WarSclerotic

Israel TV: Chemical weapons were fired by Assad’s brother’s unit | The Times of Israel.

Maher Assad’s 4th Armored Division of Syrian Army launched nerve gas shells that killed 1,000-plus last Wednesday from base west of Damascus, report says

Syrian citizens trying to identify dead bodies, after an alleged poisonous gas attack fired by regime forces, according to activists in Syria, Wednesday, August 21, 2013. (photo credit: AP/Local Committee of Arbeen)

The chemical weapons allegedly used to kill an estimated 1,000 or more Syrian civilians by the regime of President Bashar Assad last Wednesday were fired by the 155th Brigade of the 4th Armored Division of the Syrian Army, an Israel TV report said.

This division is under the command of the president’s brother, Maher Assad.

The nerve gas shells were fired from a military base in a mountain range to the west of Damascus, the Channel 2 news report said.

The embattled regime has concentrated its vast stocks of chemical weaponry in just two or three locations, the report said, under the control of Syrian Air Force Intelligence, itself reporting to the president.

Maher Assad (photo credit: Wikipedia Commons / m.nadaff)

The TV report further added that “the assessment in Israel” is that the attack was intended to serve as the possible start of a wider operation.

It said Israel was increasingly concerned about the use of chemical weapons in Syria, and their possibility of these weapons falling into still more dangerous hands than those of Assad. Israel was “privately” making clear its concerns to the United States, the report said.

In his first response Thursday to the alleged attack, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that Iran was closely watching how the world would deal with the attack.

“Syria has become Iran’s testing ground, and Iran is closely watching whether and how the world responds to the atrocities committed there by its client state Syria and its proxy Hezbollah against innocent civilians in Syria,” he said.

The alleged use of chemical weapons against Syrian civilians on Wednesday “proves yet again that we cannot permit the world’s most dangerous regimes to acquire the world’s most dangerous weapons,” Netanyahu added.

On Wednesday, rebel groups in Syria claimed that as many as 1,300 people were killed in a chemical attack in the eastern suburbs of the capital Damascus. The reports were accompanied by a string of grisly photos and videos depicting scores of dead civilians, including children.

The reports “raise the possibility that an extremely grievous crime has been committed by the Syrian regime against its citizens,” Netanyahu said.

“This act adds to the roster of crimes committed by the Syrian regime, with the aid of Iran and Hezbollah, against the Syrian people,” he said.

Netanyahu added that it was “absurd that UN investigators, who are in Damascus right now to investigate the possibility that chemical weapons have been used, are being prevented by the Syrian regime from reaching the affected areas.”

US on Syrian intervention: We have a range of options available – Israel News, Ynetnews.

US President will meet his national security team Saturday. Meanwhile, top military commanders from US, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Britain, Qatar, France, Germany, more will meet in near future at Jordan’s invitation to discuss response to Syrian massacre. Iran’s Rohani confirms chemical used in attack as UN envoy arrives in Syria to pressure Assad to allow investigation

News agencies

President Barack Obama was to meet with his national security advisers early on Saturday to discuss reports that the Syrian government used chemical weapons this week in an attack on a Damascus suburb, a White House official said in a statement.

Meanwhile, military commanders from Western and Muslim countries are to meet in Jordan to discuss the impact of the Syria conflict, a Jordanian official said in remarks published on Saturday.

“As we have previously stated, the President has directed the intelligence community to gather facts and evidence so that we can determine what occurred in Syria. Once we ascertain the facts, the President will make an informed decision about how to respond,” the official said regarding Obama’s meeting.

“We have a range of options available, and we are going to act very deliberately so that we’re making decisions consistent with our national interest as well as our assessment of what can advance our objectives in Syria,” the White House official said.

US destroyers near Syria (Photo: AFP)

In regards to the meeting of top generals from both Arab and Western nations, an unidentified official from Jordan’s high command said the meeting is to take place in the coming days at the invitation of Jordan’s chief of staff Meshaal Mohamed al-Zaban and General Lloyd Austin, head of Centcom, the US command responsible for 20 countries in the Middle East and Central Asia.

America’s top military officer General Martin Dempsey will take part, as well as chiefs of staff from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Canada, said the official, cited by state news agency Petra.

The official said the meeting would be an opportunity to “examine the questions linked to the security of the region and the repercussions of the Syrian crisis, as well as means of military cooperation to assure the security of Jordan”.

The announcement came as the United Nations disarmament chief arrived in Damascus in a bid to press the Syrian government to allow UN experts to investigate an alleged chemical weapons attack this week. Angela Kane did not speak to reporters upon her arrival on Saturday in the Syrian capital.

