Rocks and Firebombs on the Temple Mount

Violence broke out after Friday Muslim prayers.

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By Ernie Singer

First Publish: 3/8/2013, 2:28 PM

Mosques on the Temple Mount

Mosques on the Temple Mount

Flash 90

Worshippers started throwing rocks at security forces, Friday afternoon, at the end of Muslim prayers at Temple Mount mosques in Jerusalem’s Old City. Police stationed at the Mughrabi gate broke in and began to throw stun grenades to disperse the stone throwers.

The rioters responded with firebombs. One policeman was lightly injured and taken to hospital. A number of demonstrators were also injured.

via Rocks and Firebombs on the Temple Mount – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News.

Rasmussen calls for more cooperation with Israel07 March 2013 15:19 Last updated 07 March 2013 15:20NATO Secretary General met Israeli President Peres in Brussels and said the alliance sought for dialogue and cooperation with IsraelBRUSSELSSecretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen on Thursday said he was in favor of developing the Alliance’s cooperation with Israel.Rasmussen on Thursday received Israeli President Shimon Peres at the NATO headquarters in Brussels.Speaking at a joint press conference after a tete-a-tete meeting with Peres, Secretary General Rasmussen underlined that “aside from six Arab countries, Israel was a crucial partner of the Alliance in the Mediterranean Dialogue.””NATO’s security is related to the security and stability in the Mediterranean and the Middle East,” Rasmussen emphasized.”Our Alliance attaches high importance to political dialogue and practical cooperation,” Rasmussen noted.”NATO and Israel face the same strategic challenges in the eastern Mediterranean. There are all reasons present to justify deepening the already rooted cooperation with Israel,” Rasmussen stated.President Peres, in his part, thanked Rasmussen for the “opportunity” given to Israel for cooperation with NATO.”The Alliance, who were responsible for Europe’s security during the Cold War, now has become an important factor in counter-terrorism,” Peres said.”Europe and Israel are on the same front in the fight against terror in the Middle East. We will win this struggle,” Peres also said.NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue was initiated in 1994 by the North Atlantic Council. It currently involves seven non-NATO countries of the Mediterranean region: Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia.

via Rasmussen calls for more cooperation with Israel Anadolu Agency.

8 UN troops abandon Syria post, march to Israel – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Peacekeepers ordered by their commander to leave post in Syria for fear of additional kidnappings; IDF soldiers meet them at border crossing

Yoav Zitun

Two days after 21 Filipino UN peacekeepers were kidnapped by Syrian rebels in the village of Jamlah, situated less than a mile from the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights, eight other UN monitors from the Philippines abandoned their position on Friday and crossed the border into Israel.

The soldiers, who belong to a UN force that has patrolled a ceasefire line between Israel and Syria for nearly four decades, were ordered by their commander to abandon the post for fear rebels may attempt to capture more peacekeepers.

An IDF force stationed in the Golan met the peacekeepers at one of the gates along the border fence along with UN personnel who arrived from the Israeli side of the border. The Israeli army stressed that its soldiers did not cross the border to pick up the peacekeepers.

Archive photo: AFP

The IDF was expected to transport the peacekeepers to the UN’s Ein Zivanit base, located near the Quneitra Crossing.

Some two weeks ago Croatia announced that it is withdrawing its 100 troops from the buffer zone separating Israel and Syria. The Croatian government said it feared for the soldiers’ safety after reports that Saudi Arabia had bought arms from Croatia and then provided them to the Syrian rebels.

Israel prepares for next war with Hezbollah | The Times of Israel.

While tensions along Israel’s northern border run high, the army is down south, simulating battles with its Lebanese arch-foe

Israeli army tanks participate in a drill near Revivim, southern Israel, Thursday, March 7, 2013 (photo credit: AP/Sebastian Scheiner)

REVIVIM JUNCTION, Israel (AP) — On a dusty field in Israel’s southern desert, the military is gearing up for the next battle against a familiar foe: Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.

