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Syria's President Bashar Assad: Why is this man not smiling?
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| By Israel Insider staff April 7, 2008 |
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Officials in Syria, Lebanon and Iran have expressed concern that the Israeli civil defense mega-drill "Turning Point 2" is either a pretext for hostile offensive action or a preparation for it.
"The states of the region must closely watch the Israeli drill. These provocative actions should be brought to the attention of the relevant officials in the international community," an Iranian official said Monday. A spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry suspected the worst: "These actions are aimed at boosting the morale of the Israeli commanders and their soldiers."
The Iranians in their wisdom apparently believe Israelis enjoy imagining their nation under massive unconventional missile attack. Hosseini also claimed that the drill was a direct result of US Vice President Dick Cheney's recent visit to the Mideast. "Unfortunately, after every visit of senior American officials in the region and the occupied territories we witness similar actions by the Zionist regime."
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In a future war it will be much safer to live in Nahariya or Shlomi than in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv because I foresee that during the opening blow hundreds of missiles will rain on Israel.
Infrastructure Minister Benyamin Ben-Eliezer
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The IDF has been trying to alleviate concerns regarding the exercise among its neighbors. Lebanese daily As-Safir on Saturday quoted diplomatic sources in New York as saying that Israel has asked UNIFIL to inform the Lebanese government that the military exercise will not threaten Lebanon or Hizbullah and that "it will not include the border region".
But Deputy Hizbullah leader Sheikh Naim Kassem said Sunday that the Israeli exercise was intended to prepare for a new war with Lebanon and warned that Hizbullah was fully prepared to defend Lebanon if Israel attacked again. Kassem said the Israeli drills were also intended "to raise the collapsing morale of the people inside Israel following the defeat in the 2006 war."
"I want to emphasize that this is only a drill, with nothing hiding behind it," Olmert told the cabinet. "All the reports about heightened tension in the North are exaggerated. .The State of Israel is not intent on any violent confrontation in the North. We have no secret plans. This drill is not part of anything else. It seems to me that the Syrians know this as well and they have no reason to analyze this drill differently. On the contrary, we have said more than once that we have an interest in holding peace negotiations with Syria."
But sources close to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert confirmed a Channel 2 report Sunday that one of the reasons for the tension with Syria was a message Israel sent Damascus warning that Bashar Assad's regime would be held responsible if Jews around the world were harmed in retaliation for the killing of Hizbullah arch-terrorist Imad Mugniyeh.
Israel has not claimed credit for the killing, but did not exactly deny it. Syria and Hizbullah hold Israel responsible for his death, and Hizbullah chief Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah has vowed to take revenge against Jews abroad. Syria drafted reserve soldiers last week as tensions escalated.
Defense Minister Ehud Barak called off a trip to Germany scheduled for a week. While some aides tried to say that technical reasons were the cause for the cancellation, it was widely reported here that the rising tensions and the reported mobilizations and movements in neighboring countries caused him to postpone the visit.
In a move likely that will not exactly please the Syrians, Olmert approved an American request to allow congressional hearings to reveal details of the strike on an alleged Syrian nuclear installation. Foreign sources have attributed the attack to Israel, and here too Israel has not issued a denial. Officials in the Bush administration asked Israel to reveal the information so that it could be used against North Korea, believed to be involved in the provision of materials and expertise. Olmert agreed to the request despite opposition from Israeli intelligence officials.
Olmert advisers Yoram Turbowitz and Shalom Turgeman went to Washington last week to speak about the issue with US National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley and other top American officials, Channel Two reported.
Another minister seemed less concerned about Muslim reactions, and used the occasion of the drill to send a message of deterrence in their direction.
"An Iranian attack will prompt a severe reaction from Israel, which will destroy the Iranian nation," National Infrastructure Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer (Labor) said on Monday. Teheran, he added, "is definitely aware of our strength. Even so, they are teasing us with their alliances with Syria and Hizbullah, and supplying them with many weapons, and we have to deal with that."
Speaking during a visit to the war room established as part of the emergency drill "Turning Point 2," he said that "the exercise that Israeli is simulating at the moment is not a false display or a fictional scenario."
According to the minister, "the reality in the future is likely to be many times more severe than that with which we are familiar. We are facing a reality in which the home front will become the battlefield."
"In a future war," Ben-Eliezer continued, "it will be much safer to live in Nahariya or Shlomi than in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv because I foresee that during the opening blow hundreds of missiles will rain on Israel. No place in the country will be outside the range of Syria and Hizbullah's missiles and rockets."
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