Egypt: Leader of Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis, organization responsible for 2011, 2012 deadly cross-border assaults, shot by gunmen
By AP and Times of Israel staffMay 23, 2014, 3:10 amUpdated: May 23, 2014, 8:27 am
Egyptian military helicopters fly over the eastern Sinai Peninsula, October 18, 2012. (photo credit: Egyptian Presidency/AFP)
EL-ARISH, Egypt — The top leader of an al-Qaeda-inspired group in Egypt’s restive Sinai and three of his associates were killed in a drive-by shooting in the peninsula on Thursday, senior Egyptian security officials said.
According to three senior security officials, Shadi el-Manaei, who headed Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis — or the Champions of Jerusalem, as the group is also known — and the three other militants were found dead after unidentified gunmen sprayed their vehicle with bullets on a road in central Sinai.
Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis first arose in Sinai, where for years militant groups largely made of up local Bedouin had carried out attacks, lobbing rockets into neighboring Israel and opening fire on soldiers and police officers.
The terror group was responsible for the repeated attacks on Egypt’s gas pipeline to Israel and for attacks on Israeli soil.
The four terrorists killed Thursday were reportedly on their way to bomb a natural gas pipeline in the area, according to Army Radio.
In 2012, the group claimed responsibility for the deadly cross-border attack in September that year in Israel, in which three terrorists, wearing explosive belts and armed with RPG launchers, attacked a group of IDF soldiers securing civilian contractors who were working on the Israel-Egypt fence. IDF soldier Netanel Yahalomi was killed in the attack. The three terrorists were killed in the ensuing gunfight with soldiers.
Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis was also reportedly involved in the sophisticated, multi-pronged August 2011 attack on Highway 12 near Israel’s border with Egypt, which killed a total of eight Israelis.
In March, the group’s former leader, Tawfiq Mohamed Fareej, was killed by a bomb. Fareej was the “field commander” of the 2011 attack.
The terror group has also claimed responsibility for the suicide car bombing targeting Egypt’s interior minister in September last year, an attack from which he escaped unharmed. Scores of Egyptian police officers and soldiers have been killed in attacks by suspected Islamic militants since.
El-Manaei, the mastermind behind Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis’s attacks, has long been on the run.
The officials said that according to the police investigation, 15 men in vehicles and armed with automatic machineguns, attacked el-Manaei’s car to avenge the killings of tribesmen by his terror group.
The tribesmen were killed after the militants claimed they had cooperated with police against Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
The development deals a heavy blow to the militant group, which has claimed scores of deadly attacks across Egypt since the ouster of Islamist president Mohammed Morsi last July. It is also a boost for Egypt’s military-backed authorities ahead of the country’s presidential elections next week.
Attacks by the group escalated after the 2011 fall of autocrat Hosni Mubarak, but increased dramatically after Morsi’s overthrow at the hands of the military.
Egypt’s military-backed interim government has blamed Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood group for the violence, outlawing it and calling it a terrorist organization. But the Brotherhood denies being involved in the violence.
The United States has designated Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis a foreign terrorist organization.
Elsewhere in Egypt, police beat protesters with batons and rifle butts to disperse a rally on Thursday in the northern port city of Alexandria, held to denounce a rights lawyer’s two-year prison sentence, two activists said.
The rally was in support of Mahienour el-Masry, a rights lawyer convicted earlier this year of breaking a controversial law that bans public demonstrations without advance police approval. She was sentenced to two years in prison and her sentence was upheld this week.
Activist Ranwa Youssef and attorney Mohammed Ramadan said police later arrested 19 activists over the rally, but released four — two lawyers and two women.
The convicted el-Masry has joined several icons of Egypt’s 2011 uprising that toppled longtime autocrat Mubarak who have been imprisoned under a controversial law on demonstrations adopted late last year.
Egypt’s retired army chief, Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, who is the front-runner in next week’s presidential elections, says he will keep the law if elected in the May 26-27 vote.
Many pro-democracy activists maintain the imprisonments are part of a concerted campaign to isolate and stain the reputation of the youth leaders of the anti-Mubarak revolt.
At the same time, there has been a massive crackdown against the Brotherhood — at least 16,000 Brotherhood members and allies have been jailed and hundreds have been killed during protests since July 2013. Morsi and most other senior group leaders are in detention.
Also Thursday, a Christian was killed and two people, a Christian and a Muslim, were wounded when they were caught in the crossfire between two feuding groups of Muslims in the southern city of Luxor. The three were outside an Anglican church in the city center when the shooting took place, said the city’s security chief, Mustafa Bakr.
Egypt’s Coptic Christians make up about 10 percent of the country’s estimated 90 million citizens. They have long complained of discrimination by the Muslim majority, but the two communities have generally lived in peace with each other.
Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshaal signs pact with Iran
The Palestinian Hamas terrorist group has been restored to the Iranian fold and won the promise of an annual allowance of $200 million per year, military assistance and advanced weapons on a par with the hardware supplied to Jihad Islami. debkafile’s sources report that this deal was secretly sealed in Doha on Thursday, May 22, at a meeting between Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian and Hamas’s politburo head Khaled Mashaal.
It culminated a month of intense Hamas-Tehran negotiations, which were conducted quietly in parallel with Hamas’s unity talks with the rival Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
(This double track was first revealed by DEBKA Weekly 635 on May 16: Hamas forges Unity with Fatah – But Also Reopens Gaza Door to Iran.)
Hamas is now reinstated as a member of the radical Iran-Syrian-Hizballah Middle Eastern bloc, with all the accoutrements of an ally which it forfeited by turning its back on Bashar Assad at a low moment in the civil war. Tehran has promised to restore the flow of cash and advanced weapons, and go back to training Hamas operatives at courses run by the Revolutionary Guards.
US Secretary of State John Kerry knew this was going on when he met Abbas in London on May 14, but preferred not to raise the issue. Israel’s Justice Minister and negotiator, Tzipi Livni, likewise ignored the Hamas-Tehran pact when she talked to Abbas the next day.
Before clinching the deal, Iran required Meshaal to publicly endorse Iran’s policy in Syria and his support for Bashar Assad.
The Hamas politburo chief accordingly stated in Doha Thursday night that he “welcomed the position of Tehran toward Syria,” adding: “We will never forget Syrian President Bashar Al- Assad’s support for the Palestinian nation.”
Meshaal was fully backed by his own movement. Shortly before the Kerry-Abbas interview in London, the Hamas Shura Council, its supreme forum for policy and military decisions, carried three resolutions:
1. Hamas would strive to restore its ties with Tehran.
2. Khaled Meshaal would travel to Tehran to discuss the military and financial aspects entailed in the restoration of ties.
3. The revived pact with Iran should not interfere with the steps towards uniting the two Palestinian territories, the Gaza Strip and West Bank, and reconciling their rulers, Hamas and Fatah.
debkafile’s military sources add that Hamas was not only desperate for an influx of funds to its empty coffers, but extremely worried by Iran’s massive investment in building up another terrorist organization, Jihad Islami, as its senior military arm in Gaza. It was taking shape as a modern army, larger and better equipped and trained than Hamas’ own military wing, Ezz e-Din al-Qassam.
In recent months, hundreds of Jihad fighters were returning home from Iran, after training at Revolutionary Guards courses for commanders and taking instruction as military engineers and technicians for handling the new weapons. Iran was spending large sums on high-quality arms in Libya and getting them smuggled through Egypt into Gaza for Jihad.
Hamas leaders feared that if they did not move fast to repair their ties with Tehran, the Jihad Islami would soon take their place as the dominant military force in the territory.
The deal struck Thursday in Doha confronts Israel with Iran about to be ensconced solidly – not just in Syria and Lebanon, but also on the Gaza Strip to the south. Tehran’s most radical surrogate forces, like Hizballah on Israel’s northern border, are being armed to the teeth with the most sophisticated tools of war.
In the beginning, when Britain ruled Palestine, mere glimpses emerge: of twenty-three Jewish frogmen and their British commander disappearing without a trace on a seaborne mission against Vichy Lebanon (1941);1 of Jewish soldiers learning naval skills at the British naval base in Haifa (1943); and of Jewish workers posing proudly next to two minesweepers they have constructed for the Royal Navy in Tel Aviv harbor (1944).
The historian, however, begins his labors where he will, and our story commences not in British Palestine but at Fleet Landing in distant Newport, Rhode Island. It was here in April 1946 that a motorized liberty launch put in carrying crewmembers of the USS Massey and their guests—a group of Annapolis midshipmen who had come aboard for two weeks of drills. On reaching land, some of the midshipmen and crewmembers bounded ashore only to be summoned back to the launch, where they received an informative lecture from Lieutenant Paul Shulman, the Massey’s engineering officer. The topic was standard disembarkation from a naval vessel, and the take home message was this: If the sailors wanted to do things according to regulations, then officers were to debark first, followed by midshipmen (since they were destined to be officers) and finally crewmembers. While highly enlightening, the lecture seems not to have been appreciated by men anxious to begin their liberty—although they did do a commendable job of applying their new knowledge when Shulman finally let them leave the launch.2
Gruffness was nothing new to Paul Shulman. His biographer, J. Wandres, relates that five years earlier, while an Annapolis midshipman himself, he had had a terse exchange with a revered houseguest at his parents’ home. The visitor had remarked that he was delighted that Jewish boys like Shulman were studying to be naval officers since an independent Jewish state, once it came into being, would require men with such skills. Shulman snapped back that he intended to be a career officer in the U.S. Navy and wished the houseguest luck with recruitment elsewhere.3 The houseguest, David Ben-Gurion, found Shulman’s sense of commitment impressive and did not forget him.
