WarSclerotic

Oil, gas discovered off Tel Av…JPost – Business – Business News.

US nuke expert identifies Iran e… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

Poll: Most Americans support US strike o… JPost – International.

By Amos Ben-Gershom/GPO

WASHINGTON – A majority of Americans would support US military action against Iran if there were evidence that Tehran is building nuclear weapons, even if such action led to higher gasoline prices, a Reuters/Ipsos polled showed on Tuesday.

The poll showed 62 percent of Americans would back Israel taking military action against Iran for the same reasons.

US President Barack Obama has said all options are on the table in dealing with Iran’s nuclear program. Iran says its nuclear program is peaceful.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll showed 56 percent of Americans would support US military action against Iran if there were evidence of a nuclear weapon program. Thirty-nine percent of Americans opposed military strikes.

Asked whether they would back US military action if it led to higher gasoline prices, 53 percent of Americans said they would, while 42 percent said they would not.

For the first time since early July, more Americans approve of the job Obama is doing than disapprove, according to an additional Reuters/Ipsos poll that shows his approval rating now at 50 percent.

The poll, taken March 8-11 on the heels of reports that 227,000 jobs were added to the US economy in February, indicates that Obama’s rating has risen by 2 percentage points during the past month. The percentage of Americans who disapprove of the Democratic president was 48 percent, down from 49 percent in February.

Some other polls have shown a recent dip in Obama’s approval rating, and linked that to rising gasoline prices.

But for most Americans, other economic trends during the past month have been relatively positive. Obama appears to be benefiting from that, and perhaps from a bitter Republican presidential campaign that at times has focused on divisive social issues such as abortion.

“The economy is improving,” said Ipsos pollster Cliff Young. “Not by leaps and bounds but people feel that things are getting better.”

The Ipsos/Reuters poll also found that Americans’ confidence in the direction of the country is ticking upward. In the poll, 37 percent of those surveyed said the United States is headed in the right direction, up from 32 percent in February.

The Reuters/Ipsos telephone poll of 1,084 adults included 937 registered voters, of whom 554 were Democrats, 421 Republicans, and 109 independents

The poll’s margin of error was plus or minus 3.1 percentage points for all respondents; 3.3 points for registered voters; 4.2 points for Democrats; 4.9 points for Republicans, and 9.8 points for independents.

Obama’s Confusing Policy On Iran’s Nukes.

One of the most frightening possibilities that world has faced in the last 25 years is that of Iran obtaining Nuclear Weapons. Iran is already the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism and one can only imagine what could happen if Iran’s Mullah’s allowed al-Qaeda, Hamas, Boko Harum or Islamic Jihad to get their hands on a nuclear device or radioactive material.

Iran has repeatedly threatened to wipe Israel off the map and they have shown equal hostility their Arabic Muslim cousins in countries like Saudi Arabia. The belligerence and religious fanaticism that is the mainstay of Iranian political dialogue should make any freedom loving nation cringe at the idea of Iran going nuclear.

Yet, the Iranians are still defiant about their nuclear program and they have repeatedly prevented the IAEA from inspecting the various secret installations hidden in remote bases through out Iran. Despite crippling international sanctions and non-stop pressure from the Group Of Six Western Powers, Iran has continued to hurtle down the path towards obtaining a bomb.

Israel is alarmed to say the least. Jews remember all too well what happened the last time a lunatic said he would exterminate the Jewish people. Six million Jews along with over 35 million other human beings died at the hands of Adolph Hitler and his friends. Israel’s policy is clear. If a nation makes threats to wipe Israel off the map and exterminate the Jews, Israel will do everything in its power to prevent that from happening. Netanyahu has made it clear that every option, including attacking Iran, is on the table and he has stated over and over that Israel simply will not allow Iran to build a nuclear bomb.

That brings us to the unsettling question of the policies of Obama, who many feel is the most anti-Israel President in American history. The jury may still be out on whether or not this is the case, but he is certainly sending very confusing signals about American intentions towards Iran.

