WarSclerotic

France announces, withdraws solo… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

(I should have known better than to feel good about the French. – JW)

    PARIS – France’s Foreign Ministry first suggested and then “clarified” a policy to impose a unilateral ban on imports of oil from Iran, making clear on Thursday it would only act over Tehran’s nuclear program in coordination with European Union partners.

In an initial statement posted on the ministry website, in response to a Reuters question, Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said:

“The interruption of Iranian oil purchases is among the measures proposed by France to its partners. We will apply this at a national level.”

Another spokesman later called the wording ambiguous, adding: “The decision at a national level will be in coordination with our European partners.”

Nevertheless the French remarks led to a wave of comment across Europe showing determination to toughen sanctions — a drive that is likely to be central to an EU foreign ministers’ meeting on Dec. 1.

“We are discussing wide-ranging sanctions (on) Iran with partners in the EU,” a UK Foreign Office spokeswoman said, adding Britain expects to announce sanctions on further Iranian “entities and individuals.”

The EU energy commissioner said a ban on Iranian oil imports would not be a problem for the European Union’s energy security.

“This is not a problem. It can be substituted by OPEC and others.” EU Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger said.

While most of Iran’s oil goes to Asia, it still supplies significant volumes to Europe via the Suez Canal.

US government data shows EU countries accounted for 18 pct of Iranian oil purchases in the first half of 2011 or 450,000 bpd. Italy was the leading buyer with 180,000 bpd, Spain took 137,000 bpd and France 20,000 bpd.

The director of Italy’s national oil industry body said Italian sanctions on imports of Iranian crude were inevitable.

The United States, Britain and Canada on Monday announced new sanctions on Iran’s energy and financial sectors in steps aimed at raising pressure on Tehran to halt its nuclear work, which is internationally thought to have a weapons dimension. Iran says it is aimed at peaceful atomic energy.

France has been pushing hard to convince allies to also impose sanctions on Iran’s oil exports and central bank, despite concerns among other Western governments that such moves could hurt the world economy as well as Tehran.

France bought more Iranian oil in the first half of the year to make up for disruption from Libya.

French oil industry body UFIP said on Thursday France would easily make up for an Iranian crude import shortfall.

Valero’s initial statement was in response to a Reuters question whether the government would force French oil major Total to stop its crude shipping business with Iran.

Shares in Total, France’s biggest oil company, were down 1.6 percent at 34.75 euros by 1536 GMT after accelerating losses to 2 percent in the wake of the ministry’s first statement. The European energy sector was down 1.1 percent at the time.

Arabs give Syria a day to allow monitors; rebel army calls for air strikes on targets.

Al Arabiya

Thursday, 24 November 2011

The Arab League has given Syria a day to sign a protocol allowing monitors into the country or the regional body will press ahead with plans to impose economic sanctions, Egypt’s envoy to the League said on Thursday as Free Syrian Army called for foreign air strikes on “strategic targets” in Syria.

The sanctions could include a suspension of commercial flights to Syria and a halt to dealings with its central bank, the envoy, Afifi Abdul Wahab, told reporters in Cairo, according to Reuters, as Syrian activists told Al Arabiya that as many as 27 civilians were killed by the gunfire of security forces on Thursday.

“Tomorrow is the deadline for Syria to sign. If they don’t sign, the economic and social council (of ministers) will meet on Saturday to discuss economic sanctions,” he said adding that if Syria did not sign foreign ministers would meet again on Sunday to review the proposed sanctions.

 We are not in favor of the entry of foreign troops as was the case in Iraq but we want the international community to give us logistical support 

Free Syrian Army chief Riyadh al-Asaad

Meanwhile, Free Syrian Army chief Riyadh al-Asaad on Thursday called for foreign air strikes on “strategic targets” in Syria as part of a drive to topple the regime, in a telephone interview with AFP.

“We are not in favor of the entry of foreign troops as was the case in Iraq but we want the international community to give us logistical support,” said FSA chief Colonel Asaad, who is based across the border in Turkey.