The international community has called for a UN investigation into the alleged use of chemical weapons in the war in Syria, which European countries and opponents of President Bashar Assad have blamed on the regime.

Photos from the massacre (Photo: Reuters)

Syria’s main opposition group, the National Coalition, accused the government of “massacring” more than 1,300 people in chemical weapons attacks on Wednesday.

US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel suggested on Friday that the Pentagon was moving forces into place ahead of possible military action against Syria, after Russia dismissed calls for use of force against its ally.

Last week, General Dempsey discussed ways to help the Jordanian military tackle fallout from the Syria conflict, including border surveillance, intelligence and training Jordan’s special forces.

Fearing the conflict could spill over into Jordan, the United States has deployed F-16 fighters and Patriot missile defenses, along with about 1,000 US troops, to protect its close Arab ally, a major beneficiary of US aid.

Iran confirms

Earlier Saturday, Iranian President Hassan Rohani acknowledged for the first time chemical weapons had killed people in ally Syria and called for the international community to prevent their use.

Children allegedly killed in chemical attack (Photo: Reuters)

Rohani stopped short of saying who had used the arms – Tehran has previously accused Syrian rebels of being behind what it called suspected chemical attacks.

“Many of the innocent people of Syria have been injured and martyred by chemical agents and this is unfortunate,” recently elected Rohani was quoted as saying by the ISNA news agency.

“We completely and strongly condemn the use of chemical weapons,” he said, according to the agency.

“The Islamic Republic gives notice to the international community to use all its might to prevent the use of these weapons anywhere in the world, especially in Syria,” he added, according to the Mehr news agency.

(Photo: Reuters)

(Photo: Reuters)

Iran’s foreign minister earlier this week said groups fighting Syrian president Bashar Assad must have been behind what he then said was just a suspected attack.

Russia, another major ally in the Syrian government, has also blamed opposition forces.

Kosovo-Damascus

US officials are looking at the air war over Kosovo in the late 1990s as a possible blueprint for strikes on Syria without a UN mandate, the New York Times reported Saturday.

During the 1998-1999 conflict, Russia supported the Yugoslav regime of Slobodan Milosevic, accused of committing atrocities against civilians in Kosovo. But since Russia holds veto power in the UN Security Council, there was no chance of getting a resolution authorizing the use of force against the Yugoslav Republic.

In March 1999 NATO launched a series of air strikes against Yugoslav forces, arguing that it was the abuses that constituted a grave humanitarian emergency. The attacks lasted 78 days.

One year after warning that the use of chemical arms in the Syrian conflict would cross a US “red line,” the administration of President Barack Obama is searching for ways to respond to Basher al-Assad’s regime if its use of the banned weapon is proven.

Today, as in the late 1990s, Russia opposes a Security Council resolution authorizing the use of force against Syria.

“It’s a step too far to say we’re drawing up legal justifications for an action, given that the president hasn’t made a decision,” an unnamed senior administration official told The Times, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“But Kosovo, of course, is a precedent of something that is perhaps similar,” the official said.

Al-Qaida vows to strike at Hezbollah for Lebanon bombings | JPost | Israel News.

( The two biggest sources of terrorism in the world at war with each other.  Both Islamic of course, but on opposite sides of the Sunni/Shia divide.  What’s to say other than, “Too bad, so sad…” – JW )

By REUTERS

The sarin shells fired on Damascus – by Syrian 4th Division’s 155th Brigade – were followed by rockets on Israel and car bombings in Lebanon.

Assad’s chemical weapons arsenal

In the space of 48 hours, the Assad regime, Iran and Hizballah launched a three-point offensive against foreign intervention, debkafile reports. Here are some facts: The sarin nerve gas atrocity of Wednesday, Aug. 21, alleged to have claimed more than 1,000 lives, was the work of the 155th Brigade of the Syrian army’s 4th Division, headed by President Bashar Asad’s younger brother Gen. Maher Assad.

The poison gas shells were fired from the big Mount Kalmun army base south of Damascus, one of the three repositories of Syria’s chemical weapons. In response to a demand from Moscow last December, Assad collected his chemical assets in three depots. The other two are Dummar, a suburb 5 kilometers outside Damascus, and the Al-Safira air base, west of Aleppo.
Not a single shell or gram of poison gas is loaded for use at any of the three sites without an explicit directive from the president or his brother.
Therefore, the clamor raised by the US and French presidents, Western prime ministers and Russian leaders for an independent investigation to turn up evidence of the use of chemical weapons in Syria and identity of its perpetrator – the Assad regime, says the West, and a rebel provocation, according to Moscow – is nothing but playacting.  The facts are known and the evidence is present. And the price for refusing to come down to earth and putting an immediate stop to this horrifying precedent may be unimaginably grim – not just for Israel and Jordan – but for the rest of the Middle East and beyond.