As the Syrian civil war intensifies, military planners are growing increasingly jittery that the fighting could spill over into Israel, potentially dragging the Islamic militant group that is allied with President Bashar Assad into the fray. After battling Hezbollah to a stalemate in 2006, the Israeli military says it has learned key lessons and is prepared to inflict heavy damage on the group if fighting begins again.

The Israel-Lebanon border has remained largely quiet since that last war. But Hezbollah has since replenished its arsenal and has waged a shadow war with Israel around the world. The fall of the Syrian leader or alternatively an Israel strike against Hezbollah’s other main patron, Iran, could spark another full-fledged war.

“There is an increase in tension because of Syria,” a senior commander in the military’s Northern Command said about a possible battle with Hezbollah. The commander, who traveled south to observe Thursday’s exercise here, spoke on condition of anonymity in line with military protocol.

In 2006, weeks of Israeli air raids killed more than 1,000 people, including hundreds of Hezbollah fighters, and key infrastructure was destroyed. But the heavy onslaught failed to prevent Hezbollah from firing some 4,000 rockets into Israel, and the fighting ended in a UN-brokered truce.

While the truce has largely held, Israel says Hezbollah has systematically restocked its arsenal with tens of thousands of even more powerful rockets and missiles capable of striking virtually anywhere in the Jewish state. Israeli military officials frequently say it is only a matter of time before the next war erupts.

In the meantime, Israel and Hezbollah have fought a covert war outside the borders of their countries. In 2008, Hezbollah’s top military commander Imad Mughniyeh was killed in a car bomb in the Syrian capital of Damascus, an attack widely thought to be the work of Israeli agents.

Hezbollah, for its part, is thought to be responsible for a bus bombing in a Bulgarian resort town last July that killed five Israeli tourists and their Bulgarian driver, as well as failed attempts to bomb Israeli diplomats in Thailand, India and Georgia.

Israeli military officials believe that Hezbollah, which is preoccupied with its own domestic problems and the precarious position of its Syrian ally, has no desire to reignite hostilities. But they say the Syrian civil war, as well as Israel’s tensions with Iran, could easily upset the fragile balance.

As Assad’s grip on power weakens, Israeli military planners fear that Syria, backed by Hezbollah, might try to open a new front in order to deflect attention. Israel also fears that sophisticated Syrian weapons, including a chemical arsenal, could be transferred to Hezbollah. Israel has all but confirmed it carried out an airstrike on Syria in January that destroyed a shipment of anti-aircraft missiles allegedly bound to Hezbollah.

Likewise, an Israeli attack on Iran would almost certainly draw a Hezbollah reprisal. Israel has repeatedly hinted it is prepared to attack Iran’s nuclear installations if it determines that international sanctions and diplomacy fail to curb the Iranian nuclear program. Israel and much of the West believe Iran is developing a nuclear weapon, a charge Iran denies.

Israeli soldiers lie on the ground as they participate in a drill near Revivim, southern Israel, Thursday, March 7, 2013. (photo credit: AP/Sebastian Scheiner)

Earlier this week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned of the potential link between Iran and Hezbollah. 

“A nuclear-armed Iran would dramatically increase terrorism by giving terrorists a nuclear umbrella,” he told members of the pro-Israel lobbying group American Israel Public Affairs Committee, known as AIPAC. “That means that Iran’s terror proxies like Hezbollah… will be emboldened to attack America, Israel, and others because they will be backed by a power with atomic weapons.”

Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, has warned that anyone who thinks Hezbollah is vulnerable because of Syria’s civil war is mistaken. He also said the group has all the weapons it needs in case war breaks out with Israel, and it would not need to import them from allies Syria and Iran. 

“The resistance will not be silent regarding any aggression against Lebanon,” Nasrallah said last month.

Israel is also taking a fiercer tone, saying it will act with far less restraint than it did in 2006, when it took out electric grids, roads and city blocks during the month-long war that was sparked by a deadly cross-border raid by Hezbollah. Military officials say entire villages that host Hezbollah’s arsenal would be considered fair targets.