Career plans enunciated by 18-year-olds are apt to change. And so it was in the case of young Shulman. The Holocaust—and Britain’s subsequent refusal to allow the survivors of that catastrophe to immigrate to the Jewish National Home in Mandatory Palestine—made a deep impression on the maturing officer. Obtaining his release from active naval duty in 1946, he helped front an organization that purchased decommissioned U.S. and Canadian naval vessels for use in smuggling European Jews to Palestine in the teeth of Britain’s draconian blockade. (Unfortunately, the Royal Navy intercepted most of these vessels, sending the passengers back to Europe or to internment on Cyprus.)4
In April 1948, the 25-year-old Shulman accepted an offer to serve as Chief-of-Staff for naval training in the nascent Israeli Navy.5 Weeks later—on May 15th—five Arab armies crossed the frontier of the newborn Jewish state intent on annihilating it. Within the navy, at this time, there existed two competing operational philosophies. The Palyam—a frogman-based commando unit—believed that commando operations could meet all of Israel’s naval requirements, including staging attacks, keeping sea-lanes open, blockading enemy ports and transporting marines.6 Shulman adhered to the rival view, outlined by former Royal Navy officer, Robert Stephenson Miller, that a traditional navy would better serve Israel’s needs.
In the event, both operational schools were vindicated. At the outset of the war, four decommissioned naval vessels intercepted by Britain during the illegal immigration campaign were at anchor in Haifa harbor. Just prior to declaring independence, Israel took possession of these vessels, carried out repairs and formed them into the so-called “Big Flotilla” in accordance with Miller’s conception.7 In the meantime, an Israeli agent had purchased six “explosive” speedboats. Formerly belonging to the “Decima Mas” special operations unit of the Italian Navy,8 these became the chief strike weapon of the Palyam (now know as the “Marine Sabotage Unit”9 and soon to be renamed “Flotilla 13”—a name that finally stuck10).
The stage was now set for the most stunning naval feat of the war—a combined operation, involving both the Big Flotilla and the Palyam. Because the explosive boats could not travel long distances on the open sea, they were being transported in the lifeboat position aboard one of the Big Flotilla ships when the latter, commanded by Shulman, cornered the Egyptian flagship, Al Emir Farouq, off the Gaza coastline on October 21, 1948. A ceasefire had just gone into effect, but when an Egyptian shore battery opened fire on the Israeli flotilla, Shulman obtained permission to attack directly from Ben-Gurion.11 The explosive boats were lowered into the water and sped toward their quarry—each carrying 650 pounds of explosive in the prow. At a distance of 100 yards, the Palyam pilots, commanded by Yochai Bin-Nun,12 locked their rudders in position and jumped overboard. On impact, the explosives separated from the boats, sunk and exploded below the water line.13 Struck twice, the Egyptian flagship broke in half, carrying 500 men to the bottom, while a third torpedo boat crippled an Egyptian minesweeper.14 Five days later, Ben-Gurion promoted Shulman to command of the Israeli Navy with the rank of Aluf (i.e., Admiral). According to J. Wandres, Shulman would muse afterwards that he must be the first U.S. Naval lieutenant to achieve the rank of admiral in just three years.15
Notwithstanding the success of the Al Emir Farouq operation, Israel’s War of Independence was decided on land. The navy had neither to clash with an enemy fleet nor to forestall an attempt at amphibious invasion, nor even to protect seaborne commerce. (Marine insurance rates actually fell by half during the war.16) Mere shore bombardment proved beyond the fleet’s means. Because the U.S. and Canadian navies had removed the original artillery from the ships comprising the Big Flotilla, the Israeli Navy employed field guns (secured to the decks by rope) for such bombardment attempts with most unsatisfactory results.17 In sum, says one historian, the Israeli Navy emerged from the war as “a disorganized collection of unsuitable ships, operated by inadequately trained crews,” which was manifestly unable “to come up with a useful role for their service…”18 To square the circle, Shlomo Shamir, a distinguished army officer with no naval experience, was chosen to succeed Shulman in command.19
Although the equipment improved with the purchase of some bona fide naval destroyers in 1955, finding a useful mission remained problematic. Given little guidance from the rest of the military, the navy began training for the purpose of protecting Israel’s sea lines of communication in the event of another war. But the IDF (Israel Defense Force) did not intend to ask the navy to fulfill this purpose in wartime. Because Israel relied heavily on citizen reserves, a prolonged conflict was deemed impracticable. The widespread requisitioning of manpower, trucks, planes and ships at a moment’s notice upon the outbreak of war would bring the economy to a standstill—a condition that could not be long maintained. Consequently, all planning was geared toward rapid blitz-style military actions—the outcome of which would be determined before open or closed sea lines could come into play.20 The main reason that the navy was able to requisition the aforementioned destroyers21 at all seems to have been a belief on the part of the IDF brass that it would force Israel’s enemies to overspend on their own navies in order to keep up, thereby diverting the enemies’ resources from military equipment needed for the decisive battle on land.22
The navy’s new equipment saw its first action during Operation Kadesh (i.e., the 1956 Sinai Campaign), wherein Israel joined Britain and France in a war against Egypt—the Israelis responding to Egyptian-sponsored terrorist raids and the blockade of Eilat (her southern port); the British and French retaliating for Egyptian President Gamel Abdel Nasser’s nationalization of the British- and French-owned Suez Canal. At the outset, Israel’s Anglo-French allies insisted that the Israeli Navy avoid the main area of operations so as not to become entangled with the large allied naval assault force. Israeli landing craft (obtained during the early 1950s) did play a role in the Gulf of Aqaba by transporting four light tanks to southern Sinai for the IDF assault on Sharm-el-Sheikh, but it appeared that the destroyers would be consigned to the sidelines for the duration. In the event, they were spared this disappointment by the Egyptian Navy, which dispatched the frigate, Ibrahim El Awal, to bombard Haifa. As the ship withdrew, the destroyers gave chase supported by torpedo boats and IAF fighter-bombers. Crippled in the water by Israeli fire, the Ibrahim El Awal was boarded by Israeli sailors and towed back to Haifa, where it was repaired and re-commissioned as an Israeli naval vessel.23
This positive outcome did not negate the fact that the Israeli Navy had been taken by surprise at its own base of operations (Haifa) or that the Egyptian ship had fired off 160 shells and begun sailing for home before the Israelis were able to react. It was a humbling reminder that the principal duty of a small state’s navy is to guard the coastline.24 This message was driven home with finality the following year when the Soviet Union sold a new weapon—the missile boat—to Syria and Egypt. Capable of traveling at 38 knots and firing the ship-to-ship Styx missile at targets up to 40 kilometers distant, the new threat rendered Israel’s destroyer-based navy all but obsolete. Although the missile boats could not detect specific land targets owing to the cacophony of shoreline radar echoes, were they to open fire on Israel’s target-rich coastal cities, there was nothing the lumbering destroyers could do about it.25
While such weapons systems were in development in Western nations including the United States, they were not yet operational or available for sale.26 Hence, a new conception for Israel’s Navy was necessary—tilting the balance away from the “traditional navy” Miller plan and towards small ships for coastal defense. Chosen to lead the drive was former Palyam commander, Yochai Bin-Nun, who served as Commander of the Israeli Navy from 1960 to 1966. Under his leadership, the old Palyam commando concept became so preponderant that the effects still reverberate. Says one historian, “Nearly every navy in the world has commando forces at its disposal. But … in no other navy in the world do commando operations have such a predominant status.”27
Directly countering the Syrian and Egyptian missile boat threat was a prime challenge for the new navy. With no similar weapons systems existing in the West, Israel began work on its own—the Gabriel missile.28 Based on a blueprint developed by MIT-trained IDF Major General Amos Horev in 1953 and brought to fruition by the Drexel-trained engineer, Ori Even-Tov, in 1965, the new missile was smaller and of shorter range than the Soviet Styx, but had a more advanced guidance system and was virtually invisible to targeted vessels since it traveled just above the ocean plane.29 To carry the Gabriel, Israel chose German-designed patrol craft manufactured in France.30
At the outbreak of the 1967 Six Day War, these weapons were still in production. Consequently, commando operations formed the crux of the navy’s contribution. The results were discouraging. The day of explosive boats had passed with the widespread adoption of radar.31 Israel’s naval commandos now based their operations on a lone operational submarine—the 1930s-vintage, former Royal Navy S-Class Tanin—and a flotilla of underwater, Bond-like “Swimmer Delivery Vehicles (SDVs),” whose prototypes—known by the very un-kosher term maiale or “pigs” (a name which stuck with them ever after despite protests from the IDF’s chief rabbi32)—had been developed in Mussolini’s Italy. On the first night of the war, frogmen deployed by the Tanin attempted to raid Alexandria harbor only to find the base empty of military targets. Worse still, on their return they missed the rendezvous and were later captured in an attempt to hide on land. The Tanin, meanwhile, went 0 for 8 in torpedo shots against an Egyptian frigate and then got pinned down for three hours by depth charges launched in retaliation.33
On the same night the SDVs attempted a raid on Port Said at the entryway to the Suez Canal. They, too, found no targets in port, and only narrowly withdrew after shore batteries and patrol boats spotted them and opened fire. Operations off the Syrian coast—one of them commanded by Yochai Bin-Nun, who had been summoned from retirement34—fared no better, and in the end, the navy’s lone success in the war came accidentally with the capture of Sharm-el-Sheikh on June 7. The site, from which Egypt had blockaded the Straits of Tiran making war inevitable, was to have been taken by Israeli paratroopers with the navy in support. Owing to catastrophic losses in the Sinai, however, the Egyptians had already fled. Consequently, when Israeli naval forces arrived ahead of the paratroopers, they were able to come ashore unmolested to secure the vital position.35
It remained for the navy to play a role in the one great blunder of the war: In a dreadful mishap on June 8th, Israeli jets and torpedo boats attacked the American signals intelligence ship, USS Liberty, severely crippling the vessel and inflicting 205 casualties including 34 deaths. The ship had been specifically identified as the USS Liberty earlier that morning after an Israeli Noratlas reconnaissance plane detected its hull number.36 But the vessel was then lost to follow up—in large measure because after the lapse of several hours, its position marker was taken off Naval Command’s situation map as being no longer accurate. Worse still, word of the ship’s sighting was not passed on at the ensuing shift change.37
In an unfortunate coincidence one hour later, a loud explosion at El Arish in Sinai (now held by Israeli forces) was mistaken for an Egyptian naval bombardment. At the time, all other U.S. naval vessels had withdrawn from the coast, but the Liberty acting under separate orders from the National Security Agency and Joint Chiefs of Staff, had failed to receive its orders to do likewise. Thus, it continued patrolling the coastal waters north of Sinai where Israeli torpedo boats, which had not been alerted to the possible presence of an American warship, now sighted it and mistook it for an Egyptian vessel.38 Acting in accordance with IDF Chief-of-Staff Yitzhak Rabin’s standing orders to sink all unidentified vessels in the war zone, the torpedo boats requested air force assistance. After two initial flyovers failed to discern friendly markings,39 the ship was attacked from the air. Later, the Israeli torpedo boats arrived on the scene to inflict more damage.
