Israel Matzav

Iran arms Syria with sophisticated radar

Based on both Israeli and American sources, the Wall Street Journal reports that Iran has provided Syria with a sophisticated radar system that will allow Syria to monitor the skies over Lebanon and Israel. The result may be to make an Israeli strike against Iran's nuclear weapons facilities more difficult to accomplish. Additionally, the radar is likely to help Iran's and Syria's Hezbullah ally to more accurately fire missiles at Israeli cities.

The radar could bolster Syria's defenses by providing early warning of Israeli air-force sorties. It could also benefit Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militant group based in Lebanon and widely believed to receive arms from Syria.

Any sharing of radar information by Syria could increase the accuracy of Hezbollah's own missiles and bolster its air defenses. That would boost Hezbollah defenses, which U.S. and Israeli officials say have been substantially upgraded since 2006, the last time Israel fought the southern Lebanon-based group.

The mid-2009 transfer was described in recent months by two Israeli officials, two U.S. officials and a Western intelligence source, and confirmed Wednesday by the Israeli military. Though they didn't name the system's final recipient in Syria, these and other officials described it as part as a dramatic increase in weapons transfers and military coordination among Iran, Syria and Hezbollah.

Iran and Syria both denied that a radar transfer took place.

...

Israeli officials confirmed in private the transfer of the advanced radar, but the military wouldn't release specifics in response to queries by The Wall Street Journal.

"Iran is engaged in developing Syrian intelligence and aerial detection capabilities, and Iranian representatives are present in Syria for that express purpose," the Israeli military said in a statement. "Radar assistance is only one expression of that cooperation."

Ahmed Salkini, the spokesman for the Syrian Embassy in Washington, called the report of the radar shipment "classic Israeli PR stunts aimed at diverting the world's attention from the atrocities they are committing in Gaza and other occupied territories, and we will not continue wasting our time" commenting on them.

Iran denied that it had sent sophisticated radars to Syria. "It is absolutely not true," said Mohamad Bak Sahraee, spokesman for Iran's mission to the United Nations. Hezbollah officials in Beirut declined to comment.

Syria, which has long struggled against Israel's superior military, has its own interest in acquiring advanced radar. Israeli fighter jets bombed a Syrian site in 2007 that Israelis say housed a nuclear reactor in the final stages of construction. Syria said it was a defunct military facility.

Some military analysts have suggested that Israel was able to slip into and out of Syrian air space during that raid by jamming older Syrian radar.

In the 2006 war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, "There was no opposition to our jets. We flew freely," said Cpt. Ron, an active duty Israeli F-16 pilot, who under Israeli security restrictions would allow himself to be identified only by his first name and rank. "In the next Lebanon war, we know it will not be like that."

So much for Obama's 'engagement' with Syria and Iran.

Can we rename him Neville yet?

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 1:10 AM