During Thursday’s exercise, near Kibbutz Revivim, scores of Israeli reservists in full battle gear participated in a drill meant to simulate Israel’s capture of a strategic hill overlooking a southern Lebanese village.

In the drill, three tanks kicked up dust as they charged forward and fired live rounds. In front of them, groups of soldiers lay flat on the ground and opened fire with propped-up guns as other soldiers stormed up the hill. Their targets were small cutout cartoon heads meant to represent Hezbollah fighters.

On a nearby Israeli army base, reservists have also been practicing urban warfare recently on a set made to resemble an Arab village, complete with concrete homes, narrow alleyways and mosque minarets.

Military officials say that while Hezbollah has upgraded its capabilities, Israel has also made important offensive and defensive changes since 2006, when it came under heavy criticism for its lack of preparedness and perceived sloppy performance.

Israeli soldiers run as they participate in a drill near Revivim, southern Israel, Thursday, March 7, 2013. (photo credit: AP/Sebastian Scheiner)

They say the military now possesses sophisticated real-time intelligence and upgraded drones. For any potential land operation, it has fortified its Merkava armored personnel vehicles, activated a new tank-defense that can shoot down anti-tank rockets and recently deployed “Iron Dome,” a rocket defense system that shot down hundreds of rockets during a recent round of fighting against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip.

Despite its arsenal and political clout in Lebanon, Hezbollah’s maneuvering space has been significantly reduced in recent years.

Hezbollah still suffers from the fallout of the 2006 war, which many in Lebanon accused Hezbollah of provoking by kidnapping Israeli soldiers from the border area. Since then, the group has come under increasing pressure at home to disarm. And though Hezbollah has been accused of fighting alongside the military in Syria, the group has largely been cautious with regards to the Syria conflict, knowing that any action it takes could backfire.

In addition, the group’s reputation has been tarnished because its leader has supported Arab Spring uprisings in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt, but has backed the Assad regime in Syria. 

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.

Poll: 9 in 10 Americans have unfavorable view of Iran | The Times of Israel.

Gallup World Affairs survey shows Iran trailing North Korea, Syria, Afghanistan, Libya and Cuba; Israel enjoys 66% favorability

By Haviv Rettig Gur March 8, 2013, 4:58 am

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei waves to the crowd after speaking in Tehran (photo credit: AP/Office of the Supreme Leader)

NEW YORK – In a further sign of the poor state of US-Iranian relations, a February Gallup poll found that nearly nine in 10 Americans hold an unfavorable view of Iran. Only nine percent had a positive view.

The findings are being published as tensions between the United States and Iran are on the rise over the lack of progress in multilateral talks aimed at curbing Teheran’s nuclear program.

The Gallup poll measures “top-of-mind reactions toward a number of countries that are frequently in the news,” a report from the polling organization said Thursday.

Iran came in as the least favorable country out of 22 measured. Israel, at 66% favorable and 29% unfavorable, came seventh, while the Palestinian Authority was far behind, at 18, with just 15% favorable and 77% unfavorable.

“Continuing Gallup research has shown that Americans strongly favor Israel’s side of the enduring conflict between that country and the Palestinian Authority, helping explain why the latter is in this bottom group,” Gallup noted in its announcement of the survey results.

Gallup noted that four countries enjoyed the most positive reactions: Canada, Great Britain, Germany and Japan.
Three additional countries, France, India, and Israel, “although they are not at the top of the list… engender attitudes from Americans that are much more favorable than unfavorable.”

The remainder had higher unfavorable ratings than favorable.

The list, in its entirety: Canada enjoyed the highest favorability rating in the survey, with 91% favorable and just 5% of Americans holding unfavorable views of their northern neighbor. Next came Great Britain (88% favorable), Germany (85%), Japan (81%), France (73%), India (68%) and Israel (66%).