Obama is up for re-election and he is using every political trick in the book to try to sell himself as worthy of a second term. He is going out of his way to separate his supporters into racial and ethnic groups in order to tailor his message to appeal to their specific issues. He launched African Americans for Obama in February, 2012 and he has made several appearances and speeches at Mexican American gatherings, where he told Latinos, ‘We’re going to punish our enemies.” Sadly, Obama was referring to  Republicans as the enemy.

Obama is also courting rich Liberal, Jewish donors for financial support. In the last few weeks, he put in highly visible appearances in front of powerful Jewish Groups like AIPAC and he hosted several big ticket, private fund raisers for important Jewish donors.

When speaking to Jewish groups, Obama makes every effort to sound tough on Iran. He told AIPAC that “He has Israel’s back and then went on to say, “No Israeli government can tolerate a nuclear weapon in the hands of a regime that denies the Holocaust, threatens to wipe Israel off the map, and sponsors terrorist groups committed to Israel’s destruction. He topped off this tough talk by saying that he affirms “Israel’s sovereign right to make its own decisions.”

While this all makes for great campaign rhetoric, Obama then went on to propose yet another round of talks with Iran. Not only has the date for the talks not been set but first, negotiations will have to take place to decide on the location of the talks. Iran took Obama and the Western Powers for a ride 14 months ago. After stalling for months, Iran showed up at the last round of talks with no serious intention of negotiating and then walked out. Going down the same path again will just give Iran another 6 months to a year to forge ahead with their nuclear program. Meanwhile, Obama makes pretty speeches full of false bravado with lines like “Iran’s leaders should have no doubt about the resolve of the United States” and “I don’t Bluff.”  Then 48 hours later, he explains to a press conference that his comments were just a “historical reference” to supporting traditional American allies.

Even more alarming than the clever rhetoric is what Obama officials having been saying behind the scenes. One well placed Obama administration official told the Washington Post ““We’re trying to make the decision to attack as hard as possible for Israel.” Then Obama’s Director of National Intelligence, when asked by a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee if sanctions would have any effect on stopping Iran’s Nuclear Program, replied, “No. None whatsoever.”

After all these confusing messages from the Obama Administration, Israeli leaders must be about ready to rip their hair out in frustration, As noted reporter and author, Charles Krauthammer, said this week in his column, “The world’s greatest exporter of terror (according to the State Department), the systematic killer of Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan, the self-declared enemy that invented “Death to America Day” is approaching nuclear capability – and the focus of US policy is to prevent a democratic ally threatened with annihilation from pre-empting the threat?”

American voters and the citizens of Israel deserve better from Mr. Obama and his Administration. It would be unconscionable if Obama is really playing politics with the Iranian nuclear issue. While the threat is vague and far away for America, Israel is within easy reach of Iran. A country that is the size of New Jersey simply could not survive a nuclear attack.

When it comes to Iran, Obama needs to advocate a serious, effective policy to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear bomb. This policy must have a realistic time limit and serious consequences should Iran remain defiant. The 5 million Israeli Jews, the 1.5 million Israeli Arabs and the countries that border Israel, all deserve a sincere effort by Obama to derail Iran’s nuclear ambitions once and for all. The entire planet will be a much safer place is Iran does not join the Nuclear club. Obama needs to stop the campaign rhetoric and get serious about Iran before the Middle East goes up in a nuclear fireball.

Netanyahu’s ‘catastrophe law’ prevents an Iran strike – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

The politician understands that in order to prevent a future catastrophe, he must generate a small crisis immediately.

By Nehemia Shtrasler

To survive in our political jungle, we must stick to a number of fundamental rules or laws. One of the more obvious ones is the “catastrophe law,” which states that a politician will never act to prevent a future catastrophe, even if he is certain it is impending.

The reason he won’t prevent it is not because he is evil or indifferent, but because the public would not appreciate it. The politician understands that in order to prevent a future catastrophe, he must generate a small crisis immediately. But the moment he creates the small crisis, the entire public will blame him for the unpleasant consequences. He will be declared a failure and one who panics easily, and will pay a heavy political price. Nobody will give him credit for preventing a catastrophe because no catastrophe took place.

