Egypt builds a wall on border with Gaza Read

Posted February 21, 2020 by davidking1530
Categories: Uncategorized

https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2020/02/egypt-builds-new-barrier-to-boost-border-security-gaza-strip.html

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Maj. Gen. Ahmed Abdel Khalek, the Egyptian intelligence officer in charge of Cairo’s Palestinian portfolio, arrived in the Gaza Strip Feb. 10 as head of an Egyptian security delegation that made a field trip along the Egyptian-Gazan border as part of the new Egyptian preparations to boost border security and prevent extremists from entering the Sinai Peninsula from the Gaza Strip. The delegation also met with Hamas’ leadership in the Gaza Strip.

Speaking to Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, tribal sources in the northern Sinai Peninsula stated that on Jan. 27 Egyptian armed forces embarked on the first phase of building a 2-kilometer-long barrier on the border with the Gaza Strip, starting from the Kerem Shalom crossing to the Rafah border crossing. Such a step went unannounced by the Egyptian armed forces, the sources added.

They explained that the 6-meter-high barrier is made of reinforced concrete and goes 5 meters under the ground. It consists of a second barrier parallel to the old rock barrier built in early 2008 on the border with the Gaza Strip, separated by a distance not exceeding 10 meters. The barrier is designed to block the entry of gunmen from the Gaza Strip into Sinai and shut down the remaining Palestinian cross-border tunnels.

The sources said the second and last phase involves building the barrier along unspecified segments of the border that Egyptian armed forces appraise as vulnerable or where underground tunnels are suspected. The sources anticipate completion of the barrier would drag out until mid-2020.

Egyptian armed forces announced Feb. 3 “having found south of the Rafah security camps’ yard a nearly 3-kilometer-long [underground] tunnel coming from the Gaza Strip to the heart of the [Egyptian border city of] Rafah,” Palestine’s Maan News Agency reported the same day.

Maan News quoted Egyptian security sources as saying that “the tunnel serves as [an underground means] for the infiltration of terrorists from the Gaza Strip, planting [roadside bombs] in the Egyptian side, pushing terrorist [Islamic State] supporters to Sinai, and for the transfer of arms and explosives. Ammunition and explosives were seized in the tunnel.”

Egyptian armed forces announced having discovered the tunnel a few hours after five Egyptian soldiers were killed and others were wounded Feb. 3 in a roadside bomb south of the town of Sheikh Zuweid, which borders the Gaza Strip.

Previously, there were multiple Egyptian measures to close the Palestinian tunnels, including a buffer zone along the 14-kilometer-long Egyptian-Gazan border in October 2014. The 500-meter-deep buffer zone set up on the Egyptian side was expanded to 1,500 meters deep into the Egyptian side in October 2017.

Such an Egyptian policy managed to close and destroy hundreds of border underground tunnels and caused Hamas a stifling financial crisis that has been ongoing to date.

The recent developments on the border coincided with US President Donald Trump announcing Jan. 28 his Mideast peace plan, which assigns to the Palestinians new lands adjacent to Sinai in Israel.

Mohammed Abu Harbeed, an expert on security affairs at the Interior Ministry in the Gaza Strip, told Al-Monitor, “The construction of this barrier was highly coordinated with Hamas and the Gaza Interior Ministry. It is designed to bring about better security on [both] sides of the border.”

He explained that all of the security measures Egyptian authorities made, including building the barrier, serve the interests of both sides. Ending contraband, including the smuggling of drugs from Sinai to the Gaza Strip, and preventing the infiltration of extremists from and into the Gaza Strip are what Hamas seeks as well, Abu Harbeed added.

He did not find it strange that Egyptian armed forces discovered a Palestinian tunnel on the border with the Gaza Strip. “Prior to the Egyptian army’s crackdown on the tunnels in October 2014, there were hundreds of tunnels underneath the Egyptian-Palestinian border — some of which were wide enough for the smuggling of cars. Yet the number of tunnels has become small following the Egyptian crackdown. The [remaining] tunnels are unknown and are run by individuals who are smuggling goods from Egypt to the Gaza Strip with the intent to evade customs duties or contraband such as drugs,” said Abu Harbeed.