Following Israel are, in order of declining favorability, Mexico (47%), Russia (44%), China (43%), Venezuela (40%), Egypt (40%), Saudi Arabia (36%), Cuba (34%), Libya (20%), Iraq (19%), Afghanistan (15%), the Palestinian Authority (15%), Syria (14%), Pakistan (14%), North Korea (12%) and Iran (9%).

As reported earlier last month, the same ‘World Affairs’ poll found that 99 percent of Americans believe the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program is a threat “to the vital interests of the United States in the next 10 years,” with 83% saying it was a “critical threat” and another 16% saying it was an “important, [but] not critical” one. Just 1% declined to say it was at least an important threat.

The findings on Iran correspond to past polling that asked similar questions. A Gallup poll conducted in early February 2012 asked Americans whom they considered to be the United States’ “greatest enemy today.” The question was open-ended. Nearly one-third, or 32%, named Iran — more than any other country.

KHALILI: The West’s dangerous naivete on Iranian nukes – Washington Times.

Now that negotiations over Iran’s illicit nuclear program have concluded, the Islamic regime is positive the West will start easing sanctions, not because Iran will halt its nuclear activity, but rather owing to a belief that the West has reached the end of its ability to pressure the regime.

As I’ve written several times over the years, Iran has long thought that the West, particularly America, will do everything it can to avoid a military confrontation, leaving negotiations and sanctions as the West’s only options. It thinks that eventually the West will realize that Iran’s nuclear program cannot be stopped and, therefore, will look for a way out of this dilemma by reducing sanctions and finally accepting a nuclear-armed Iran.

Gen. Rahim Safavi, a former commander of the Revolutionary Guards and currently a special adviser to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said in a recent speech that America regrets its invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and cannot repeat another war.

“Before the U.S. election, [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu visited the White House for a meeting with Obama, and President Obama had taken him to a U.S. Army veterans hospital and told the Zionist prime minister that [the veterans] were the face of the war, and the American people cannot tolerate such a situation anymore,” Gen. Safavi said.

This belief was underscored by last week’s talks in Kazakhstan between Iran and the 5-plus-1 countries — the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany. The 5-plus-1 for the first time accepted that Iran could continue to enrich uranium up to 20 percent, a level needed only for its so-called medical nuclear research reactor.

This is a major shift from the prior 5-plus-1 position of wanting a total halt to the 20 percent level. At that level, uranium could be further enriched to weapons grade within weeks, should the regime decide to do so. It will.

“We are of the opinion that sanctions will no longer be intensified but from now on we will witness the gradual lifting of sanctions,” Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi told Iranian media after the talks. He said the Islamic republic had managed to circumvent all sanctions and reduce the effects of the sanctions, “wearing the enemy away.”

After several years of negotiations, the demands of the 5-plus-1 have changed dramatically from requiring Iran to ship out its enriched uranium, to accepting its right to nuclear energy, to accepting its enrichment to 5 percent for peaceful purposes and finally, to accepting its right to produce at the 20 percent level for medical research.

Meanwhile, the regime has successfully bought time to master the enrichment technology and add thousands of centrifuges to increase output while working on its nuclear bomb program at several secret sites.

A recent analysis in Keyhan, the newspaper mouthpiece of Ayatollah Khamenei, refers to the West’s demands over the past decade as not allowing Iran to have a handful of centrifuges for research, to the current situation in which the West “has knelt” in front of Iran as more than 10,000 centrifuges now enrich uranium.

“During the last decade, the resistance front and Islamic Awakening (Arab Spring) led by the Islamic Republic of Iran have managed to defeat the power of Zionist Christians in four corners of the Middle East and have forced America to beg for negotiations,” the analysis said, adding that the future is bright for Iran and that America is hopeless.

Officials of the International Atomic Energy Agency in their visits to Iran in January and February failed again to get the regime to allow inspections at several secret sites, including the Parchin military site, where it’s thought tests on nuclear bomb components took place. In its Feb. 21 report, the U.N. nuclear watchdog also talked about a lack of cooperation by the regime on its Arak heavy-water plant, which is set to go into full operation in 2014 and could produce plutonium, providing Iran with a second path to building nuclear bombs.