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu commented Thursday, Aug. 22 that Iran is using Syria as its testing ground while closely monitoring international responses to its actions.

His remark followed the four Grad rockets fired on northern Israel the day after the chemical attack in East Damascus. His words were scarcely noticed, mainly because Israel’s own spokesmen were busy spreading a blanket of disinformation over the attack, attributing it vaguely to “Global Jihad” (whatever that is).
debkafile’s military sources affirm that, just as the Assad brothers orchestrated the chemical shell attack on Syrian civilians, so too did Hizballah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah set in motion the rocket attack on Israel.

By good fortune, the two which exploded in built-up areas caused damage but no casualties and a third was intercepted by Iron Dome.

Nasrallah had his disposal two Palestinian terrorist groups functioning in Lebanon and Syria under direct Iranian command. They are the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestinian – General Command (PFLP-GC) and Jihad Islami – both of them eager to attack Israel.
Then, on Friday night, two car bombs blew up outside Sunni mosques in the northern Lebanese town of Tripoli, killing 42 people and injuring 500.
The triple coordinated outrages added up to a dire warning from Tehran and Damascus about what they have in store for the region, and especially Syria’s neighbors, as payback for foreign intervention in the Syrian civil war.
On the subject of intervention, the French daily Le Figaro took the liberty last Thursday, Aug. 23, of lifting wholesale and publishing without credit the exclusive report carried Wednesday, Aug. 21, by debkafile. We were the first publication in the world to reveal on Saturday, Aug. 17 the entry from Jordan into southern Syria of a unit of US-trained Syrian rebel commandoes, under the caption: Reported Syrian gas attack after first US-trained rebel incursion from Jordan.
In that report, debkafile was also the first to expose Assad’s poison gas attack as a warning of the heavy price he would exact for intervention in the Syrian war by foreign forces or by rebels trained by foreign forces – in this case US instructors and officers based in Jordan.

CBS News reported Friday that US and Israel intelligence monitoring known chemical weapons sites detected activity there 20 minutes before the chemical shells were fired Wednesday. Those agencies were therefore on top of valuable advance information, but did nothing to stop – or even warn against – the coming poison gas attack.

Washington and other Western capitals as well as Israel continued to circle around reality Friday and Saturday, when Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel let it be known that US warships had been sent to the region for possible cruise missile attacks, in case the president decided on action against Syria.
The Secretary “forgot” to mention that, had the president really wanted to do something, all he had to do was keep the USS Truman aircraft carrier, which was present in the Mediterranean on Wednesday, the day of the chemical attack, from sailing out through the Suez Canal Thursday.

Furthermore, America doesn’t need to send more warships to the region for possible attacks on Syria. It holds plenty of assets at US air and missile bases crisscrossing the Middle East, southern and central Europe and the Persian Gulf. All are fully capable of conducting a variety of operations against Syria without bringing in extra warships.
Except that none of these assets has so far been ordered into action.

What could the Obama administration do if it was so minded?

debkafile’s exclusive military sources described three options available: One: Striking the Syrian unit which perpetrated the poison gas last Wednesday east of Damascus. Two: Destroying the Syrian army’s three chemical weapons depots. Or Three: Coordinated attacks on the first two targets.
For Options Two and Three, the attack would have to destroy all the poison shells at once before they exploded and leaked contamination across wide regions of Syria and neighboring Turkey, Israel and Jordan. The Syrian ruler is capable of having the shells’ contents mixed and armed ready for use ahead of a US attack, thus maximizing the deadly impact of lethal gases across a broad Middle East region.

Notwithstanding the grave risks of action, the consequences of inaction by the US and Israel would be worse: It would give Damascus and Tehran a green light for escalating their viciousness – and not just against the Syrian people. If the barbarity is not stopped, they will get away with making nerve gas and other poison substances acceptable weapons for fighting their foes. Lebanon and Israel are in extreme jeopardy.

Iran’s Rouhani acknowledges chemical weapons attack in Syria | JPost | Israel News.

( “Mr. Moderate”… Establishing his credentials. – JW )

US forces move closer to Syria as options weighed | The Times of Israel.

Fourth warship with ballistic missiles deployed to eastern Mediterranean; top US general Dempsey to present Obama with Syria strike scenarios Saturday

By AP and Michal Shmulovich August 24, 2013, 10:32 am

US President Barack Obama, pictured here speaking in Syracuse, New York in August, says a possible chemical weapons attack in Syria this week is a “big event of grave concern” that has hastened the timeframe for determining a US response. (photo credit: AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

WASHINGTON — US naval forces are moving closer to Syria as President Barack Obama considers military options for responding to the alleged use of chemical weapons by the Assad government. The president emphasized that a quick intervention in the Syrian civil war was problematic, given the international considerations that should precede a military strike.