Before examining the Iranian situation vis-a-vis the catastrophe law, here are two examples to prove it, one economic and the other military. The economic example pertains to the banking crisis of 1983. Yaakov Gadish, the treasury budgets commissioner, realized back in 1981 that the banks’ share manipulation needed to be stopped. Gadish told then Finance Minister Yoram Aridor that the share manipulation must be stopped because that huge balloon would blow up one day and bring the whole economy down with it.

Aridor said fine, but first get the bankers’ agreement to an orderly cessation of the manipulation. Gadish spoke to the bankers, but not all of them consented. He returned to Aridor and insisted that the treasury halt the manipulation unilaterally. But Aridor wasn’t too keen. Being all too familiar with the catastrophe law, he knew that if he stopped the manipulation by himself, the bankers and public would accuse him of killing the goose that laid the golden eggs and made us all rich (on paper ). Nobody would credit him with preventing a catastrophe, which indeed came two years later in October 1983.

The military example regards the Yom Kippur War. Imagine if Golda Meir had come to her senses and ordered a preemptive strike on the Egyptian and Syrian armies in October 1973. Most of the public (and the whole world ) would have condemned her for warmongering. They would have claimed the other side was only conducting a drill and she, gripped by hysteria, had caused an unnecessary war in which dozens of soldiers had died. Who would have understood, let alone accepted, that by so doing, Golda would have prevented the Yom Kippur War and its 2,569 IDF fatalities?

Now for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Iran. If Netanyahu strikes Iran, he will break the catastrophe law, because he will be creating a small crisis to prevent a future catastrophe. The missiles expected to fall on Tel Aviv are nothing compared to the danger of Iran’s nuclear missiles. And all this is even before the significant change expected to occur in Israel’s strategic situation with regard to Syria and Hezbollah in the north and Islamic Jihad in the south, at the moment Iran turns into a nuclear power.

Some argue against attacking Iran, because it is impossible to know if the strike will destroy Iran’s nuclear capability, especially since it is not certain whether Iran will attack Israel when it has nuclear weapons. They err in understanding their leaders’ responsibilities. The leaders’ entire role should be to assess the risks involved in dire future scenarios in an uncertain world. If they find that a future catastrophe which will cause enormous damage is possible, it is their duty to act now – even if the probability is low. Sometimes a leader must initiate a small war in order to prevent a big catastrophe in the future. That is precisely what his duty is.

The easiest thing is to frighten the public by discussing all the risks involved in an attack on Iran, without mentioning the consequences of not carrying out such an attack. For example, was then Prime Minister Ehud Olmert right to attack (according to foreign sources ) a nuclear facility in Syria in 2007? He too took a huge risk.

All this does not mean Israel should attack Iran now. In any case, the chances of that happening are slim, simply because Netanyahu knows the catastrophe law all too well.

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report March 13, 2012, 4:35 AM (GMT+02:00)

