Publication: ViewPoint
Was Israeli raid a dry run for attack on Iran? by Peter Beaumont | |
Subscribe FREE to ViewPoint by clicking here.
VIEWPOINT
"Exploring The Powerful Issues & Emotions of The Middle East"
Reaching out to 51,228 Viewpoint readers around the globe
-----------------------------------------------------------
Editor's Note:
Mystery surrounds last week's air foray into Syrian
territory. The Observer's Foreign Affairs Editor
attempts to unravel the truth behind Operation
Orchard and allegations of nuclear subterfuge.
-----------------------------------------------------------
PET BLINKERS... The Pet Safety Light
Protect Yourself & Your Pet!
Store Price: $7.99
DEAL PRICE: $2.99
Pet Blinkers give you the added security and peace of mind
knowing you and your pet(s) are visible at night. Whether
you’re going for a jog with your pet or if you just want
extra attention, attach the Pet Blinker to your pet's
collar and be seen a half-mile away. These eye-catching
LEDs accessorize any pet. Requires three AG3 lithium cell
batteries (included). PET BLINKERS... The Pet Safety Light
-----------------------------------------------------------
Video Clip Of The Week
Andrew Meyer Tazered For Asking Kerry About Skull & Bones
This student was tazed for asking John Kerry about the
Skull & Bones but the commentator says he was asking
annoying questions. What message does this send to our
college students?
View:
Andrew Meyer Tazered For Asking Kerry About Skull & Bones
-----------------------------------------------------------
Was Israeli raid a dry run for attack on Iran? -
by Peter Beaumont
The head of Israel's airforce, Major-General Eliezer
Shkedi, was visiting a base in the coastal city of
Herziliya last week. For the 50-year-old general, also
the head of Israel's Iran Command, which would fight a
war with Tehran if ordered, it was a morale-boosting
affair, a meet-and-greet with pilots and navigators who
had flown during last summer's month-long war against
Lebanon. The journalists who had turned out in large
numbers were there for another reason: to question Shkedi
about a mysterious air raid that happened this month,
codenamed 'Orchard', carried out deep in Syrian territory
by his pilots.
Shkedi ignored all questions. It set a pattern for the
days to follow as he and Israel's politicians and officials
maintained a steely silence, even when the questions came
from the visiting French Foreign Minister, Bernard Kouchner.
Those journalists who thought of reporting the story were
discouraged by the threat of Israel's military censor.
But the rumours were in circulation, not just in Israel
but in Washington and elsewhere. In the days that follow-
ed, the sketchy details of the raid were accompanied by
contradictory claims even as US and British officials
admitted knowledge of the raid. The New York Times
described the target of the raid as a nuclear site being
run in collaboration with North Korean technicians. Others
reported that the jets had hit either a Hizbollah convoy,
a missile facility or a terrorist camp.
Amid the confusion there were troubling details that chimed
uncomfortably with the known facts. Two detachable tanks
from an Israeli fighter were found just over the Turkish
border. According to Turkish military sources, they
belonged to a Raam F15I - the newest generation of Israeli
long-range bomber, which has a combat range of over 2,000km
when equipped with the drop tanks. This would enable them
to reach targets in Iran, leading to speculation that it
was an 'operation rehearsal' for a raid on Tehran's nuclear
facilities.
Finally, however, at the week's end, the first few tangible
details were beginning to emerge about Operation Orchard
from a source involved in the Israeli operation.
They were sketchy, but one thing was absolutely clear. Far
from being a minor incursion, the Israeli overflight of
Syrian airspace through its ally, Turkey, was a far more
major affair involving as many as eight aircraft, including
Israel's most ultra-modern F-15s and F-16s equipped with
Maverick missiles and 500lb bombs. Flying among the Israeli
fighters at great height, The Observer can reveal, was an
ELINT - an electronic intelligence gathering aircraft.
What was becoming clear by this weekend amid much
scepticism, largely from sources connected with the
administration of President George Bush, was the nature
of the allegation, if not the facts.
In a series of piecemeal leaks from US officials that gave
the impression of being co-ordinated, a narrative was laid
out that combined nuclear skulduggery and the surviving
members of the 'axis of evil': Iran, North Korea and Syria.
It also combined a series of neoconservative foreign policy
concerns: that North Korea was not being properly monitored
in the deal struck for its nuclear disarmament and was off-
loading its material to Iran and Syria, both of which in
turn were helping to rearm Hizbollah.
Underlying all the accusations was a suggestion that
recalled the bogus intelligence claims that led to the war
against Iraq: that the three countries might be collaborat-
ing to supply an unconventional weapon to Hizbollah.
It is not only the raid that is odd but also, ironically,
the deliberate air of mystery surrounding it, given
Israel's past history of bragging about similar raids,
including an attack on an Iraqi reactor. It was a secrecy
so tight, in fact, that even as the Israeli aircrew climbed
into the cockpits of their planes they were not told the
nature of the target they were being ordered to attack.
According to an intelligence expert quoted in the
Washington Post who spoke to aircrew involved in the raid,
the target of the attack, revealed only to the pilots while
they were in the air, was a northern Syrian facility that
was labelled as an agricultural research centre on the
Euphrates river, close to the Turkish border.
