WarSclerotic

Fall of Assad will Break Syria-Iran Axis: Meridor – Middle East – News – Israel National News.

Dan Meridor

Israel news photo: Flash 90

The fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad will break the Iranian-Syrian axis and will be good for Israel, Intelligence Minister Dan Meridor told Army Radio Sunday morning.

“There is an Assad-Ahmadinejad axis, a Tehran-Damascus axis. Breaking this axis would be good for Israel,” said Meridor, who is on the left flank of the Likud party.

“We are not giving advice,” he added. “Practically the whole Arab world is against the regime. We have to wait to see what will happen.”

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu appointed Meridor to a Cabinet position after the last elections, despite his views that favor ceding most, if not all, of the strategic Golan Heights to Syria in return for a peace treaty.

Meridor said the IDF is prepared for a Syrian attack on Israel intended to take attention off his brutal suppression of the year-long uprising, but he asserted, “I don’t think that is on the agenda.”

Thousands of refugees and army deserters have fled from Syria into Jordan and Lebanon, and the government, and the IDF has said it is prepared to absorb thousands of Syrians.

If Assad loses power, tens of thousands of his Alawite loyalists may want asylum in another country out of fear of reprisals from the majority. The Alawite sect is an offshoot of Shi’ite Muslims, which reject several of its planks.

Netanyahu: Upcoming meeting with… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

By Marc Israel Sellem

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Sunday that his upcoming meeting with US President Barack Obama in Washington scheduled for March 5 will largely center around Iran’s continued development of its nuclear program.

Speaking at the opening of the weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday, Netanyahu said, “Our region is volatile and quickly changing in the North, South and East, including the atrocious massacre we are seeing in Syria against innocent civilians. All of these subjects will be raised at the meeting, but one issue will be central: the increasing power of Iran.”

Netanyahu’s comments came after the International Atomic Energy Agency released a report on Friday, which said that Iran has sharply stepped up its controversial uranium enrichment drive.

The IAEA report to member states showed Iran had carried out a significant expansion of activities at its main enrichment plant near the central city of Natanz, and also increased work at the Fordow underground facility.

Enriched uranium can be used to fuel nuclear power plants, which is Iran’s stated aim, or provide material for bombs if refined much further, which the West suspects is Tehran’s ultimate aim.

Netanyahu stated on Saturday that the IAEA report proves that Iran is continuing its nuclear program “without let-up,” despite interantional sanctions levied against the Islamic republic.

Iran “is enriching uranium to a high level of 20%, while grossly ignoring the demands of the international community,” Netanyahu said in a written statement.

Netanyahu was scheduled to travel to the United States next week, where he will address the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC’s annual policy conference, which will be held from March 4-6. The March 5 meeting between Netanyahu and Obama will mark the first face-to-face-conversation between the leaders since they met on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in September.