WarSclerotic

Tardy IDF intelligence, slow responses aggravated Gaza clash. Egypt cuts military contact.

DEBKAfile Exclusive Analysis June 20, 2012, 8:20 PM (GMT+02:00)

Missile that injured Israeli Border Police

At a particularly sensitive moment in Israeli-Egyptian relations, Israel’s military leaders were caught napping by the June 18 terrorist attack from Sinai on the southern Route 10, in which an Israeli fence team worker was killed. Because they were too slow to catch on to the identity of the perpetrators, those military chiefs misdirected their reprisals at the wrong quarters and so sparked a three-day missile-for-air strike cycle in Gaza.
That slowness of uptake was evident at the different military and defense levels of responsibility – the field command, the Southern Command and the general staff. Above all, the forces under the Southern Command were not ready for action although their sector abutting the Gaza Strip and the Egyptian border of Sinai should have been on high alert.

It took three days and scores of missiles from the Gaza Strip before an Iron Dome missile defense battery was finally deployed Wednesday, June 20. The battery immediately intercepted a Grad missile before it exploded in the town of Netivot.

debkafile’s military sources trace the start of the downward turn of events to Monday, June 18. After word was received of a major roadside bomb-RPG-shooting attack on an Israeli team working on Route 10 on the Israel-Egyptian border fence and the death of Said Fashasha, the IDF made every possible mistake.
Instead of waiting for solid intelligence to come through on the terrorists’ identity, Israeli commanders lashed out in every direction.
An unidentified officer decided that the hand behind the attack was that of the Palestinian Jihad Islami. He may have been the same wise guy who attributed to Hamas the double Grad missile attack two days earlier on two southern locations, Ovdat and Mitzpeh Ramon. Some military sources “explained” to Israeli media that Hamas was shooting missiles on orders from the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt in order to heat up the Egyptian-Israeli border ahead of the second round of the presidential election.
This caused Israeli media to hare off in the wrong direction. Neither Hamas nor the Muslim Brotherhood was actually involved in either of those attacks, but since the information was not corrected, the misapprehension stood and generated more damage.
The field commanders concerned were not informed by the general staff or military intelligence that the Grad missiles in southern Israel were fired by al Qaeda from Sinai. This failure left the command chain in the field unprepared for follow-up attacks from the same quarter in Sinai. The deadly ambush on Route 10 two days later was therefore not linked to the earlier Grad missile fire.
The consequence of this lapse was that when the IDF decided to retaliate, it went after the wrong terrorists – Hamas and Jihad Islami in Gaza – so touching off a three-day missile blitz against a range of Israeli locations and military targets.
As we reported Tuesday night, Hamas posted a message to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak through intelligence channels saying that it can’t stop shooting missiles at Israel as long as the IDF continues to strike targets in Gaza. “We had nothing to do with the attack on the Philadelphi Route 10 on Monday, and we’re certainly not looking for trouble with Cairo over military action from Sinai,” said Hamas.
The note, disclosed by debkafile’s intelligence and military sources, went on to say that IDF attacks on Hamas and Jihad Islami personnel were unwarranted since neither was involved in the Route 10 ambush.

“If you stop attacking us, we’ll stop launching missiles at Israeli targets,” Hamas offered.
But the next day, IDF carried on striking targets in Gaza, so as not to be seen caving in to Hamas demands.

At the same time, the IDF and the various intelligence bodies, including the Shin Bet, finally put two and two together and correctly assigned the Route 10 attack to al Qaeda in Sinai. Wednesday, a targeted air strike over Rafah killed Ghaleb Ramlath and injured Muhammad Rashwan, two al Qaeda operatives in Gaza and Sinai, who were involved in that attack.

Israeli diplomacy around the episode was completely botched. When defense ministry officials invited Egyptian commanders at liaison offices in Sinai to cross into Israel and view the fragments of the Grad missiles, they refused. They said they did not believe Israel’s version of the episode and declined to be drawn by Israel into any sort of involvement.

Given the turmoil in Cairo, it should have been obvious to defense ministry “diplomats” that Egyptian army personnel would on no account risk being seen in the company of Israeli officers.
By now, the situation has become so bogged down that it is hard to see how the Gaza exchange of blows can be stopped.

CBSNews.com Live Video – CBS News Video.

Out of curiosity, I wanted to see how the onslaught of rockets (about 70) over the last two days on Israel was being covered in the States.

Simple answer:  It isn’t.

Arabs dropping rockets on Jews doesn’t even merit coverage.  I’ll show you the top stories on CBS below.  All the MSM was the same.  I chose CBS because they are usually the best.