The first clue that a tragic mistake had been made was the recovery, by one of the torpedo boats, of a life raft from the Liberty that possessed a U.S. Naval insignia. Israel immediately offered apologies to the U.S. government and offered to pay compensation. The episode has become the subject of conspiracy theories and cover-up charges, but ten subsequent U.S. government (and three Israeli) investigations have failed to expose any evidence or motive to support the notion that the attack was anything but a terrible and unintentional blunder.40
Four months after the war, the navy suffered a humiliating setback. During a routine patrol along the Sinai coastline on October 21st, the destroyer Eilat, Israel’s flagship, discerned a flash of light from Egypt’s Port Said at the outlet of the Suez Canal. It was a Soviet-made Styx missile, and it found its mark in the Eilat’s stern. Some 15 minutes later a second missile found its target. The ship began to list. For two hours, Israeli sailors attempted to salvage the destroyer, but when a third Styx struck the vessel’s magazine, her captain issued the order to abandon ship. Within a quarter of an hour, the Eilat went to the bottom. A fourth of the crew were killed and fully half wounded in this sea-to-sea missile strike—the first ever in naval history.41
Three months later, disaster struck anew when the T-class submarine, Dakar, manned by a crew of 69, disappeared without a trace during its maiden voyage home after purchase in Great Britain. Its fate remained a mystery for 30 years until its wreckage was discovered on the ocean bottom, 1.8 miles down, off the island of Crete in 1999. The cause of the tragedy has never been determined.42
Despite these devastating reverses, new vistas were opening for Israel’s navy. Possession of the Sinai Peninsula with its extensive coastline promised a vast expansion in its scope of operations. Hoping to capitalize on this fact, Israel’s new naval chief, Avraham “Cheetah” Botzer, sought to enhance the navy’s relevance by realigning its mission in accordance with the needs of the other branches.43 Henceforth, the navy was to regard itself not as a separate entity, but as an integral part of the IDF. Reflective of the new outlook, it adopted IDF-style uniforms to replace its former navy attire and relocated “Naval Command” from Haifa to Tel Aviv where the rest of the IDF was headquartered.44
In order to patrol Sinai’s Mediterranean and Red Sea coastlines effectively, the navy needed to press ahead with procurement of the French-built, German designed missile boats that were to carry the new Gabriel missile. Known by the designation SA’AR (Hebrew for “Storm”45), the new boats were less than 1/10th the size of a destroyer.46 Hence, they were faster, more maneuverable and required far smaller crews (eliminating the risk of an Eilat-magnitude disaster should a single ship be lost). At the same time, the compact new missile system allowed them to pack a stronger punch, all at a fraction of the cost of a new destroyer.47
Unfortunately, there was a problem. Just prior to the Six Day War, the French government had placed an embargo on military sales to Israel in order to appease Arab sentiment. Two of the missile boats had already been delivered, and France allowed two more, which had been paid for while under construction, to sail for Israel after the war. But when Israel used French-made helicopters in a raid on Beirut Airport in retaliation for Palestinian terrorist attacks on Israeli planes (1968), President de Gaulle ordered a halt to all further deliveries. Alerted to the decision several days before the orders reached Cherbourg where the boats were under construction, Israel informed the port authorities that they would be running sea trials on two nearly complete boats on January 4, 1969. Unaware of de Gaulle’s decision, the port approved. Once out to sea, the boats simply kept going until they reached Haifa.48
As these vessels, too, had been purchased in advance, the action didn’t exactly constitute theft, but de Gaulle angrily declared that five boats still being built at Cherbourg—for which contracts had been signed replete with a 30% down-payment49—were not to reach Israel. Instead, they were resold to a Norwegian company involved in oil exploration off the coast of Alaska with Israel being reimbursed from the proceeds. The boats set sail from Cherbourg on Christmas Eve 1969 in the teeth of 30-foot waves and 70-knot winds. Two days later they were sighted off Gibraltar, where the British authorities effectively winked at them by signaling, “bon voyage” as they sailed past.50 On New Year’s Eve they arrived in Haifa. Though headed by a well-known Norwegian shipping agent, the Norwegian “company,” was actually a front for Israeli buyers, and the crewmen were actually Israeli sailors participating in Operation Noah to recover Israel’s contractual property.51
With the missile boats now on hand to fill the roles of attack and forward defense, the Israeli Navy rounded out its inventory upgrade by obtaining shallow-draught, U.S.-made Dabur (“hornet”) class patrol boats for coastal and rear defense and by incorporating landing craft (some of which were built domestically at Haifa’s “Israel Shipyards”) for amphibious operations carried out in cooperation with the IDF.52 Equipped with its new arsenal, Israel’s Navy was poised to sail into a new era.
________________________
Notes
1 This was Operation Boatswain—an attempt to sabotage the oil refineries in Tripoli (Samuel M. Katz, The Night Raiders: Israel’s Naval Commandos at War. New York: Pocket Books, 1997, 27-28).
2 J. Wandres, . The Ablest Navigator: Lieutenant Paul N. Shulman, USN, Israel’s Volunteer Admiral. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2010, 28.
3 Wandres, 14.
4 Wandres, 39.
5 The course was taught in English since Hebrew lacked naval terminology (Wandres, 58).
6 Mommsen, 22-23.
7 Mommsen, 28, 30.
8 A former Italian naval officer (and ex-Fascist), Fiorenzo Capriotti, trained the Palyam in the boats’ operation. (Katz, 60-61).
9 Moshe Tzalel, From Ice-Breaker to Missile Boat: The Evolution of Israel’s Naval Strategy. Contributions in Military Studies, Number 192. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2000, 10. 10 The name derived from the unit’s tradition of toasting its membership on the 13th of each month (Katz, 72-73).
11 Mommsen, 40.
12 After targeting the minesweeper and locking his rudder, Bin-Nun had trouble ejecting with his flotation device—finally exiting the boat under fire with only 40 meters to spare. He received the Medal of Valor for his role in the raid (Katz, 68-69; Abraham Rabinovich, The Boasts of Cherbourg. New York: Seaver Books, 1988, 24-25).
13 Mommsen, 29.
14 Wandres, 1-3; Mommsen, 40; Tzalel, 90. The reason the Al Emir Farouq had 500 men aboard was because it was transporting troops to the Gaza front (Katz, 69).
15 Wandres, 3.
16 Tzalel, 11.
17 Tzalel, 10.
18 Tzalel, 14.
19 After serving one year as naval Aluf, Shamir was given command of the air force.
20 Tzalel, 16-18; Mommsen, 44-46.
21 Also obtained was a small flotilla of torpedo boats, several WWII-surplus infantry landing craft and three small wooden Italian boats, which were carried overland across the Negev to Eilat to serve as the Israeli Navy in the Gulf of Aqaba (Mommsen, 52).
22 Mommsen, 46.
23 Mommsen, 67-68; Moshe Dayan, Diary of the Sinai Campaign, New York: Harper & Row, 1965, 110-14. On November 3, the IAF accidentally attacked a British frigate in the Gulf of Aqaba, mistaking it for an Egyptian ship that had been sunk by the British two days earlier. The Israelis lost a plane in the attack. (Mommsen, 69; Tzalel, 27)
24 Tzalel, 2, 93.
25 Mommsen, 77-78.
26 Mommsen, 81.
27 Mommsen, 79.
28 The name was suggested by a Canadian engineer, whose firm codenamed its war materiel after angels and Catholic saints (Rabinovich, 48).
29 Mommsen, 80; Rabinovich 37.
30 There was domestic opposition in Germany to the sale of weapons to Israel, so the German manufacturer subcontracted production to a French shipyard.
31 Mommsen, 52-53.
32 Katz, 93.
33 Mommsen, 85, 105-07; see also Tzalel, 101.
34 Mommsen, 113.
35 Mommsen, 107-111; Tzalel, 100.
36 Mommsen, 116; Tzalel, 144-45.
37 Tzalel, 145; Michael B. Oren, “The USS Liberty: Case Closed.” Originally published in Azure, Spring 5760 / 2000, No. 9. Accessed here November 19, 2013.
38 Oren, op cit.
39 Admiral Thomas Moorer of the U.S.N., would later express astonishment that Israeli pilots could not identify ships accurately, but in a prior exercise, this had been shown to be a distinct shortcoming of Israeli fighter pilots. (Tzalel, 147-48)
40 Mitchell Bard, Myths and Facts: A Guide to the Arab-Israeli Conflict. Chevy Chase: The American Israeli Cooperative Enterprise (AICE), 2002, 62-64; Oren, op cit.
41 Rabinovich, 5-9; Mommsen, 127-28; Tzalel, 108.
42 No distress call was ever received. Examination of the wreckage, which was discovered by Nauticos—the same company that located the wreckage of the Titanic— showed that the periscope was extended (indicating that the submarine was near the surface when the problem occurred). The hull, broken into two pieces, had imploded—evidence that the submarine broke apart under pressure (Mommsen, 144).
43 Tzalel, 43-44.
44 Mommsen, 152; Tzalel, 46-47. Naval Command did not relocate until 1972.
45 Rabinovich, 65.
46 The boats displaced 250 tons compared with 3,500 tons for the average destroyer (Rabinovich, 28).
47 Rabinovich, 28, 67.
48 Rabinovich, 13-20.
49 Rabinovich, 88.
50 Rabinovich, 151-52.
51 Mommsen, 137-42. France had considered bombing the vessels after they were sighted off Gibraltar, but as this technically would have been an act of war, they dropped the idea.
