Speaking to official state media in Russia, Putin said that any such
deals between Israel and Ukraine would be “counterproductive” and would
“only cause a new round of hostility.”
“The death toll would
rise, but the result would not change,” Putin was quoted as telling
Rossiya, the official state-run television channel.
...
“It’s a choice for the Israeli leadership to make, they can do what they see necessary,” Putin said.
Something tells me that Putin doesn't really want a direct confrontation with Israel. He just wants money from Iran. Perhaps we should offer to buy the S-300 instead?
On Monday, Russia's Presidential Spokesman Dmitry
Peskov said that supplies of the Russian S-300 air defense missile
systems to Iran may begin any moment in line with the relevant decree
signed by the Russian president,
Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree
on Monday to lift the ban on the delivery of S-300 air defense missile
systems to Iran.
"The decree stipulates… no delays," Peskov told
journalists adding that the second provision of the decree states that
"it comes into force on the day it was signed."
...
In January, Tehran and Moscow signed an agreement
to broaden their defensive cooperation and also resolve the problem with
the delivery of Russia's S300 missile defense systems to Iran.
The agreement was signed by General Dehqan and his
visiting Russian counterpart General Sergei Shoigu in a meeting in
Tehran in January.
The Iranian and Russian defense ministers agreed
to resolve the existing problems which have prevented the delivery of
Russia's advanced air defense systems to Iran in recent years.
The two sides also agreed to broaden their defense cooperation and joint campaign against terrorism and extremism.
In 2007, Iran signed a contract worth $800mln to buy five Russian S300 missile defense systems.
But the deal was scrapped in 2010 by the
then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who was unilaterally expanding
on sanctions against Iran imposed by the UN Security Council.
Iran filed a $4bln lawsuit against Russia in the international arbitration court in Geneva, which is currently pending review.
But Amir Rappaport reports that Israel is not taking this lying down. Israeli defense officials have told him that Israel may sell advanced weapons systems to Georgia and Ukraine in response to the Russian move.
To understand the relationship between the transactions between Israel,
Ukraine and Georgia and the recent Russian move, we should go back to
the background of things: Russia was planning to sell Iran the advanced
S300 missiles defense system at the end of the last decade.
The weapon system is considered to have strategic
capabilities. Although the Russians have not offered the Iranians the
most advanced version of the system they possess, it is still an
anti-aircraft system that can hit aircraft even at ranges of 150 km – a
huge challenge for every Air Force, including the Israeli Air Force.
The deal between Russia and Iran was canceled in 2010,
under the pressure of Israel and against the background of global
sanctions imposed on the Iranian regime. In a silent understanding,
Israel has refrained from selling advanced weapons systems to Ukraine
and Georgia, that are both considered enemies of Russia. Regarding
Georgia, the supply of Israeli arms was completely stopped after their
war with the Russians at the end of the last decade (and after Israeli
weapons brought down several Russian helicopters). Regarding Ukraine,
several transactions were on the agenda recently, including the sale of
advanced unmanned aircraft amounting tens of thousands of dollars. These
transactions were frozen based on a demand of the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs, in view of the "delicate" relationship between Israel and
Russia. Now, it is quite possible that the approval for exporting Israel
arms to Ukraine will be granted.
Rappaport also reports that the S-300 systems being sold to Iran are not the most advanced of such systems (but would still complicate an Israeli attack against Iran's nuclear facilities), and that contrary to other reports, delivery will take at least three years.
Still, I would view any prospect of delivery of the S-300 to Iran as reason for the advancement of an Israeli attack against Iran's nuclear facilities.
The timing on this announcement - which is apparently real - cannot be beat.
Russia will purchase snow from Israel for Sochi Olympic Games, internet
television Piter.tv informs.
According to the spreading news, Russia is going to buy snow-making
equipment from one of Israeli firms for appropriate snow cover for Sochi
Olympics in 2014.
The president of Russia’s ski association has already visited Israel for negotiations.
The
internet television site informs that in recent years, due to global
warming, all of Europe’s ski resorts more frequently buy snow making
equipment from Israel.
UNbelievable: US ambassador to Georgia told Prime Minister to vote for 'Palestinian state'
This is amazing.
President Hussein Obama's ambassador to the Republic of Georgia told that country's Prime Minister to vote in favor of granting non-member observer status to 'Palestine' at the United Nations last month, despite the fact that the Obama administration was nominally committed to opposing it (Hat Tip: Atlas Shrugs).
Just
before the November 29 United Nations vote granting non-member state
observer status, the U.S. ambassador to Georgia, Richard Norland, an
Obama appointee, met with Georgian Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili.
During their conversation, Norland recommended that the Prime Minister
that Georgia should vote in favor of a Palestinian state.
This
happened despite the U.S.'s official opposition, as Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton called the vote "unfortunate and counterproductive ...
plac[ing] further obstacles in the path of peace." Israeli Prime
Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said on the day of the vote: "None of the
vital interests of peace appear in the resolution that will be put
forward before the General Assembly today and that is why Israel cannot
accept it." He was right. But in Georgia, the U.S. was betraying a
steadfast and true ally.
