WarSclerotic

Israel’s helicopter strike causes Hizballah and Iranian casualties as warning that Golan is out of bounds.

Lebanese and Western intelligence watchers of the Syrian conflict reveal that the two missiles fired Sunday, Jan. 18, by Israeli helicopters at an armed military convoy on the Syrian side of the Golan struck a group of Iranian and Hizballah officers traveling near Quneitra.

Hizballah has confirmed that six people were killed – three of them its own officers. One is said to have been Jihad Mughniyeh son of the Shiite terrorist movement’s military chief, whom Israel killed in 2007.

The group was on a tour to inspect a site for a Hizballah force to take up position opposite Israel’s Golan lines as part of the Syrian surface missile deployment near Quneitra. The helicopter strike was intended to post a tough Israeli warning to Iran, Damascus and Hizballah: The Golan is off-limits – especially Queneitra.

This followed a warning through back channels issued on June 5, 2014, when a small Hizballah advance guard arrived in the Quneitra sector as back-up for Syrian troops fighting rebels. Israel then put Hizballah on notice that if its men were not removed from the Golan, they would be attacked. And they were indeed withdrawn in short order.

But a new situation has meanwhile developed, say military and intelligence sources. The Syrian army has boosted its ground-to-ground missiles in Quneitra with Iranian medium-range Fatah-110s. Shortly before the weapons were deployed on Jan. 10, the Syrian Dep. Chief of Staff Gen. Ali Abdullah Ayoub arrived at the site accompanied by Iranian Revolutionary Guards officers in civilian clothes, advisers to the Syrian high command on Bashar Assad’s strategy for various fronts. The arrival of the new missiles followed that visit.

Two days ago, Hizballah’s General Secretary Hassan Nasrallah issued a reminder that his army has been armed with those same Iranian Fatah-110 missiles since 2006. He also reiterated that those weapons could reach any target on Israeli soil.

Nasrallah was apparently referring to the same missiles’ improved vantage position if they were deployed on the Golan for easier and more accurate launches against Israel.  What he did not say was that the plan that had been cooked up in Tehran was to attach Hizballah crews to the Golan-based missile batteries and shoot them at Israel for the first time from Syrian territory.

It was this plan which the Israeli helicopter must be presumed to have aimed at thwarting.

Hezbollah said to mobilize after top commander killed in strike

Japan PM arrives for state visit; Israel pushes ICC funding cut in response to Palestinian suit; police nab 7 suspected of forming IS cell

By Ilan Ben Zion January 18, 2015, 2:10 pm

via Hezbollah said to mobilize after top commander killed in strike | The Times of Israel.

Following the Palestinian bid to have Israeli officials convicted on war crimes charges at the International Criminal Court, Jerusalem now seeks international support in defunding the tribunal. Meanwhile, Israeli security agencies have announced the arrest of seven residents of northern Israel on suspicion of forming an Islamic State cell with the aim of carrying out terrorist attacks in Israel. Top politicians from Japan and Canada are visiting, and the pre-election campaign continues to heat up. The Times of Israel is liveblogging developments through Sunday.

From

http://www.aa.com.tr/en/news/452146–6-iranians-5-hezbollah-killed-in-israeli-strike-in-syria

6 Iranians, 5 Hezbollah killed in ‘Israeli strike’ in Syria

18 January 2015 20:07 (Last updated 18 January 2015 20:12)
“The five included two Hezbollah commanders and the son of slain Hezbollah military commander Imad Mughniyah.

BEIRUT

Five Hezbollah members and six Iranians were killed Sunday in an alleged Israeli strike in southern Syria’s Quneitra province, a source close to the Lebanese Shiite militant group has said.

“Six Iranians, including a field commander, were killed in the Israeli strike,” the source told The Anadolu Agency.

He added that five Hezbollah members were also killed in the same Israeli attack.

“The five included two Hezbollah commanders and the son of slain Hezbollah military commander Imad Mughniyah,” added the source.

Mughniyah was killed in a car bomb in Syria in 2008, which Hezbollah has blamed on Israel.

The Lebanese militant group has mobilized its fighters on Lebanon’s southern border with Israel a short time after the strike, a Lebanese security source told AA.

Hezbollah has confirmed that its members were targeted in an Israeli strike as they toured a farm in Quneitra.

The group’s statement said some of its members had been killed, adding that their names would be announced once their families had been notified.

Israel has not commented on the reports yet.

Sources: 5 members of Hezbollah including son of Imad Mughniyeh killed in Israeli strike in Syria

via Sources: 5 members of Hezbollah including son of Imad Mughniyeh killed in Israeli strike in Syria – Arab-Israeli Conflict – Jerusalem Post.

Five members of Hezbollah, including a commander were killed in an Israeli strike in Syria on Sunday, Lebanese security sources said.

An Israeli helicopter fired two missiles in the Syrian province of Quneitra near the Golan Heights, Lebanese sources close to Hezbollah said.

Two sources close to Hezbollah said that the son of former Hezbollah military leader Imad Mughniyeh was killed in the strike.

Mughniyeh was killed in 2008 in a car-bombing widely attributed to Israel in the foreign media.

AFP cited an Israeli security sources as saying the strike had targeted purported terrorists who were planning an attack on the Jewish state.

The IDF said in response that it does not comment on foreign reports and Syrian state media did not mention the attack.

The missiles reportedly hit near Quneitra, not far from the border with Israel.

“An Israeli helicopter fired two missiles on Amal Farms in Quneitra,” Lebanese news channel Al-Manar said, adding that two reconnaissance planes were also flying over the area.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based group monitoring the civil war, said the missiles fired on Sunday targeted armed vehicles, citing local sources.