“We also want international protection, the establishment of a no-fly zone, a buffer zone and strikes on certain strategic targets considered as crucial by the regime,” he said.

In contrast, the leader of the main Syrian opposition group in exile said after talks in Paris on Wednesday that his organization does not want to see rebels launch armed attacks on President Bashar al-Assad’s forces.

Amid fears of the deadly anti-regime protests in Syria since mid-March turning into civil war, Burhan Ghaliun of the Syrian National Council said the FSA should try to avoid direct confrontation with regime troops.

“We would like this army to carry out defensive actions to protect those who have left the (regime’s) army and peaceful demonstrations, but not take on offensive actions against the army,” he said.

Seven military pilots were killed when gunmen attacked their bus in the center of the country on Thursday, opposition sources told AFP.

The attack, carried out by “armed Bedouins,” took place near the city of Palmyra, said an opposition member based in the flashpoint region of Homs, and was claimed by the rebel Free Syrian Army.

At least 11 security force members were killed by army defectors in Syria’s flashpoint city of Homs on Thursday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a statement sent to AFP in Nicosia.

“Eleven soldiers and members of the security forces were killed in skirmishes on Thursday with deserter troops in the Homs region,” the rights group said.

Earlier, the group said at least two civilians were killed when a sniper killed a man in the Bayyada area of Homs, where security forces shot dead another civilian during a raid in Karm al-Zeitoun district.

On Tuesday, six children and five mutinous soldiers were among 34 people killed across Syria, according to the Britain-based group.

Leader of the so-called Syrian Free Army, Col. Riyadh al-Asaad. (File photo)

Meanwhile, France said on Thursday it will seek Arab support for a humanitarian corridor in Syria, the first time a major power pushed for international intervention in the eight-month uprising against President Assad.

Foreign Minister Alain Juppe, who first floated the proposal for humanitarian intervention on Wednesday, gave more details of the plan and said he would propose it to a meeting of Arab League foreign ministers gathering in Cairo to discuss Syria.

Iraq’s foreign minister said Damascus had accepted a plan to send monitors to Syria, seen as a last-ditch attempt to avert Arab League sanctions. There was no immediate confirmation from Syria, according to Reuters.

After months in which the international community has seemed determined to avoid any direct entanglement in a core Middle East country, the diplomatic consensus seems to be changing.

The Arab League suspended Syria’s membership two weeks ago, accusing Assad of failing to fulfill a Nov. 2 pledge to halt the violence and withdraw troops from cities.

This week, the prime minister of regional heavyweight Turkey – a NATO member with the military wherewithal to mount a cross-border operation – compared Assad to Hitler, Mussolini and Qaddafi, and called on him to quit.

Juppe said international monitors should be sent to protect civilians, with or without Assad’s permission. He insisted the proposal fell short of a military intervention, but acknowledged that humanitarian convoys would need armed protection.

“There are two possible ways: That the international community, Arab League and the United Nations can get the regime to allow these humanitarian corridors,” he told French radio on Thursday. “But if that isn’t the case we’d have to look at other solutions … with international observers,”

Asked if humanitarian convoys would need military protection, he said: “Of course… by international observers, but there is no question of military intervention in Syria.”

He added that he had spoken to partners at the United Nations and U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, and would speak later on Thursday to the Arab League. On Wednesday Juppe also embraced the exiled opposition Syrian National Council as a legitimate group that France sought to work with.

In a sign of Paris’ growing frustration at events on the ground, Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said France was particularly concerned with what was happening in the city of Homs, which has become a centre of resistance against Assad.

“Information from several sources tell us that the situation in Homs is particularly worrying. It would appear to be under siege today, deprived of basic materials and experiencing a brutal repression,” he said.

“A way must be found so that this city is supplied with humanitarian aid,” he added.

Washington repeated an appeal on Wednesday for U.S. citizens to leave Syria: “The U.S. Embassy continues to urge U.S. citizens in Syria to depart immediately while commercial transportation is available,” the embassy said on its website.

The U.S. navy said the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush arrived this week in the Mediterranean. It made no reference to the unrest in Syria and said the ship would continue through the Mediterranean en route to the United States.