He affirmed that the Gaza Interior Ministry does not see a need for these tunnels as long as Egypt opens the Rafah border crossing to Gazans, adding that the ministry is preventing any attempt to dig any new tunnels.

On the Palestinian side, Hamas took multiple measures to promote border security and prevent any infiltration attempt into Egypt. On June 28, 2017, it set up a 100-meter-wide buffer zone into the Palestinian side.

Iyad al-Qara, a political analyst and journalist for the Hamas-affiliated Felesteen newspaper in Gaza, told Al-Monitor that “in the past years, Hamas worked on boosting security on the border with Egypt, deploying dozens of its members and a series of observation towers and surveillance cameras mounted on the towers along the border to prevent infiltration attempts from the Gaza Strip into Egypt.”

The Gaza Interior Ministry announced Nov. 14 thwarting an infiltration attempt by three Islamic State supporters from Gaza to Egypt.

Qara perceived that the Egyptian and Palestinian sides agreed on the construction of the barrier at their meetings in early 2018, noting that the arrival of an Egyptian security delegation in the Gaza Strip to inspect the border at this time points to this agreement.

He indicated that Hamas in the Gaza Strip has great interest in securing the border with Egypt “because bringing about security in Sinai will be positively reflected on the Gazan security.”

Talal Okal, a political writer for the West Bank-based newspaper Al-Ayyam, told Al-Monitor that Hamas hears the Egyptian concerns about the infiltration of extremists from the Gaza Strip into Sinai. He said this is particularly true since such extremists do not find the Gaza Strip to be a favorable environment, given that Hamas opposes the presence of extremist organizations that have religious motives behind espousing conflicts.

Okal ruled out the possibility of a correlation between the construction of the barrier and the deal of the century. He said, “I do not think that the construction of this barrier has anything to do with the deal of the century in any way. It is a security, not a political, measure.”

Comments: Be the first to comment

Iran’s Khamenei says ‘Zionist-controlled’ US government will sink like Titanic 

Posted February 20, 2020 by Joseph Wouk
Categories: Uncategorized

Source: Iran’s Khamenei says ‘Zionist-controlled’ US government will sink like Titanic | The Times of Israel

Supreme leader appears to quote progressive Democratic talking points, says most of US riches going to a few billionaires while ordinary Americans suffer

By TOI STAFF and AFPToday, 3:51 am  Iranian President Hassan Rouhani walks past a portrait of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as he arrives for a news conference in the capital Tehran, on February 16, 2020.(Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani walks past a portrait of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as he arrives for a news conference in the capital Tehran, on February 16, 2020.(Photo by ATTA KENARE / AFP)

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Wednesday said the United States will sink like the “Titanic,” blaming it on “wealthy Zionist individuals and corporate owners” who he said controlled the US economy.

In a long series of tweets, Khamenei said the strength of the US economy was a “facade” and appeared to quote  progressive Democrats saying that US President Donald Trump was overseeing the transfer of US wealth to a few billionaires.

“Today, the epitome of rebellion, arrogance and tyranny is the US government, which is controlled by the wealthy Zionist individuals and corporate owners,” Khamenei tweeted.

“In the same way that the glory and splendor of the famous #Titanic ship did not prevent her from sinking, the apparent glory & splendor of the US won’t prevent it from sinking. And, the US will sink,” he said.

Khamenei took aim at Trump’s economic policies, which the president often touts as one of his greatest accomplishments, noting that markets are at record highs and and the unemployment rate is at its lowest  in decades.

“The current US President claims he has improved the economic situation there. Others say yes, it’s become better, but only for the billionaires, not for the people of the US,” Khamenei said.

Without mentioning names, Khamenei appeared to cite Democratic candidates like Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren.