Those who promoted negotiations and reached out to the Islamic regime in hopes of changing its behavior have not only failed, but also have created a dangerous situation that could haunt the world for many years to come.

A nuclear-armed Islamic regime in Iran at the least could become a nuclear proliferation nightmare in which humanity, world peace and global stability could become hostage. The clock is ticking, and it seems the West still fails to understand the ramifications of its failure.

Reza Kahlili is a pseudonym for a former CIA operative in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and author of the award-winning book “A Time to Betray” (Simon & Schuster, 2010)

‘Obama won’t bring peace plan or even general framework’ to Israel | The Times of Israel.

President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House in March 2012 (photo credit: Avi Ohayon/GPO/Flash90)

President Barack Obama will not be bringing any peace plan or even a “general framework” with him on his trip to Israel later this month, and he did not say he would in a briefing with Jewish leaders at the White House Thursday, according to sources in the administration and several participants in the meeting.

According to one participant, however, the president said: “That doesn’t mean six or nine or 12 months from now we won’t be in the midst of a policy initiative.”

Earlier Thursday, Israel’s Channel 10 reported that Obama planned to present a “general framework” for Israeli-Palestinian peace during his visit, quoting what it said were remarks made by the president in the White House briefing.

While he would not unveil a “comprehensive Middle East peace plan” during the trip, the Israeli TV report said, he told the Jewish leaders they should not rule out him doing so “sometime in the next six, nine or 12 months.”

A US source familiar with the White House’s plans for the trip described the Channel 10 report as “absolutely false.”

A senior administration official told The Times of Israel: “The president did invite leaders from across the American Jewish community to discuss and get input about his upcoming trip to Israel. He did not present a framework for peace talks.”

Added the official, “The president reiterated America’s unshakeable support for Israel and thanked the leaders for role they play in strengthening ties between the two nations. The president noted that the trip is not dedicated to resolving a specific policy issue, but is rather an opportunity to consult with the Israeli government about a broad range of issues – including Iran, Syria, the situation in the region, and the peace process. He also underscored that the trip is an opportunity for him to speak directly to the Israeli people about the history, interests, and values that we share.”

According to Channel 10, Obama told the Jewish leaders he intended to speak to the Israelis about peace with the Palestinians, and would make clear that “wanting peace is not enough.” He would be asking Israel “which tough steps it will be willing to take,” the TV report said.

The report twice repeated that while the president would not be bringing a specific plan, he did intend to present a “general framework.” The president’s remarks to the senior Jewish leaders, the TV report added, were not supposed to have been publicized.

A source familiar with what was said at the briefing told The Times of Israel that “The president started off the meeting by saying he has no intention of delivering a peace plan. That was flatly said.” As for the possibility he will bring a plan down the road, the source said, “There was no discussion about any sort of timeline.”

Another meeting participants said Obama thought prospects for peace were “bleak,” but added: “That doesn’t mean six or nine or 12 months from now we won’t be in the midst of a policy initiative.” He said he would tell the Israelis that “the prospects for peace continue to go through the Palestinians.”

There was no indication that Obama had suggested he would be bringing an initiative on the visit, or afterwards.

The White House briefing was meant to be off the record, but the Times of Israel has counted at least 25 Jewish leaders who attended the meeting, with different versions of what was said being reported in the media.

Besides Obama, White House staff in the meeting included Senior Advisor Valerie Jarrett, Deputy National Security Adviser for Strategic Communication Ben Rhodes and interim liaison to the Jewish community Zach Kelly.

Jewish groups represented in the meeting included the National Jewish Democratic Council, AIPAC, the Conference of Presidents, the American Jewish Committee, the Reform, Conservative and Orthodox movements, the Anti-Defamation League, B’nai Brith International, the World Jewish Congress, Jewish Women International, National Council of Jewish Women, J Street, the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, Hadassah, Americans for Peace Now and the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

JTA contributed to this report.