This
information comes from Gabriel M. Mirilashvili, a prominent businessman
and corporation owner in Georgia, who is Vice-President of the
Euro-Asian Jewish Congress and head of the World Congress of Georgian
Jews. Mirilashvili says that he heard this from Ivanishvili himself, and
that there exists an official record of the conversation between
Norland and Ivanishvili. When Mirilashvili urged Ivanishvili to oppose
the Palestinian statehood resolution, Ivanishvili responded that the
American ambassador had told him to support it.
It
is also interesting to note that a few days before this meeting, George
Soros came to Georgia and also met with Prime Minister Ivanishvili, and
they agreed to collaborate on various initiatives. President Obama's
close ties to Soros goes back to the 2007 and the run up to the 2008 presidential election.
Israel's shadow war with Iran: Phone calls from Lebanon to Burgas
The New York Times reports on a shadow war going on between Israel and Iran. The only Iranian operation that has been 'successful' was the one in the Burgas Airport in Bulgaria last month in which five Israelis were killed. That plot was orchestrated by Hezbullah out of Lebanon, although that cannot be proven... yet.
Analysts say the shadow war pitting Israel against Iran and Hezbollah has more in common with the cloak-and-dagger maneuverings of the C.I.A. and the K.G.B. during the cold war than the publicity-hungry terrorism campaign of Al Qaeda. It represents a return to the idea that the most effective attack is often an ambiguous one.
“They want just enough ambiguity that you can’t nail down that they did it, the seed of doubt that makes it difficult for Israel or the United States to respond,” said Andrew Exum, a senior fellow with the Center for a New American Security in Washington. The undercover conflict signaled “a return to the black arts of the cold war,” he said.
After the blast in Bulgaria, both Iran and Hezbollah denied involvement almost as quickly as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel pointed the finger at them. American and Bulgarian officials backed the assessment off the record, but would not say so openly. There has been little hard evidence presented to show how or by whom the plots were coordinated.
Israeli intelligence has evidence of many telephone calls between Lebanon and Burgas in the two months before the bombing, according to a senior government official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the information is classified, with the volume intensifying in the three days leading up to it.
But they are no more prepared to expose the details of their counterintelligence work publicly than the attackers are to claim responsibility. “We know the sources in Lebanon,” though not the identity of those on the other end in Bulgaria, the official said. “They shouldn’t know that we know the numbers in Lebanon.”
Weeks after the attack, the Bulgarian investigation has largely stalled. Officials there have yet to identify the attacker, also killed in the blast, or his suspected accomplices. They are hesitant to declare Hezbollah responsible without ironclad proof, given that the European Union has never designated the group a terrorist organization.
European allies expect more concrete evidence than the volume of calls before taking steps against Hezbollah. They maintain “some skepticism that it was Hezbollah as an organization itself, and not, for instance, Iran using individuals with some Hezbollah affiliation,” said a senior security official in Germany.
In India, local agencies told ministers a bomb attack which badly injured the wife of the Israeli military attaché in New Delhi in February was the work of an Iranian "security entity". Their conclusions have not previously been made public and Indian officials have made significant efforts to avoid blaming Tehran, an ally and oil supplier.
The governments of Georgia and Thailand, which both uncovered bomb plots on the day of the Delhi attack, have also not officially blamed Iran.
European intelligence officials told the Guardian they now found it difficult to judge Tehran's "risk calculus".
"Until recently it was possible to see why they were doing what they have been doing," one intelligence official said. "Now it has become very unpredictable. It's very hard to see the logic behind [the February bombings], other than perhaps demonstrate an ability to cause problems in the event of war or a desire for revenge of some kind."
You mean Iran might not be a rational actor that can be trusted not to use nuclear weapons if they have them. What a shock!
Police evidence, witness statements and court documents seen by the Guardian, plus interviews with local and international law enforcement and security officials, indicate that the attempted triple-bombing on 13 and 14 February was conducted by a well co-ordinated network of about a dozen Iranians and prepared over at least 10 months.
The evidence includes the identification of at least 10 Iranians allegedly involved in the plots, money transfers to key individuals from Iran, the use of Iranian phone connections and the flight following the attacks of conspirators to Iran.
"The question is not was this Iran-backed or Iran-organised but who in Iran was running all this," said one western security official.
The first elements of the plot were put in place in April 2011 when at least five Iranians who have been implicated in the attacks travelled to Thailand and India, apparently on reconnaissance missions, investigators say. Their journeys came around four months after a spike in tension between Iran, Israel and the west following the killing in Tehran of Majid Shahriari, a nuclear scientist, by a bomb stuck to his vehicle by a motorcyclist.
Houshang Afshar Irani has been identified by Indian police as the man who attached a magnetic charge to the car of the wife of the Israeli defence attaché in Delhi. Copies of his passport show he first visited the city in April 2011 for 10 days before returning on 29 January this year. At 11.30pm on 13 February, almost seven hours after reaching the Indian capital's main airport 75 minutes after the bomb attack, he flew to Malaysia and then on to Tehran via Dubai.