Palestinian Grad lands on Beersheba outskirts

A high-ranking Egyptian official reported before dawn Tuesday, March 13, that Israel and the Palestinian organizations in Gaza, including Jihad Islami and the Popular Resistance Committees, had agreed to a ceasefire which went into effect at one o’clock a.m. Neither Israel nor Jihad Islami released statements of a truce. And shortly after 0400 missile warnings sounded in Ashkelon.
The initial Egyptian statement remains to be clarified. It interprets the Israeli position as having accepted Jihad’s condition for halting its missile barrage and agreed to halt targeted killings of high-profile terrorists.
All Israeli defense officials affirmed in backdoor negotiations with Egyptian intelligence officials, debkafile’s sources report, was its standard position: If the Palestinians halt cross-border attacks from the Gaza Strip and Egyptian Sinai, there will be no need for targeted killings. And if the Palestinians stop shooting missiles from the Gaza Strip, the Israeli Air Force will have no reason to strike terrorist targets.
An Egyptian delegation has reportedly arrived in Gaza to discuss with the strip’s Hamas rulers terms for restoring fuel supplies, shortages of which have forced them to severely ration power to the population. Cairo has kept Gaza short in order to squeeze Hamas into pulling the military facilities and units it deployed in northern Sinai back into the Gaza Strip.
Egyptian officials deny their delegates offered to resupply Gaza as part of the still-shadowy ceasefire deal. It is possible, say our sources, that Cairo used it as leverage to make Hamas to force the pro-Iranian Jihad Islami to stop firing missiles and slow – if not abandon –  its four-day offensive on Israel’s towns and villages.
debkafile: For the Cairo-Hamas truce maneuver to work, all the parties involved must give ground: Israel must tacitly leave Jihad with the unspoken prerogative for deciding when Israel has violated the “deal” and responding with a fresh missile offensive; Jihad undertake to halt its terrorist operations against Israel from Sinai – albeit shrugging off responsibility if its networks go into action to duplicate former attacks on Israel. Because Egypt must give up for now its most pressing demand to recover control of northern and central Sinai from the Hamas and Jihad Islami forces which have overrun parts of the peninsula.
It is therefore hard to see how this loose patchwork of deals – if they are indeed finalized – can hold up for long.

debkafile reported earlier Monday, March 12:
The combined Egyptian-Israeli-Hamas effort to negotiate an early ceasefire in the current round of Palestinian-Israeli violence struck several major obstacles Monday, March 12:  debkafile’s intelligence sources report a Cairo demand for any truce deal to embody a Palestinian Hamas and Jihad Islami commitment to withdraw their forces from Sinai and stop using the peninsula for terrorist operations against Israel. Egypt’s military rulers are resolved to use this opportunity to chase the terrorists out and restore their control over Sinai.
However, Palestinian leaders, including Hamas, are playing innocent, claiming to the Egyptian mediator Intelligence chief Gen. Murad Muwafi that they have no armed presence in Sinai and would never impair Egyptian sovereignty.

Four days into the Gaza violence, this impasse has brought the mediation effort to a close.
debkafile’s military sources report that acceding to Cairo’s demand would oblige the Palestinian terrorist organizations to dismantle the logistic, operational and military infrastructure they have built in Sinai.  Hamas has even transferred all its weapons manufacturing, including missiles, from the Gaza Strip where it was vulnerable to Israeli attack to safe locations in northern Sinai, along with its training facilities.
This tactic has worked: Most of Hamas’ military facilities were out of reach of Israeli Air Force bombings in the current round of violence because none remained in the Gaza Strip, except for a forward position.
The Egyptian ultimatum would require Hamas to pull its military machine and weapons production back into the Gaza Strip and Jihad Islami to evacuate its terrorist networks which carried out a cross-border attack last August killing 8 Israelis and were preparing a follow-up.
Another obstacle on the road to a ceasefire is Egypt’s refusal to hold direct, or even indirect, talks with Jihad Islami, Tehran’s Palestinian surrogate. Gen. Muwafi addressed his mediation effort to Hamas, a fairly useless exercise since it is the Jihad Islami which has been shooting the missiles.
The breakdown of negotiations, such as they were, has led Israel to escalate its military pressure on Gaza and intensify its air strikes, in the hope of forcing Jihad Islami to stop the missile assaults on its cities.

But for now, its leaders show no sign of being beaten into accepting a truce and are unlikely to do so, so long as Tehran wants the violence to go on.
The Gaza confrontation is therefore evolving into a military clash between Israel and Iran.
Hamas, finding it increasingly difficult to stay on the sidelines, called on all Palestinian organizations Monday to unite and close ranks against “Zionist aggression.”  Hamas lined up with the Jihad sine qua non that a truce be conditional on an Israeli guarantee to discontinue targeted killings of wanted terror chiefs.

For now, the Hamas is still trying to pressure Egypt and Israel into coming to terms on a ceasefire. Failure would inevitably bring Gaza’s ruling faction into the battle against Israel.
Unless these circumstances undergo a radical shift, the million Israelis confined to shelters have no reason to look forward to relief from the missile attacks on their homes and schools – quite the opposite: The conflict looks like escalating.