A Western diplomat in the region said about the U.S. aircraft carrier: “It is probably routine movement but it is going to put psychological pressure on the regime, and the Americans do not mind that.”

“The darkness of the Middle Ages”

Syrians living in Egypt wave a large Syrian national flag and shout slogans against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during a protest before the Arab League foreign ministers emergency meeting, at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo. (Reuters)

Syria’s bloodshed could pitch the Muslim world into “the darkness of the Middle Ages,” Turkish President Abdullah Gul said on Wednesday.

A day earlier, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan criticized the “cowardice” of Assad, once a close ally, for turning guns on his own people.

Erdogan spoke of the fate of defeated dictators from Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini to Muammar Gaddafi, who was lynched by a mob last month at the end of an uprising that ultimately won the support of the West and Arab League states.

Speaking after a meeting with Syria’s opposition National Council on Wednesday, Juppe described it as “the legitimate partner with which we want to work” — the biggest international endorsement yet for the nascent opposition body.

NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu said allies were watching the situation in Syria with great concern, but reiterated that the alliance had no intention to intervene in Syria as it had done in Libya.

“There’s been no request and there is no specific discussion about these proposals,” she said in response to Juppe’s proposal.

She said the situation in Syria could not be compared with Libya, where NATO had a clear United Nations mandate for intervention and support from the Arab League.

The violence in Syria itself showed no signs of abating.

Authorities blame the bloodshed on armed groups, who they say have killed more than 1,100 members of the security forces since the unrest erupted in March. Syria has barred most independent media from Syria, making it difficult to verify accounts from activists and officials.

Thousands of soldiers have deserted the regular army since it started cracking down on the eight-month protest movement, inspired by Arab uprisings which have toppled the leaders of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen.

On Wednesday, state news agency SANA reported funerals of nine soldiers and policemen killed by “armed terrorist groups.”

Assad, 46, seems prepared to fight it out, playing on fears of a sectarian war if Syria’s complex ethno-sectarian mosaic shatters and relying on support of senior officials and the military.

However many experts say Assad, who can depend mainly on the loyalty of two elite Alawite units, cannot maintain current military operations without cracks emerging in the armed forces.

Syria: Iraq’s Muqtada al-Sadr Reported Sending Fighters to Prop Up Assad Regime – International Business Times.

(Photo: REUTERS / Khaled al-Hariri)

Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr reacts during a news conference after meeting with former Iraq’s Prime Minister Iyad Allawi in Damascus July 19, 2010.

By Anissa Haddadi

Iran CIA agent claims ‘linked to… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

 By YAAKOV LAPPIN

    Iran’s claim to arresting 12 CIA agents in its territory is linked to clandestine efforts by Tehran to disperse missiles around the country, a senior Iran analyst in the US told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday.

Professor Raymond Tanter, adjunct scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and founder of the Washington-based Iran Policy Committee, said the Iranians were moving and testing missiles “that would form the first response” to an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear sites.

“The rollup of alleged western spies in Iran involves the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC),” Tanter said, adding that this was an organization which “operates all of Iran’s Scud missiles and provides the military leadership for Iranian missile production.”

“Events in Iran concern surreptitious testing and movement of missiles at an IRGC facility during mid-November to harden and hide them from surprise attack,” he added.

Referring to a mysterious and powerful blast that rocked a missile base on the outskirts of Tehran earlier this month, killing General Hassan Moghaddam, the architect of Iran’s missile program, and at least 16 other Iranian officials, Tanter said, “The accident in Iran is consistent with statements by Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak that Tehran seeks to create a ‘zone of immunity,’ which spreads missile sites around. The goals are to increase the costs of an Israeli first strike, lower the likelihood of success, and decrease the time window of opportunity for Israel to attack Iran.”

Earlier on Thursday, Iran’s IRNA official media outlet said the supposed agents were planning to attack Iranian targets. The report quoted a senior Iranian security official as saying that the alleged spies were planning to carry out espionage attacks to “damage Iran both from inside and outside with a heavy blow, using regional intelligence services.”