52 Mommsen, 145-46.
_____________________________________________
Part Two
While Israel revamped its fleet, Egypt embarked on the so-called War of Attrition (1969-1970) with the intention of breaking Israeli morale by causing a steady stream of casualties through artillery actions along the Suez Canal. Notwithstanding its new equipment, Israel’s navy fulfilled its role in this conflict not with missile boats but with old-fashioned Palyam-style raids and Navy-IDF combined amphibious operations. Following its subpar performance in the Six Day War, Flotilla 13 had undergone a complete overhaul under the leadership of its new commander, Ze’ev Almog—a converted infantryman who had joined the naval commandos in 1954.1 Later to obtain a Master’s Degree at the U.S. Naval War College (1972) and to serve as Israel’s naval Commander-in-Chief (1979-1985), Almog was famous at this juncture for accosting senior officers, map in hand, with an unsolicited plan for a raid.2 Under his tutelage naval commandos were trained for combined diving activity/ground raiding and outfitted with specialized webbing gear appropriate for action on land and in the water. Thanks to Almog’s persistent lobbying, the new gear was finally put to use on June 21, 1969, when Flotilla 13 commandos swam a third of a mile from rubber dinghies and stormed ashore at Adibiyah, destroying an Egyptian monitoring station and inflicting heavy casualties. The attack, says Almog, “proved [Flotilla 13’s] ability to execute an infantry assault from the sea.”3
In July 1969, Flotilla 13 and the IDF’s special commando unit Sayeret Matkal undertooka combined operation against heavily garrisoned “Green Island” in the Gulf of Suez—a position so “unassailable” that its Egyptian defenders dubbed it the “Rock of Gibraltar.”4 The raid required twenty Flotilla 13 commandos to arrive simultaneously at the landing site after a half-mile swim—something that had never been done. To facilitate the task, the swimmers formed a “human centipede”—ten swimmers (swimming one behind the other) on one side of a central cord paired with ten swimmers on the other side. Each pair of swimmers was attached to the central cord by a contact rope to avoid separation from the group.5 Once ashore the commandos successfully secured the assigned “grip area,” from which the Sayeret Matkal commandos were to press forward to subdue all resistance. As the Sayeret Matkal force had not yet landed, however, the naval commandos pressed ahead with successful attacks on both flanks, with the unfortunate consequence that an Egyptian grenade felled two of their number.6
Subsequent to this, the twenty Sayeret Matkal commandos stormed ashore from rubber dinghies, accompanied by Commander Almog who promptly established a command post atop the fortress roof. In a battle lasting just under forty minutes, Green Island was “crushed to smithereens”7 and Flotilla 13 dispelled any and all doubt as to its status as an elite unit. Even Egyptian sources regard the attack as a crucial turning point whereby Israel seized the initiative in the War of Attrition.8 But the 40% casualty rate (six killed and ten seriously wounded out of a 40-man combined force) made a deep impression on the IDF brass.9 Consequently, no further raids of this magnitude were attempted during the Attrition War.10
This is not to say that Flotilla 13 remained inactive. Just two months later, it achieved another coup with operations Escort and Raviv (September 1969). In the first of these paired operations, naval commandos driving submerged SDVs mined two Egyptian torpedo boats at Ras Sadat. They succeeded in destroying the boats, but a self-destruct mine aboard one of the two SDVs malfunctioned and exploded during the return voyage, killing three of its crewmembers. (A rescue helicopter found the survivor six hours later, treading water and guarding the bodies of his fellows.11) Despite this tragedy, the way was now open for Operation Raviv in which Israeli-manufactured12 landing craft transported three Egyptian tanks (captured as war booty during the Six Day War) across the Gulf of Suez. The tanks roamed the Egyptian coastline Trojan-horse style, destroying Egyptian military installations (which took them for friendly vehicles) before successfully rendezvousing with the landing craft for the trip back home. There were no Israeli casualties in this ten-hour raid, during which 150 Egyptian soldiers were killed.13
With the coming of the Yom Kippur War (October 1973), naval warfare entered a new era. The Israeli Navy’s main concern at this time was the possible deployment of enemy missile boats off Israel’s heavily populated coastal plain. To pre-empt such a strike, Israel deployed its own missile boats in a “forward defense” posture close to its enemies’ bases. On October 6th, Yom Kippur, the first night of the war, the tactic paid high dividends. The first ship-to-ship missile battle in naval history took place that night at Latakia on the Syrian coast. Although the first Gabriel missile fired in wartime missed its mark, Israel finished the encounter, with the sinking of 5 Syrian ships—including three Syrian missile boats whose Styx missile proved utterly ineffectual despite their superior range. Once launched, the Styx relied upon an on-board guidance system to locate its target. Israel managed to dodge everything that was fired at them by using evasive maneuvers, launching chaff decoys14 and jamming the Styx’s target acquisition electronically. In contrast, Israel’s superiorly designed Gabriel could receive continued guidance input from the firing ship throughout its flight to the target, switching to on-board guidance only if the target was definitely locked. The result was the destruction of a patrol boat, a minesweeper and three Syrian missile boats on October 6th, and the sinking of two more missile boats in a second raid five days later.15
Similar engagements ensued on the Egyptian front. At Port Said, an Egyptian flotilla reached the safety of its harbor solely because misconnected wiring on the pursuing SA’ARs prevented effective fire.16 At the Battle of Damietta, however, the Russian-made Styx again proved ineffectual against Israeli countermeasures—and this time the Egyptians could find no safe harbor. Three of four Egyptian missile ships were overtaken and destroyed by Gabriel missiles while attempting flight. The victories at Latakia and Damietta left Israel free to target and destroy naval stations, radar installations, oil refineries and ammunition stores along the Syrian and Egyptian coastlines.17
In the southern theatre, naval Commander-in-Chief “Bini” Telem had devised an amphibious operation for the Gulf of Suez that would allow for the crossing of tanks, which could then attack Egyptian forces from behind.18 As a prerequisite, Israel had to destroy two Egyptian missile boats guarding this theatre. As the Israeli Navy had no missile boats of its own south of the Canal, Flotilla 13 commandos were tasked with the mission. On the first attempt (October 11), they managed to sink one of the Egyptian missile boats in its harbor with underwater explosives. An attempt to destroy the second one with a new generation explosive boat on October 19th failed when the boat’s rudder jammed after the pilot abandoned ship. (The boat navigated chaotically in the darkness—menacing the Israeli commandos as much or more than the Egyptians—until it finally self-destructed within the harbor.19) Two nights later, another attempt was carried out with anti-tank missiles fired from speedboats. The first eight shots with these clumsy weapons missed, whereupon Ze’ev Almog, who had accompanied his commandos on the mission, threatened to fire the weapon himself. His gunners pleaded for another chance, and with their last two rockets destroyed the target.20
Nevertheless, there would be no amphibious tank foray across the Gulf of Suez: Days earlier the IDF had affected its own crossing further north—over the Suez Canal—to threaten the Egyptian 3rd Army in Sinai with encirclement. (Unit 707, the navy’s diving corps, assisted IDF engineers in laying the initial bridge for this otherwise IDF-conducted crossing.21)
In contrast to its gross underperformance in the Six Day War, the Israeli Navy’s success in 1973 constituted one of the few untarnished bright spots of the war. The sole naval limitation to be exposed during the conflict was the navy’s inability to counter Egypt’s closure of the Bab el Mandeb Strait. Unable to blockade Eilat by closing the Straits of Tiran as it had done prior to the Six Day War,22 Egypt achieved the same purpose by halting traffic far to the south at Bab el-Mandeb where the Red Sea enters the Gulf of Aden. Oil shipments from Iran were thus interdicted, although Israel was able to continue importing oil from the deposits it had discovered in the Sinai.23 Having foreseen the possibility of such a blockade prior to the war, Israel had augmented its fleet of missile boats with two state-of-the-art SA’AR-4s capable of operating at this distant strait.24 Unfortunately, both ships were in the Mediterranean at the outbreak of the war and were thus unavailable for their intended mission. More ominous, however, was the fact that even properly positioned, they would not have been capable of prolonged intervention at Bab el Mandeb since air support—available to the enemy owing to its ties to local nations—would not have been feasible for Israel at this distance. The Israeli ships might strike, but they would soon have to depart, leaving the enemy once again in control of the strait. After the IDF surrounded the Egyptian 3rd Army in Sinai, Sadat capitalized on his control of Bab el Mandeb—offering to allow a modest number of ships to pass through to Eilat in return for Israel’s allowance of the passage of non-military necessities to the encircled Egyptians.25
Hence, Israel’s possession of Sharm el-Sheikh at the tip of the Sinai Peninsula was shown to be insufficient to maintain open sea-lanes to Eilat, Israel’s southern port. A definitive solution to this puzzle would only come with the signing of the 1979 Camp David Accords establishing peace with Egypt.26 The new treaty not only guaranteed navigation in Israel’s southern sea-lanes, but also greatly reduced the likelihood that Israel or her navy would be drawn into a full-scale conflict with her neighbors in the near term.
Unfortunately, the 1970s had seen a new naval threat arise in the form of seaborne Palestinian terrorism. Originating from Lebanon—to which the bulk of the PLO had fled after its ouster from Jordan in 1970—the attacks employed rubber dinghies—some proceeding directly along the coastline from Lebanon, others deployed from “merchant” boats further offshore.27 Two of the most infamous anti-Israel terrorist raids in history were carried out in this fashion—namely the 1975 Savoy Hotel attack and the 1978 “Coastal Road Massacre” (which remains the deadliest terrorist attack against Israel to date). To combat this onslaught Israel relied on its “second line” (i.e., coastal) defense, comprised of patrols by Dabur patrol craft augmented by smaller, commando-driven Snunit (“Swallow”) speedboats.