“These aren’t my words, but the words of a member of the U.S. ruling body. He says over $100B has been added to the wealth of the 5 richest people in the US in the 3 years of Trump’s presidency. 3 of them own wealth equal to half the US population. Look at this social gap!

Khamenei.ir@khamenei_ir

1,571

Khamenei’s comments come as Iran gears up for a crucial parliamentary election in two days, with many people in the country feeling that their lives have been crippled by an economic slump exacerbated by harsh US sanctions since Trump pulled the United States out of a landmark nuclear deal with the Islamic Republic in 2018.

Conservatives are expected to make an overwhelming resurgence in Friday’s vote, which comes after months of steeply escalating tensions between Iran and its decades-old arch foe the United States.

Their gains would be made at the expense of those who back President Hassan Rouhani, a relatively moderate conservative who was re-elected in 2017 promising people more freedoms and the benefits of engagement with the West.

Rouhani urged people to go and vote, saying that taking part would give Iran the “strength and unity” needed in its stand against the United States.

“We are going to the polls to choose the best people for parliament, which is a very important institution,” he said in televised remarks after a meeting of his cabinet.

“We are under severe sanctions and pressure by the global arrogance, and we have to break these sanctions and improve people’s lives,” he added, referring to the United States.

People withraw money from an automated teller machine in the Iranian capital Tehran’s grand bazaar on November 3, 2018. (ATTA KENARE / AFP)

“Sanctions are a terrorist and tyrannical act against Iran.

“One cannot say sanctions have no effect and the government should be doing more… It’s lies, it’s supporting America.”

Iran’s electoral watchdog on Wednesday defended its decision to disqualify thousands of candidates from the vote.

The Interior Ministry said around half of the 16,033 hopefuls would contest the election after the Guardian Council barred thousands, most of them relative moderates and reformists.

But the Council said it was “neutral” in its dealings with all political camps and acted in accordance with the law when it blocked their candidacy.

“The Guardian Council follows the laws and regulations parliament has passed at different times,” said its spokesman Abbas Ali Kadkhodaee.

 

Comments: Be the first to comment

Israel’s Merkava Tank: The Toughest Tank on the Planet?

Posted February 20, 2020 by Joseph Wouk
Categories: Uncategorized

 

Israel’s Merkava Tank: The Toughest Tank on the Planet?

The Merkava tank is sometimes called the most survivable tank in the world. The reasons given usually include its active protection system, forward engine design, urban warfare specific modifications, and thick armor. But do these claims hold up to scrutiny?

The Merkava was designed in the 1970s following the failure to purchase Chieftain tanks from the United Kingdom. Originally designed to duke it out with Soviet tanks in the deserts surrounding Israel, the tank was laid out in a rather unorthodox manner compared to contemporary Western and Soviet tanks, featuring a design more akin to some infantry fighting vehicles. Instead of having the engine at the rear, the engine was moved in front of the crew compartment, with the turret placed further back on the chassis.

The result was that the front armor could be more gradually sloped, and the crew could enter and exit the tank quickly from the rear.

However, this comes with the drawback of having the engine more easily disabled, as any penetrating front hit will disable it. Israeli doctrine prioritizes the survivability of the crew in an engagement, so in the event of a disabling hit the crew will bail out rapidly through the rear hatch if the situation allows. On the other hand, a penetrating frontal hit on a western tank will likely leave the tank still mobile.

While the question of whether a tank crew would stay in a tank or not after a penetrating hit is up for a lot of debate, there are instances where mobility will increase the survivability of the crew, primarily in a fighting disengagement where the tank might be surrounded. In an engagement where an attack is succeeding (which to be fair to the Israeli Defense Forces, is likely in most of their post-1970s conflicts), the Merkava’s design makes sense, but for a European army expecting to hold against a Soviet or later a Russian advance, a mobility kill might be a far bigger deal.

