We know that Isaiah 17 and Ezekiel 38-39 are just around the corner, and in a single news cycle we see the build-up continuing. It won't be long now:
Lebanese media reported Sunday afternoon that Israeli war planes were spotted in the skies above southern Lebanon.
It appeared the pilots were rehearsing attacks on targets in the region, local sources told media outlets.
It appeared the pilots were rehearsing attacks on targets in the region, local sources told media outlets.
Both Syria and Lebanon accused Israel of carrying out air strikes on a convoy last Wednesday that was transporting Russian-made surface-to-air missiles from the Damascus area towards the border with Lebanon.
Barak did not bluntly say that Israel had carried out the strike, skirting the issue by saying, “I cannot add anything to what you have read... about what happened in Syria several days ago.
“But I keep telling ... that we said, and that is another proof that when we say something we mean it, we say that it should not be allowable to bring advanced weapons systems into Lebanon and Hizbullah from Syria when [Syrian President Bashar al-] Assad falls.”
Barak added that in his view, “Hizbullah from Lebanon and the Iranians are the only allies that Assad has left.” He said the region has not been this unstable since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.
“But I keep telling ... that we said, and that is another proof that when we say something we mean it, we say that it should not be allowable to bring advanced weapons systems into Lebanon and Hizbullah from Syria when [Syrian President Bashar al-] Assad falls.”
Barak added that in his view, “Hizbullah from Lebanon and the Iranians are the only allies that Assad has left.” He said the region has not been this unstable since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.
Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak brought the issue up at a gathering of the world’s top diplomats and defense officials in Germany, initially saying: “I cannot add anything to what you have read in the newspapers about what happened in Syria several days ago.”
But, addressing the audience in English, he then added: “I keep telling frankly that we said – and that’s proof when we said something we mean it- we say that we don’t think it should be allowed to bring advanced weapons systems into Lebanon.”
In Syria, President Bashar Assad said his military was capable of confronting any “aggression” targeting the country, his first comments since the airstrike.
The chief of Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guards said in remarks Sunday that Tehran also hopes Syria will retaliate against Israel for a recent airstrike on its territory.
The report by the official IRNA news agency quotes Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafari as saying, “We are hopeful that Syria gives an appropriate response to the strike in the proper time.”
Israel’s defense minister Ehud Barak had strong words for Iran and its allies at the Munich Security Conference Sunday, Feb. 3, while, in Damascus, Iran’s National Security Director Saeed Jalili conferred urgently with Syrian President Bashar Assad. They discussed activating the secret mutual defense pact binding Iran, Syria, Hizballlah and Hamas in reprisal for the Israeli air strike which reportedly hit a military complex near Damascus last Wednesday.
Iranian and intelligence sources believe the Iranians are simply playing for time to decide how to retaliate for Israel’s reported strike on the military complex which Syria shares with its allies. The man to watch is Jalilee who, we can report exclusively, arrived post haste in Damascus Saturday, Feb. 2, to warn Syrian leaders that Tehran is not willing to forego a military response to an attack which destroyed a whole supply of advanced Iranian weapons Tehran sent to Hizballah in the last two years and which were stored at the Jamraya compound.
The Syrian ruler clearly agrees with his Iranian guest. Sunday, he accused Israel of trying to "destabilize" his country. His first remarks on the reported Israeli air strike in Syria on Wednesday came after he met Jalilee. He added that Syria was able to confront "current threats... and aggression."
Barak’s tough comments in Munich told Tehran that Israel is ready to remove the gloves against Syria and Hizballlah. Iranian leaders heeded his words well while at the same time keeping track of the Syrian opposition leader Mouaz al-Khatib’s meetings in Munich with US Vice President Joe Biden and, for the first time, with the foreign ministers of Russia and Iran, Sergey Lavrov and Ali Akbar Salehi.
Israeli warplanes reportedly buzzed southern Lebanon on Sunday and conducted “mock raids” for the third consecutive day, according to the Lebanese National News Agency.
The government outlet reported earlier in the weekend that Israel Air Force jets flew over the southern Lebanese towns of Nabatieh, Tuffah, Marjayoun and Bint Jbeil.
On Friday, a Lebanese security official reported that Israeli warplanes flew over southern Lebanon and were headed toward the eastern Bekaa Valley on the Syrian border.
Israel Radio on Friday cited a Lebanese media report that claimed Israeli jets were conducting reconnaissance missions over several sites in the south.
Israel’s army chief on Sunday landed in the United States for talks with his American counterpart, amid tension with Syria following a reported Israel airstrike there last week. He arrived as Israel’s defense minister insisted that Israel “means what it says” about preventing advanced weaponry being moved into Lebanon as Bashar Assad’s regime in Damascus loses control.
IDF chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz began a five-day work visit in the United States as the guest of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the IDF announced on Sunday afternoon.
It said Gantz and Dempsey would hold “a series of work meetings together” and with other American officials, and would “discuss current security challenges, the regional security status in the Middle East and military cooperation.”