Analysis by Indian investigators of the type of explosive used in Delhi reveal it to be a variant of TNT. The shell of the bomb was manufactured outside India and magnetic strips used to attach the device to the car in Delhi were identical to those recovered in Bangkok and Tbilisi.
The attack in Bangkok involved at least five people, all Iranians. One, a 31-year-old woman identified as Leila Rohani, visited Thailand twice in 2012 and rented the house off the central Sukhumvit Road that was partly destroyed when 28-year-old Saeed Moradi, also Iranian, appears to have prematurely detonated a device. Moradi, who suffered serious injuries, was arrested. From Bangkok, Rohani travelled to Kuala Lumpur and then on to Tehran, investigators have found.
A second alleged conspirator was detained at the airport, also en route for Tehran. This man, Sedaghatzadeh Masoud, 31, is believed to be the overall co-ordinator of the international operation. Masoud is in custody in Malaysia, pending possible extradition to Thailand.
As in Delhi, a reconnaissance trip also appears to have been conducted in Thailand in April 2011. Members of the cell were pictured with bar girls in the sleazy resort of Pattaya days before the blast.
Read the whole thing. The world is not safe from Iran. Will anyone wake up in time to do something about it?
Russian Defense Ministry sources say that the Russian military doesn't believe that Israel has sufficient military assets to defeat Iranian defenses and further believes that U.S. military action will be necessary.
The implication of preparing to move Russian troops not only is to protect its own vital regional interests but possibly to assist Iran in the event of such an attack. Sources add that a Russian military buildup in the region could result in the Russian military potentially engaging Israeli forces, U.S. forces, or both.
Informed sources say that the Russians have warned of "unpredictable consequences" in the event Iran is attacked, with some Russians saying that the Russian military will take part in the possible war because it would threaten its vital interests in the region.
The influential Russian Nezavisimaya Gazeta newspaper has quoted a Russian military source as saying that the situation forming around Syria and Iran "causes Russia to expedite the course of improvement of its military groups in the South Caucasus, the Caspian, Mediterranean and Black Sea regions."
This latest information comes from a series of reports and leaks from official Russian spokesmen and government news agencies who say that an Israeli attack is all but certain by the summer.
Because of the impact on Russian vital interests in the region, sources say that Russian preparations for such an attack began two years ago when Russian Military Base 102 in Gyumri, Armenia, was modernized. It is said to occupy a major geopolitical position in the region.
Families of Russian servicemen from the Russian base at Gyumri in Armenia close to the borders of Georgia and Turkey already have been evacuated, Russian sources say.
"Military Base 102 is a key point, Russia's outpost in the South Caucasus," a Russian military source told the newspaper. "It occupies a very important geopolitical position, but the Kremlin fears lest it should lose this situation."
PUBLICATION: ask me first ATTRIBUTION: N/A SOURCE DESCRIPTION: MX301 - Former Mexican cop, Latam military analyst, writes for Jane's SOURCE RELIABILITY: A ITEM CREDIBILITY: 1 SUGGESTED DISTRIBUTION: SPECIAL HANDLING: n/a
...
Ok, here's the really juicy part: There is a private Mexican company called Idra that the government funded to make UAVs. They are actually pretty high standard according to him and beat out the Israeli UAVs in testing. My friend was consulting Idra at the time and so he was privy to a lot of deals that were on the table. This is the story --
The Mexican government is now paying some $25m (? can get the #s later) for UAVs from Israel. Idra is basically like WTF, but the reason is basically corruption. There is a deal b/w the Mexican interior ministry and the Israelis where they're getting a hefty kickback.
This is the interesting part, though.
Idra had an offer to sell UAVs to Georgia (this was happening during and after the war). The reason Georgia needed the UAVs is because the UAVs they had bought from Israel had been compromised by the Russians. The Russians got the data link for the UAV (there is some suspicion that the Israelis after the war may have given this to them. Remember all the intense mtgs b/w the Israelis and the Russians where the Russians got the Israelis to back off of defense deals to Georgia in return for Russia backing off Iran?). Anyway, the Georgians gave Idra a picture of one of their crashed UAVs. The source explained though that if the UAV were targeted, it would have been blown to pieces pretty much (it's like the size of a car basically). But the picture he saw showed the UAV intact. He inquired and basically what happened was that the Russians acquired the data link to hack into the system and force the UAV into the ground. I think they may have crashed another one too.
So, since the Georgian UAVs were compromised, they then tried to sell them to the Azerbaijanis. I dont know if that deal went through. Idra backed off the deal to Georgia because they were advised that it would raise a lot of political complications between Mexico and Russia.
...
PUBLICATION: No, but ask first ATTRIBUTION: N/A SOURCE DESCRIPTION: MX301 - Former Mexican cop, Latam military analyst, writes for Jane's SOURCE RELIABILITY: A ITEM CREDIBILITY: 1 SUGGESTED DISTRIBUTION: SPECIAL HANDLING: n/a
Met with my Mexican source/friend again today and dude is getting shadier by the day. We followed up on our past discussion on Russia compromising the Israeli-made Georgian UAVs prior to the August war.