“Fortunately, with swift reaction by the Iranian intelligence department, the actions failed to bear fruit,” the official, named as Parviz Sorouri, a member of Iran’s foreign policy and national security committee, added.

Sourouri also said the alleged agents were working with “the Zionist regime.”

Tanter said that “there is a humongous need for human intelligence from inside Iran,” adding, “The best source to complement western intelligence on the IRGC is the main Iranian opposition organization, the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MeK), which is under siege in Iraq but still maintains an effective intelligence network in the Iranian national security establishment.”

On Tuesday, unnamed US officials were quoted by Reuters as saying that Hezbollah too “succeeded in identifying and arresting informants within its ranks who were working for the CIA,” and described the development as an apparent “serious setback for US intelligence.”

“Some former US officials said that the CIA informants, believed to be local recruits rather than US citizens, were uncovered, at least in part, due to sloppy procedures – known in the espionage world as ‘tradecraft,’ – used by the agency,” Reuters said.

Israel’s Closing Window to Strike Iran.

David Makovsky , The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, November 24, 2011

In a revealing interview with CNN last weekend, Israeli defense minister Ehud Barak hinted that Israel and the world may reach the limit of their capacity to effectively strike Iran’s nuclear facilities within as little as six months. His comments suggest that unless additional international sanctions deter Tehran’s nuclear efforts, Israel is increasingly likely to opt for a military option while it still can.

New Statements Reflect Longstanding Concerns – Israel has repeatedly warned of the need to halt the Iranian nuclear program — whether by sanctions or a military strike — in light of its pace and the quantity of enriched uranium it has produced. Yet Barak’s statements mark the first time an Israeli official has made clear that the ability to target the program may be limited by technical capacity, firmly indicating that the window for a military option may be closing.

Whether or not Iran is able to produce a nuclear weapon in the coming years, Barak argued, the regime’s efforts to disperse and fortify its facilities mean that attempted strikes against them are unlikely to have the desired impact after next year. As he explained, “It’s true that it won’t take three years — probably three quarters [of a year] — before no one can do anything practically about it because the Iranians are gradually, deliberately entering into what I call a zone of immunity, by widening the redundancy of their plan, making it spread over many more sites.” When pointedly asked about the date at which a strike becomes impossible, he replied, “I cannot tell you for sure, nor can I predict whether it’s two quarters or three quarters [of a year]. But it’s not two or three years.” Yet he refused to answer direct questions about an Israeli strike, insisting that such a subject should not be discussed on television.

Barak has repeatedly made clear in the past that inaction now guarantees inaction later, since a nuclear Iran would be as untouchable as nuclear North Korea is today. From this perspective, a nuclear Iran would profoundly change the balance of power in the Middle East, intimidating moderate forces and unleashing a regional arms race that could even proliferate nuclear technology to nonstate actors.

If Barak is to be believed, little time remains for sanctions to have the necessary effect. Indeed, the potency and timing of new sanctions are inversely related to the probability of an Israeli military strike. Israel will presumably try to determine whether the latest sanctions are likely to succeed before it loses its ability to attack. And if the window for a strike will close by next fall, waiting until late 2012 to impose even tougher sanctions would already be too late for Israel.

Although there is wide agreement in Israeli decision making circles that sanctions are preferable to a military strike, and that they are better led by the United States in its capacity as a superpower, many Israelis also fear that their allies will eventually abandon them on this issue. And their fears are reinforced when U.S. officials such as Defense Secretary Leon Panetta comment on the inadvisability of a strike. These comments may therefore have the opposite effect than intended, convincing Israel that no one will come to its aid and that it has no other choice but to attack.

Impact of the IAEA Report – If Israel does attack Iranian nuclear facilities in 2012, the turning point in its decisionmaking may have already occurred earlier this month. On November 8, the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Board of Governors endorsed a report citing “credible” information “that Iran has carried out…activities that are relevant to the development of a nuclear explosive device.” Notably, this was the board’s first meeting since the discovery that Iran’s Qods Force had plotted to assassinate the Saudi ambassador on American soil.