Gantz was accompanied by the head of the IDF’s Planning Directorate, Maj.-Gen. Nimrod Sheffer.
Apart from the Syria crisis, the two military chiefs will likely also focus on Iran’s nuclear weapons drive. Formally starting the process of building his new government on Saturday night, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said stopping Iran would be his first priority. Late last summer, amid reports that Netanyahu wanted to launch military action against Iran, Dempsey publicly and dramatically declared that he would not want to be “complicit” in any such Israeli action.
Since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war, Israeli leaders have repeatedly expressed fears that if Syria were to disintegrate, Assad could lose control of his chemical weapons and other arms.
On Saturday night, Netanyahu, who is in the process of forming a new ruling coalition, said his new government would have to deal with weapons "being stockpiled near us and threatening our cities and civilians" — an apparent reference to the deteriorating situation in Syria.
Barak said "Hezbollah from Lebanon and the Iranians are the only allies that Assad has left." He said in his view Assad's fall "is coming imminently" and when it happens, "this will be a major blow to the Iranians and Hezbollah."
"I think that they will pay the price," he said.
As a top security official from Tehran arrived in Damascus to show support for the regime of President Bashar Assad, a senior Iranian military chief warned that there will a massive response to Israel’s alleged attack on a Syrian research facility last week, Iranian Press TV reported on Sunday.
“Syria’s response to the recent aggression of the Zionist regime against this country will send this regime into a coma,” Brig. Gen. Masoud Jazayeri, the deputy chairman of the Iranian Armed Forces, said on Saturday.
Iran on Thursday threatened “grave consequences for Tel Aviv” after an alleged Israeli airstrike on Syrian military targets early Wednesday morning.
Jazayeri added that the era in which hegemonic powers bullied independent nations had come to an end, the report said.
“In the new era, the criminals should know that behind their every blow lies a massive retaliatory blow, whose time, level and magnitude will be determined by the resolve of the free and anti-hegemonic nations,” he warned.
Jazayeri’s comments came as Saeed Jalili, the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, arrived in Damascus for a round of talks with senior regime officials, including Assad.
“Syria is considered the front line of the Muslim world in the face of the Zionist enemy,” Jalili said. “Enemies are attacking the Syrian infrastructure and imposing economic sanctions on it, in a desperate attempt to break the resistance and steadfastness of the Syrian nations.”
Jalili warned that Iran would not permit another Israeli attack on Syria. In 2006 Iran and Syria signed a military cooperation pact.
Iran is acquiring new centrifuges to reduce the time it takes to enrich uranium, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said at the start of Sunday's cabinet meeting, citing this as an example of why the country needs a national unity government.
Netanyahu said Israel is at a "decisive point" in its history, and repeated his call for a national unity government made Saturday night, when President Shimon Peres formally charged him with forming a coalition.
"The next government's primary objective will be to stop the weaponization of Iran's nuclear program," he said. "This is a task that is becoming more difficult because Iran is acquiring new centrifuges that reduce the enrichment time. We cannot accept this."
Iran announced last week that it is upgrading its nuclear enrichment equipment at the Natanz nuclear plant, something that will speed up the uranium enrichment process. A senior official in the Prime Minister's Office said following that announcement that while the West was discussing where and when to meet Iran next, Iran is speedily working toward getting the bomb.
Members of Congress are asking the Obama administration to reconsider sending F-16 fighter jets to Egypt due to popular protests against the government and its use of anti-Semitic language.
“Recent violent outbreaks and the volatile situation in Egypt should give the US reason to pause when considering continuing to provide foreign assistance to the government of Egypt,” said Republican Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Middle East subcommittee, in announcing she was signing onto the letter sponsored by Republican Rep. Tim Griffin to US President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry. The letter requests that the administration delay the delivery of F-16 planes.
Ros-Lehtinen continued, “Even more disconcerting are Morsi’s views toward our closest friend and ally, the democratic Jewish State of Israel.”
She said that his statements “clearly reveal a man who holds Jews and Israel in such contempt that it would not be out of the realm of possibility to believe he is capable of turning his aggression toward Israel.”
Tensions are running high in the North of Israel. The IDF is bracing for possible retaliation by Syria, Hezbollah, and/or Iran after its recent air strikes on Syrian targets. Some Mideast analystsbelieve it’s just a matter of time before there is significant trouble on Israel’s northern borders.
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday night promised to establish ‘the widest possible national unity government’ and urged even those political leaders who did not recommend him as prime minister to reconsider and join him,” reports the Times of Israel. “Netanyahu spoke immediately after President Shimon Peres, at a ceremony at the President’s Residence, formally charged him with the task of forming the next government. Netanyahu said the first priority of his new government would be thwarting Iran’s effort to attain nuclear weapons. He also pledged to seek peace, saying ‘every day that passes’ without negotiations with the Palestinians was a day wasted, and urging Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to come back to the peace table.”
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