According to 'Pentagon sources' cited by Jeffrey Goldberg, it was Israel's Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, and not the United States, that asked for the postponement of Operation Austere Challenge 12, the joint anti-missile exercise that was to have taken place in Israel in April (Hat Tip: Memeorandum).
Despite claims made in the Israeli press that the Obama Administration, worried about provoking Iran, initiated a postponement of a massive joint Israeli-U.S. missile defense exercise scheduled to begin later this month, Pentagon officials say it was the Israeli defense minister, Ehud Barak, who asked his counterpart, Leon Panetta, for the postponement. The claim that the exercise, dubbed "Austere Challenge 12," was scrubbed from the calendar because the Obama Administration feared provoking the Iranian regime is "baseless," one senior Pentagon official told me just a few minutes ago, in a telephone call initiated by a group of senior defense officials.
One of the senior defense officials told me this: "Minister Barak called Secretary Panetta and asked if we could take the exercise off the calendar. The Israelis were concerned that they did not have the resources in place to carry it out effectively." The exercise, which was to begin with a live-fire drill, would have involved several thousand Israelis as well as several thousand American military personnel, and Barak told Panetta, according to these officials, that Israel could not pull together the resources necessary to stage the exercise successfully. "Our military is much bigger than theirs and this exercise was going to consume a much larger portion of their resources," the official said.
Panetta, according to these Pentagon sources, was concerned that the Iranians would interpret the scrubbing of the exercise, well, the way it's currently being interpreted, as a sign of American wavering in the face of Iranian threats. He told Barak that he would not agree to a cancellation, as Barak was suggesting, but only a postponement. "Panetta's initial reaction was, 'I don't want to take this off the calendar.' He said it would send the wrong signal." After multiple conversations, Panetta and Barak agreed to postpone Austere Challenge 12 until fall.
As of now, there has been no comment from Israel.
Frankly, I find this one hard to believe even if live Pentagon sources told this to Goldberg. It makes no sense to me that Israel would try to cancel the drill.
Turkey and Egypt are conducting a massive naval exercise in the Mediterranean and you can guess who the target it.
Let's go to the videotape.
Here's more:
The forces simulated a frontal clash between naval forces, exercised methods of defense in high seas, facing hostile vessels and firing live ammunition at aircraft.
The published images showed the naval commando units and submariners of both countries exercising together.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan discussed the importance of his country's navy several months ago. Erdogan, who visited Egypt in September, was asked if Turkey's plan to send warships to escort Turkish vessels headed to Gaza could lead to a military clash.
He responded negatively, but added: "The Turkish navy is prepared to face every possibility, even the worst ones."
The bodies of the pilot and navigator from an F-16I that was reported missing during the night on Wednesday were found on Thursday in the Ramon crater. Their plane had crashed and both were killed.
The remains of IAF pilot Maj. Amihai Itkis, 28, and navigator Maj. Emmanuel Levi, 30, whose F16I jet crashed at the Ramon Crater on Wednesday night, were found on Thursday afternoon. IAF commander Major General Ido Nehushtan notified the pilot and navigator's families of their loss.
Nehushtan arrived earlier to the scene of the crash so that he could oversee the search for the missing bodies. Army rabbis also arrived to help with the searches of the two servicemen who were feared dead.
The IAF found the black box of the jet just a few hours after the discovery of the remains, IAF Brig.-Gen Nimrod Shefer said.
The Air Force expressed hope that the black box will help them understand what occurred in the final minutes before the crash.
The black box will be sent to the plane's manufacturer Lockheed-Martin in the US, where it will be examined to determine the exact cause of the crash. IAF assessments suggested that the jet crash was likely caused by human error rather than a technical fault.
The jet was the leader of four planes that was on a training exercise and sank from an altitude of 11,000 feet to a much lower altitude. IAF investigators suspect that the pilot did not realize how low he had flown because no distress call was received.
The IAF launched extensive searches near the crash site in hope of finding survivors but several hours after the crash it appeared that the pilot and navigator did not succeed in ejecting from the plane.
Nehushtan was expected to order the establishment of an expert panel to investigate the crash.
May their memory be blessed. May their families be comforted among all mourners for Zion and Jerusalem and may they know of no more sorrow.
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
According to 'Pentagon sources' cited by Jeffrey Goldberg, it was Israel's Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, and not the United States, that asked for the postponement of Operation Austere Challenge 12, the joint anti-missile exercise that was to have taken place in Israel in April (Hat Tip: Memeorandum). 