The navy’s approach, however, was by no means purely defensive. The missile boats used in the Yom Kippur War were now used to transport Naval and IDF commandos to the Lebanese coast for raids against terrorist facilities and munitions stores.28 At times, the disparity in equipment between the Israeli Navy and its terrorist adversaries led to a “theatre of the absurd” as when an Israeli missile boat fired nearly 1,000 shells of varying calibers at a lone terrorist on a small island before finally dispatching him.29 But with Ze’ev Almog now in command of the Israeli Navy (1979-1985) there would not be a single successful terrorist strike by sea from Lebanon.30
During Operation Peace for Galilee (the First Lebanon War, 1982) the Israeli Navy was able to operate unopposed off the coast of Lebanon, supporting the coastal arm of Israel’s infantry advance with flanking fire from the sea. More significantly, the navy carried out the first large-scale amphibious landings in its history—first at a sandy beach secured in advance by naval commandos just north of Sidon (where ultimately 2,400 troops and 400 tanks and APCs were unloaded),31 and later at Junieh, north of Beirut. In both cases, the amphibious forces were able to assist the infantry by approaching PLO positions from the rear.32
Throughout this period and beyond, the Israeli Navy continued to modernize its arsenal. After the Yom Kippur War, the Gabriel-II missile with a range of 36 km (comparable to the 40 km range of the Soviet Styx) replaced the 20 km range Gabriel-I. Soon thereafter, the navy obtained Harpoon class missiles from the U.S. with a stunning 100 km range. The extended strike capability created a new problem for the Israeli Navy because targets 100 km distant were “beyond the horizon” (i.e., beyond radar range). Israel solved the quandary with ship-borne helicopters that could take off from the deck and fly forward to assist with targeting. However, the helicopters proved a poor fit for the navy’s existing missile boats, and a larger version specifically designed to carry helicopters had to be developed. Although it would not become operational until the late 1990s, the SA’AR-5 missile boat would boast a mind-boggling arsenal, including the Gabriel II (for short and medium range targets), the Harpoon (for “beyond the horizon targets”), a helicopter to guide the latter, anti-submarine warfare torpedoes, a 20 mm, six-barrel Phalanx gun which could fire 3,000 rounds per minute to shoot down incoming anti-ship missiles at a range of 1.5 km, and the newly developed, vertically-launched Barak missile which could speed off at Mach 2 to destroy incoming anti-ship missiles up to 10 km away.33 As seaborne Palestinian terrorists were now utilizing racing boats which greatly outpaced the navy’s Daburs, Israel also updated its coastal-defense flotilla with new Super Dvora-class patrol boats capable of speeds up to 46 knots.34
Also requisitioned during the 1990s were two Dolphin-class diesel-electric submarines. Built by a German contractor, they had an operational range of 8,000 nautical miles making them suitable for deep-sea operations. But dating to the 1950s, when it obtained its first submarine, the Israeli Navy had used the vessels to deliver underwater naval commandos to the vicinity of their targets.35 Hence, the new generation subs were also outfitted for coastal commando operations with large-diameter torpedo tubes capable of transporting swimmer delivery vehicles36 and blue-green exterior paint for camouflaged near-surface activity.37
While these various upgrades were taking place, the Israeli Navy maintained a near perfect record in interdicting seaborne terrorism. Attempted raids from Lebanon using small boats or rubber dinghies were universally unsuccessful. A more novel attempt came from further away. In April 1985, a “cargo” vessel sailing towards Israel from Algiers was ordered to stop and identify itself. Instead, the ship’s crew fired rocket-propelled grenades at an approaching Israeli missile boat. The missile boat sank the vessel on the spot—learning afterwards from survivors that the ship was bound for Tel Aviv, where terrorists (who were to leave the ship and come ashore in rubber dinghies) intended to raid the Ministry of Defense in order to assassinate then Defense Minister, Yitzhak Rabin.38 With the Palestinian attacks originating from more distant sites, the Israeli Navy began retaliating against more distant targets (thus letting the involved terrorists know that they were not immune to retribution). Hence, when PLO terrorist Abu Jihad orchestrated the “Bus of Mothers Massacre”—a deadly bus hijacking in Beersheba during the first Intifada (1987-1993)—the Israeli Navy sent naval and Sayeret Matkal commandos all the way to Tunis by missile boat to kill Abu Jihad in his own home. The mission (which was aided by Mossad) was a complete success.39 A similar type of raid against Hezbollah in Lebanon in 1997, however, ended in complete disaster. Tipped off in advance, Hezbollah laid an ambush in which eleven Israeli commandos were killed.40
On the High Seas, the Israeli Navy sought to intercept terrorist arms shipments. In May 2001, during the second Intifada (2000-2005), it seized the Santorini, a cargo vessel loaded with weaponry bound for Gaza. More celebrated was the January 2002 capture of the Karine A in the Red Sea. In a lightning raid, naval commandos boarded the ship by ropes lowered from helicopters, while patrol boats raced alongside.41 The operation—which recovered a hold full of munitions bound for Gaza from Iran—came off without a hitch.
The Second Lebanon War (2006), launched in retaliation for a deadly cross-border raid by Hezbollah, found the Israeli Navy enforcing a tight blockade of the Lebanese coast. The only vessels allowed in or out of Lebanese ports were ships participating in the evacuation of foreign nationals from Lebanon to Cyprus. With Hezbollah lacking a naval arm, the Israeli Navy was able to operate close in to shore, launching commando raids, shelling Hezbollah positions and destroying coastal roads to cut off lines of retreat. Unfortunately, these lopsided operations led to an act of negligence. The Hanit, a state-of-the-art SA’AR-5 missile ship, confident that it would not face fire from the shore, shut off its anti-missile electronic warning systems so that the signals would not interfere with Israeli jets flying overhead. While operating in this condition, the ship was struck by a land-based C-802 anti-ship missile and suffered significant damage (although it was rapidly repaired). Iran had transferred the missile to Hezbollah only one day prior to the attack.42 Henceforth, the SA’AR-5s maintained themselves on high alert.43
Following the war, the Israeli Navy was barred from operating off the Lebanese coast, which was instead patrolled by a UN-mandated Maritime Task Force. At the coastal border with Lebanon, the Israelis had already erected an underwater barrier with sensor-equipped netting capable of detecting contact with swimmers or boats. A similar safeguard was now put in place at the coastal border with Gaza.44 But here, the Israeli Navy would soon require something more. In 2007, Hamas illegally seized control of Gaza from the lawful Palestinian Authority. An escalation in rocket attacks from Gaza followed, leading to the outbreak of an open conflict—Operation Cast Lead—that was fought over a three-week period between December 2008 and January 2009. The navy supported the land campaign with seaborne artillery fire and amphibious naval commando raids.45 Additionally, it enforced a sea blockade as part of a comprehensive effort to halt the flow of rocket-making materials to Gaza.46 But the most stunning naval exploit of Operation Cast Lead took place far from the main theatre of action—in distant Sudan—where Israeli naval commandos reportedly damaged an Iranian arms ship bound for Gaza while it lay docked at Port Sudan.
After completion of Operation Cast Lead, persistent arms smuggling mandated continuation of the Gaza blockade. In May 2010, this led to an international incident when a flotilla of ships from Turkey attempted to run the blockade, purportedly to deliver humanitarian aid. Ignoring an Israeli offer to offload its cargo at Ashdod for inspection and overland transport to Gaza, the six-ship flotilla was intercepted by the Israeli Navy, which announced by loudspeaker that it would not be allowed to proceed. When the flotilla pressed on nonetheless, the navy attempted to reprise the raid it had carried out eight years earlier against the Karine A. Speedboats lowered by davit from a SA’AR-5 came alongside the Mavi Marmara in an effort to board, but were forced to break off the attempt when sprayed with water hoses and pelted with chains, boxes of dishes and a stun grenade. Similarly, Israeli naval commandos attempting to repel onto the deck from helicopters were immediately assaulted with metal clubs. Not having anticipated this reception, the commandos had come aboard with riot control paint ball guns as their primary weapons. They also carried holstered pistols, but were told not to employ them except in situations of life and death. Sadly that was precisely the situation they found themselves in. By the time order was restored, nine of the Turkish perpetrators had been killed and some 50 more wounded. Nine Israeli commandos were also wounded, including one who sustained a skull fracture after being thrown from an upper deck to a lower one.
At the present day, Israel faces new naval challenges. The recent discovery of offshore gas fields has placed novel defense responsibilities on the Israeli Navy at a time when many of its original missile boats are nearing the end of their operational lifespan. The navy is responding with a new generation of naval vessels and missile systems. In a back-to-the-future move, it has placed an order in Germany for two naval destroyers to patrol its pipeline routes. Likewise, in October 2013, Israel Aerospace Industries was contracted to build three new Super Dvora patrol boats capable of 50-knot speeds to guard the gas fields against seaborne attack. More impressive is a new stealth-technology-equipped SA’AR-72 mini-corvette, which will become operational in 2015. Capable of deploying two helicopters and a variety of unmanned vehicles, the ships can also transport twenty commandos and a flotilla of inflatable boats in addition to its fifty-man crew. With a range of 3,000 U.S. nautical miles, the ship boasts an electronic warfare system and an arsenal of advanced weaponry including the vertically launched, 1500 mph Barak-8 missile capable of striking aircraft and incoming missiles at a range of 70 kilometers. The latest Barak arrives just in time, as it is capable of countering the new Russian Yakhont cruise missile reportedly acquired by Hezbollah in 2012 (which can be used to threaten Israel’s gas rigs). On the submarine front, Israel has received the first of three “advanced” Dolphin-class subs from Germany featuring a hyper-quiet, air-independent propulsion system, which averts the need for surfacing for up to seven days. Enlarged torpedo tubes can double as housing for swimmer delivery vehicles—the swimmers, themselves, deploying from a wet/dry compartment. There is also much unconfirmed speculation that the subs can be modified to fire nuclear cruise missiles, thus giving Israel a submarine-based “second strike” capability as Iran threatens to go nuclear.
Israel’s tiny navy led the Western world into the naval missile age, and it hasn’t lost its capacity to innovate. In time, its saga is sure to embrace more chapters, but as the future has yet to unfold we must end our survey just as we began it—with mere glimpses.
_____________________
Notes
1 Samuel M. Katz, The Night Raiders: Israel’s Naval Commandos at War. New York: Pocket Books, 1997, 74.
2 Katz, 150.
3 Rear Admiral Ze’ev Almog, Flotilla 13: Israeli Naval Commandos in the Red Sea, 1967-1973. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2010, 7-9, 19-22, 34 [quote].
