WarSclerotic

Iran reportedly preparing for post-Assad S… JPost – Middle East.

    Iran is reportedly weighing its options in Syria should the beleaguered government of President Bashar Assad succumb to a nationwide popular insurgency now approaching its sixth month.

The French newspaper Le Figaro reported this week that representatives of the Islamic Republic recently met with Syrian opposition figures in a European capital. The Iranians were reportedly trying to assess whether opposition figures are amenable to the current government staying in power should it institute long-demanded reforms, or whether Assad’s ouster would be the only acceptable outcome.

Iran also hoped to gauge the relative strength of Islamist factions within the Syrian opposition, and the position a post-Assad government would have toward Tehran and its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah. The paper reported that Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah had sent out feelers to the Syrian opposition to help ascertain whether it might work with the radical Shi’ite group.

Syrian opposition spokesman Mohammed Al-Abdullah told the Al-Arabiya network this week that the Iranians have already begun making initial efforts at mediating between Syrian authorities and the country’s opposition. Abdullah said he believes Iran is already preparing for Assad’s removal, or at least a scenario in which Assad remains in power but in a severely weakened position.

After months of tacitly supporting Damascus’ crackdown, Iran’s rhetoric on Syria softened in recent weeks, with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad referring recently to the “legitimate demands” of protesters and calling on Assad to respect “people’s right to elect [leaders] and achieve freedom.”

“Iran welcomed the Arab awakening until it arrived in Syria,” , Iran expert Karim Sadjadpour of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said Tuesday. “The violence and brutality in Syria has escalated to such a level that Iran has become forced to acknowledge it publicly.”

Tehran has categorically denied widespread reports that it is training and arming Assad’s security forces, and that it is encouraging its Syrian allies to show no mercy in putting down the uprising.

“If the Assad regime were to be succeeded by a regime in Damascus that was no longer interested in continuing Syria’s patronage of Hezbollah, or was not interested in maintaining the Syrian-Iran alliance, it would be very difficult logistically for Iran to continue its patronage of Hezbollah,” Sadjadpour told the Council on Foreign Relations. “Damascus has really been Iran’s only regional ally since the 1979 revolution. If the Assad regime fell, it would be a tremendous blow to the Iranian regime. And, in particular, the crown jewel of the Iranian revolution is Hezbollah in Lebanon.”

IAF deploys third Iron Dome battery outside As… JPost – Defense.

    The Israel Air Force deployed a third battery of the Iron Dome rocket defense system outside the southern city of Ashdod on Wednesday in the face of continued rocket fire from the Gaza Strip.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who earlier this week said that it would take ten days until the battery was deployed near Ashdod, praised Wednesday the IDF and the IAF air defense divisions for speeding up the deployment to the day before the opening of the new school year.

“The deployment is part of a national emergency plan that I announced several weeks ago and is a demonstration of Israel’s commitment to defend its citizens from rockets and missiles” Barak said.

Ashdod Mayor Yehiel Lasri issued a statement thanking the defense establishment for deploying the system outside of his city. Ashdod has been bombarded by rockets in recent weeks during the current escalation of violence in the South in which over 160 rockets were fired into israel from Gaza.

Israel already had two batteries stationed in the South – one outside of Ashkelon, and one near Beersheba – which successfully intercepted a few dozen rockets during the recent escalation.

By the end of 2012, Barak said that Israel would have nine operational Iron Dome batteries including thousands of Tamir interceptors. Each interceptor costs around $50,000 and usually two are fired at rockets slated for interception.

“This is something that completely changes the way we protect our citizens, who still need standard shelters, but will also increase the government’s operational freedom in the future,” he said.

Earlier this year, the Obama Administration gave Israel $205 million to purchase four more Iron Dome batteries. Each battery consists of three launchers equipped with 20 Tamir interceptors and is reportedly capable of protecting an urban area of approximately 150-square kilometers.

IDF beefing up defenses in south after intelligence warnings of terror attack – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Members of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Popular Resistance Committees are cooperating with Egyptian Islamists, planning to avenge killing of fellow militants during Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip.

By Revital Levy-Stein and Anshel Pfeffer

Israel is beefing up defenses in the south following intelligence that a number of Palestinian terror groups are operating from within Sinai.

Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Benny Gantz ordered the reinforcement of forces all along the border, from the Gaza Strip to the Gulf of Eilat, on Sunday night, following concrete intelligence that a number of cells of militants had entered Sinai through tunnels in Rafah, aiming to carry out attacks on Israeli territory.