Here is what else I learned
One of the source's friends/colleagues -- formerly military i think but now does private defense deals on the side (it's Mexico) contacted him in July (prior to the Georgia war). Apparently the Georgians had contacted this guy because they were frantically looking for a replacement for the Israeli UAVs that were compromised....
Here is the most interesting part:
I inquired more about the compromised Israeli UAVs. What he explained was that Israel and Russia made a swap -- Israel gave Russia the 'data link' code for those specific UAVs; in return, Russia gave Israel the codes for Iran's Tor-M1s.
I asked about the S-300 (source tracks a lot of defense deals for Jane's). He doesn't think the Russians will give it to the Iranians. Besides, he said... Israel and Turkey have been collaborating very closely on the S-300s. He explain how about 8 years ago when Russia sold S-300s to Greece to base in Crete (which were supposed to protect Cyprus), Russia delivered those with a carrier so that Turkey wouldn't try to sink them. (things got a bit noisy so i may have misheard some of this). The gist of what he said is that Turkey has been cracking the S-300 since the Crete sale and has been sharing intel on the S-300 with the Israelis to ensure that they retain an advantage over Iran should Iran get them from the Russians.
as far as the Georgian UAVs go, they were interested in the Mexican ones because the Mexican UAVs had something (forget the name. it was auto-something' that basically backs up teh UAV system in case someone hacks into it and immediately returns the UAV to base.
Hmmm.
By the way, that's a Tor M-1 at the top.
UPDATE 1:41 AM
I forgot to add that Israel Radio has been reporting all evening that Georgia's Foreign Minister was here for a one-day 'secret' mission on Tuesday. But if Stratfor was correct and Georgia knew its UAV's had been compomrised, one has to wonder why he was here now. It may have had nothing to do with this.
The journalist, Hamza Kashgari, had been detained by the Malaysian police since Thursday, when he was stopped at Kuala Lumpur International Airport at the request of the Saudi government. Mr. Kashgari, a newspaper columnist based in Jidda, had fled Saudi Arabia amid public outrage after he wrote about an imaginary meeting with the Prophet Muhammad in a series of posts on Twitter, according to news reports. ... The Saudi king has reportedly called for his arrest, and many in the religiously conservative country have accused him of blasphemy, a capital offense in Saudi Arabia. Muhammad Afiq Bin Mohamad Noor, the Malaysian lawyer hired by Mr. Kashgari’s family, said he obtained an interim court order from the Kuala Lumpur High Court on Sunday afternoon that would have prevented the authorities from deporting Mr. Kashgari. He only discovered later on Sunday, when he spoke to an immigration officer at the Kuala Lumpur airport, that Mr. Kashgari had already been deported on a private Saudi jet.
This incident - of a Saudi national who had escaped Saudi Arabia only to be extradited by a different Muslim nation - ought to raise questions as to why the United States is involved in the Istanbul Process, which would criminalize defamation of religion internationally. This question is even more serious, because it has been charged (and denied) that Interpol played a role in Kashgari's identification and capture.
Back in December, Nina Shea wrote about the problems with the Istanbul Process advocated by the OIC and apparently encouraged by the State Department. Among the problems was:
It offered a transnational venue for the OIC to reintroduce its anti-defamation push, just as the issue had been laid to rest at the United Nations. The administration erred in viewing resolution 16/18 as a meeting of minds between the OIC and America on freedoms of religion and speech. In Istanbul, Clinton asserted that the United States does not want to see speech restrictions — but her conference announcement immediately reignited OIC demands for the West to punish anti-Islamic speech. As the OIC reported it: “The upcoming [Washington] meetings . . . [will] help in enacting domestic laws for the countries involved in the issue, as well as formulating international laws preventing inciting hatred resulting from the continued defamation of religions.”
The end of this process would be an international regimen for prosecuting anyone who could be said to be defaming Islam. Think about the fatwa against Salman Rushdie with the force of international law behind it.
2) The bliss of ignorance
Roger Cohen has written an important column called the Dilemmas of Islamic Power:
Major American Islamic organizations, their agendas often supported by clueless liberal publications (like the increasingly unserious New York Times), have in general made uncritical defense of Islam — rather than constructive criticism — the cornerstone of their policies and viewed deviation from the ever-refreshed victimhood narrative as unacceptable dissent. A recent New York Times editorial called a film that was critical of extreme Islam, a "hateful film."
Yet, as Beinart chronicles, major American Jewish organizations, their agendas often swayed by a few wealthy donors (like the casino mogul Sheldon Adelson), have in general made uncritical defense of Israel — rather than constructive criticism — the cornerstone of their policies and viewed deviation from the ever-refreshed victimhood narrative as unacceptable dissent. He quotes Abraham Foxman, the director of the Anti-Defamation League: “Israeli democracy should decide; American Jews should support.”
Except that much criticism of Israel is not constructive, as Cohen, in his ignorance demonstrates in subsequent paragraphs.