Facing Hamas – JPost – Opinion – Editorials.

By REUTERS/Amir Cohen The latest round of rocket and mortar attacks from Gaza is part of a pattern. Every few months, Islamist terror organizations loosely linked or opposed to Hamas launch attacks against Israel in an attempt to undermine Israeli military deterrence.

Hamas plays the game of claiming that it is not directly connected to the attacks while doing little to prevent them. In this way, Hamas hopes not to provoke Israel while at the same time avoiding a direct confrontation with hard-line Islamist terrorists attempting to continue their armed struggle against Israel.

The trigger for the latest conflagration was the targeted killing of Zuhair Qaisi, the leader of the Popular Resistance Committees in the Gaza Strip. The IDF says Qaisi was behind the August 2011 gun and bomb attacks near Eilat that left eight Israelis dead. He was apparently planning a repeat performance, also to be launched from Sinai, a lawless no-man’s land nominally under Egyptian rule and home to Islamist terrorists and Beduin drugs and arms smugglers. But the IDF took the initiative, bombing a car carrying Qaisi and another top terrorist in the organization released in the Gilad Schalit prisoner exchange.

In October 2011, there was another flare-up after Islamic Jihad fired a Grad rocket at Rehovot to mark the October 1995 assassination in Malta of Islamic Jihad leader Fathi Shkaki. Israel retaliated, killing five terrorists, including Ahmed Sheikh Khalil, the head of the Islamic Jihad’s rocket production facilities.

But even when there is no official “escalation,” the various terrorist organizations operating in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip and the anarchic Sinai have kept up a steady stream of fire directed at about a million civilians – men, women and children – living within range of Kassam rockets, mortar shells and Grad missiles.

Over the course of 2011, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the PRC and other terrorist organizations fired 680 deadly projectiles of various types from the Gaza Strip at surrounding towns, kibbutzim and moshavim, a significant rise from the 365 fired during 2010. Sixteen-year-old Daniel Viflic was killed by Hamas terrorists who fired a Kornet anti-tank missile at the school bus he was riding in on April 7, 2011.

Israel significantly restored its deterrence after launching Operation Cast Lead – the 22-day military incursion in the Gaza Strip that began in December 2008 and ended in January 2009. But in the months since, there has been a steady deterioration of the security situation. Thousands of families now live under the constant threat of mortar, rocket and missile fire. Many lack proper bomb shelters.

True, the Iron Dome system has been a game-changer. Its three rocket-defense batteries – in Beersheba, Ashdod and Ashkelon – have significantly improved Israel’s defense capabilities. Dozens of rockets and missiles that might have hurt or injured Israelis were shot from the air. This has given our leaders the breathing room to plan for the future. Israel would have no choice but to react on a much wider scale if one of the more-than-100 recent mortar shells, rockets and missiles caused series injuries or deaths.

Meanwhile, the air force has succeeded in accurately pinpointing about 20 terrorists, many of them caught in the act of firing mortar shells, rockets and missiles at Israel. Civilian deaths on the Palestinian side have been kept to a minimum.

However, as Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz noted in November and reiterated in December on the third anniversary of Operation Cast Lead, a military offensive in Gaza will be launched “sooner or later.”

Hamas cannot be allowed to continue to play the game of claiming it is not directly connected to the attacks while doing little to prevent them.

We are living in an untenable situation in which every few months, there is an “escalation,” and between these “escalations,” Gaza’s various terrorist groups maintain a steady stream of mortar shells, rockets and missiles. Over a million of our citizens live in constant danger and our children are regularly kept home from school.

Unfortunately, sooner or later our leaders will be forced to confront Hamas. The Iron Dome system provides them with important breathing time. But that time is limited.

Hamas sees ceasefire soon; PRC, PIJ disagr… JPost – Middle East.

By Reuters

A truce is likely soon in the cross-border hostilities between Israel and Palestinians in Gaza but the timing depends on Israel, Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar said on Monday.

“I expect matters will calm down,” Zahar told Reuters in Cairo.

