WarSclerotic

Injured in Syrian-Israeli border clashes

Day-long clashes Sunday, June 5, escalated towards evening between Israeli troops ordered to prevent border incursions and hundreds of Syrian-Palestinians throwing rocks and attempting to break through. A mass sit-on the border was threatened after Syrian children were toward the Israeli border and Sunday night, Majd al-Shams youth began stoning Israeli troops from the rear. Israel’s border contingents remained on alert Sunday night for further disturbances from Syria.
Two breaches of the fence occurred during the day at Majd al Shams and Kuneitra on the Golan but the marchers refrained from stepping across into Israel. The breaches occurred during a ceasefire requested by the Red Cross to evacuate wounded.

Later Sunday, many more casualties were reported from a powerful anti-tank mine explosion some 3 kilometers inside Syria. Ambulances were seen heading for Kuneitra hospital.

debkafile reported earlier Sunday:
Israeli troops opened fire during the day when the Syrian advance was not stopped by tear gas, shots in the air, firing aimed at legs and loudspeaker warnings in Arabic that they approached the border on pain of death.

The soldiers used sniper fire against pinpointed targets of individuals trying to damage the fence and two armed men sighted in near the Kuneitra border. The reinforced contingents were ordered to act firmly and with restraint to prevent a recurrence of the mass breaches of Israel’s Syrian, Lebanese, Gaza Strip and West Bank borders on May 15.
The Israel-Syrian fence was repaired and strengthened with coiled razor wire, ditches were dug and signs warning of minefields put up. The IDF declared the entire Golan a closed military zone.

Ahead of Sunday, the Netanyahu government relayed messages to neighboring Arab leaders that Israel would not tolerate any more assaults on its borders.
This latest round of attempted Palestinian incursions was called for June 5 to mark the 44th anniversary of the Arabs armies’ defeat by Israel in the Six-Day War. Syrian TV goaded the demonstrators to sustain their assaults on the Israeli border fence after sending a special crew to cover the event – unlike the Assad regime’s brutal crackdown of dissent against his own regime which is closed to domestic and foreign media. During the day, 28 protesters were shot dead in northwest Syria.

North of Jerusalem, police used rubber bullets, stun grenades and tear gas to push hundreds of stone-throwing rioters back from the Kalandia crossing from the West Bank side.  The Palestinians reported 20 minor injuries.

In Lebanon, the army and UNIFIL combined forces to prevent disturbances near the Israeli border.

It’s still not over for Bashar Assad?

Two unforeseen events Friday, June 3 rekindled Syrian protests with full force – just as Syrian President Bashar Assad was preparing to celebrate his reassertion of authority after suppressing the uprising against his regime with active Iranian and Hizballah help: The leaders of the Syrian opposition-in-exile meeting in Antalya under Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s aegis struck a deal with the Muslim Brotherhood which brought 100,000 Brotherhood loyalists back on the streets in the northern town of Hama.
debkafile‘s military sources disclose: Just as the conference of major Syrian opposition party leaders approached a fruitless ending, the Muslim Brotherhood, consented to introducing a clause in the “National Unity Charter” providing for the separation of religion and state in the guidelines of the post-Assad regime.
The MB made this concession after consulting with the group’s leaders in Cairo and under heavy Turkish pressure.
It means that, even if the Brotherhood, which is banned and persecuted under the Assad regime, does run for election, the regime taking over would not be religious in nature.
This decision is of major significance not only for Syria but also for Egypt, Jordan and the Palestinians where the Muslim Brotherhood has a strong presence.
Word of the Antalya accord flashed through Hama, center of the Brotherhood’s revolt against the Assad family since 1982, and brought half the population out on the streets. Syrian security forces were caught unawares. Someone on the spot or along the higher Syrian and Iranian chain of command in Damascus panicked. An order went out to shoot directly into the crowd and break up the demonstration with maximum casualties. The result of up to 150 dead and 350 injured ignited fresh outbreaks in neighboring Homs, a town of more than 1.2 million inhabitants.

Northern Syria was aflame again after the uprising in the North and most other parts of Syria had largely subsided last week.
Fresh disturbances also hit the southern province of Horan and its capital Deraa a month after unrest there had been suppressed by troops shooting dead more than 500 protesters and injuring thousands. Covert Saudi agents operating from Ramtha in neighboring Jordan managed to whip up fresh anti-Assad riots in Deraa and Deir a-Zur among the Shamar, a nomadic tribe which roams across the Syrian, Jordanian and Iraqi borders and whose center is in northern Saudi Arabia.
The new outbreaks confronted President Assad with a fresh challenge at the very moment that he was polishing his victory speech to celebrate the crushing of the revolt against him.

He must now decide between carrying on with his iron-fist crackdown to douse persistent protests, or rely on the new bloodbath in Hama, Deraa and Deir a-Zur to act as a deterrent against the nationwide revival of mass demonstrations.

The third option, which he threatened earlier in the three-month revolt, would be to re-channel the fury directed against his regime into aggression on the Syrian-Israeli border.