Such prescriptions worked for an embattled little Israel and a generation of Holocaust survivors; they fall short today. “In their support for a halt to settlement growth and their comfort with public criticism of Israeli policy,” Beinart writes, “the mass of American Jews are to the left of the organizations that speak in their name, organizations that almost always oppose U.S. pressure on Israeli leaders and blame the Palestinians almost exclusively for the lack of Middle East peace.” Blaming Palestinians — for disunity, for grandstanding, for seeking not the 1967 lines but Israel’s disappearance — is easy enough, although increasingly an exercise in misrepresentation of the major Palestinian shifts under Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. The blame game would, however, be far more credible if the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had shown the least interest in peace; it has not. Subsidized West Bank settlement expansion continues, a claim in concrete to the land Netanyahu calls Judea and Samaria.
Granted, the mistakes in these quoted paragraphs would not be known to someone who only reads the New York Times for news on the Middle East, so maybe Cohen could be forgiven for his ignorance. However, since he has such a major platform, he ought to have done a bit more research.
The mass of American Jews are not "to the left" of organizations speaking in their name. If they were J-Street wouldn't have been reduced to a political footnote three years after its founding.
A few days after another agreement Fatah / Hamas agreement relegating Salam Fayyad to irrelevance it is amazing that Cohen appeals to "major shifts" under Fayyad. True, the Fatah / Hamas agreement may not actually come to fruition, but it is a sign of Fayyad's marginalization and reflects that he really had no political base in the first place. Even now Barry Rubin points out that Fatah's official new Facebook page denies Israel's right to exist and praises terrorists.
Beinart's thesis makes a lot of sense if one is ignorant about what is going on. But when the true story is known Beinart and Cohen are simply engaged in calumny against Israel and its supporters, especially Israel's Jewish supporters. It is they who embrace a hateful canard.
3) The attacks in India and Georgia
In Ha'aretz, Anshel Pfeffer suggests a reason why the Israeli embassies in India and Georgia were targeted (h/t Israel Matzav):
Hezbollah's and Iran's focus therefore has been centered on Israeli representations abroad. Attempts to attack targets in Azerbaijan, Bulgaria and most recently Thailand were nipped in the bud through close cooperation between Israeli intelligence and the local security services. A Hezbollah cell operating in Western Europe was also apprehended last year before it could launch an operation. Two years ago, a shooting at cars carrying Israeli diplomats in Jordan resulted in no casualties. There were multiple intelligence warnings of a pending attack - and the recent assassinations of nuclear scientists in Tehran and mysterious explosions at various Iranian installations only added impetus. The twin locations, India and Georgia, are countries where Israel has close relationships with the local political leaderships and especially with the defense establishments. They are also countries where the security forces are not in total control of wide regions and borders.
Jackson Diehl considers an aspect of India's relationship with Iran and concludes that the attack may be a sign of desperation:
According to news service reports, a man on a motorcycle stuck a bomb on the van of the wife of an Israeli military attache as she drove to pick up her children from school. Israeli reports said she was moderately injured by shrapnel, and several Indians in her van also suffered injuries. Remarkably, the attack took place within a few hundred meters of the offices of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who just last week was resisting pressure from the United States to cut back on Indian purchases of Iranian oil. As Europe had applied an embargo on oil purchases, and even China has cut back, India has recently become Iran’s largest customer. It has even reportedly worked out barter arrangements to pay for continuing oil deliveries so that its banks are not exposed to U.S. sanctions. Having suffered repeated major terrorist attacks by Islamic militants in recent years, India takes terrorism very seriously. It is unlikely to respond mildly if today’s attack can be traced to Iran or to Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia which serves as Iran’s proxy in countries around the world.
The silver lining on this unfortunate event is that it is a further proof of Hezbollah’s loss of the ability to carry out long-range terror attacks. While it has been generally assumed the Hezbollah is one of the most capable terrorist groups this morning was its first successful operation outside of Lebanon since 1996. Hezbollah has certainly had the motivation to carry out major terror attacks, particularly to avenge the assassination of its operations chief, the arch-terrorist Imad Mughniyeh. In the past I have argued that extensive international intelligence efforts against Hezbollah have taken a heavy toll, restricting their ability to carry out complex attacks abroad. While this morning’s attack was a tragedy it is a far cry from the devastating attacks Hezbollah launched in Argentina or against the Khobar Towers (or its initial attacks against the US Embassy and Marine Barracks in Lebanon.) Hezbollah has also assassinated its enemies, but the targets were carefully chosen – this morning’s attacks were more akin to targets of opportunity. It is of course possible that Hezbollah was merely holding its fire, that these were shots across the bow rather then full-fledged strikes. But the fact that a revenge attack for the Mughniyeh killing has only come four years does little to suggest that Hezbollah has maintained its once formidable international network. None of this is to suggest, that Hezbollah as been defanged. The efforts needed to keep Hezbollah international terror capabilities in check are essential - if they were not present the organization would probably be able to resume high-level attacks.
My favorite statement summing up the past year's complexities: The IDF has prepared humanitarian assistance for Syrian refugees in a buffer zone between Syrian- and Israeli-controlled territory, including thousands from the ruling Alawite sect, prompting Israel's chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, to muse: "I am not sure all the Alawites will run toward Israel," but many will do so.