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel declined to discuss any specific force movements while saying that Obama had asked the Pentagon to prepare military options for Syria. US defense officials told The Associated Press that the Navy had sent a fourth warship armed with ballistic missiles into the eastern Mediterranean Sea but without immediate orders for any missile launch into Syria.

US Navy ships are capable of a variety of military action, including launching Tomahawk cruise missiles, as they did against Libya in 2011 as part of an international action that led to the overthrow of the Libyan government.

“The Defense Department has a responsibility to provide the president with options for contingencies, and that requires positioning our forces, positioning our assets, to be able to carry out different options — whatever options the president might choose,” Hagel told reporters traveling with him to Asia.

Hagel said the US is coordinating with the international community to determine “what exactly did happen” near Damascus earlier this week. According to reports, a chemical attack in a suburb of the capital killed at least 100 people. It would be the most heinous use of chemical weapons since Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein gassed thousands of Kurds in the town of Halabja in 1988.

According to CBS News, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Martin Dempsey is expected to present President Obama with options for a Syria strike during a meeting at the White House Saturday morning.

Meanwhile, the French newspaper Le Figaro reported Saturday that a possible reason Syrian President Bashar Assad may have deployed chemical weapons earlier this week was because Syrian rebel units, also comprising “Israeli, Jordanian, and CIA commandos,” had been training for a week near Daraa in southern Syria and were approaching Damascus.

The newspaper mentioned the fact that US-Jordanian military exercises have been ongoing in the Hashemite Kingdom. American special ops teams have also been training the Jordanian army to handle possible chemical threats from Syria, Jordanian Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour told reporters earlier this week.

Top military officials, including general Dempsey, will come to Jordan next week to discuss recent developments in Syria, the Hashemite Kingdom’s semi-official news agency, Petra, reported Saturday. Army leaders from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, France, Britain, Canada, Germany, and Italy were also set to attend.

Obama remained cautious about getting involved in a war that has killed more than 100,000 people and now includes Hezbollah and al-Qaeda. He made no mention of the “red line” of chemical weapons use that he marked out for Assad a year ago and that US intelligence says has been breached at least on a small scale several times since.

“If the US goes in and attacks another country without a UN mandate and without clear evidence that can be presented, then there are questions in terms of whether international law supports it — do we have the coalition to make it work?” Obama said Friday. “Those are considerations that we have to take into account.”

Obama conceded in an interview on CNN’s “New Day” program that the episode is a “big event of grave concern” that requires American attention. He said any large-scale chemical weapons usage would affect “core national interests” of the United States and its allies. But nothing he said signaled a shift toward US action.

The New York Times reported Saturday that Obama aides were studying the NATO air war in Kosovo as a precedent for ways how to handle a suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria without United Nations backing. The Obama administration was looking into ways to circumvent Russia’s likely veto of any military action in Syria at the UN Security Council, the report stated. It was seeking to build an international coalition, based on legal justification that Syrian civilians are greatly suffering, in support of such military action.

US defense officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss ship movements publicly. But if the US wants to send a message to Assad, the most likely military action would be a Tomahawk missile strike, launched from a ship in the Mediterranean.

For a year now, Obama has threatened to punish Assad’s regime if it resorted to its chemical weapons arsenal, among the world’s vastest, saying use or even deployment of such weapons of mass destruction constituted a “red line” for him. A US intelligence assessment concluded in June chemical weapons have been used in Syria’s civil war, but Washington has taken no military action against Assad’s forces.

US officials have instead focused on trying to organize a peace conference between the government and opposition. Obama has authorized weapons deliveries to rebel groups, but none are believed to have been sent so far.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters Friday that the president didn’t expect to put “boots on the ground” in Syria.

In his first comments on Syria since the alleged chemical attack, Obama said the US is still trying to find out what happened. Hagel said Friday that a determination on the chemical attack should be made swiftly because “there may be another attack coming,” although he added that “we don’t know” whether that will happen.

After rebels similarly reported chemical attacks in February, US confirmation took more than four months. In this instance, a UN chemical weapons team is already on the ground in Syria. Assad’s government, then as now, has rejected the claims as baseless.

Obama also cited the need for the US to be part of a coalition in dealing with Syria. America’s ability by itself to solve the Arab country’s sectarian fighting is “overstated,” he said.

Pressure Rises on Hamas as Patrons’ Support Fades – NYTimes.com.

By JODI RUDOREN

¶ GAZA CITY — The tumult roiling the Arab world had already severed the lifeline between the Palestinian militant group Hamas and two of its most important patrons, Iran and Syria.