Comments: 1 Comment

Syria: latest developments – Jerusalem Studio 489 

Posted February 19, 2020 by Joseph Wouk
Categories: Uncategorized

 

 

Comments: Be the first to comment

Netanyahu Says Work on Annexation Map Has Begun: ‘We Are Turning Parts of the Homeland in Judea and Samaria Into Part of the State of Israel Forever’

Posted February 19, 2020 by davidking1530
Categories: Uncategorized

I’ll believe it when it happens.

Sorry, if it happens…

Netanyahu Says Work on Annexation Map Has Begun: ‘We Are Turning Parts of the Homeland in Judea and Samaria Into Part of the State of Israel Forever’

Israel’s government has established a team to map out areas of the West Bank that it will annex in accordance with President Donald Trump’s recently released peace plan, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday.

Speaking at the weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu said, “In recent weeks, we brought enormous news for the State of Israel and the Land of Israel. My friend President Trump clearly stated that he would recognize Israeli sovereignty over the Jordan Valley, the northern Dead Sea, and all Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, as well as a broad area encompassing them.”

“We have formed an Israeli team to work with the American team on the work of mapping, which has already begun — it is underway,” Netanyahu announced.

The team, he said, includes Minister of Tourism and Aliyah and Integration Yariv Levin, National Security Council chief Meir Ben-Shabbat, and the Prime Minister’s Office Director-General Ronen Peretz, with assistance from the Israeli Ambassador to the US, Ron Dermer.

“This team will work closely with settlement and, of course, security officials in order to complete the work quickly,” Netanyahu said.

“For their part, the Americans will work with us,” he added. “We will complete the work as quickly as possible.”

“We are turning parts of the homeland in Judea and Samaria into part of the State of Israel forever,” the prime minister declared.

The Trump peace plan, which has already been rejected by the Palestinians, provides for Israeli annexation of almost all current Jewish settlements in the West Bank, or Judea and Samaria as the area is referred to in Hebrew.

This includes annexation of Israeli enclaves deep in West Bank territory, which is fiercely opposed by the Palestinians. In previous negotiations, the Palestinians have been offered over 90% of the West Bank, but turned it down. Under Trump’s plan, they would receive 70% of the territory, with Israel annexing the rest.

While most observers, whether supportive or not, view the Trump plan as the most generous toward Israel ever offered, settler leaders have been disappointed that Netanyahu did not immediately annex the territories guaranteed under the plan.

While US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman intimated that Israel was free to annex the territory following the release of the plan, Netanyahu backed off the idea, reportedly under pressure from the White House.

Comments: Be the first to comment

With ‘suicide drones’ and rocket attacks, Navy simulates war with Hezbollah 

Posted February 17, 2020 by Joseph Wouk
Categories: Uncategorized

Source: With ‘suicide drones’ and rocket attacks, Navy simulates war with Hezbollah | The Times of Israel

Times of Israel joins the 3rd Flotilla of missile ships as it holds an exercise preparing for possible conflict off the northern coast

By JUDAH ARI GROSS 15 February 2020, 10:35 am
Israeli sailors prepare to fire a machine gun during a naval exercise off the coast of the northern Israeli city of Haifa on February 3, 2020. (Judah Ari Gross/Times of Israel)

Israeli sailors prepare to fire a machine gun during a naval exercise off the coast of the northern Israeli city of Haifa on February 3, 2020. (Judah Ari Gross/Times of Israel)

ABOARD THE I.N.S. KESHET — In the next conflict with the Hezbollah terror group, Israel’s Navy knows that one of its main goals will be to protect Israel’s burgeoning natural gas infrastructure and shipping in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea.

Hezbollah has long identified the maritime platforms as a potential target for attack, with verbal threats by the terror group’s leader Hassan Nasrallah and his deputies over the years, as well as ominous videos and graphics putting the structures in cross-hairs.

Moreover, the military assumes that the terror group possesses the capabilities necessary to carry out those threats and stage potentially successful attacks not only on the gas platforms but on the commercial shipping lanes that bring in nearly all of Israel’s imported goods.