“The statements coming from them (Israel) either in public or via mediators, especially Egypt, say that they do not want escalation.”

Asked how long it would take, Zahar said he did not know but it would depend on Israel, which he blamed for setting off the latest round of violence by killing Palestinian leaders on Friday.

“Hamas has not taken any decision now to escalate. It is trying with the Palestinian factions and the rest of the parties to reach a conditional truce, a truce conditioned on the Israeli enemy halting the aggression and pledging that targeting will not happen again,” he said, referring to Israel’s killing of the leaders.

Zahar’s comments came as representatives from Islamic Jihad and the Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) said Monday that they oppose signing a ceasefire with Israel, the Palestinian Ma’an news agency reported.

“We will not agree on a ceasefire stipulated by Israel, neither do we accept a ceasefire while the lives of our people are taken without restraint,” Ma’an quoted Islamic Jihad officials as saying. Ma’an added that the PRC’s armed wing supported Islamic Jihad’s stance on the issue.

The two terrorist groups have fired over 200 rockets at Israel since Friday, 39 on Monday alone.

Monday was the fourth day of violence in which 23 Palestinians, most of them terrorists, have died.

The latest surge in violence spiraled on Friday when Israel killed the Popular Resistance Committees leader Zuheir al-Qaisi’s in the Hamas-run territory. The IDF has said that the assassination of Qaisi was part of an operation to thwart attempts by the PRC to carry out a terror attacks in Sinai, along the Israeli-Egyptian border.

Police: Several homes damaged in Ashdod rock… JPost – Headlines.

Northern-most strike yet: Grad lands near Gade… JPost – Defense.

By Nikola Solic / Reuters

A Grad rocket fired from the Gaza Strip landed in the Gedera area on Monday, marking the northern-most point hit by terrorists in the current round of escalation that began Friday and has included the launching of some 200 rockets by terrorists targeting southern Israel.

The Grad, which struck in the Gedera area, was one of 25 rockets fired into Israel on Monday. Some damage was caused to a structure in the attack.

Earlier on Monday, terrorists in the Gaza Strip directed rocket salvos at two major cities, Beersheba and Ashdod.

At least seven of the 24 rockets fired on Monday were intercepted by the Iron Dome rocket defense system.

Five rockets fired toward Ashdod were intercepted by the Iron Dome rocket defense system later on Monday. An additional rocket exploded in the Ashdod area later on Monday, causing damage to homes.

Almost simultaneously to the offensive on Ashdod, two rockets landed in an open area outside of Beersheba on Monday morning and a third rocket was intercepted by the Iron Dome.

The Home Front Command, along with the heads of a number of local authorities in southern Israel, decided Sunday night to cancel school in all towns and cities located between 7 km to 40 km from the Gaza Strip for the second straight day. The decision applied to the cities of Ashkelon, Ashdod, Beersheba, Netivot, Sderot, Kiryat Malachi, Gadera, Rahat, Yavneh, Lakiyeh, and the Gan Yavneh Regional Council.

The IDF continued to respond to the attacks with at least nine airstrikes launched against terror targets in Gaza overnight Sunday and on Monday.

Palestinian Islamic Jihad said that two armed terrorists belonging to the organization were killed in IAF strikes, bringing the total number of Palestinians killed since hostilities began Friday to 20.

Palestinians later reported that three Palestinian civilians had been killed in IAF strikes. Gaza hospital sources added that 25 civilians were hurt when an Israeli rocket hit a house in northern Gaza. The IDF did not confirm the Palestinian reports.

The IAF strikes carried out early Monday morning targeted a weapons-storage site and four rocket-launch sites in the northern Gaza Strip and one rocket-launch site in the southern Gaza strip. The IDF confirmed hits on its targets, and stated that the strikes were in response to rocket fire.

The latest round of violence flared on Friday when an air strike killed two Palestinian terror leaders in Gaza accused by Israel of planning a cross-border attack via Egypt. A salvo of rockets followed, leaving six people wounded in Israel.

Reuters contributed to this report.