Adnan Al-'Ar'our: Good people, this is shameful, by Allah. Good people, we don't want any weapons from you. All we want is for you to treat the wounded and open up your hospitals. Have your hearts become that cruel? Have you become such cowards? Open up your hospitals. Give us money to buy shrouds. […] Good people, there is an unwritten law with regard to treating the wounded. I think we should even appeal to Israel. Maybe that would be easier. Perhaps they would give us… If it is possible, we appeal to them to treat the wounded. Interviewer: But would the Syrian army allow the wounded safe passage through the Golan? Adnan Al-'Ar'our: Not, it would not.
Israel unlikely to respond to New Delhi and Tbilisi attacks
Haaretz reports that although there is ample evidence that Iran was behind the two attacks on Israel's embassies in New Delhi and Tbilisi on Monday, Israel is unlikely to respond.
The bombings sparked the usual tough rhetoric from Israeli officials: Lieberman said Israel "would not overlook" the attacks, while Netanyahu vowed to "continue to act forcefully, systematically and patiently" against Iranian terror. Nevertheless, a harsh Israeli response is seen as unlikely.
One reason for this is that if, as is widely believed, Israel is behind a recent series of assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists in Tehran, government officials presumably knew that Iranian revenge attacks were likely and took that possibility into account. Though an innocent diplomat's wife cannot be compared to a scientist directly involved in Iran's nuclear program, Monday's attacks were still limited enough that they didn't violate the "rules of the game." Indeed, the modus operandi of the New Delhi bombing exactly mimicked that used to kill several of the Iranian scientists. Hence a direct Israeli military strike on either Hezbollah or Iran seems unlikely.
Moreover, while Iran and Hezbollah have been trying to take revenge for Mughniyeh's assassination ever since it occurred on February 12, 2008, Yehoshua Koren is the first casualty in a long line of failed attacks. The previous attacks, which according to foreign news sources, have been thwarted by close cooperation between Israeli intelligence and local security services, included attempts to bomb the Israeli embassy in Azerbaijan, to assassinate an Israeli consul in Turkey, and, most recently, to bomb popular tourist sites frequented by Israelis in Thailand.
Monday's targets - two embassy cars, neither of which was on embassy grounds at the time - were both at relatively low-level targets, located at the outer perimeter of the security envelope Israel provides its overseas embassies and consulates. This may indicate that Hezbollah and Iran are having trouble reaching more "prestigious" targets.
Moreover, while both attacks attest to careful observation and planning and precise execution, the results were meager enough that neither Tehran nor Beirut is likely to be rejoicing.
...
Nevertheless, two caveats are in order. First, these attacks may not be the last, but rather the first in a series. Second, it could be that the planners were capable of wreaking greater harm, but deliberately chose to cause only modest damage. Israel has repeatedly warned that a mass-casualty Hezbollah attack on Israeli targets overseas would spark a massive Israeli assault on Lebanon, and that is something Iran doesn't seem to want right now.
The attacks also shed new light on the surprising comments made last week by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in a speech in Beirut: that Hezbollah doesn't take orders from Iran. It could be that Nasrallah already knew of the plans for Monday's attacks and was trying to portray them as independent Hezbollah initiatives.
Hezbollah's interest in distancing itself from Iran - at least verbally - stems in part from the organization's difficult domestic situation: Tuesday is the seventh anniversary of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri's assassination, and despite Nasrallah's repeated denials, many Lebanese, along with much of the international community, think Hezbollah was behind that killing. Just on Monday, Prime Minister Najib Mikati - who owes his appointment to Hezbollah - personally announced that the international tribunal investigating Hariri's murder plans to indict new suspects, alongside the four Hezbollah operatives already charged; he said the tribunal's chief prosecutor, Daniel Bellemare, had informed him of this during a recent visit to Beirut.
Adding to Hezbollah's domestic woes is the fact that one of its key allies, the Assad regime in Syria, may not survive. The Syrian opposition no longer bothers to hide its loathing for Hezbollah and Iran, so a new Syrian government would likely be bad news for the Lebanese organization.
Obama may end up isolating Iran and Hezbullah despite himself. Heh.
Why were the attacks on Monday carried out in India and Georgia? Here's an attempt at an explanation.
Hezbollah's and Iran's focus therefore has been centered on Israeli representations abroad. Attempts to attack targets in Azerbaijan, Bulgaria and most recently Thailand were nipped in the bud through close cooperation between Israeli intelligence and the local security services. A Hezbollah cell operating in Western Europe was also apprehended last year before it could launch an operation. Two years ago, a shooting at cars carrying Israeli diplomats in Jordan resulted in no casualties.
There were multiple intelligence warnings of a pending attack - and the recent assassinations of nuclear scientists in Tehran and mysterious explosions at various Iranian installations only added impetus. The twin locations, India and Georgia, are countries where Israel has close relationships with the local political leaderships and especially with the defense establishments. They are also countries where the security forces are not in total control of wide regions and borders.
There are actually four countries surrounding Iran where Israel has attempted to improve ties recently: India, Georgia, Azerbaijan (where, as noted above, an attack failed, and which was accused by Iran last week of helping Israeli intelligence efforts) and Kazakhstan. So why hasn't Iran tried attacking Kazakhstan? Here's a clue:
Kazakhstan is close to opening a nuclear fuel bank that would allow countries a safe, reliable means of getting fuel for their nuclear power plants, and would theoretically make it more difficult for would-be rogue nuclear states to secretly build weapons.