4 Katz, 163-64.
5 Almog, 41-42. The cord was invented by Italy’s elite frogman unit, “COMSUBIN.” (Commando Subacquei ed Incursori). Katz, 166.
6 Almog, 66.
7 Commando Uri Matityahu, quoted in Almog, 95.
8 Almog, 90-91.
9 Ami Ayalon, still fighting despite wounds in the neck and both legs, received Israel’s rare Medal of Valor for his part in the raid. Afterwards, he eloped from the hospital to rejoin Flotilla 13 for its next big mission—Operation Escort (Katz, 186, 196-97).
10 Moshe Tzalel, From Ice-Breaker to Missile Boat: The Evolution of Israel’s Naval Strategy. Contributions in Military Studies, Number 192. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2000, 102-03; Klaus Mommsen, 60 Years Israel Navy. Bonn: Bernard and Graefe, 2011, 158.
11 Almog, 27-28. The survivor, Aryeh Yitzchak, was partially shielded from the blast by the three who were killed—Oded Nir, Rafi Miloh and Shlomo Eshel (Almog, 121-25).
12 Mommsen, 87.
13 Mommsen, 159-60; Tzalel, 103-04.
14 Two Israeli Navy officers, Titzhak Shoshan and Herut Tsemach, purchased £20 British pounds worth of hand-held chaff dispensers abroad, and proved that the chaff decoys could create enough static to cloak to a torpedo boat (Rabinovich, 181-82).
20 Israel determined later that this had been the missile boat that sank the Eilat (Almog, 183-84; Mommsen, 199; Katz, 277-79; Rabinovich, 296-98).
21 Mommsen, 201.
22 Sharm el-Sheikh at the tip of the Sinai Peninsula was the critical position from which to implement such a blockade, but like the rest of Sinai, it had been in Israeli hands since Israel’s victory in the Six Day War.
23 Mommsen, 185-86; Rabinovich, 197.
24 Tzalel, 52.
25 Tzalel, 135.
26 Tzalel, 59-60.
27 Mommsen, 237.
28 For examples, see Mommsen, 136-37, 248 and Katz, 216 and 232-44.
29 Tzalel, 75-76.
30 Katz, 295-96.
31 Mommsen, 258. See also Katz, 303-04.
32 Mommsen, 258-59.
33 Mommsen, 224-25, 229-30, 271-72.
34 Mommsen, 280.
35 Tzalel, 29.
36 Mommsen, 273-75.
37 The decision to purchase the SA’AR-5 and the Dolphin from foreign contractors left Israel’s government-owned Israel Shipyards without any large-scale projects. Consequently, in 1995, the government declared the concern bankrupt (Tzalel, 70). Today, it thrives under private ownership as the eastern Mediterranean’s most innovative shipbuilding company. See http://www.israel-shipyards.com.
38 Mommsen, 288, Katz, 305-06.
39 Mommsen, 290; Katz, 309-10.
40 Mommsen, 297; Tzalel, 76.
41 Mommsen, 299-300.
42 Mommsen, 308-10.
43 Later, when Hezbollah proved its ability to reach Haifa with its land-based rocket arsenal, consideration was given to placing missile boats in Haifa harbor to see if their vertically launched Barak missiles could serve as a missile shield (Mommsen, 311).
44 Mommsen, 319.
45 Yanir Yagna, Eli Ashkenazi and Anshel Pfeffer, “Hamas launches first phosphorus rocket at Negev; no injuries reported,” Haaretz.com, 1/15/2009. Accessed 1/8/2014.
46 Sir Geoffrey Palmer, Chair. Report of the Secretary-General’s Panel of Inquiry on 31 May 2010 Flotilla Incident. United Nations, September 2011, 39.
(Now he wants to charge an admission fee for his Persian rug market and, after payment, may consider negotiating in good faith if he can figure out what that means. — DM)
Rouhani said that reparations from the United States would make him more willing to negotiate in good faith with the United States and increase steps to broaden ties between the nations. . . . The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani is demanding that the Obama administration pay Tehran reparations for “hostile policies” that have cost the Iranian people “much loss and damage,” according to the country’s state-run media.
Rouhani said that reparations from the United States would make him more willing to negotiate in good faith with the United States and increase steps to broaden ties between the nations, according to an interview he gave Wednesday evening on China’s CCTV network.
Although Rouhani did not outline a monetary figure he believes would be acceptable to placate the Iranian people, he told CCTV that the “Iranian people have suffered a lot as a result of the hostile policies of the U.S.” and that he “expect[s] White House politicians to abandon their past behavior of ignoring Iranians’ interests,” according to excerpts of the interview published by Iran’s state-run Fars News Agency.
“The U.S. should take steps in the direction of respecting the rights of the Iranian nation and at the same time undertake to compensate for the losses inflicted on Iran,” Rouhani was quoted as telling CCTV during an interview from China, where he is meeting with officials to “strengthen ties” between the countries.
Rouhani’s call for reparations from Washington came just a day before he told Chinese officials in a separate press conference that Tehran is “in no hurry, neither in negotiations nor in reaching the final agreement” with Western nations over its contested nuclear program.
While officials in Washington have not discussed potential compensation for Iran, the White House has significantly rolled back sanctions on the country, significantly boosting its economy, and released upwards of $7 billion in frozen assets.
These gestures are not enough, Rouhani said, outlining the “loss and damage” Iran has incurred “from U.S. hostile policies,” such as economic sanctions.
“If the U.S., in practice, abandons its hostile policy toward the Iranian nation and compensates for its past [antagonism], a new situation can be envisaged for the future of both nations,” Rouhani was quoted as saying.
If the “rights of Iranians are respected” by the United States there could be potential for a “dialog between the representatives of both nations,” Rouhani said.
With the interim nuclear accord signed between Iran and Western powers nearing its expiration date in July, Rouhani said that he is in “no hurry” to reach a final deal over the country’s nuclear program.
“We are in no hurry, neither in negotiations nor in reaching the final agreement,” he said during a press conference Thursday in Shanghai. “However, we believe that reaching a conclusion would benefit both sides.”
Iran has blamed the United States for the holdup in talks, claiming that American negotiators are making “excessive demands” that go too far.
As negotiations drag on, the significant repeal of U.S. economic sanctions has boosted Iran’s economy.
Oil exports, for instance, have soared and companies from across the globe have been clamoring to reenter the lucrative Iranian marketplace.
“Even when these companies are not finalizing deals, Tehran has been adept at turning the sharp increase in trade delegations visiting Iran and other indicators of renewed interest in the Iranian economy into news stories that improve market sentiment,” Mark Dubowitz, executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), wrote in a recent op-ed.
“This has translated into economic gains: According to recent reports from the IMF and World Bank, Iran has nearly halved its 40 percent plus inflation rate, is stabilizing its previously plummeting currency, and is projected for positive growth after losing 6-7 percent in GDP between 2012 and 2014,” Dubowitz wrote.
Several of the companies that have been making overtures to Iran were found to have lucrative U.S. government contracts worth billions, according to recentWashington Free Beacon reports.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
(Al Arabiya is published in Saudi Arabia, where Iran’s access to nukes is seen as undesirable. North Korea and Iran are different: North Korea brags about its nuclear weapons and Iran denies that it has or wants any.
Is Israel failing to develop a long term strategy? That’s an unknown: Israel does not brag much about that sort of stuff and it generally remains secret unless the Obama Administration leaks it.
On balance, it is a reasonably good article. — DM)
To make things worse, the Supreme Leader Khamenei is providing unremitting damaging commentary, including labeling the international community’s expectations that Iran contain its missile development as “stupid and idiotic.” His rallying cry against Iran not bowing to international pressure in the nuclear talks, and urging the country’s Revolutionary Guard to intensify the production of missiles were populist and reckless, especially in the days leading up to the resumption of nuclear negotiations in Vienna.
Calling Netanyahu “a rabid dog of the region,” and saying that Israeli leaders “cannot be even called humans,” is unsettling for the Israelis. It also provides ammunition to those in Israel, who believe that the interim agreement on Iran’s nuclear program and the current negotiations are no more than an Iranian delay tactics.
What is lacking from Israeli strategic thinking, however, is the development of a long term strategy to deal with Iranian capabilities if the negotiations fail.
Not many would expect an Israeli prime minister to make a scathing attack on Iranian nuclear policy during his visit to the Far East. These trips are usually devoted to promoting fast growing economic trade relations and consolidating other areas of cooperation with the region. However, Prime Minster Netanyahu’s remarks about nuclear ties between Iran and North Korea during his visit to Tokyo last week were well-choreographed and well-timed. It was an attempt to link Iranian nuclear program with the much feared North Korean nuclear program, which threatens stability in this part of Asia. Establishing common interests between Israel and the Far East around the nuclear issue aimed to highlight that the Iranian nuclear program poses danger not only to the Middle East and Israel, but to the whole world.
The timing of Netanyahu’s comments was not coincidental, as negotiations between the P5+1 and Iran over a long term agreement just resumed in Vienna. If successful, the agreement would aim to ensure that the Iranian nuclear program does not pursue a military component. It is part of Israeli strategy to rally as many states as possible to put pressure on those negotiating with Iran to avoid a deal which would leave room for Iran to develop nuclear military capability at some point in the future. In this context one can also explain the tacit co-operation between Israel and the Gulf States, especially Saudi Arabia, and the effort to draw Japan into the Iranian nuclear issue. Israel fears that the looming expiration of the interim agreement between Iran and the international community on July 20, might cause the negotiators to be too hasty and keen to sign an agreement. Such an agreement might not be able to guarantee that Iran will not turn her nuclear program from peaceful purposes to military ones.