¶ Now, the dismantling of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood by the new military-backed government that ousted the Islamist president has Hamas reeling without crucial economic and diplomatic support. Over the past two weeks, a “crisis cell” of ministers has met daily. With Gaza’s economy facing a $250 million shortfall since Egypt shut down hundreds of smuggling tunnels, the Hamas government has begun to ration some resources.

¶ Its leaders have even mulled publicly what for years would have been unthinkable — inviting the presidential guard loyal to rival Fatah back to help keep the border with Egypt open. (They quickly recanted.)

¶ The mounting pressure on Hamas has implications beyond the 141 square miles of this coastal strip that it has ruled since 2007. It could serve to strengthen President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority and his more moderate Fatah faction that dominates the West Bank just as Washington-orchestrated peace talks get under way. It also adds another volatile element to the rapidly changing landscape across the region, where sectarian tensions have led to bloodshed and the Islamists’ rise to power through the ballot box has been blocked.

¶ “Now, Hamas is an orphan,” said Akram Atallah, a political analyst and columnist, referring to the fact that the movement sprang from Egypt’s Brotherhood a quarter century ago. “Hamas was dreaming and going up with its dreams that the Islamists were going to take over in all the capitals. Those dreams have been dashed.”

¶ The tide of the Arab Spring initially buoyed Hamas, helping bolster Iran and Syria, which provided the Gazan leadership weapons and cash, while undermining President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, who was deeply distrustful and hostile to the group. But Hamas eventually sided with the Sunni opposition in the civil war in Syria — alienating President Bashar al-Assad and his Iranian backers. That was offset when Mr. Mubarak was replaced by Mohamed Morsi, a Muslim Brotherhood leader and ideological ally who relaxed the borders and brokered talks between Hamas and the hostile West as well as its Palestinian rivals.

¶ With Egypt’s military crackdown, Mr. Morsi in detention and the Brotherhood leadership either locked up, dead or in hiding, smuggling between Gaza and Egypt has come to a virtual halt. That means no access to building materials, fuel that costs less than half as much as that imported from Israel, and many other cheap commodities Gazans had come to rely on.

¶ Egypt kept the Rafah crossing point closed for days — stranding thousands of students, business people, medical patients, foreigners and Gazans who live abroad. Adding to Hamas’s isolation, the new emir of Qatar, another benefactor, is said to be far less a fan than his father and predecessor.

¶ In interviews here this week, as well as in public speeches, several Hamas leaders insisted that the Egypt crisis makes repairing the Palestinian rift more urgent. Instead, it already appears more elusive, with the loss of Cairo as the host and broker for reconciliation talks.

¶ Seizing on its opponent’s weakness, the Fatah Revolutionary Council plans to consider declaring Gaza a “rebel province” at a leadership meeting Sunday with President Abbas, which would tighten the noose by curtailing Palestinian Authority financing of operations in the strip. Officials in Fatah and Hamas said that both have increased arrests of the other’s operatives in recent weeks. The Hamas leaders here blame Fatah for what they call a “vicious campaign” against them in the Egyptian news media.

¶ “You can feel the heat because of what’s happening in Egypt,” said Ahmed Yousef, a former aide to Ismail Haniya, the Hamas prime minister of Gaza, who now runs a Gaza research group called House of Wisdom. “The tense relations between Gaza and Ramallah has been intensified. Everybody is suspicious.”

¶ In separate interviews this week, three senior Hamas leaders — Ziad el-Zaza, the finance minister and deputy prime minister; Ghazi Hamad, who handles foreign affairs; and Mahmoud al-Zahar, a hard-liner — said they were taking a “wait and see” approach to Egypt, hoping that perhaps the tide could turn their way. They imagined that a public backlash against what they called a coup could yet lead to the Brotherhood’s resurgence.

¶ “Our policy right now is to keep the people quiet,” Mr. Zahar said. “We have to keep our people highly immunized against the extreme attitude.”

¶ Mr. el-Zaza, the finance minister, declined to say what spending was being cut beyond the use of government cars and expense accounts. All three said Hamas had been through worse: Israeli bombings and assassinations, exiles from Arab capitals, months-long closures of the Rafah crossing during Mr. Mubarak’s reign. “The region is in labor,” Mr. Hamad said. “It’s a time of difficulty, time of challenges.”

¶ The opposition here has been emboldened by the events across the border. A new youth movement called Tamarod — Arabic for rebellion — after an Egyptian group that helped bring down Mr. Morsi, released a YouTube video urging the overthrow of Hamas and a Facebook page calling for mass demonstrations on Nov. 11. An engineering student who is among the group’s founders and spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals said that Hamas had detained at least 50 of Tamarod’s Facebook fans this week, and that he and several others had been jailed, placed under house arrest and had their mobile phones and computers seized. “Maybe Hamas leaders are afraid of what happened in Egypt,” he said.

