Israel
Attacks Syria
And finally
warmonger Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tests the patience of his
key rival Syria and its allies Iran and Hezbollah by attacking a caravan in
Syria.
Israel is not likely to accept this, which is usual as it never admitted
the 2007 air strike on a Syrian nuclear site despite US authorities confirming it.
According to
a Reuters report Israeli jets bombed a convoy near Syria's
border with Lebanon early on Wednesday apparently targeting weapons destined
for Hezbollah. This is being termed a warning to Damascus not to arm Israel's
Lebanese enemy.
Syrian state
television accused Israel of bombing a military research centre, at Jamraya and
even Syrian rebels disputed Israeli claim saying their forces had attacked the
site. But Israel insisted on that the truck was carrying sophisticated weapons
to Hezbollah.
According to
Western diplomats the target was a truck loaded with weapons, heading from
Syria to Lebanon and may have included anti-aircraft missiles or long-range
rockets.
The
overnight raid followed warnings from Israel that it was ready to act to
prevent the revolt against President Bashar al-Assad leading to Syria's chemical
weapons and modern rockets reaching either his Hezbollah allies or his Islamist
enemies.
Syrian
sources said these criminal acts would not weaken Syria's support for
Palestinians and other groups engaged in resistance to Israel. Apparently the episode
boils down to a warning by Israel to Syria and Hezbollah not to engage in the
transfer of sensitive weapons.
Experts say Assad
knows his survival depends on his military capabilities and he would not want
those capabilities neutralized by Israel - so the message is this kind of
transfer is simply not worth it, neither for him nor Hezbollah.
Such a
strike or strikes would fit Israel's policy of preemptive covert and overt
action to curb Hezbollah and does not necessarily indicate a major escalation
of the war in Syria.
It is on
record that Israel has recently raised its concerns about Syrian chemical
weapons, but its officials say a more immediate worry is that the civil war
could see weapons that are capable of denting its massive superiority in air power and tanks reaching Hezbollah; the group fought Israel in 2006 and
remains a more pressing threat than its Syrian and Iranian sponsors.
Israel’s
problem is even bigger because rebel groups of Syria are hostile to Jewish
state because of its atrocities An attack inside Syria could be
diplomatically provocative, especially because Iran views any strike on Syria as
an attack on itself.
Israeli apprehends
that Syria's advanced conventional weapons, much of it Russian-built hardware has
the capacity to destroy Israeli planes and tanks.
Hezbollah
fighters and the Syrian army have close relations. While Damascus may have been
reluctant to hand over key parts of its own arsenal to its Lebanese allies,
some analysts suggest that if Syrian or Hezbollah commanders fear hardware is
about to fall into rebel hands they might try to move it across the border -
possibly even without formal government approval.
During the
2006 war in Lebanon, Israel's air forced faced little threat, though its navy
was taken aback when a missile hit a ship. Israeli tanks suffered losses to
rockets, and commanders are concerned Hezbollah may get better weaponry.
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