Last week, the navy’s 3rd Flotilla of missile ships — known in Hebrew by the acronym satilim — simulated such a war with a week-long exercise at sea, including deadly missile strikes on Israeli vessels, attempted suicide boat bombings and drone attacks.

Lt. Col. Guy Barak, commander of the 34th Anti-Submarine Squadron, onboard the INS Keshet during a naval exercise off Israel’s northern coast in February 2020. (Israel Defense Forces)

“We assume [Hezbollah] will try to attack on the maritime front. They see it as a very important arena,” Lt. Col. Guy Barak, commander of the 34th Anti-Submarine Squadron, told The Times of Israel, on board the INS Keshet, a 67-meter (220-foot) Sa’ar 4.5-model “submarine hunter” missile ship, during the second day of the five-day drill.

“With an enemy like Hezbollah, a surprise can come on the tenth day of a war or within the first hour,” he said. “So we have to know how to go from zero to 60 fast.”

Barak declined to comment on the specific types of weapons that the IDF believes the Tehran-backed Hezbollah has in its arsenals, but said generally that this included shore-to-sea missiles, suicide drones, submarine capabilities and others.

“We have to think that whatever Iran has, Hezbollah — and Hamas — can also have,” he said.

An image from a video by the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah threatening to attack Israeli offshore gas platforms. (Screen capture)

Barak said the military is both directly tracking Hezbollah’s weapons development closely and also making assessments based on the “vectors” that the terror group was already on.

In the 2006 Second Lebanon War, Hezbollah forces fired an anti-ship missile at the INS Hanit that killed four Israeli soldiers — one of the most significant, and in Israel, infamous, events of the 34-day conflict.

The strike on the Hanit on July 14 crippled the ship but did not destroy it. It was the first direct strike on an Israeli warship in decades and Hezbollah celebrated it as among its biggest victories of the war.

Though much of the exercise was conducted virtually, one aspect that was simulated with live fire was an attack by a “suicide drone” packed with explosives, a weapon that Hezbollah and other Iran-backed militias are known to have.

A civilian company was brought in to fly a Styrofoam glider around the participating ships, as machine gunners tried to shoot them down.

On board the INS Keshet, it took 94 bullets from one of the ship’s .50-caliber machine gun to send the drone crashing into the sea.

An Israeli sailor prepares to fire a machine gun during a naval exercise off Israel’s northern coast in February 2020. (Israel Defense Forces)

Asked why only one drone was used in the operation, when it’s possible a swarm of them could actually be used in a future war, Barak recognized that this was true not only of drones but of all aspects of the exercise, and that the decision to only use one was something of an arbitrary one.

“It can be one suicide boat or several, one drone or several, one rocket or several,” he said.

Israel is an island

Though surrounded on three sides by land, the State of Israel effectively functions as an island economy, importing and exporting nearly all of its goods through the sea — rather than by land — making the maritime arena one of critical value to the normal functioning of the country. The recent discovery of natural gas reserves in Israel’s territorial waters and the construction of one extraction platform in easy view of northern Israeli coastal communities has only added to the importance to the sea.

To assist in defending these new resources, the Israeli military has purchased four Sa’ar 6-model missile ships to be delivered beginning next year that will come equipped with two Iron Dome air defense batteries to defend the natural gas platforms from missile and rocket attacks.

An Israeli Navy Sa’ar 5 corvette defends a natural gas extraction platform off Israel’s coast, in an undated photograph. (Israel Defense Forces)

In the meantime, the Israeli Navy is protecting the extraction platforms with slightly smaller Sa’ar 5-model missile ships, also equipped with Iron Dome batteries.

In addition to their strategic importance to the State of Israel, these platforms also represent a highly visible targets for Hezbollah, which could provide it with what military officials refer to as a “victory picture,” like the Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima from World War II or the Israeli paratroopers at the Western Wall from the 1967 Six Day War. A massive fireball erupting out of the extraction rig less than 10 kilometers from the Israeli shore could serve a similar function for Hezbollah.