David Makovsky is the Ziegler distinguished fellow and director of the Project on the Middle East Peace Process at The Washington Institute.

The above article was published in washingtoninstitute.org on November 22nd, 2011.

France to unilaterally halt impo… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

    PARIS – France will stop importing Iranian oil at a national level as part of a proposal it made to its allies to consider ending purchases from the world’s fifth largest producer, the foreign ministry said on Thursday.

Asked by Reuters whether the French government would force French oil major Total to stop its crude shipping business with Iran, Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said in a written answer, posted on the ministry’s website:

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“The interruption of Iranian oil purchases is among the measures proposed by France to its partners. We will apply this at a national level.”

France turned to Iranian oil in the first half of the year to make up for disruption during the Libyan war. Last year, Iran supplied 2.8 percent of French oil imports, or 1.8 million tons.

In the seven months to July this year, it supplied 1.6 million tons or about 55,000 barrels per day.

European Union Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger said Wednesday that a ban on Iranian oil imports to press Tehran to abandon its nuclear activity would not be a problem for the EU. “It can be substituted by OPEC and others,” he told Reuters.

On Tuesday the head of the National Iranian Oil Company said he had no fear of losing EU markets and that Iranian exports to the European Union were relatively small, with other countries willing to buy.

Report: Russia Sent Syria Advanced S-300 Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News.

missile

morgufile royalty free

Russian warships that have reached waters off Syria in recent days were carrying, among other things, Russian technical advisors who will help the Syrians set up an array of S-300 missiles Damascus has received in recent weeks, a report in the London-based Arabic language Al Quds-Al Arabi said Thursday. Citing sources in Syria and Russia, the paper said that Moscow sees a Western attack on Syria as a “red line” that it will not tolerate.

Despite the mounting opposition in the West and even in the Arab world against Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad for his assaults on protesters seeking to unseat him as leader of the country, Russia maintains its support for Assad, the report said. Russian and Syria military officials are working together to maintain Assad’s rule, and to deflect a possible attack by NATO or the U.S and EU.

Along with the missiles, the report says that Russia has installed advanced radar systems in all key Syrian military and industrial installations. The radar system also covers areas north and south of Syria, where it will be able to detect movement of troops or aircraft towards the Syrian border. The radar targets include much of Israel, as well as the Incirlik military base in Turkey, which is used by NATO.

The S-300 system is regarded as one of the most potent anti-aircraft missile systems available. The system’s radar is able to simultaneously track up to 100 targets while engaging up to 12. Deployment time for the S-300 is five minutes, and they have a very long life span, with no maintenance needed.

Russia had attempted to sell the system to Iran, but that sale was cancelled due to pressure by the U.S. and Israel, with Russia returning Iran’s deposit. According to the report, the Iranians paid for Syria’s S-300 missile system. It is not known if some of the missiles have reached Iran as well.

France calls for ‘secured’ humanitarian intervention in Syria – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Foreign Minister Alain Juppe describes Syrian exiled opposition National Council as ‘legitimate partner with which we want to work.’

By Reuters

France has called for a “secured zone to protect civilians” in Syria, the first time a major Western power has suggested international intervention on the ground in the eight-month uprising against President Bashar Assad.

Foreign Minister Alain Juppe also described Syria’s exiled opposition National Council as “the legitimate partner with which we want to work,” the biggest international endorsement yet for the nascent opposition body.

	A protester facings riot police at Khalidia, near Homs, Syria, November 4, 2011.
	Photo by: Reuters

A spokesman for European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said the EU was ready to engage with the Syrian National Council and other opposition groups, but stressed the need for them to maintain a peaceful, non-sectarian approach.

Asked at a news conference on Wednesday after meeting the SNC president if a humanitarian corridor was an option for Syria, Juppe ruled out military intervention to create a “buffer zone” in northern Syria but suggested a “secured zone” may be feasible to protect civilians and ferry in humanitarian aid.

“If it is possible to have a humanitarian dimension for a secured zone to protect civilians, that then is a question which has to be studied by the European Union on the one side and the Arab League on the other side,” Juppe said.