¶ Several experts said toppling Hamas would be tough. Unlike the Brotherhood, Hamas controls the security forces and service institutions in Gaza as well as its politics. And so far, the rhythm of life appeared to carry on.

¶ Qatar-financed workers were widening the main north-south road this week. Kiosks were crammed with cartoon-character backpacks ahead of school opening on Sunday. The Ferris wheel at a Hamas-run amusement park continued to turn. But at the Rafah crossing, hundreds of desperate would-be travelers waited in vain for days. The gleaming, air-conditioned terminal opened last year was empty but for a handful of Hamas workers watching Al-Jazeera, its baggage carousel idle, a sign flashing “Welcome to Gaza” to nobody.

¶ Egypt announced Friday that it would reopen the border on a limited basis Saturday, after not allowing anyone to leave since Aug. 15, after the government’s deadly raids on two Islamist protest camps.

¶ While Gazans have suffered from intermittent Rafah closures for years, this time many dismissed the ostensible security rationale and saw it as collective political punishment.

¶ “The governments are fighting, and we pay the price,” said Ahmed Muqat, 20, who was trying to get back to medical school in Turkey. “Things are going from worse to worse.”

¶ Dalia Radi, 22, got married Aug. 15, but instead of a honeymoon, spent the week sitting on plastic chairs in a parking lot outside the crossing. For Ms. Radi, whose new husband has lived in Norway for six years, it would have been her first time leaving Gaza.

¶ For Mayy Jawadeh, a 21-year-old student at the University of Tunisia, it may be the last.

¶ “I will never come back again to Gaza,” Ms. Jawadeh said. “Here, no rights for humans — no electricity, no water, you can’t travel. Hamas interferes in Egypt and we bear the brunt.”

¶

Air War in Kosovo Seen as Precedent in Possible Response to Syria Chemical Attack – NYTimes.com.

By MARK LANDLER and MICHAEL R. GORDON

WASHINGTON — As President Obama weighs options for responding to a suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria, his national security aides are studying the NATO air war in Kosovo as a possible blueprint for acting without a mandate from the United Nations.

With Russia still likely to veto any military action in the Security Council, the president appears to be wrestling with whether to bypass the United Nations, although he warned that doing so would require a robust international coalition and legal justification.

“If the U.S. goes in and attacks another country without a U.N. mandate and without clear evidence that can be presented, then there are questions in terms of whether international law supports it, do we have the coalition to make it work?” Mr. Obama said on Friday to CNN, in his first public comments after the deadly attack on Wednesday.

Mr. Obama described the attack as “clearly a big event of grave concern” and acknowledged that the United States had limited time to respond. But he said United Nations investigators needed to determine whether chemical weapons had been used.

Kosovo is an obvious precedent for Mr. Obama because, as in Syria, civilians were killed and Russia had longstanding ties to the government authorities accused of the abuses. In 1999, President Bill Clinton used the endorsement of NATO and the rationale of protecting a vulnerable population to justify 78 days of airstrikes.

A senior administration official said the Kosovo precedent was one of many subjects discussed in continuing White House meetings on the crisis in Syria. Officials are also debating whether a military strike would have unintended consequences, destabilize neighbors like Lebanon, or lead to even greater flows of refugees into Jordan, Turkey and Egypt.

“It’s a step too far to say we’re drawing up legal justifications for an action, given that the president hasn’t made a decision,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the deliberations. “But Kosovo, of course, is a precedent of something that is perhaps similar.”

In the Mediterranean, the Navy’s regional commander postponed a scheduled port call in Naples, Italy, for a destroyer so that the ship would remain with a second destroyer in striking distance of Syria during the crisis. Pentagon officials said the decision did not reflect any specific orders from Washington, but both destroyers had on board Tomahawk cruise missiles, long-range weapons that probably would be among the first launched against targets in Syria should the president decide to take military action.

On Friday, the Russian government called on President Bashar al-Assad of Syria to allow United Nations investigators into the areas east of Damascus where the attack occurred. But American and foreign diplomats said Russia’s move did not reflect any shift in its backing of Mr. Assad or its resistance to punitive measures in the Security Council.

In a statement, Russia’s foreign ministry put the onus on Syria’s opposition forces to provide secure access to the site of the “reported incident.” A second statement suggested that the Russians believed the attack was actually a provocation by the rebels. It cited reports criticizing government troops that were posted on the Internet hours before the attack.

“More and more evidence emerges indicating that this criminal act had an openly provocative character,” Aleksandr K. Lukashevich, a spokesman for Russia’s foreign ministry, said in the statement. “The talk here is about a previously planned action.”