Failure of peace talks
Only last month, the United States had to all but concede failure in reaching a framework for peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians as another deadline to reach the a deal came and went. Some in Israel suspect that the U.S.and her partners in the negotiations with Iran are averse to the idea of another failure, even at the price of a less than satisfactory agreement. Israel sees a flawed agreement as worse than no agreement at all. For Israeli leaders, a less than satisfactory agreement would create a false sense of resolution. This might lead to Iran developing nuclear military capability free of economic sanctions. The decision makers in Jerusalem see this as the worst case scenario. The no agreement option, from Israel’s point of view, at least leaves the sanctions in place and allows Israel more room to maneuver in acting against Iran. This can be done either diplomatically, through covert operations or even through a very risky, one might say even irresponsible, military operations.
Israel no doubt would continue to warn the world about the danger of Iran becoming a nuclear power and her deceitfulness in the process
Yossi Mekelberg
Another element of this Israeli pressure was in series of meetings with high rank American officials, including Chuck Hagel, the U.S. secretary of defense , and U.S. National Security Advisor Susan Rice. These meetings seemed to actually reveal that the gap between Washington and Jerusalem regarding the approach towards the nuclear negotiations is widening. The Americans would like the Israelis to keep a low profile during these complex negotiations, and are continually reassuring the Israelis and the Gulf States that the U.S. is fully committed to stopping Iran from developing nuclear weapons. The Israelis insist that there is enough evidence that the Iranians are dishonest regarding their nuclear program. Whilst President Rowhani and Foreign Minister Zarif are presenting a more conciliatory face to the international community, their country’s nuclear program has never stopped in accordance with the terms of the interim agreement. This view is reinforced by a recent report by the U.N. Panel of Experts which highlighted that despite slowing down procuring materials for her nuclear program, Iran still continues to develop some aspects of her nuclear program that are forbidden by U.N. security resolutions. According to this report, Iran also continues to develop long-range ballistic missiles in further violation of U.N. Security Council Resolutions. This is in addition to arms transfers from Iran to Syria, Gaza, Sudan, and Bahrain, which fuel further instability in the region.
Damaging commentary
To make things worse, the Supreme Leader Khamenei is providing unremitting damaging commentary, including labeling the international community’s expectations that Iran contain its missile development as “stupid and idiotic.” His rallying cry against Iran not bowing to international pressure in the nuclear talks, and urging the country’s Revolutionary Guard to intensify the production of missiles were populist and reckless, especially in the days leading up to the resumption of nuclear negotiations in Vienna.
Calling Netanyahu “a rabid dog of the region,” and saying that Israeli leaders “cannot be even called humans,” is unsettling for the Israelis. It also provides ammunition to those in Israel, who believe that the interim agreement on Iran’s nuclear program and the current negotiations are no more than an Iranian delay tactics. They believe that these delay tactics enable Iran to both develop their nuclear military capabilities and relieve the hardships inflicted by the sanctions. Israel might not be sitting around the negotiation table in Vienna, but her views are ever-present, as the negotiators are cognizant of her government’s determination to stop Iran’s nuclear program.
International pressure
The line that Netanyahu took in Tokyo was another tier in these efforts. He is trying to put international pressure on those negotiating with the Iranians, via those who might not be present at the negotiations, but still might be concerned that Iranian nuclear might directly or indirectly impact their security nevertheless. This combined with utilizing Israel’s well-oiled lobbying machine on Capitol Hill places pressure on U.S. President Obama to not give into concessions which might compromise Israeli security in the negotiations with Iran. The strategy at times has its own intrinsic rational of preventing an enemy from acquiring weapons of mass destruction, though at other times smacks of hysteria.
Israel no doubt would continue to warn the world about the danger of Iran becoming a nuclear power and her deceitfulness in the process. What is lacking from Israeli strategic thinking, however, is the development of a long term strategy to deal with Iranian capabilities if the negotiations fail. An even trickier situation may occur, if the negotiations are successful and all the issues of a Middle East Nuclear Free Zone are resumed with the international community requesting more transparency from Israel on the matter.
Containers on the Ark Futura, a Danish-chartered cargo vessel, carry precursors to sarin gas, part of the effort to extract chemical weapon stockpiles from Syria, in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, May 13, 2014.
Credit: Reuters/Staff
(Reuters) – Syria has made no progress in relinquishing a last batch of chemical weapons it says is inaccessible due to fighting, making it increasingly likely it will miss a final deadline to destroy its toxic stockpile, Britain said on Thursday.
The British deputy representative to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) told delegates in The Hague that packaging material had arrived for the 100 metric tonnes (110 metric tons) of toxic chemicals.
“But there is still no sign of any movement of chemicals, nor any indications of a time scale for a move,” said the statement, a copy of which was obtained by Reuters.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, embroiled in civil war with rebels fighting to oust him, agreed last year to hand over the country’s entire chemical weapons stockpile after hundreds of people were killed in a sarin gas attack near Damascus.
The agreement with Russia and the United States averted Western military strikes threatened in response to the worst chemical weapons atrocity in decades, which has been blamed by Washington on Assad’s government.
His government, which denies the allegation and blames the rebels, still has roughly 7 percent of 1,300 tonnes it declared to the OPCW, enough highly toxic material to carry out a large-scale attack.
It has missed several deadlines, most recently its own promise to hand over the remaining chemicals by April 27. It has also failed to destroy a dozen facilities that were part of the chemical weapons program.
Under the deal, Syria’s entire stockpile is supposed to have been destroyed by mid-2014, but “it is growing ever clearer that the 30 June deadline will not be met”, the British statement said.
PACKED FOR SHIPMENT
There was confusion earlier this week about how much progress there had been in transporting the remaining chemicals to the Syrian port of Latakia, from where they will be shipped overseas for destruction.
The Pentagon said on Tuesday “it is starting to be moved as we speak,” and senior diplomats from two other Security Council member states told reporters on Wednesday there were indications the Syrians were preparing to dispatch the remaining stockpile.
A diplomat in the Middle East said the remaining chemicals have been packed in containers, but that the joint U.N.-OPCW operation overseeing the destruction still lacks access to the site.
The Syrian army has launched a military operation in the area, where the chemical storage site is being monitored remotely by camera, to clear the way for transport of the toxins, the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said.
The operation to destroy Syria’s chemical stockpile is a complex logistical undertaking, involving a dozen countries and hundreds of millions of dollars.
The most toxic chemicals are to be destroyed onboard the Cape Ray, a converted U.S. cargo ship, after being dropped off by Norwegian and Danish vessels now waiting in the Mediterranean.
The remaining bulk chemicals are to go to commercial destruction facilities in Britain, Finland and Germany.
( ISLAMIC terrorist attack, you mean. But even the Post, the only MSM site to frontpage the story mentions Islam almost as an irrelevant afterthought in the third paragraph.
Terror is news.
Islamic terror gets buried.
Two factors involved:
No need to mention “Islamic” because essentially ALL terror today is Islamic.
Additionally it blows the left’s foreign policy position, so the less said the better.
Transparent and sickening… – JW )
By Simon Denyer, Updated: Thursday, May 22, 1:03 PM
BEIJING — Two cars plowed through crowds of shoppers in a busy street market in the capital of China’s restive western Xinjiang region Thursday, setting off multiple explosives, killing 31 people and wounding more than 90, the government said, in what it called a vile act of terrorism.
It was the deadliest in a series of recent terrorist attacks linked to Xinjiang, where unrest at Beijing’s iron rule appears to have exploded into an extreme Islamist jihad waged by separatists from the mostly Muslim Uighur community.
The two SUVs crashed through metal barriers in the city of Urumqi at 7:50 a.m., the Xinjiang regional government said in a statement. The cars drove over people, their occupants hurling explosives as they went, before crashing head-on into each other, according to state media reports. One of them then exploded, with flames shooting as high as a one-story building, a witness said.
Witnesses quoted by state media said the cars carried no number plates, but flew two small black flags carrying writing in the local Uighur language. A potato vendor was quoted by China News Agency as saying he heard around a dozen explosions.
Pictures carried on social media showed bodies lying in the street, with large flames in the distance, and other people sitting amidst scattered vegetables and boxes looking dazed.
“At close to 8 this morning, there were multiple explosions at the morning market near the Cultural Palace in Urumqi,” a user called Paike Luotuoci posted on the Sina Weibo microblogging service. “I was less than 100 meters from the scene and I could see flames, heavy smoke. There were vehicles and goods burning. Vendors left their goods behind and fled. ”
Another Weibo user called Jiazuo Yangzhoufu said an elderly family member had been returning from a nearby park after exercising when the explosions happened, quoting from his account. “The two cars were driving like crazy, and aiming at crowds. They drove over people in the middle repeatedly. Police went after the cars and fired shots but didn’t seem to stop them,” she wrote. “People were running for their lives.”
“The air was full of the smell of gunpowder and the sound of sobbing,” one witness who passed by the scene shortly after the attack told the Reuters news agency, adding there were “simply too many” casualties, including elderly people attending the morning market.
Many of the posts describing the attack or showing pictures of the incident were later deleted from Weibo, presumably by censors.
The Xinjiang regional government called the attack “a serious violent terrorist incident of a particularly vile nature.” President Xi Jinping pledged to severely punish terrorists and spare no efforts in maintaining stability, according to the official Xinhua news agency.
Last month, a bomb exploded at a railway station in Urumqi, just two miles to the south of Thursday’s attack, killing three people, including two attackers, and injuring 79. The attack, blamed on Islamist extremists, took place as Chinese leader Xi Jinping was concluding a visit to the region. The militant Turkestan Islamic Party later posted a video on its Web site calling that attack “good news” that “would fill the suppressed hearts of believers with joy, and fill the apostates and infidels’ hearts with fear,” according a translation by Radio Free Asia. The group’s head, Abdulheq Damolla, said that attack had been carried out by “our mujahideen brothers.”
Islamist extremists from Xinjiang have also been blamed for two other significant terrorist attacks outside the region in recent months. Last year, three Uighurs rammed a vehicle into crowds in a suicide attack near the main gate of Forbidden City in Tiananmen Square in the heart of Beijing, killing themselves and two tourists.
In March, 29 people were slashed and stabbed to death by knife-wielding assailants at a train station in the southern city of Kunming.