	An Israeli army jeep passes by Egyptian soldiers on the Israeli-Egyptian borders on North East Sinai, August 22, 2011.
	Photo by: Reuters

The terrorists who identify themselves with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Resistance Committees are cooperating with Egyptian Islamists and are planning to carry attacks to avenge the killing of their members during Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip over the past two weeks.

The intelligence warnings affect various points along the border and include different type of attacks, including penetration of the border and attacks against Israeli vehicles traveling on highways running close to the border.

An attack earlier this month left eight Israelis dead and dozens wounded after terrorists who had tunneled from Gaza into Egypt attacked buses and cars traveling near the border north of Eilat. Defense sources fear a repeat attack.

Another possible scenario is the launching of rockets against Eilat and other Israeli communities from Sinai.

Despite the warnings, the resort town of Eilat does not appear to be showing any signs of stress. Hotels in the city have not registered any losses and some 5,000 visitors are in town for a Mizrahi song festival.

The presence of security and military forces in the city is noticeable but a military source said that the real military presence is felt along the border with Egypt.

“One should remember that the length of the border is 200 kilometers and that the larger concentration of forces is found northwest of Eilat,” the source said.

In addition to the additional troops deployed along the border, the IDF has also positioned in place various electronic and other intelligence gathering resources.

Communities near the Egyptian border have received bolstered security, while Routes 10 and 12, which run along the border, have been closed.

The army is also preparing for any possible sea-borne attack on Eilat with naval reinforcements along the gulf, including anchoring Israel’s two most advanced missile boats in the port of Eilat.

The two missile boats may also be in the area in anticipation of Iranian naval vessels making their way from the Persian Gulf to the Red Sea, as was reported yesterday in Tehran.

Calm was kept yesterday all along the border with the Gaza Strip and no rockets or mortars were fired at Israel.

Senior Israeli officials have been leaking intelligence on what is known about the terrorists’s plans, both publicly and off the record.

During a visit to an Elbit plant in Sderot, Minister Matan Vilnai made reference to the Ramadan ending-holiday yesterday and said “the Islamic Jihad has been trying for a long time to carry out attacks from Sinai and Id al-Fitr is a good time for them to do so. The defense establishment has intelligence about a plans for an attack by a cell of more than 10 militants. The defense establishment and the IDF are in full readiness in cooperation with Egypt in order to foil these attempts.”

Talks have also been held in recent days at the Defense Ministry on how to expedite the procurement of Iron Dome missile defense batteries in order to protect the south against rockets. Discussions are also focused on the construction of a border fence with Egypt, which according to the current plan is due to be completed in the end of 2012.

Rafael, the main contractor in the Iron Dome project, and ELTA, which produces the system’s radar of the system, have changed their production priorities in order to provide the air force with a third Iron Dome battery in two weeks and a fourth by year’s end.

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

DEBKAfile Special Report August 31, 2011, 9:03 AM (GMT+02:00)

Egypt’s tanks stand idle against terrorists

The Cairo media’s highly colored accounts Monday, Aug. 30 of 1,500 Egyptian commando and tank supposedly raiding Jihad Islami and al Qaeda cells in Sinai are pure fiction, debkafile‘s military sources confirm. Israeli forces along the Gazan and Egyptian borders down to Eilat have been forced to stand for a week at the highest level of preparedness since receiving word that a large group of terrorists had left the Gaza Strip for Sinai on Aug. 24 bent on another attack on southern Israel. The Egyptian army, for its part, is sitting on is hands as the jihadists take up assault positions on its side of the Sinai border.
The group set out from Gaza the day after the head of the Jihad Islami missile and logistics chief Ismail al-Asmar died in a targeted Israeli air strike on the car he was travelling in Rafah.

Israelwent on high terror alert on Aug. 25. Its leaders have repeatedly warned since then that Israel is fully prepared to respond swiftly if attacked.
Tuesday night, the IDF’s Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz said: “Hamas and the other terrorist organizationsin Gaza had better realize that if they harm Israeli citizens we shall hit them hard. Testing our strength would be a mistake.”

Tuesday, Home Front Minister Mattan Vilnai cited information that the at least 10 terrorists were in Sinai getting set to strike southern Israel.

Our sources report he was scolded by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak for letting it be known that the coming Palestinian raid was liable to be bigger than the coordinated highway attacks just north of Eilat of the Aug. 18, in which gunmen shot eight people dead. Limited Israeli reprisal then against Gazan terrorist targets brought forth a 150-missile barrage from Gaza against locations within its constantly expanding range.