“But that’s less my concern,” Barak said. “My concern is defending national infrastructure installations — regardless of how things look.”

Israeli sailors take part in a naval exercise off Israel’s northern coast in February 2020. (Israel Defense Forces)

To accomplish this task, Israel’s missile ships are equipped with a dizzying array of sensors and detection systems — radar, sonar, electro-optical and more — active defense systems that can intercept incoming attacks, as well as ship-to-ship and ship-to-shore missiles.

While other navies around the world maintain fleets of different varieties of ships capable of performing specific tasks and mission, Barak said, “we need our missile ships to do everything.”

All of these systems are controlled from the warships’ combat information center — known in Hebrew by the acronym MIK, or Merkaz Yediyat Krav — a pitch black, cramped room in the belly of the vessel whose walls are covered in a myriad of screens and information panels.

Barak said these detection systems and weapons make the missile ships critical for defensive and offensive operations “not just on the sea, but above it and below it.”

However, he stressed, the navy cannot use these tools solely for the maritime front and must serve an integral part of the overall war effort.

Naval officials often point to the case of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, in which the military’s air and ground forces suffered heavy losses while the navy performed far better. Despite the navy’s significant successes on its front, the war in general is seen as having been far less than a decisive victory for Israel.

An ultra-Orthodox Israeli sailor holds a rifle during a naval exercise off Israel’s northern coast in February 2020. (Judah Ari Gross/Times of Israel)

“It’s no longer the military telling the navy, ‘Just keep the sea clean,’” he said.

Barak said the navy, especially the 3rd Flotilla and the 7th Flotilla of submarines, does have a slightly different mindset than the rest of the military, as the vessels they use are not only war machines, but also their homes, on which they can remain for extended periods of time.

“The sailors see this as their house and the other crew members as their family, so when they fight, they’re fighting for their home,” he said. “We go out to war and we come back when we’ve won. We don’t know for how long.”

Despite this singular quality, the navy works closely with the other branches of the IDF, especially the Israeli Air Force, Barak said, giving the specific example of the air force-operated Iron Dome batteries on board navy ships.

But in order to maintain the ability to fight more traditional naval warfare, last week’s exercise also included fleet-on-fleet combat.

The drill also simulated the death of the captain of the INS Romach from the direct strike of a Hezbollah rocket, fires and flooding onboard ships, emergency helicopter evacuations and other emergencies.

“The exercise took the commanders to extremes and tested their functioning under pressure,” the military said.

The 3rd Flotilla’s ship-to-shore missiles and other weaponry ensures that it will also play an active role in any future war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, as it did in the 2006 Second Lebanon War and against Hamas in Gaza in the 2014 conflict there.

“Hezbollah knows that if an all-out war breaks out, the IDF will display force like never before, and that will include a ‘punch’ from the sea from the 3rd Flotilla,” Barak said.

 

Comments: Be the first to comment

Rouhani vows US pressure will not force Iran into talks

Posted February 17, 2020 by Joseph Wouk
Categories: Uncategorized

Source: Rouhani vows US pressure will not force Iran into talks | The Times of Israel

( Does this ‘phony moderate’ terrorist actually know NOTHING about Trump ? – JW )

President says Washington’s ‘maximum pressure’ campaign is doomed to fail, Trump won’t start a war because it would ruin his reelection chances

By TOI STAFF and AP16 February 2020, 6:47 pm

Iran's President Hassan Rouhani gives a press conference in Tehran, Iran, February 16, 2020. (Ebrahim Noroozi/AP)

Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani gives a press conference in Tehran, Iran, February 16, 2020. (Ebrahim Noroozi/AP)

Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani on Sunday vowed that US sanctions would not force his country to negotiate new terms for the moribund 2015 nuclear deal and declared that Washington’s pressure campaign was doomed to fail.