Further details of the proposal were not immediately available. Until now, Western countries have imposed economic sanctions on Syria but have shown no appetite for intervention on the ground in the country, which sits on the fault lines of the ethnic and sectarian conflicts across the Middle East.

“The French have tried to position themselves in a position of leadership, first with Libya and now here,” said Hayat Alvi, a lecturer in National Security studies, at the U.S. Naval War College. “Military intervention in Syria is a very different prospect of that in Libya, but we could well see an increase in covert action.”

The Arab League has suspended Syria’s membership over the conflict, one of the most important signs of Assad’s isolation, but has shown little appetite for international intervention.

Britain said it welcomed the opportunity to discuss the French proposal and repeated its call for Syria to end human rights violations.

Ashton’s spokesman said the EU foreign policy chief had met this week with leaders of the Syrian National Council. “The EU stands ready to engage with the Syrian National Council and other representative members of the opposition who adhere to non-violence and democratic values,” he said.

Addressing the need for a humanitarian response, he said: “Protection of civilians in Syria is an increasingly urgent and important aspect of responding to the events in the country.”

Darkness of the Middle Ages

Syria’s bloodshed could pitch the Muslim world into “the darkness of the Middle Ages,” Turkish President Abdullah Gul said on Wednesday.

A day earlier, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan criticized the “cowardice” of Assad, once a close ally, for turning guns on his own people. Erdogan spoke of the fate of defeated dictators from Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini to Muammar Gadhafi, and bluntly told Assad to quit.

In Brussels, an EU diplomat said European Union governments were considering a new range of sanctions against Syria that would bar investment in Syrian banks, trading its government bonds and selling insurance to state bodies.

Gul told a think-tank in London: “We exerted enormous efforts in public and behind closed doors in order to convince the Syrian leadership to lead the democratic transition.”

“Violence breeds violence. Now, unfortunately, Syria has come to a point of no return,” he said. “Defining this democratic struggle along sectarian, religious and ethnic lines would drag the whole region into turmoil and bloodshed.”

The violence in Syria shows no sign of let-up.

Syrian forces killed two villagers on Wednesday in an agricultural area that has served as a supply line for defectors, activists and residents said.

An armoured column entered the town of Hayaleen and surrounding villages on the al-Ghab Plain. Troops fired machineguns from tanks and trucks and set fire to several houses after arresting around 100 people, they said.

The region, northwest of the city of Hama, 240 km north of Damascus, has been a transit route for defectors operating in the province of Idlib near Turkey, activists said.

Two youths were also killed in the central city of Homs, 140-kms north of Damascus, which has become a centre of resistance against Assad. Activists said evening demonstrations were held in several neighborhoods of Homs.

A YouTube video showed a rally being led by a local soccer player. Protesters waved green and white Syrian flags from the era before Assad’s Baath Party took power in a 1963 coup and a woman sang a lament to those who had been killed, while the crowd chanted after her.

In the south, two villagers were killed near the city of Deraa on the border with Jordan, where more tanks and armoured vehicles deployed in the last month after a slew of defections and attacks on loyalist forces, activists said.

It was not possible to confirm the events independently. The authorities, who blame the unrest on “armed terrorist groups,” have barred most independent media from Syria.

Thousands of soldiers have deserted the regular army since it started cracking down on the eight-month protest movement. Some have formed rebel armed units loosely linked to an umbrella “Free Syrian Army” led by officers in Turkey.

Syria army reinforce near border

Syrian defectors say they are hopeful that Turkish troops will create a safe haven within Syria. Defectors say they could use such a zone as a staging ground to mount a rebellion.

Turkey is reluctant to take military action across the border but Turkish officials say they could set up a sanctuary on Syrian territory if huge numbers of refugees head for the frontier or if massacres take place in Syrian cities.

Ground forces commander Hayri Kivrikoglu inspected troops near the border on Tuesday, Turkish state television reported.

Syrian deserters and civilians in refugee camps and villages in Turkey close to the frontier say the Syrian army has reinforced its positions in border areas.

