More on Russia-Israel Meeting

Mike Mickey has done an excellent and thorough review of the current situation between Russia and Israel, and the meeting which took place last week. There is a lot more to this story and it also involves the mysterous disappearance of the Russian "cargo ship" recently Link Here. I'll let brother Mike do the rest:


Russia and Israel Talk In Secret

by Michael G. Mickey
(9-11-09)

It was reported earlier this week, on September 7th, that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had mysteriously gone missing for some ten hours in what Israeli sources originally indicated was a visit to "a security installation inside Israel." Three days later, however? A source inside the Kremlin said that wasn't the case at all. Where had Netanyahu been in reality? If the Kremlin source is trustworthy, he was on a clandestine trip to Russia to meet with Russian officials, the definitive topic of discussion being an unknown.

Why So Secretive?

Why would the Israeli Prime Minister travel in secret to Russia? Could it be that Israel has made a decision to attack Iran's nuclear facilities? It's certainly a possibility but I suspect the tight-lipped meeting may have been related to something else that made a slight bit of news lately before quietly fading into obscurity. Let's consider the latter for a moment.

ABC News reported the following yesterday:

There are reports that Israel may have been involved in the mysterious disappearance of a Russian cargo ship last month.

Israeli media says Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went on a secret trip to Moscow earlier this week.

There is speculation that his visit may be linked to the peculiar story of the cargo ship, the Arctic Sea, which disappeared during its trip from Finland to Algeria.

The Russian government then announced that the ship, with its cargo of timber, had been hijacked and that the Russian navy had rescued the crew.

Now, one senior Israeli figure close to the intelligence services has told the BBC that the Arctic Sea was in fact carrying an advanced Russian air defence system bound for Iran.
Israel involved in state-sanctioned piracy of ships loaded with timber? That doesn't make sense, but if Russia was smuggling advanced weapons systems into Syria, Iran or both that could hamper or prevent Israel from defending its national interests? That's an animal of a whole different variety! Think about it.

If Israeli Mossad agents played an active role in the reported hijacking of the Arctic Sea, particularly if Russia was caught red-handed aiding Israel's enemies, tensions between Israel and Russia are undoubtedly very high right now. Could this be why the two sides elected to sit down for a quiet heart-to-heart talk they're apparently more than content to keep between themselves? Quite possibly. A Haaretz story seems to corroborate the ABC story linked above on several key points.

According to Haaretz, rumors persist that the Arctic Sea was carrying advanced S-300 anti-aircraft missile systems that were en route to either Syria or Iran.

According to Haaretz, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, in keeping with the story as told to us by ABC, has indicated there was nothing on board the ship but a load of timber, an odd cargo for a group of pirates to seize a ship for weeks and relocate it "thousands of kilometers" from what was to be its original destination, not to mention the fact that Russia dispatched an enormous force to recover the ship, its crew and its alleged cargo of wood.

TIME magazine is reporting the following concerning Russia's rescue mission, raising questions I can't help but suspect, based on everything I've read on the topic and shared in this commentary, could only be answered by high-ranking Israeli and Russian government officials (which I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for):

"On orders from the Kremlin, Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov sent a completely disproportionate force, including destroyers and submarines, to look for the vessel. It took five days for them to find it, the Defense Ministry said, even though the Foreign Ministry later announced that it was fully aware of the Arctic Sea's coordinates the entire time. To fly the alleged pirates and the crew back to Moscow — a group of only 19 men — Russia dispatched two enormous military-cargo planes. And then on their arrival, the ship's crew was detained along with the alleged hijackers for days of questioning, with no access to their families or the media.

"Even from the basic facts, without assumptions, it is clear that this was not just piracy," says Mikhail Voitenko, editor of the Russian maritime journal Sovfrakht, which has been tracking unusual incidents on the high seas for decades. "I've never seen anything like this. These are some of the most heavily policed waters in the world. You cannot just hide a ship there for weeks without government involvement."

If I'm reading Voitenko's opinion correctly, he doesn't believe any group of pirates, short of being the nationally-sponsored variety if you catch my drift, could pull off an operation like the one pulled off against the Arctic Sea for a host of reasons.

All of the above reads like something out of a Tom Clancy novel, doesn't it? It certainly stirs the imagination if nothing else.

Unanswered Questions

Did the Mossad grab a payload of advanced Russian anti-aircraft systems headed for Iran, Syria or both and make off with them for a few weeks? If so, what was the mission's goal other than to keep the weapons out of Iranian and Syrian hands? Did the Mossad think it was merely intercepting some black market Russian military equipment on its way to the Middle East when it boarded the ship but subsequently realized it had intercepted a legitimate covert Russian military operation instead? Could it be, God forbid, there was something aboard the Arctic Sea far more deadly than S-300 anti-aircraft systems? We will likely never know the answers to these questions with any clarity but TIME raises some questions I think one would be hard-pressed to believe have been answered in Russia's official version of the events in question, the three following being prime examples:

Why, with so many other ships carrying much more valuable cargo, would the hijackers target the Arctic Sea and its small load of timber?
Why didn't the ship send out a distress signal?
Why did Israeli President Shimon Peres pay a surprise visit to Russia a day after the ship was rescued?
That's right, folks! We now know that both Israeli president Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have met with high-ranking Russian officials in peculiar manners since the Arctic Sea incident took place.

Of Prophetic Interest

It's common knowledge here that bible prophecy indicates Russia is going to be up to its armpits in involvement with Iran in the last days, particularly where the Gog-Magog attack described in the 38th and 39th chapters of the book of Ezekiel is concerned. As such, the possibility that there was far more to the hijacking of the Arctic Sea than we're being told should come as no surprise to those of us waiting and watching for the fulfillment of bible prophecy to occur on this front.

Assuming for a moment there absolutely was Israeli involvement in the incident in question, blatant falsehoods being told to the public by Russia and Israel to cover the entire incident up may have been an agreed upon ending to a potentially deadly confrontation as this outcome would permit both Moscow and Jerusalem to save face publicly, neither side having won or lost anything but credibility with the other. Such an end game scenario would be especially beneficial to the Russians at a time when the Russian government is standing in the way of the entire world punishing Iran for pursuing what I believe we can all safely assume is nuclear weaponry at this point. Just today, for example, the BBC is reporting that Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is warning everyone against attacking Iran militarily or even imposing any additional sanctions on Iran that might slow its nuclear program.

Conclusion

The Middle East is, in typical form, a powder keg ready to explode at any moment. As in times past, in keeping with the ways of the former Soviet Union and bible prophecy's predictions for the future, Mother Russia is up to her eyeballs in aiding Israel's enemies and their plots to destroy the Jewish nation from the face of the earth. Essentially, all I'm trying to convey here is God's prophetic plan remains perfectly on course to fulfillment, particularly if what we've been told by the Russians in their official story concerning the hijacking of the Arctic Sea is what experts seem to believe it is, namely one whopper of a lie!

Keep looking up, not for S-300 anti-aircraft missiles but for Jesus Christ, our Lord! Surely His return draws near!