“We will never go to the negotiation table in a position of weakness,” Rouhani said at a press conference in Tehran, according to a report by Iran’s Mehr news agency.

He reiterated that the US should rejoin the nuclear deal — which it left in 2018 — if it wants to return to negotiations.

“We will finally get the enemy to sit at the negotiating table some day, like before,” said Rouhani, referring to the US.

He said he didn’t believe the US would pursue war with his country, because it would harm US President Donald Trump’s 2020 reelection bid.

Trump knows that war with Iran will “ruin” his chances of winning the 2020 US presidential election, he assessed.

The Iranian leader added that war would be harmful to US interests and those of its regional allies, as well as Iran.

“I think the Americans aren’t after war since they know what harm it could do them,” said Rouhani in a news conference.

He said that Persian Gulf nations like the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Qatar stood a lot to lose if conflict between Iran and the US turns to war.

Iran would always play a key role in the region’s stability, Rouhani declared.

“It is clear to the entire world that peace and stability in this region are impossible without a powerful and great country like Iran,” he said.

Tehran and Washington came close to an open conflict in January, when a US drone strike killed Iran’s top general, Qasem Soleimani, outside Baghdad. Iran retaliated with missile strikes on a base housing US troops in Iraq.

An Iranian flag flutters at Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant on November 10, 2019. (Atta Kenare/AFP)

In May 2018 Trump pulled out of the nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, then reinstated severe economic sanctions under a “maximum pressure” campaign to force Iran to renegotiate the pact.

The so-called Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action saw previous international sanctions lifted from Iran in return for it agreeing to curb its nuclear program to limit it from being able to produce weapons.

The Trump administration claims the JCPOA doesn’t go far enough in stopping Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons and also did not address the country’s ballistic missile program. Strict sanctions have targeted Iran’s vital oil industry, ravaging its economy.

As the other signatories to the deal struggle to keep the pact alive, Iran has also dropped some of its commitments to the deal, restarting processes that experts say shorten the breakout time it needs to produce enough enriched uranium to make an atomic bomb.

Iran has said it is only prepared to open talks on the deal if the US first removes its sanctions.

At his Sunday press conference, Rouhani conceded that “sanctions will naturally create problems for the people,” but predicted “these sanctions will be fruitless for our enemies.”

Washington knows that “the path and strategy they chose was based on a miscalculation and will not affect the great Iranian nation,” he said and claimed that for the first time in its history Iran was managing without its oil industry to keep the economy going.

Last month three European signatories to the JCPOA — Britain, France and Germany — announced action under the nuclear agreement paving the way for possible sanctions in response to Tehran’s attempts to roll back parts of the deal.

The three countries, which signed the international agreement along with the United States, Russia and China, triggered its “dispute mechanism,” ratcheting up pressure on the Islamic Republic.

 

Comments: 1 Comment

If Russia can’t curb Iran in Syria, the Saudis ask: How can Israel? – DEBKAfile

Posted February 17, 2020 by Joseph Wouk
Categories: Uncategorized

Source: If Russia can’t curb Iran in Syria, the Saudis ask: How can Israel? – DEBKAfile

  , , , , , 

The Saudi paper Sharq al-Awsat reported on Feb. 15 that the Russians had given up on curbing Iran’s military presence in Syria. It cited Saudi intelligence sources in eastern Syria where the Saudis took control of Syria’s eastern oil region in December under the US aegis. Those sources wonder how Israel can hope to succeed where the Russians have failed.

On Thursday, Feb. 13, they note, Israel took out four Iranian officers in an attack on a new Iranian weapons consignment delivered in the Damascus area. Two of the dead were Revolutionary Guards generals – Riday Mahmadi, commander of Iranian forces in the Damascus region, and Haj Hossein, who was in charge of arming Iranian forces in Syria.