Foreign media reports have attributed a number of air strikes in Syria to Israel over the past several years, although Israel has refused to confirm the reports.

In the most recent such incident, Syrian state television reported in December 2014 that Israeli jets had bombed targets near Damascus International Airport and in the town of Dimas, near the border with Lebanon.

A Lebanese TV correspondent reported that Israel struck 10 crucial intelligence-linked locations in Syria that belong to Iran. The outlet reported that explosions were heard near the Israeli-Lebanese border, allegedly the result of IDF maneuvers.

In October 2014, a senior IDF source said all terrorism directed against Israel from the Syrian border, and every deliberate incident
of cross-border fire or bomb attack, was launched by the Shi’ite Hezbollah-Iranian axis, not radical Sunni organizations.

IAF Chopper Blasts Al-Qaeda Targets in Syria – Defense/Security – News – Arutz Sheva.

Hezbollah TV says IAF helicopter fired rockets at Jabhat al-Nusra targets near the Golan border.

By Gil Ronen

First Publish: 1/18/2015, 3:29 PM

Hezbollah’s television station, Al Manar, reported Sunday that an IAF helicopter fired rockets at Jabhat al-Nusra targets near the Golan border, in the early afternoon.

Jabhat al-Nusra is Al Qaeda’s Syrian arm.

According to Al Manar, two rockets were fired at a target in Mazraat al-Amal near Quneitra.

No casualties have been reported as of yet.

According to the report, shortly before the IAF struck, two drones were seen circling above the area, apparently to collect intelligence.

Mazraat al-Amal is located in the Syrian Golan, near the border with Israel, and recent reports said that Jabhat al-Nusra forces were occupying it.

The IDF refused to confirm or deny the report of the strike and said that it “does not respond to reports in foreign media.”

Earlier in the day, it was reported that Israeli forces fired smoke grenades and tear gas toward Lebanese territory. Three Lebanese soldiers were taken to a hospital for treatment following that incident.

U.S. President Barack Obama vows to veto any sanctions on Iran, pleading to Congress, “Just hold your fire” • In unusual move, British Prime Minister David Cameron personally calls U.S. senators to lobby against new sanctions on Iran.

The Associated Press and Israel Hayom Staff

U.S. President Barack Obama speaks during a joint news conference with British Prime Minister David Cameron at the White House, Friday|

Photo credit: AP

U.S. President Barack Obama came out swinging Friday against congressional attempts to slap fresh sanctions on Iran, warning such a move would likely destroy nuclear talks and increase prospects for a military showdown. Vowing to veto any sanctions that reach his desk, Obama pleaded, “Just hold your fire.”

In an unusual move by a foreign leader, British Prime Minister David Cameron said he was personally calling U.S. senators to say that new sanctions would drive a wedge through international unity.

Standing side by side with Cameron at the White House, Obama said world powers would be sympathetic to Iran and would blame the U.S. if Congress moved ahead with more sanctions while fragile negotiations are under way. At that point, Obama argued, the world would lose its best chance to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

“Congress should be aware that if this diplomatic solution fails, then the risks and likelihood that this ends up being at some point a military confrontation is heightened — and Congress will have to own that as well,” Obama said in his most impassioned rebuke yet of the sanctions effort.

Clinching a nuclear deal would be a major foreign policy victory for Obama, who for years has fended off accusations of naiveté in engaging diplomatically with countries like Iran. Obama said prospects for a deal are still 50-50 at best, insisting he wouldn’t agree to any deal that fails to ensure that world powers can verify Iran’s actions or to protect Israel’s security.

Iran maintains that its program is solely for energy production and medical research purposes. Under the interim deal, Iran agreed to some restrictions to its program in exchange for billions of dollars in relief from U.S. economic sanctions.

The U.S. ,Britain and other world powers are struggling to reach a framework accord with Iran by March, with hopes of finalizing a longer-term deal by July that would limit Iran’s ability to produce a nuclear weapon. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has spent much of the week holed up in European hotels with his Iranian counterpart, Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif, as both countries seek to infuse the talks with fresh urgency.

But in Washington, many lawmakers are so skeptical of the negotiations that they have insisted the U.S. move forward with additional sanctions to keep tightening the screws on Iran.

A tense exchange between Obama and a top Democrat this week illustrated the degree to which Obama’s diplomacy with Iran has rattled even members of his own party.

At a closed-door strategy meeting with Senate Democrats, Obama and Sen. Bob Menendez, a Democrat, traded arguments about whether fresh penalties would undermine or bolster the negotiations. It was then that Obama renewed his longstanding vow to veto sanctions legislation passed by Congress while talks are still ongoing.

“We just have a fundamental disagreement,” Menendez told reporters Friday in New Jersey. “It is counterintuitive to understand that somehow Iran will walk away because of some sanctions that would never take place if they strike a deal.”

Menendez, who until recently chaired the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has been working across partisan lines with Sen. Mark Kirk, a Republican on new sanctions on Iran’s economy that would kick in only if Iran fails to sign or live up to a nuclear deal in time.

Yet Obama argued that Iran would rightfully interpret any new sanctions — even ones that don’t kick in right away — as violating the terms of the interim deal reached in 2013 that made the current talks possible. He said the likelihood that Iran would pull out of the talks was “very high.”

“They would be able to maintain that the reason that they ended negotiations was because the United States was operating in bad faith and blew up the deal,” Obama said. “And there would be some sympathy to that view around the world.”

Cameron, who was holding two days of meetings with Obama, took the rare step of calling another nation’s lawmakers to lobby them against proceeding with more penalties. Cameron said his calls Friday to U.S. senators were intended not to tell them what to do, but to convey that sanctions have already had their desired effect.

via Israel Hayom | Obama comes out swinging against new Iran sanctions.