...
What makes Kazakhstan a logical place to host such a bank, in addition to its status of the world's leading uranium producer, is its multi-vectored foreign policy. This is obviously a politicized issue, and countries would be reluctant to buy in if they thought that they could be cut off for political reasons. But Kazakhstan can make a credible case that it is a pretty neutral broker in the world.
...
Good relations with Iran would seem exactly the reason Kazakhstan is a good place for this, although that situation increasingly looks too far gone for this bank to make any difference.
Iran may be warning the other three countries against cooperating with an Israeli strike on it. It may not want to, or may not feel it has to, give such a warning to Kazakhstan. In any event, the choice of Georgia and India does not seem accidental.
Iran rejects as "sheer lies" accusations that it was involved in a bomb attack on the Israeli embassy in India, the official IRNA news agency quoted the Islamic Republic's ambassador to New Delhi as saying on Monday, after Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu implicated Tehran and its ally Hezbollah in the attacks.
"Any terrorist attack is condemned (by Iran) and we strongly reject the untrue comments by an Israeli official," Mehdi Nabizadeh was quoted as saying by IRNA. "These accusations are untrue and sheer lies, like previous times."
In a strike virtually identical to attacks on Iranian nuclear scientists, U.S. sources say a passing motorcyclist attached a shaped charge to an Israeli diplomatic vehicle in New Delhi, India. The driver and the wife of Israel's deputy defense ministry representative to India were wounded.
Television footage showed flames pouring from a minivan with its back door blown out. The attack took place at 4 p.m. on Race Track Road, close to the Israeli Embassy.
A single source confirms that a failed attack against an Israeli car in Tblisi, Georgia used a similar method, but the bomb did not detonate. A worker at the embassy alerted local police after seeing a black plastic bag attached to the bottom of the Israeli envoy's car. The bag held a hand grenade.
No attackers have been identified in either incident. An unconfirmed report says that a third Israeli facility in Amsterdam may also have been targeted.
Speaking in Moscow a day after talks with Assad on Tuesday, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stressed the Syrian president’s willingness to engage in a national dialogue, even though an overwhelming majority of members of the opposition, both inside and outside the country, have said that dialogue is no longer an option. ... Lavrov also said Wednesday that the abrupt departures from Syria in recent days of the U.S., French, British and Persian Gulf country ambassadors — some temporarily and others permanently — were irrational and did not “contribute to the implementation of the Arab League plan to resolve the crisis,” Syrian state media reported.
According to Le Figaro on Tuesday, Russian military “advisors” are “omnipresent” in Syria. Besides reportedly sending S-300 anti-air missile systems to Damascus and agreeing to deliver a new batch of military aircraft, the Russians this week celebrated the reopening of a Cold War-era intelligence listening post on Mount Qassioun, the summit that dominates Damascus from the northwest. The Russians appear increasingly dug in. Russian advisors are also laboring to reorganize the Baath Party and arrange talks with members of the Syrian resistance. They are making their own contacts with Arab and Islamic organizations, seeking to dilute the solidarity of the West with Arab leaders on the Syrian problem. In a phone discussion with Nicolas Sarkozy this week, Dmitry Medvedev warned France not to use a coalition of the willing to take unilateral action in Syria. France – not the United States – was the Perm-5 nation that inaugurated the “friends of the Syrian people” effort immediately after the Russian and Chinese vetoes in the UN on 4 February. (Tunisia has reportedly agreed to host the first gathering of this coalition.)
The Optimistic Conservative looks at to what Russia's aims are:
It is not certain how these questions would be answered, and that’s where Russia’s dilemma lies. I do not by any means assess that Russia is ready to launch a campaign today. But I do assess that the West has not taken seriously Russia’s fundamental objection to seeing Syria regime-changed by an Arab coalition whose principal outside patron is not Russia. The problem for Russia is not so much that Assad has to be replaced as that the Western powers propose to do it in conjunction with the Arab League, an arrangement that diminishes Russia’s influence on the process while opening a door for state-Islamist radicals. If Syria is to be given a new regime through an Arab partnership, Russia wants to be in the lead. The strategic issue for Russia here is not merely the narrow concern about having a base in the Med. It is the approach, ever closer to Russia, of a Western-backed “tectonic shift” – Medvedev’s expression for the Arab Spring – that keeps opening political doors to the Muslim Brotherhood. If common cause is going to be made with the Muslim Brotherhood, Russia will do it, selectively, and for her own purposes. She will resist having Muslim Brotherhood-led or -influenced regimes inflicted on her near abroad by the West.
In the absence of a strong western response, we have seen Iran, Turkey and now Russia attempt to leverage the situation in Syria to their own advantage.