The media loves to play up Israel’s “paranoia” and “siege mentality.”  Really?  What other country in the world having rockets dropped on it wouldn’t merit a mention?

Truly sickened….

JW
____________________

CBS Top Stories:

• Sandusky defense rests, coach won’t testify
• Executive privilege asserted in “Fast and Furious”
• French police capture gunman alive in standoff
• New Greek PM Antonis Samaras sworn in
• Mubarak reportedly in coma, off life support
• Obama hits Romney for outsourcing jobs
• Watch: Ex-TSA agent demos intrusive pat-down
• Hero dog spurs new policy at women’s shelter
• Sources: Pakistan nabs 9/11-linked al Qaeda figure
• Dad’s frantic 911 call after halting alleged attacker
• Watch: Alec Baldwin denies hitting photographer
• 3 dead, 2 wounded in Houston strip club shooting
• 48 Hours: Murder at the manor

Iran impasse to stir sanctions pressure, tensions | Reuters.

(Reuters) – Western diplomatic efforts to curb Iran’s nuclear program may not have breathed their last but the troubled process appears to be on life support after talks this week failed to resolve a row stirring regional tensions and unsettling oil markets.

Mindful of a possible Israel strike, both Iran and its negotiating partners are keen to pursue even a minimal level of contact to shore up the process despite the failure of the negotiations in Moscow on Monday and Tuesday.

A technical discussion is scheduled for July 3 in Istanbul, but no further political talks have been agreed. The West, suspicious Tehran is working towards a nuclear bomb, is due to introduce hard-hitting trade sanctions in the two weeks before that.

“Diplomacy in now on a respirator,” said Cliff Kupchan of the Eurasia Group consultancy. “Both sides underestimated the difficulty of moving talks forward. How little progress was made underlines how far apart the sides are on substance.”

U.S.-based Iran expert Trita Parsi said if a compromise was not vigorously pursued, “war will become far more likely.”

“It really does seem like the Iranians just haven’t made the decision to accept limits on their nuclear program,” a Western diplomat said.

“If they haven’t made that decision then all the talking in the world really isn’t going to get us anywhere.”

“Iran really pressed for this experts meeting and Russia wanted it so we agreed to do it. It doesn’t feel to us like there is a lot of progress that is going to be made even there.

“(But) nobody is going to shut the door entirely.”

The six powers – the United States, China, Russia, France, Britain and Germany – want Iran to scale back its nuclear work and, in particular, stop enriching uranium to levels that could bring it close to making an atom bomb.

Last month, and again in Moscow, the powers asked Tehran to shut down the Fordow underground facility where uranium is being enriched to the 20-percent level of fissile purity and ship any stockpile out of the country.

IRAN SEEKS SANCTIONS RELIEF

In return, they have offered fuel to keep Iran’s medical isotope reactor running, assistance in nuclear safety and an end to a ban on spare parts for Iran’s ageing civilian aircraft.

Iran denies its work has any military purpose and says the powers should offer it relief from sanctions and acknowledge its right to enriching uranium before it meets their demands.

New U.S. and European sanctions are due to come into effect in the next two weeks. In addition to totally banning Iranian oil imports, the EU measures prohibit European insurers from covering Iranian oil exports anywhere in the world, which would leave importers exposed to personal injury and pollution claims.

Western officials are suggesting that even further punitive measures may now be in prospect.

After the Moscow discussions broke up, a senior U.S. administration official said the talks would not go on indefinitely and Tehran should expect more sanctions if it fails to address international suspicions over the nature of its work.

“Sanctions will be increasing. We have told the Iranians there will be more pressure coming if this (lack of progress) proceeds forward,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

There was no immediate world from Israeli officials on the failure of the Moscow talks.

PRESSURE WILL RATCHET UP

But on June 4, a U.S. official was quoted as saying the United States was conferring with Israel about new sanctions planned against Iran should the Moscow talks fail.

“If we don’t get a breakthrough in Moscow there is no question we will continue to ratchet up the pressure,” said David Cohen, U.S. Treasury undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, Haaretz newspaper reported.

The comment offered a strong hint that Washington is continuing to apply the brakes on any plan by Israel to attack Iranian nuclear facilities preemptively.

In Paris, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said France would continue to strengthen sanctions against Iran. Some analysts say they suspect U.S. President Barack Obama, seeking a second term in November elections, cannot afford politically to make concessions to Tehran right now.

