Israel Matzav

Moment of truth is near?

Israel's Channel 10 cable news ran a report on Sunday evening that shows preparations for war with Iran. It gives the impression that the day on which Israel will attack Iran's nuclear weapons facilities is near (so much for the P-5+1). I'd like to show you the report (which is in Hebrew) and I will follow it up with an English summary from another web site.

Let's go to the videotape.



And here's the summary I promised you (Hat Tip: Dan F).

The report, screened on the main evening news of Channel 10, was remarkable both in terms of the access granted to the reporter, who said he had spent weeks with the pilots and other personnel he interviewed, and in the fact that his assessments on a strike were cleared by the military censor.

No order to strike is likely to be given before the P5+1 talks with Iran resume in May, the reporter, Alon Ben-David, said. “But the coming summer will not only be hot but tense.”

In the event that negotiations fail and the order is given for Israel to carry out an attack on Iranian nuclear facilities, “dozens if not more planes” will take part in the mission: attack and escort jets, tankers for mid-air refueling, electronic warfare planes and rescue helicopters, the report said.

Ben-David said the Israel Air Force “does not have the capacity to destroy the entire Iranian program.” There will be no replication of the decisive strikes on Iraq’s Osirak reactor in 1981 or on Syria in 2007, he said. “The result won’t be definitive.” But, a pilot quoted in the report said, the IAF will have to ensure that it emerges with the necessary result, with “a short and professional” assault.

Ben-David said that if negotiations break down, and Iran moves key parts of its nuclear program underground to its Qom facility, the IAF “is likely to get the order and to set out on the long journey to Iran.”

“Years of preparations are likely to come to realization,” he said, adding that “the moment of truth is near.”

Ben-David interviewed several squadron leaders, pilots and other officers. He noted that some of the IAF personnel, “it is likely, will not return from the mission.” An officer named Gilad said it would be “naive” to think there would be no losses.

Read the whole thing.

It sounds like the IDF is trying to condition the public to be ready for an attack.

For those who read Hebrew, Channel 10's summary is here.

Labels: Iranian nuclear threat, Israeli attack on Iran, P 5+1

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 4:44 AM