Xinjiang, rich in resources and strategically important, lies on the borders of Central Asia and is home to the mainly Muslim Uighurs, who speak a Turkic language and are culturally distinct from China’s ethnic Han majority.
For years, many Uighurs and other, smaller Muslim minorities in Xinjiang have agitated against China’s authoritarian government. Their protests are a reaction, Uighur groups say, to oppressive official policies, including religious restrictions, widespread discrimination and large-scale immigration by Han Chinese.
Urumqi, a city of some 3 million people that lies over 1,500 miles west of Beijing and was once a major hub on the ancient Silk Route, is around three-quarters Han Chinese.
The government has long denied oppressing Uighurs or any other ethnic group and has blamed terrorist acts on separatist Muslims who want to make Xinjiang an independent state, called East Turkestan..
Ethnic rioting and clashes between ethnic Uighurs and Han Chinese in Xinjiang reached a peak in 2009, resulting in roughly 200 deaths and triggering a crackdown by local authorities. Renewed protests last year also turned violent and are thought to have claimed more than 100 lives.
But the recent attacks seemed to have pushed the conflict in a new direction, with civilians increasingly targeted, as opposed to police stations which were often attacked in the past.
In recent weeks, China has tightened a crackdown on Uighurs in the region, but many foreign experts say Beijing’s heavy handed policies have consistently failed to curb unrest in the past, and are unlikely to be any more successful now in preventing attacks.
On Tuesday, courts in Xinjiang sentenced 39 people to prison for crimes including organizing and leading terrorist groups, inciting ethnic hatred, ethnic discrimination and the illegal manufacture of guns.
On Thursday, China’s President Xi and his Pakistan counterpart Mamnoon Hussain vowed to strengthen cooperation in counter-terrorism operations, specifically targeting “East Turkestan” terrorists groups who have bases in Pakistan’s lawless tribal areas.
Earlier in the day, Pakistani warplanes and helicopters pounded militant hideouts near the Afghan border, wires services reported, with the army claiming to have killed 60 fighters including “foreigners”. Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper quoted a security official as saying the raid targeted strongholds of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, whose members including militants from Uzbekistan and Xinjiang.
In a regular news conference Thursday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said the Chinese government had the confidence and ability to combat terrorists who he described as “swollen with arrogance.” He said the attack in Urumqi “should be condemned jointly by the Chinese people and the international community”.
In a post on its Chinese-language microblog account, the U.S. Embassy in Beijing expressed its “deepest condolences” to the victims and families of the “violent attack on innocent civilians” in Urumqi, but stopped short of labeling it terrorism.
Head of political-military affairs at Defense Ministry, Amos Gilad, warns of storm clouds “on the horizon,” says Israel has not been able to stop build up of Hezbollah’s rocket arsenal.
Amos Gilad speaking at conference Photo: KOBI ZOLTAK
Iran can break out to nuclear weapons “very quickly,” and Israel must maintain operational readiness for any threat that may arise, Maj.-Gen. (res.) Amos Gilad, director of political-military affairs at the Defense Ministry, warned on Monday.
Speaking in Tel Aviv at a security conference organized by the Israel Defense publication and the Israel Artillery Association, Gilad said the security forecast was not sunny. “Today is a pleasant day. But there are clouds, and a storm, on the horizon,” he said. “People don’t believe it until it comes,” he added.
Iran’s nuclear weapons program remains the top threat to Israeli security, he said, describing the Islamic Republic as a “horrible regime” that threatens to exterminate Israel. He referred to a past statement by former Iranian president Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani, who said that one atomic bomb would be enough to destroy Israel.
“They’re determined to reach nuclear weapons. They want to get to a situation where [Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah] Khamenei asks [Ali Akbar] Salehi, [head of the Atomic Energy Association of Iran], can we develop nuclear weapons? And the answer must be yes we can. Not in English, in Persian,” Gilad continued.
Iran’s strategy is based on the twin goals of getting rid of choking international sanctions, and keeping the option of breaking out to nuclear weapons within “a few months,” he said.
“President Obama keeps saying, and I think he means it, we won’t tolerate Iran with nuclear weapons. Iran says, okay… we will build the infrastructure to get to nuclear weapons, including missile capabilities, scientists, etc. It’s like a runner who can’t jump two meters, so he builds a 1.95 meter ramp, and later he can jump from it and get to two meters. This is the greatest danger. There is a possibility Iran will achieve this. It’s a potential existential threat,” Gilad said.
He noted that Iran has overseen the construction of Hezbollah’s arsenal of 100,000 rockets, and spent billions of dollars to build up Hezbollah’s firepower, which threatens all of Israel’s territory.
“This is a military threat, not a terrorist one,” he said, adding, Israel has “not been successful in preventing a buildup [of rockets] in Lebanon.” Alleged Israeli action to prevent Hezbollah’s armament program, as mentioned by foreign press reports, is the exception, Gilad said.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps has global command centers for terrorism that are located “everywhere,” and planned to “slaughter dozen of Israelis over Passover in Thailand,” the senior defense official said. These efforts are “mostly failing,” he added.
“Can you imagine nuclear bombs in Iran’s possession, and how this will destabilize the region?” If the July 20 deadline for nuclear talks between the international community and Iran is delayed, this would be “excellent for the Iranians, as they want to stop the momentum of sanctions,” he added.
Israel must maintain operational readiness, and never knows “when some threat will come,” Gilad stated. He praised the country’s defense industries for building up a shield against ballistic missile threats, and paid tribute to “unbelievable” intelligence achievements vis-a-vis Iran.
Turning his attention to the Palestinians, Gilad said that should Palestinian Authority security forces take exclusive control of West Bank, there would be a “very high feasibility” of rockets and shelling raining down on greater Tel Aviv.
Gilad expressed skepticism over the chances of Hamas and Fatah achieving real unity, rather than an “image of unity,” adding, “I cannot imagine them reconciling. Hamas is determined to take over the PLO. Their strategic plan has never changed, to take over whole of the Middle East, and they don’t mind starting in Ramallah.”
Addressing the situation in Syria, Gilad said that two al-Qieda organizations, terror groups “without limits,” are operating over the northern border, and include 1500 European or foreign passport holders fighting in Syria. “Sooner or later, they will carry out a spectacular terrorist attack in Europe or Israel.” Israel has beefed up defenses along the northern border, but the Syrian crisis is also “putting pressure on Jordan,” he warned.
“Al-Qaida is new in our neighborhood. It is [now] in Lebanon, Syria, and it is trying but failing to attack Jordan and Israel. In Sinai, it is extending capabilities to Cairo to be able to murder [the Egyptian] president. Either it defeats you or you defeat it.”
Israel today “can defeat any combination of enemies,” Gilad said, but the moment Iran goes nuclear and triggers an Arab nuclear arms race, the region will become “hell,” he said.
An Iranian military official touts the Islamic republic’s “full preparedness” in face of foreign aggression, echoing Israel’s warning earlier this week of “a storm on the horizon.”
Iranian security official at Bushehr nuclear plant. Photo: REUTERS
“The Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran will never be caught unawares, and should the enemy want to act on the immature fantasy of aggression, it will face a crushing and lethal response by the Armed forces,” commander of the Iranian Army’s Ground Forces Brigadier General Ahmad-Reza Pourdastan was quoted as saying by Iranian news agency Fars.
“Today, we are facing new threats that are different from [those in] the past in terms of type, shape and size,” he added.
Pourdastan said Iranian intelligence experts are monitoring the movements of the “enemy at the borders, across the region and beyond the region.”
The Islamic Republic has repeatedly said its nuclear program poses no threat to other countries, reiterating that its defense doctrine is based on deterrence.
Speaking in Tel Aviv at a security conference organized by the Israel Defense publication and the Israel Artillery Association, Gilad said Iran could break out to nuclear weapons “very quickly” and that the security forecast was not sunny.
“Today is a pleasant day. But there are clouds, and a storm, on the horizon,” he said. “People don’t believe it until it comes.”
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani delivers a speech during a ceremony at the Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization (AEOI) in Tehran on May 11, 2014. (photo credit: AFP/HO/ PRESIDENCY WEBSITE)
SHANGHAI, China — Talks between Iran and six world powers on a comprehensive deal over its nuclear program are “very likely” to reach a successful conclusion by a July 20 deadline, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said Thursday.
“The signs that we have been receiving in the last few days are telling us we are very likely to come to an agreement by the end of July,” Rouhani told reporters in Shanghai, speaking through a translator. “We can achieve this.”
Iran insists its nuclear technology activities are aimed at civilian use, while Western powers suspect its drive masks military objectives.
Rouhani’s comments came after an apparently largely fruitless fourth round of negotiations in Vienna last week.
But the UN atomic watchdog said Wednesday that Iran has agreed to address some of the many long-held allegations that it conducted research into making nuclear weapons before 2003 and possibly since.
The International Atomic Energy Agency said that Iran, which denies ever having sought nuclear weapons, has undertaken to implement “practical measures” by a separate deadline of August 25.
“It takes time” to resolve outstanding issues, Rouhani said a day after attending an Asian security forum in China’s commercial hub of Shanghai.
“We cannot expect it to be resolved in a few meetings.”
He did not specify problems in the talks with the five United Nations (UN) Security Council permanent members plus Germany — known as the P5+1 group.
But he said outstanding issues had been a “matter of contention for years,” suggesting they involved Iran’s nuclear program.
According to media reports, among those gaps are the scope of Iran’s enrichment of uranium, which if further purified could be used to trigger a nuclear explosion, and its unfinished Arak research reactor, whose by-product waste could provide an alternative route to an atomic bomb.
Rouhani criticized unnamed countries for acting slowly and creating obstacles in the nuclear talks.
“There are certain countries behind the scenes that want to create problems. If they are not given a chance to sabotage talks, then we have enough time to achieve the ultimate success,” he said.
But he also said the July 20 deadline could be extended if an agreement could not be reached in time.
“Let’s say we don’t come to an agreement by that deadline, we can extend that interim agreement by another six months,” he said.
Rouhani met Chinese President Xi Jinping for bilateral talks on Thursday. China is party to the nuclear talks as a permanent UN Security Council member.
WarSclerotic 
Recent Comments