For the loss of its logistics chief, the group decided it was not satisfied with heavy missile assaults and plotted a “quality operation” from Sinai.
debkafile‘s intelligence and counter-terror sources report that the absence of Egyptian preventatives and Israel’s passivity in the face of an assault known to be approaching afford the Palestinian terrorist group, which is sponsored and armed by Iran, extra leverage and strategic leeway in its contest with Israel.
Sunday, Aug. 21, after accepting an Egyptian-brokered truce for halting the missile blitz from Gaza, Netanyahu commented that Israel had gained the upper hand: The Palestinians had landed themselves with a new negative equation: Their attacks from Sinai would henceforth incur retaliation in Gaza.
Jihad Islami is now turning this equation on its head by demonstrating that Israeli attacks on Palestinian terrorist targets in the Gaza Strip bring forth Palestinian reprisals from Sinai.
They calculate correctly as it turned out this week that the Egyptian border offers them no obstacle to cross-border terror, whereas Israeli counteraction is stopped short.

Held back from its famous preemptive tactics by Israel’s leaders out of fear of further strains on relations with the military rulers in Cairo, the Israeli army’s deterrent strength is progressively sapped and the pro-Iranian Palestinian terrorists are getting the last laugh even before they strike.
They have wound up holding the initiative in the next round. It is up to them to decide for how much longer – days or weeks – reinforced Israeli units must stay on maximum preparedness and Israel’s main routes to the south, Highways 10 and 12, stay closed to civilian traffic. They can keep Israel on tenterhooks as long as they like before deciding to press the trigger.

Hundreds of Syrian troops enter city of Hama, raid homes.

Al Arabiya

Wednesday, 31 August 2011

Syrians living in Jordan attend a protest rally on the first day of Eid to demand the ouster of President Assad. (Photo by REUTERS)

inShare0

Syrian troops backed by tanks raided houses looking for activists in two main districts of the city of Hama on Wednesday, residents said.

Syrian authorities said the army had withdrawn from Hama this month after a 10-day assault to crush pro-democracy protests against the rule of President Bashar al-Assad, who has sent the military to numerous towns and cities across the country to crush the five-months of street protests.

“Several light tanks and tens of small and big buses parked at Al-Hadid bridge at the eastern entrance of Hama. Hundreds of troops then went on foot into al-Qusour and Hamdiya neighborhoods. The sound of gunfire is being heard,” Abdelrahman, a local activist, told Reuters by phone.

“These neighborhoods have been among the most active in staging protests,” he added.

Another resident said Toyota pick-up trucks mounted with machineguns and buses full of troops also assembled overnight near al-Dahiriya district at the northern entrance of Hama, 205 km (130 miles) north of the capital Damascus.

Hama, on an ancient agricultural plain on the Orontes River, was scene of a 1982 massacre by the military. The city saw some of the largest protests in the current uprising.

Tanks and troops entered the city of 700,000 on the eve of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan on July 31 and according to an activist group killed 130 civilians in the first day of the attack alone.

Troops withdrew after 10 days though and residents reported a resumption of protests, encouraged, like elsewhere in Syria, by the overthrow of Muammar Qaddafi in Libya, with whom Assad had close ties, and increased international pressure on the government.

Assad, from Syria’s minority Alawite sect, has repeatedly said he is using legitimate force to defeat what he says is a foreign plot to divide Syria.

State television aired an audio recording on Tuesday of what it said were two terrorists. It said the tape revealed “a full agenda of provocation and targeting police and army camps and terrorizing peaceful citizens in the name of freedom and non-violence”.

Foreign media were expelled from Syria after the uprising began in March, making verification of reports difficult.
In the northwestern province of Idlib on the border with Turkey, troops shot dead one villager, Hazem al-Shihadi at a checkpoint overnight near the town of Kfaruma where there has been increased army defections, activists said.

Demonstrations broke out across the country on Tuesday after prayers to mark the end of Ramadan, notably in Damascus suburbs, the city of Homs, 165 km (100 miles to the north) and the northwestern province of Idlib, activists and residents said, adding that security forces shot dead four demonstrators in the southern Deraa province, who included a 13-year-old boy.

“The people want the downfall of the president,” protesters shouted in the Damascus suburb of Harasta, where activists said dozens of soldiers defected at the weekend after refusing to shoot at the crowds.

The Obama administration froze the US assets of Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem and two other Syrian officials on Tuesday in response to the crackdown.

Opposition figures in Syria see international pressure as crucial to stripping Assad of legitimacy and in helping raise the momentum of protests.

In a report published on Tuesday, the Syrian Revolution Coordinating Union grassroots activists’ group said Assad’s forces killed 551 people during the month of Ramadan.