According to the state news agency SANA, Brig. Gen. Issa al-Kholi was fatally shot by three gunmen waiting outside his home in the Rukn Eddin neighborhood, which had in the past been one of the few places in the capital to witness large-scale anti-government protests until they were suppressed there last fall. Kholi is not the first senior military official to be assassinated in recent months, as the protest movement has rapidly evolved in many parts of the country into an armed, if disorganized, insurgency. But the brazen attack in the center of the normally calm capital, coming a day after twin suicide bombings in the commercial center of Aleppo, heightened the building sense of vulnerability in the two major cities that have remained largely immune to the violence raging elsewhere.
Michael Young suspects that the reports of Al Qaeda mentioned later in the article are overblown.
Regional news reports have said Hamas has resisted pressure from Iran, its principal backer, to express support for President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, in his efforts to suppress the uprising there. The Hamas leadership outside Gaza recently left its base in Damascus because of the turmoil. But analysts said the Iranian welcome for Mr. Haniya indicated that relations between Hamas and Iran remained positive.
Part of the story isn't told here. Khaled Meshal is not mentioned at all. There appears to be some sort of a split between Meshal and Haniyeh - possibly over how close each wants to be with Iran. (Meshal seems to prefer the patronage of Sunni Islamists. This move has been interpreted by some as moderation on Meshal's part.) In addition to a sign of friendship, this could be an effort of Iran to re-assert its control over Hamas.
Late in the article we read:
The visit was likely to antagonize the Israeli government, which believes that Hamas and Iran want to destroy it.
Israel "believes" that? Iran and Hamas state that's their goal.
Iran's supreme leader Ali Khamenei on Sunday warned the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas against any "compromise" in its fight against Tehran's nemesis Israel, his official website reported. "Always be wary of infiltration by the compromisers in a resistance organization, which will gradually weaken it," Khamenei told the visiting Hamas Gaza prime minister Ismail Haniya, according to the leader.ir website. "We have no doubt about your resistance and that of many of your brothers, and the people only have this expectation of you," said Khamenei, reaffirming that Iran "will always be alongside the Palestinian resistance."
Somehow Khameinei's statement did not make it to the New York Times.
3) The media A few unrelated items: a) Israel Matzav links to an article that foreign media outlets are buying space on rooftops in Tel Aviv, in anticipation of an Iranian counterattack against Israel. I'm not convinced that anything is close to happening - many of the sources who claim that an attack is near seem to be highly speculative - but I don't live in Israel. However, Israel Matzav, who does, observes:
Suffice it to say that over the last week or two, it's beginning to feel more and more like war is on the horizon.
b) A recent report to make the rounds on the internet accused CNN of firing its Jewish employees. Honest Reporting believes there's less to this report than meets the eye.
A day after the fourth anniversary of the untimely death of Imad Mughniyah - Shem Reshaim Yirkav (may the names of the wicked be obliterated) - two simultaneous bombs were planted outside the Israeli embassies in New Delhi, India and Tbilisi, Georgia. The good news is that the bomb in Tbilisi was neutralized and no one was hurt. In New Delhi, two people were injured, one of them the wife of an Israeli diplomat.
A day after the fourth anniversary of the assassination of Hezbollah’s military commander, two seemingly coordinated attacks were launched on Monday against Israeli embassies overseas.
In the first attack, the wife of an Israeli diplomat was injured when a bomb exploded in her car in New Delhi, India. The woman succeeded in driving to the Israeli embassy where she was evacuated to a nearby hospital.
Local authorities were investigating the possibility that the bomb was planted under the car or alternatively that an assassin on a motorbike attached it to the vehicle as it was driving.
In the second attack, an embassy staffer in Tbilisi, Georgia discovered a bomb underneath his car as he was driving to the embassy Monday morning. The staffer – a local Georgian national – heard something during the drive, pulled over to the side of the road, noticed the bomb and called local authorities. The bomb was dismantled before exploding.
This is from Indian television. Let's go to the videotape.
Israeli Embassy Spokesman David Goldfarb confirmed that an explosion took out a diplomat's car and that one person was injured, but did not identify the victim.
Foreign Ministry Spokesman Yigal Palmor also would not discuss the identity of the nor the extent of the injuries because it was a security matter.
"We are looking into the incident and cooperation with local security forces is excellent," Palmor said.
Indian police said only that a car was on fire on the street outside the embassy. New Delhi media reported that two people were wounded. Television footage showed a charred minivan with blue diplomatic plates, its rear door apparently blown out.
The Foreign Ministry said that Israeli missions worldwide have been briefed on the event.
...
Israeli Ambassador to Georgia Yitzhak Gerber told Ynet that "We don't have all the details yet. The local authorities are looking into it, but so far it doesn’t look too dramatic.
"From what we know now, there was an attempt to place an explosive device on a car belonging to one of our local employees. He noticed it while he was on his way to us, and alerted the authorities. The device was defused."
Gerber added that "these kinds of things are part of the job. It's very unpleasant, but it's always in the back of our mind. Considering that yesterday was the day we bid farewell to Imad Mugniyah this was to be expected."
Thank God it sounds like everyone is going to be alright.
UPDATE 5:01 PM
Israel Radio reports that the wife of the Ministry of Defense's attache in New Delhi was lightly to moderately wounded, and that an embassy driver and two locals were also wounded.
The bomb was attached to the car.
The Prime Minister is blaming Iran and Hezbullah - more on that later.
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