“There are tanks in the valleys, hidden among the trees, and they’ve dug trenches,” Syrian refugee Hamid Fayzo told Reuters in the Turkish village of Guvecci, overlooking the border.

The United Nations says 3,500 people have been killed in the uprising, triggered by Arab revolts which have toppled leaders in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya.

Assad, 46, seems prepared to fight it out, playing on fears of a sectarian war if Syria’s complex ethno-sectarian mosaic shatters.

But many experts say Assad, who can depend mainly on the loyalty of two elite Alawite units, cannot maintain current military operations without cracks emerging in the armed forces

Israel’s policy of nuclear ambiguity won’t be changing for long – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

With El Baradei gone and the Arab countries more conciliatory, Israel’s policy of nuclear opacity won’t be changing for long.

By Yossi Melman

“The sky didn’t fall on us,” admits the Israel Atomic Energy Commission, whose representatives returned from two days of talks at the headquarters of the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna. The subject was a nuclear-weapon-free Middle East.

The meeting they had so much feared was nonbinding and academic. The goal was to learn from other nuclear-weapon-free zones. These five are Africa, Central Asia, Southeast Asia, the South Pacific and Central and South America.

	A 2002 picture of the nuclear resesearch installation in Dimona.
	Photo by: AFP

Israel has taken part in similar meetings in the past. One of them took place in Cairo in August 2010 at the initiative of an international organization headed by the foreign ministers of Australia and Japan. Iranian representatives took part. Another conference, initiated by the European Union, was held in June 2011 in Brussels. But the conference this week in Vienna, with the participation of Israel, Arab states and about 70 other countries, marked the first discussion under the IAEA’s sponsorship on forming a nuclear-weapon-free zone.

Iran boycotted the event, apparently not because of Israel’s participation but because it is angry at the IAEA and Director General Yukiya Amano, who didn’t hesitate to publish a tough report about two weeks ago. The document claims that Iran’s nuclear program includes worrisome military aspects.

For 11 years Israel refused to take part in every forum the IAEA wanted to convene on the issue. The Israeli delegation to the Vienna talks was headed by David Danieli, deputy director of the Israel Atomic Energy Commission. He told Haaretz that Israel expressed its willingness to participate after the agenda and terms of reference were coordinated in advance. The terms of reference included a decision to discuss lessons learned – not only in nuclear-weapon-free zones but also parts of the world where this is no such zone. Europe, for example.

Soft on Iran

But the real reason for Israel’s refusal to take part in a meeting sponsored by the IAEA until now was the person who headed the organization, Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, whose name is now being mentioned as a possible Egyptian president. ElBaradei is seen in Israel – and in Washington and Western European capitals as well – as soft on Iran, someone who closed his eyes to Iran’s military nuclear activities. He is also seen as hostile to Israel. Danieli does not respond directly to the question of whether the change in Israel’s attitude stems from the IAEA’s change in leadership. He prefers to put it this way, without mentioning names: “In previous years the agreement among the countries and the IAEA secretariat that has now made the event possible had not yet formed.” At the meeting, Israel’s representatives were surprised by two interesting developments. One is that the representatives of the Arab countries, headed by Egypt, presented their views in a practical and nonbelligerent tone. Only the Syrian representative, whose country was exposed as having secretly built a reactor to produce nuclear weapons (which was destroyed by the Israel Air Force ) delivered a tough and characteristic speech. He described Israel as a threat to peace and security in the region because it has nuclear weapons and refuses to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Let there be no mistake. The Arab countries have not changed their stance. They would still like to see Israel get rid of what the entire world believes it has: nuclear weapons. But apparently a reason for the moderate and sometimes confused tone of Arab spokesmen is domestic problems. The violent unrest sweeping the Arab world is preoccupying them more than their desire to see nuclear disarmament in Israel. Israel’s nuclear policy is defined as “ambiguous.” The world believes that Israel has nuclear weapons, but Israel has never declared this and repeats the mantra formulated already in the early 1960s by then-Deputy Defense Minister Shimon Peres: Israel will not be the first to introduce nuclear weapons to the region. Nor did Israel sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. From that day it has rejected any international pressure – and the pressure has not been heavy – to join the treaty and let IAEA inspectors check out the nuclear facility in Dimona and other facilities suspected of engaging in nuclear activity for military purposes.