However, Mr. Lukashevich may have been confused by YouTube’s practice of time-stamping uploaded videos based on the time in its California headquarters, no matter the originating time zone. The attacks occurred early Wednesday in Syria, when it would still have been Tuesday in California for about eight more hours.

Mr. Lukashevich praised the Assad government for welcoming Carla del Ponte, a member of a United Nations commission on Syria who suggested in May that the rebels had used chemical weapons, and he accused the Syrian opposition of not cooperating with the investigation by United Nations experts.

The Syrian government did not comment on Friday.

On Friday CBS News, citing administration officials, reported that American intelligence agencies detected activity at locations known to be chemical weapons sites before Wednesday’s attack. The activity, these officials believe, may have been preparations for the assault.

Other Western officials have been less cautious than Mr. Obama. “I know that some people in the world would like to say that this is some kind of conspiracy brought about by the opposition in Syria,” said William Hague, Britain’s foreign secretary, in an interview with Sky News. “I think the chances of that are vanishingly small, and so we do believe that this is a chemical attack by the Assad regime.”

Mr. Hague did not speak of using force, as France has, if the government was found to have been behind the attack. But he said it was “not something that a humane or civilized world can ignore.”

Such statements carry echoes of Kosovo, where the Yugoslav government of Slobodan Milosevic brutally cracked down on ethnic Albanians in 1998 and 1999, prompting the Clinton administration to decide to act militarily in concert with NATO allies.

Mr. Clinton knew there was no prospect of securing a resolution from the Security Council authorizing the use of force. Russia was a longtime supporter of the Milosevic government and was certain to wield its vote in the Security Council to block action.

So the Clinton administration justified its actions, in part, as an intervention to protect a vulnerable and embattled population. NATO carried out airstrikes before Mr. Milosevic agreed to NATO demands, which required the withdrawal of Yugoslav forces.

“The argument in 1999 in the case of Kosovo was that there was a grave humanitarian emergency and the international community had the responsibility to act and, if necessary, to do so with force,” said Ivo H. Daalder, a former United States ambassador to NATO who is now the president of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

In the case of Syria, Mr. Daalder said, the administration could argue that the use of chemical weapons had created a grave humanitarian emergency and that without a forceful response there would be a danger that the Assad government might use it on a large scale once again. Dennis B. Ross, a former adviser to Mr. Obama on the Middle East, said that if the president wanted to develop a legal justification for acting, “there are lots of ways to do it outside the U.N. context.”

They hate Israel, but they hate Hezbollah more – Israel News, Ynetnews.

( “Clowns to the left of me, Jokers to the right, here I am, Stuck in the middle with you.”  – JW )

Abdullah Azzam Brigades took responsibility for rocket fire at Israel on Thursday, but also defies Hezbollah for backing Syrian regime. Al-Qaeda affiliated group also linked to rocket launches at Eilat

Roi Kais

In an ironic turn of events, over the last months Sunni world jihad elements in Lebanon have become a common enemy for Israel and its nemesis, the Shiite Hezbollah .

The radical groups have already dealt several blows to Hezbollah, the most recent of which was the car-bombing of the movement’s stronghold in southern Beirut, only several months after the first rocket attacks in the same area in May.

Related stories:

• IDF bombs Lebanon target in retaliation for rocket attack
• PM on rocket attack: We’ll harm those who harm us
• 2 explosions kill 27 in north Lebanese city

As Hezbollah’s leader is driving his movement deeper into the Syrian mire, his movement is garnering sharper acrimony, now starting to coalesce into actions, sometimes directed at Israel, like the rockets launched on Thursday toward the Galilee.

Iron Dome interception, Thursday

World jihad activity in Lebanon is not a new phenomenon. As early as 2007 the al-Qaeda affiliated Fatah al-Islam group fought bloody skirmishes with the Lebanese army in the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee

camp in northern Lebanon, with casualties numbering in the hundreds.

About two months ago the city of Sidon was the scene for similarly bloody exchanges between the same

jihad group and the fanatic salafist sheikh Ahmad al-Asir’s men.

Fatah al-Islam, which still has remnants in Palestinian refugee camps in the country, is joined by other groups such as the Lebanese-Palestinian Jund al-Sham, which operates in the Palestinian refugee camp Ain al-Hilweh in Sidon and the Abdullah Azzam Brigades, which is rapidly attaining a prominent place among the medley of groups operating in refugee camps in southern Lebanon, especially with regards to attacks against Israel.