According to this version of events, a North Korean ship,
officially carrying a cargo of cement, docked three days
before the raid in the Syrian port of Tartus. That ship
was also alleged to be carrying nuclear equipment.
It is an angle that has been pushed hardest by the neo-
conservative hawk and former US ambassador to the United
Nations, John Bolton. But others have entered the fray,
among them the US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice,
who, without mentioning Syria by name, suggested to Fox
television that the raid was linked to stopping un-
conventional weapons proliferation.
-----------------------------------------------------------
HOME SECURITY DOOR ALARM
Store Price: $19.99
DEAL PRICE: $9.99 or get two for $15.98
When you see this you'll wonder... how the heck does this
work? It's a door alarm that ANYONE can install... without
any special wiring, on any non-metallic door.
This handy device will sound an instant ear piercing alarm
if anyone touches your door knob. The 2-in-1 Alarm is great
protection against unwanted visitors.
Best of all, besides the price, is No Wiring Needed!
And if you're like me and wonder how it does work, visit
the site and click on the link to watch the short video.
Grab one or save even more and get two.
Visit: 2 in 1 Home Security Door Alarm
-----------------------------------------------------------
Most explicit of all was Andrew Semmel, acting deputy
assistant Secretary of State for nuclear non-proliferation
policy, who, speaking in Rome yesterday, insisted that
'North Koreans were in Syria' and that Damascus may have
had contacts with 'secret suppliers' to obtain nuclear
equipment.
'There are indicators that they do have something going on
there,' he said. 'We do know that there are a number of
foreign technicians that have been in Syria. We do know
that there may have been contact between Syria and some
secret suppliers for nuclear equipment. Whether anything
transpired remains to be seen.
'So good foreign policy, good national security policy,
would suggest that we pay very close attention to that,'
he said. 'We're watching very closely. Obviously, the
Israelis were watching very closely.'
But despite the heavy inference, no official so far has
offered an outright accusation. Instead they have hedged
their claims in ifs and buts, assiduously avoiding the
term 'weapons of mass destruction'.
There has also been deep scepticism about the claims from
other officials and former officials familiar with both
Syria and North Korea. They have pointed out that an almost
bankrupt Syria has neither the economic nor the industrial
base to support the kind of nuclear programme described,
adding that Syria has long rejected going down the nuclear
route.
Others have pointed out that North Korea and Syria in any
case have also had a long history of close links - making
meaningless the claim that the North Koreans are in Syria.
The scepticism was reflected by Bruce Reidel, a former
intelligence official at the Brookings Institution's Saban
Centre, quoted in the Post. 'It was a substantial Israeli
operation, but I can't get a good fix on whether the target
was a nuclear thing,' adding that there was 'a great deal
of scepticism that there's any nuclear angle here' and
instead the facility could have been related to chemical
or biological weapons.
The opaqueness surrounding the nature of what may have been
hit in Operation Orchard has been compounded by claims that
US knowledge over the alleged 'agricultural site' has come
not from its own intelligence and satellite imaging, but
from material supplied to Washington from Tel Aviv over
the last six months, material that has been restricted
to just a few senior officials under the instructions of
national security adviser Stephen Hadley, leaving many in
the intelligence community uncertain of its veracity.
Whatever the truth of the allegations against Syria - and
Israel has a long history of employing complex deceptions
in its operations - the message being delivered from Tel
Aviv is clear: if Syria's ally, Iran, comes close to
acquiring a nuclear weapon, and the world fails to prevent
it, either through diplomatic or military means, then
Israel will stop it on its own.
So Operation Orchard can be seen as a dry run, a raid using
the same heavily modified long-range aircraft, procured
specifically from the US with Iran's nuclear sites in mind.
It reminds both Iran and Syria of the supremacy of its
aircraft and appears to be designed to deter Syria from
getting involved in the event of a raid on Iran - a
reminder, if it were required, that if Israel's ground
forces were humiliated in the second Lebanese war its
airforce remains potent, powerful and unchallenged.
And, critically, the raid on Syria has come as speculation
about a war against Iran has begun to re-emerge after a
relatively quiet summer.
With the US keen to push for a third UN Security Council
resolution authorising a further tranche of sanctions
against Iran, both London and Washington have increased
the heat by alleging that they are already fighting 'a
proxy war' with Tehran in Iraq.
Perhaps more worrying are the well-sourced claims from
conservative thinktanks in the US that there have been
'instructions' by the office of Vice-President Dick Cheney
to roll out support for a war against Iran.
In the end there is no mystery.
------------------------------------------------------------
Check out Political Videos on the Net at evtv1.com
Political Videos
------------------------------------------------------------
All VIEWPOINT subscribers, we have a special. You can now
SAVE $10.00 on the book:
PALESTINE & THE MIDDLE EAST
A Chronicle of Passion and Politics
Written by the editor of Viewpoint it's ONLY $4.98.
Visit: A Chronicle of Passion and Politics
For Viewpoint archives, visit: Viewpoint Archives
------------------------------------------------------------
Questions...Comments...? Contact: Contact Viewpoint
-----------------------------------------------------------
Here's the link to the Viewpoint Forum: Viewpoint Forum
------------------------------------------------------------
End of VIEWPOINT
Copyright 2007 by NextEra Media. All rights reserved.
 E-Mail this issue
Subscribe FREE to ViewPoint by clicking here.
|