Israel’s many conditions

Israel has never claimed that there is no possibility it will change its nuclear policy one day. But for Israel that’s a vision for the distant future. First, as Danieli said during the discussion, there are several conditions: Every country in the region must recognize Israel, sign peace agreements and make security arrangements with it; only then will it be possible to discuss regional nuclear disarmament. Israel believes that there should also be a simultanenous discussion on eliminating all weapons of mass destruction: biological and chemical weapons and the missiles that launch them.

Israel also points out another issue: How the Middle East’s borders should be defined. Isn’t the status of Pakistan, considered the largest proliferator of nuclear weapons (Pakistan supplied the know-how and technology to Iran, Libya and perhaps Syria ), relevant to the creation of a nuclear-free Middle East? For the Israel Atomic Energy Commission the answer is clear.

The second development that was sweet music to Israeli ears was the stance of most non-Arab countries at the meeting. They gave the impression that they support Israel’s position in principle. The ambassador of a large Western country asked a rhetorical question: Was there ever a situation in which a discussion about promoting a nuclear-weapon-free zone was launched without the countries in the region recognizing one another?

Even the Russian representative, who also spoke in the name of Britain and the United States (the three are considered the NPT’s “trustees” ), said the region won’t be able to become nuclear free without progress in the peace process.

In his summation, Amano praised the “positive atmosphere” and summed up the conference as a “symbolically important” attempt to bring together rival nations, even if no “concrete results” were achieved.

Even after the conference, and perhaps even more emphatically because of it, the Israel Atomic Energy Commission does not intend to recommend a change in Israel’s position. Despite calls for doing so both at home and abroad, Israel will not change its policy of nuclear ambiguity. That may happen only if Iran has nuclear weapons and other countries in the region such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Algeria follow in its footsteps.

Syria | Aircraft Carrier | Bush | The Daily Caller.

USS George H.W. Bush

The USS George H.W. Bush, the Navy’s newest aircraft carrier, has reportedly parked off the Syrian coast. The move comes as the U.S. embassy in Damascus urged Americans to “immediately” leave the country.

“The U.S. embassy continues to urge U.S. citizens in Syria to depart immediately while commercial transportation is available,” began a statement released Wednesday on the embassy website. “The number of airlines serving Syria has decreased significantly since the summer, while many of those airlines remaining have reduced their number of flights.”

In addition to urging citizens to leave the country, CBS News reports that Ambassador Robert Ford, who was recalled from Syria last month due to what the Obama administration called credible threats to his safety, will not return to the country later this month as planned.

Syria’s government has been strongly condemned by the international community following months of state-sponsored violence against political activists protesting the regime of President Bashar al-Assad. The violence is said to have left thousands dead in the country, which is a close ally of Iran and a sponsor of the Islamic terrorist group Hezbollah.

Adding to the sense of danger, Turkey, a NATO member and fierce critic of Assad’s government, recently warned its citizens to avoid traveling through the country after Syrian troops fired on at least two buses carrying Turkish Muslims returning from the annual pilgrimage to Mecca.

Some Arab publications have reported this week that a no-fly zone will soon be put in place over Syria — similar to the one implemented over Libya last spring. And while such reports in the Arab press are often met with skepticism by western observers, the financial news service ZeroHedge flagged down a report from the respected private intelligence company Stratfor stating that CVN 77, better known as the George H.W. Bush, had left the strategically vital Straits of Hormuz for the Syrian coast.

The idea of imposing a no-fly zone over Syria — an increasingly hot topic in Washington, D.C. — was discussed at Tuesday’s CNN Republican debate. Texas Gov. Rick Perry has said he would “absolutely” propose a no-fly zone for the country, but when asked if they would do the same, other Republican presidential candidates remained hesitant.

“This is not the time for a no-fly zone over Syria,” said Romney.