While this was yet another impressive Israeli intelligence feat, its impact will be short-lived, say DEBKAfile’s military sources. Tehran will rapidly replace the two officers, in the same way as it quickly slotted a Hizballah loyalist close to Hassan Nasrallah into the vacancy left by the US assassination of Al Qods chief Qassem Soleimani on Jan. 3. The Guards don’t leave missing links in their chain of command – either in Syria or in Iraq.

The systematic destruction by Israeli missiles of Iran’s weapons consignments landing in Syria is likewise of provisional value. While the IDF is exceptionally effective in spotting and targeting the incoming arms shipments, a certain quantity must be presumed to be getting through to destination, else how account for periodic reports on the rising numbers of precision missiles in the hands of Iran’s proxy, the Lebanese Hizballah? This question also applies to the Palestinian Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

IDF commander Lt. Gen. Aviv Kochavi addressed the Iranian and other threats to Israel’ security when he presented his new multi-year military program last week, He pointed out in his preamble that Israel’s armed forces must contend with “surrounding terrorist armies in Syria, Lebanon, the Gaza Strip and Sinai, which are not under state control,” as well as Iran, which “currently holds a stock of 1,000 precision missiles capable of reaching Tel Aviv, some of which have multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRV) that are difficult to intercept.” He stressed too that “Hizballah is advancing in its own precision rockets project.”

Our military sources pose this question. How can Hizballah make such advances after three years of constant Israeli attacks? And how come that terrorist groups from the Gaza Strip and Sinai are still allowed to pose a strategic threat to national security?

The new IDF plan, dubbed “Momentum,” speaks of “strengthening the capabilities of the ground forces, and taking advantage of aerial range to enable combat units to attack and destroy a maximum number of targets in as short a time as possible.” However, say DEBKAfile’s sources, one lesson learned from long experience of wars is that no-one can predict how a conflict, once started, will end. None can be counted on to achieve a rapid in-and-out bang-bang victory. In countering Iran, Israel is more likely to come up against the same obstacles as Russia encountered in Syria – a lingering, constantly evolving presence that is hard to pin down.

There is nothing innovative about Gen. Kochavi’s decision to establish an Iran Command headed by a general. IDF generals have filled this position in the past, the last appointee was Maj. Gen. NItzan Alon, after whom the position vanished without explanation.

While “Momentum” was approved by the prime minister and defense minister, PM Binyamin Netanyahu added a rider criticizing the plan as needing a sharper offensive strategy.

Naftali Bennett returned last week from his first Washington visit and talks in the Pentagon as defense minister. He reported an agreement for a division of labor to push back Iranian expansion: the Americans would operate in Iraq, while the IDF would continue to take on the Iranians in Syria.

No US officials has confirmed or, for that matter, denied the existence of this deal. Neither has any reference been made any other competent Israeli official in the caretaker government that is officiating in Jerusalem up until the March 2 general election.

 

Comments: Be the first to comment

Israel’s trophy Active Protection System 

Posted February 17, 2020 by Joseph Wouk
Categories: Uncategorized

Israel’s trophy Active Protection System

The World’s First and Only Fully Operational, Combat-Proven APS
By proactively detecting, locating, and (if necessary) neutralizing anti-armor threats, TROPHY™ dramatically increases platform survivability, and creates a new paradigm of networked threat awareness for maneuver forces.

BENEFITS:

Defeats all known anti-armor, shaped charge weapons (missiles, rockets, tank-fired HEAT) before they strike the platform
Enables networked threat awareness by pinpointing and Reporting shooter location across the battle management system
Greatly improves platform protection, with very low risk of collateral injury, without increasing armor or sacrificing vehicle performance
Networked Threat Awareness ensures freedom of movement and maneuver, retaining the initiative and maintaining offensive momentum.

 

Comments: Be the first to comment

PM Netanyahu speaks about Israel’s power and the significance of the Trump plan 

Posted February 17, 2020 by Joseph Wouk
Categories: Uncategorized

 

Speech given Feb 16, 2020.

Comments: Be the first to comment

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »