill towards Assad (or addiction to non-confrontational leverage), Obama cannot simply overlook the brutal repressions – at least not while they are happening and while he is bombing Libya in order to “save civilians” from another repressive government.

Beside that, he would lose any remnant of international credibility in that arrangement of events, the American president would face a serious internal challenge from within his own power base in the Democratic Party. Tanks rolling over crowds and snipers shooting protesters are the kinds of things that the Soviet Union was once famous for, and that a sincere Democrat could not live with.

Foreign pressures are also pulling the White House in opposing directions. Saudi Arabia, which Syrian and Iranian sources have accused of stirring the unrest, seems intent on taking advantage of it to weaken Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Egypt is quietly benefiting as well. Israel and Turkey, two other close American allies, cringe at the possibility of Syria falling into anarchy, justifiably worried that the violence could spill in some form into their own territories.

The European Union is pushing for sanctions, France once again leading with calls for “strong measures”. (Surprise? At least the French show consistency.) This time, however, Russia and China took no chances and vetoed outright on Wednesday a United Nations Security Council statement condemning the crackdown. “A real threat to regional security could come from outside interference,” the Russian deputy UN ambassador, Alexander Pankin, said during the discussions, quoted by al-Jazeera.

Russia has a lot at stake in Syria – not least its only naval port in the Mediterranean, Tartus, is in Syria and Russia has been expanding and renovating it for some years now. Syria is a long-standing Russian (previously Soviet) ally in the Middle East, and a Russian weapons client. Besides, the Russians (and the Chinese) are incensed by how the UN Security Council Resolution 1973 was stretched endlessly to justify operations aimed effectively at regime change in Libya, and are looking for a way to get back at the Europeans and the Americans.

According to some sources, there is also a growing domestic pressure on Russian leaders to respond more forcefully to the Arab uprisings and to assert a Russian brand of imperialist policies.

So far, the Obama administration has been threading carefully and uncertainly, in its own version of foreign policy consistency. It called for “targeted sanctions” against the Syrian regime, but stopped short of pulling out its ambassador – something that is certain to generate further domestic controversy. It also pointed a finger at Iran for helping quell the protests in a move that was probably aimed to shift some of the blame for the crackdown onto the Islamic Republic and to drive a wedge between it and whoever comes on top in Syria.

In support of this position stands the circumstance that it is unclear what exactly is going on in Syria. The situation is murky and fraught with tensions, giving rise to many conspiracy theories (some of which are at least partially true, in all likelihood). Besides the alleged Saudi, Jordanian, American or Israeli plots (depending on whom you ask), information is circulating about Iranian officers commanding Syrian troops in the crackdowns.

A source in Syria told Stratfor that “Many are still placing hope in Habibna [literally “Our Love”, a nickname for the president] to bring about enough reforms to placate the demonstrators,” even though privately they acknowledged that this would be a tall order and “major, major concessions” would be needed “quickly”. The source, however, cast doubts on the protesters as well:

Support for the protests is mixed. Many of those out in the streets are there because someone close to them was killed. Think tribal mentality: I wasn’t mad at you before but you killed my cousin/brother/friend and now I am mad. People are gathering to defend their honor … There is almost no organization inside Syria among the protesters. I asked several people and they agreed that the Muslim Brotherhood was almost non-present in the country. All that is coordinated is information being leaked out about the responses by the security forces against the protesters.

This report, although considered unconfirmed by Stratfor, resonates loosely with many other reports that are coming through the tight informational blockade on the country. It deserves noting that the opposition mastered just enough unity and organization on Wednesday to threaten to “destroy” the regime, and that some more speculative reports suggest that it has gotten hold of anti-tank missiles.

Meanwhile, as the crackdown intensifies (night raids, tank fire, snipers, gangs, to mention a few types of terror to which Syrians are subjected), the army has held its discipline and obedience to the regime remarkably, but signs of dissent have emerged in the political ranks.

According to reports, some 200 members of the ruling Ba’ath party resigned on Wednesday. Tribalism also rears its ugly head: according to the Stratfor source quoted above, “Everyone is thinking along their sect even if they aren’t open about it.” All this casts doubts on the army’s continued loyalty to the regime should the unrest continue for much longer, especially given that the majority of the soldiers are Sunni Muslims serving a minority Alawite regime.

Given that such powerful players as Russia, China, Israel and Turkey are opposed to an intervention of any form, the wait-and-see approach makes sense as short-term tactics, even though it is morally dubious and cannot replace a longer-term strategy that so far has not emerged from the White House. This approach, moreover, while it also carries dangers, has attracted a number of other followers.

For example, Egypt could expect to gain from a prolonged crisis – not least in traction with the Palestinians, whom it apparently managed to convince to reconcile on Wednesday. Hamas is shaken by the instability of its main patron, Syria – some analysts speculate it might even be looking for alternative locations for its headquarters.

It is also pulled apart by its solidarity with its kin Muslim Brotherhood movement in the country and by its own needs for protection and sponsorship against Israel. This would theoretically push it closer to Egypt’s orbit (not least now that the Muslim Brotherhood is a prominent power in Egypt as well), and would explain why it would be more accommodating to its rival Fatah.

Egypt would gain vis-a-vis Iran as well, but after Hosni Mubarak’s departure that relationship has moved away from a straight-forward enmity. Last week, Iran appointed an ambassador to Egypt after a hiatus of more than 30 years. In another report, Stratfor commented: “Establishing ties with Iran also allows Egypt to undercut Syria, which thus far is the only Arab state to have close relations with the Persian Islamist state.”

Finally, Egypt would gain with respect to Turkey (Syria is key to Turkey’s influence in the Arab world), on the one hand, and Israel and Jordan (via the Palestinians; among other things, Egypt has been seeking to renegotiate a natural gas contract with both countries).

Lebanon also must be mentioned. For it, the wait-and-see approach is the only viable option. Hezbollah, in particular, faces a dilemma. On the one hand, it is undoubtedly threatened, because Syria is crucial for resupplying it with arms from it main patron, Iran.

On the other hand, however, over the past months and years the relationship between Assad and the Lebanese militant organization has gradually soured. On several occasions, Damascus reportedly pulled it in so as to prevent it from taking over the country by force.

The Syrian regime has always seen Lebanon as “its” territory and tried to prevent any player in the country from becoming too powerful. This would explain also the alleged hesitations that Assad had when considering using Hezbollah’s help to quell the protests – this would give the militant organization an unwelcome foothold in Syria.

The Syrian crisis further intensifies a growing identity dilemma that Hezbollah faces. According to many sources, the organization is pulled apart by its Lebanese and its pro-Iranian Shi’ite identities, not least in the context of a Sunni-Shi’ite crisis emerging in the entire region. Moreover, despite its military and organizational strength, Hezbollah has not fared very well in its political ambitions. After it toppled the government of prime minister Saad Hariri (a close Saudi ally) earlier this year, it was unable to help the candidate it supported, Najib Mikati, to form a new one.

“This crisis,” writes journalist Zvi Bar’el in the Israeli daily Ha’aretz, “has put Hezbollah in an uncomfortable political position; when there is no government, there is no one on whom to exert pressure, there is no one from whom to ‘demand a price’, and there is no way to promote its political interests.”

If the Syrian crisis continues, however, and unless Hezbollah’s military strength is degraded by some sort of military campaign, exposing its weakened supply line, the organization stands to gain. It would most likely get a window of opportunity to reshape realities inside Lebanon, not so much by brute force (there are two many trigger-happy peacekeepers out there with a responsibility to protect) as by covert actions and threats.

It could also, in a more fanciful scenario, expand into Syria proper, and why not even in North Africa (from where consistent reports of its activity arrive). All this, however, would require a careful planning process and a redefinition of the organization’s core identity of a local resistance movement, which would take some time.

It is important to watch the behavior of Iran with respect to this process, as Hezbollah is an important part of Iranian deterrence vis-a-vis any potential attack, and it will invariably try to draw the militant organization closer into its orbit.

As a whole, the intensifying Syrian unrest is sending shockwaves throughout the entire Middle East and beyond. For now, most of the big players have adopted a wait-and-see policy, but it is a silence fraught with tension that is untenable beyond the short run. Meanwhile, there is a considerable risk of a regional escalation, and that Syria soaks in blood. Competent global leadership seems nowhere in sight.

Notes
1. Barack Obama appoints first US ambassador to Syria since 2005, The Daily Telegraph, December 31, 2010.
2. What Happened to the American Declaration of War?, Stratfor, March 29, 2011.

Victor Kotsev is a journalist and political analyst based in Tel Aviv.

‘Syria, Hezbollah to compete over firing Scud at Tel Aviv’.

  If war breaks out between Israel, Syria, and Hezbollah, Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime will “play powerful cards” in south Lebanon and will not hesitate to respond, senior security officials in Syria said, according to the Kuwaiti newspaper Al Rai.

According to the officials, in case of war with Israel, Syria and Hezbollah will compete with each other over who will fire the first Scud or Fateh missile at Tel Aviv.

The Syrian officials also warned that the deteriorating security situation in Syria and damage to the country’s stability may also have an effect on the situation in Iraq, Jordan, and Lebanon.

They added that it will be very difficult to topple the Assad regime, which has moved from a defensive position to an offensive one.

The comments by the Syrian officials comes after a European push for the UN Security Council to condemn Syria’s violent crackdown on anti-government protesters was blocked on Wednesday by resistance from Russia, China and Lebanon, envoys said.

Meanwhile, Syrian forces tightened their gripover several hot spots of unrest on Wednesday, as troops poured overnight into a Damascus suburb, tanks patrolled the volatile city of Deraa and security men surrounded Banias on the coast.

Palestinian unity could end Israel’s ‘ruthless’ occupation, Iran official says – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Iranian FM hails reconciliation agreement between rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas, encourages the factions’ resistance against Israel.

By Haaretz Service and Reuters

The Iranian government wholeheartedly supports the reconciliation of Palestinian political parties Fatah and Hamas that was announced on Wednesday night, Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported on Thursday.

Iran also commended the new Egyptian government on its role in helping to mediate the agreement of Palestinian national unity, heralding it as a diplomatic achievement, according to Iranian Foreign Minister Dr. Ali-Akbar Salehi.

	Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi speaking in Ankara, January 17, 2011.
	Photo by: AP

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah movement hammered an historic reconciliation deal with the rival Hamas group on Wednesday, agreeing to form an interim government and fix a date for general election within the year.

The deal, which took many officials by surprise, was thrashed out in Egypt and followed a series of secret meetings. A Hamas spokesman said that representatives of Fatah and Hamas would soon travel to Egypt to sign documents that would officially authorize the agreement.

Salehi credited resistance to Israel and the unity of the people as being the two guiding principles that provided the basis for the Fatah-Hamas agreement. “Observing these two necessities would lead to the materialization of the Palestinian nation’s absolute rights,” he said.

Salehi said that he hoped the unity agreement would lead to triumph over entities that he termed “ruthless occupiers,” presumably referring to Israel and possibly the United States. Salehi also said that he hoped that the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt would soon be opened to Palestinian traffic, allowing the free flow of goods.

Fatah’s unity government with Hamas collapsed during a five-day civil war in 2007 and ended with the Islamic militant group seizing power in the Gaza Strip. Since then, Palestinians have been divided between rival governments in the West Bank and Gaza, two territories they hope to turn into an independent state.