TALKS SEEN AVERTING ISRAELI STRIKE RISK

The Democratic White House has strongly rejected a Republican charge that Obama, who sought to ease 30 years of enmity with Iran after he came to power in early 2009, has shown a lack of resolve abroad.

Bijan Khajehpour, an Iranian and managing partner of Atieh International, a Vienna-based consultancy on the Middle East, told Reuters there were two reasons why the two sides were prepared to engage without a clear result.

One of them was that the continuation of such contacts, both sides calculated, reduced the risk of an Israeli strike.

The other reason was that either side suspected time would change the strategic situation in their favor.

“Western governments think the sanctions will bite further, Iran will come to its knee and then it will be more willing to compromise,” he said. “From the Iranian perspective, the Americans have an election and it is not clear whether Obama will win ‘so let’s just wait and see what happens’.”

Meir Javedanfar, lecturer on Iranian politics at Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, Israel, said that despite the failure of the Moscow gathering diplomacy was not dead.

Neither side would want to show that it was not interested in diplomacy as the costs at home and abroad would be high, he said. “It just means that for this route to succeed, more time and effort will be needed. Until then, both sides will try to use their own leverages to pressure the other side to compromise at the next round, whenever that may be.”

(Additional reporting by Fredrik Dahl in Vienna, Marcus George in Dubai and Yeganeh Torbati, Thomas Grove and Tim Heritage in Moscow)

Flame was scout ahead of Stuxnet attack on Iran nukes – US spooks • The Register.

Israel blamed for cyberweapons’ escape into the wild

By John Leyden

Jerusalem Post – Breaking News.

Leading player in Al Qaeda’s Route 10 attack was killed.

DEBKAfile June 20, 2012, 2:03 PM (GMT+02:00)

The motorcycle on which Ghaleb Ramilath was riding in the southern Gaza town of Rafah was struck by an Israel Air Force aircraft. He was killed and his passenger wounded.  They were key players in the al Qaeda cell which ambushed an Israeli fencing crew Monday, killing one of its members, and were planning more attacks from Sinai on southern Israel.

The main southern Israel artery, Route 12 to Eilat, running near the Egyptian border, is again closed to traffic shortly after it was reopened. A high terror alert kept it closed several months.

Daylight: The Story of Obama and Israel – YouTube.

The Emergency Committee for Israel

( Want to see Obama reelected?  Watch this half hour video. – JW )

Israel Hayom | Cast Lead 2 is just a matter of time.

Gaza rockets land in Negev community; cause fire – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Palestinian terrorists continue to shell south; rockets explode in Eshkol Regional Council community and outside Beersheba; Israeli aircraft strike targets across Gaza

Ilana Curiel, Neri Brener

Escalation in south continues: Five Qassam rockets fired by Palestinian terrorists in Gaza landed in a community within the Negev’s Eshkol Regional Council at around noon Wednesday. A fire broke out as a result, but there were no immediate reports of injuries. However, two women suffered from shock, and heavy damage was reported at the site.

Residents said the siren that is supposed to warn of incoming rockets was not activated.

At around 7:45 am a Qassam exploded in an open area outside Beersheba. No injuries or damage were reported.

Another four rockets landed in the Eshkol Regional Council Wednesday morning. No one was hurt. One of the rockets exploded landed in one of the council’s communities.

Some 50 rockets were fired towards Israel since the latest round of violence began on Monday.

Ten rockets were fired towards the western Negev region overnight. In response, Israeli aircraft attacked seven targets throughout Gaza.

Eleven Border Guard officers were injuredTuesday night as a result of rocket fire on the Hof Ashkelon Regional Council. One officer sustained moderate shrapnel injuries, while the others were lightly hurt.

Rocket in Hof Ashkelon Regional Council (Photo: Zeev Trachtman)

While elementary schools in the Eshkol Regional Council are expected to open as usual despite the incessant rocket fire, the Ma’agalim school in the Sdot Negev Council will keep its gates closed.

“The government said it would provide us with miguniyot (cement shelter against Qassam rocket attacks), but we will be getting them only in September,” explained Avidan Califa, the head of the school’s parents’ committee.

“We won’t be sending our kids to school until a solution is found or calm is restored. The State has yet to come to its senses and hasn’t eradicated the rocket fire,” he said.

High school and middle school students have already begun their summer vacation.

Netivot resident Ya’arit Trabelsi, whose children attend Ma’agalim, said “we have no choice but to stay at home with them. It’s better this way because we have a fortified room at home. It’s dangerous to send them to an unfortified school, particularly after a Grad rocket fell close by in the previous round of violence.

“Those who live in the south know that it’s problematic to send our kids to school. They are very afraid,” she said.