Site of Israeli airstrike, south of Beirut (Photo: Reuters)

UN troops in a rocket landing site (Photo: Adham Mohamed)

Landing site in Gesher Haziv (Photo: Aviyahu Shapira)

The Abdullah Azzam Brigades is a radical Sunni group, affiliated with al-Qaeda groups around the Middle East, and has offshoots in Egypt, Iraq and other areas in the region.

The group was established in 2004 and named after sheikh Abdullah Azzam, a Palestinian, one of the

founding fathers of the Afghani al-Qaeda group and, according to some, the mentor of future al-Qaeda leader Osama bin-Laden.

Challenging Hezbollah

The group has a distinct Palestinian orientation, and is responsible for attacks in Egypt and for rocket fire toward Aqaba and Eilat. Its Lebanese presence became more prominent in recent years after it claimed responsibility for several rocket launches at Israel from southern Lebanon.

Its Lebanese branch is dubbed the Ziad Jarrah Battalion, named after one of the Lebanese perpetrators of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Heading the group, according to some reports, is sheikh Majid ben-Mohamed Majid, a Saudi wanted by Saudi Arabia for security reasons.

Beyond its belligerent agenda against Israel and Jews in general, in recent months the group has also challenged the Shiite Hezbollah , following the latter’s involvement in the Syrian civil war.

Abdullah Azzam Brigades take responsibility for firing rockets at Israel in 2009

In early August the group stated that as it has warned Shiites many times that they are on the bring of destruction, Nasrallah’s bases are now viable targets.

They have since claimed responsibility for several attacks on Hezbollah posts, including in the Lebanon Valley and also in the Dahiyeh neighborhood in Beirut.

The Sunni Lebanese sheikh, Siraj a-Din Zarikhat, sponsored by the Abdullah Azzam Brigades, slammed Hezbollah in a tweet on Thursday.

“The Iranian party Hezbollah’s mission to protect Jews will become a burden,” he posted after claiming the Abdullah Azzam Brigades are behind the rocket launches at Israel.

Additionally, several other al-Qaeda-affiliated minor groups operate across Lebanon, and have placed Hezbollah in their crosshairs due to its Syrian involvement.

For instance, the 300-gunmen strong Abdullah al-Sabaa group which operates in Tripoli, the site of much bloodshed in recent months due to clashes between the anti-Assad Sunni extremists and his Alawite

supporters.

Sleeper cells

Concurrently, several groups operate in the village of Arsal in the Lebanon Valley area, near the Syrian border.

These groups, led by the Hassan Dar’am group, are deployed in the mountains bordering on Syria. Another al-Qaeda affiliated group is active in the al-Kaa village near the Syrian border.

Recently, Lebanese security services uncovered sleeper cells in the Mount Lebanon area. Lebanese Interior Minister Marwan Charbel said security services tracked a cell which planned to attack in several

areas in Lebanon.

The cell was exposed due to a work-related accident in an apartment in the town of Daria. “Lebanon is defended by coincidence these days,” said the minister.

After the accident, security services searched the apartment and found a target list, maps, explosives and Jabhat al-Nusra flags.

A few days ago Lebanese security nabbed another cell in the Noaima village between Beirut and Sidon, where the IDF attacked on Friday morning.

A car carrying explosives was found and neutralized. Several persons have been arrested, including some Palestinians. Lebanese media affiliated with Hezbollah claimed the security forces thwarted an attack

against the Lebanese state.

The PFLP

Another piece in this puzzle is Ahmed Jibril, the leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), which one of its bases was bombed by the IDF on Friday.

Ahmed Jibril (Photo: AFP)

The PFLP’s spokesperson in Lebanon disavowed any connection between the group and Thursday’s rocket launches. Jibril established the group in the ’60s, after a rift with the Palestinian Liberation

Organization.

The PFLP objects to any peace deal with Israel and supports the armed struggle against it. Jibril is one of the few top Palestinian officials whose loyalty to Bashar Assad‘s regime remains unwavering.

As far as is currently known, he still resides in Syria, contrary to several Hamas officials who left after expressing firm opinions against the Syrian regime. Jibril was even lightly wounded some months ago in a

rebel attack in the Damascus area.

In recent years the PFLP has been linked to several rocket launches at Israel from southern Lebanon.

However, the group is now almost dormant compared to its initial years. The PFLP is mainly remembered due to the 1985 Jibril Deal, which saw the release of three IDF prisoners of war from the First Lebanon War in return for 1,150 prisoners in Israeli jails.

After the May 2012 Damascus bombing, alleged to Israel by foreign media, top Syrian officials including Assad himself announced the possibility of opening a new front on the Golan Heights against Israel.

Tapped as a potential dominant candidate in that front, Ahmad Jibril congratulated the new direction drawn by Syria.

After the attacks, an unidentified Palestinian group claimed responsibility for mortar fire toward the

Hermon.

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