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Israel remains dormant despite the serious consequences to its strategic and security situation threatened by the new proposal the UN-Arab League envoy for Syria Kofi Annan is to present to the UN Thursday, June 7. DEBKAfile: He proposes establishing a “contact group” that would amount to giving the Syrian crisis into Russian and Iranian hands. It has Barack Obama’s blessing although it is a catastrophe for Israel’s security and a negation of his pledge to contain Iran’s regional expansion and halt its nuclear program.
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Will Obama’s grand Syrian ploy with Russian help him with Iran?
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The new US 9-point blueprint precludes an attack on Iran during diplomacy.
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US to impose air and sea transport embargo on Iran in the fall.
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- Russian-Iranian ire over Azerbaijan’s stake in Israeli energy
- Obama’s blockade plan for Iran delays Israeli strike
- Rebels set fire to Syrian air base opposite Golan
- Turkey ditches Syrian rebels, Hizballah may move Scuds into Lebanon
- Syrian rebels abduct Hizballah chiefs
- Exclusive: Obama seeks to guard Assad’s WMD
- Obama nixes French-Saudi plan to bomb Assad’s palace
- Putin turns arms ship back from Syrian port
- Israel revives military option on Iran
DEBKAfile Special Report
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrives in Baku, Azerbaijan Wednesday, June 6, amid Ali Khamenei and Vladimir Putin’s deep disapproval of President Ilam Aliyav’s pro-Western orientation and fast-growing ties with Israel. Frictions center on Baku’s $1.6 billion arms transaction with Israel and even more, DEBKAfile reports, on the fact that the deal is matched by expanding Azerbaijani investment in Israel’s Mediterranean gas and oil projects. This tradeoff is marked for expansion.
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US President Barack Obama has again persuaded Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to hold off attacking Iran’s nuclear program in the coming months by promising a new set of tough sanctions against Iran. US administration officials assuredDEBKAfile’s Washington sources that Israel’s leaders, were won over once more – this time by the Obama administration’s promise to impose an air and sea blockade on Iran, failing progress at the Moscow nuclear talks. Tehran may hit back by closing the Strait of Hormuz.
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As Syrian ruler Bashar Assad stood before parliament in Damascus Sunday, June 3, declaring, “Not even monsters could have carried out the Houla massacre,” rebels attacked a Syrian Air Force base east of the southern town of Deraa opposite the Israeli Golan border – their first such attack in the 14-month uprising,DEBKAfile’s military sources report. Several rebel teams firing mortars set fire to fighter aircraft and assault helicopters in their hangars at the As Suwayda air base and ripped up runways.
Read moreDEBKAfile Exclusive Report
Two radical developments arising from the Syrian conflict are revealed byDEBKAfile: In an astonishing about face, Turkey has abandoned its 14-month support for the Syrian revolt alongside the West and made common cause with Russia, i.e. Bashar Assad. Further exacerbating fears of a “proxy war” involving Israel, Iran and Syria, the Lebanese Hizballah is preparing to transfer its Scud D missiles, capable of hitting any point in Israel, from Syria to Lebanon. Israel has threatened to stop their crossing by force.
Read moreDEBKAfile Exclusive Report
Despite the deep secrecy surrounding the incident,DEBKAfile reports exclusively that unidentified commandos this week kidnapped five top Hizballah commanders, naming them as Ali Safa, a senior officer of Hizballah’s intelligence service and nephew of Hassan Nasrallah; Hussein Hamid, Dep. Commander of Hizballah forces in South Lebanon; Ali Zerayb, member of its Jihad Council; Hassan Arzouni, chief of intelligence in the Bint Jbeil district bordering on Israel; and Aras Shoeib, head of training in the Beqaa Valley of E. Lebanon.
Read moreDEBKAfile Exclusive Report
US President Barack Obama, widely expected to pursue direct action against Syrian ruler Bashar following the Houla atrocity, is preoccupied with what he regards as the greater threat to the world: a potential grab for the huge Syrian stock of chemical and biological weapons by Al Qaeda or other terrorist organizations, to prevent which,DEBKAfile reports, he has reached out to Russian President Vladimir Putin with a fresh plan for Syria: 5,000 international monitors, most Russian, to guard those stocks.
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DEBKAfile Exclusive Report
US President Obama recently vetoed a detailed Franco-Saudi plan for ending President Bashar Assad’s rule by means of a massive air strike against his palace that would wipe him, his family and top leadership circle out, DEBKAfile reports. French warplanes from the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier off Syria and Saudi and United Arab Emirates bombers flying in through Jordan would devastate the palace atop Mount Qassioun northeast of Damascus. The US was asked to pitch in by disrupting Syrian air defenses.
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Vladimir Putin, after taking stock of the early days of his third presidency, concludes that Moscow’s handling of the al-Houla massacre and Syria’s ongoing collapse into civil war will go down as a Russian foreign policy failure. He personally comes out of it as the patron of a bloodthirsty tyrant. He has quietly ordered the Russian arms ship Professor Katsman to leave the Syrian port before unloading its cargo. Putin is now taxed with determining his next steps on Syria.
Read moreDEBKAfile Exclusive Report
Israel has withdrawn its pledge to US President Barack Obama not to strike Iran’s nuclear sites before the November presidential election after he rejected its minimal demands for the nuclear negotiations with Iran. This is reported exclusively by DEBKAfile as the Six-Power talks with Iran in Baghdad drag into a second day on Thursday, May 24. Defense Minister Ehud Barak warned Wednesday: “No one has to tell us what to do [or not to do]. All options are on the table.”
Read more- Israel revives military option on Iran
- Qualified Israeli OK for Obama's interim Iran deal
- New US battle strategy for Iran
- Multinational force on Jordanian-Syrian border
- Putin turns arms ship back from Syrian port
- Turkey ditches Syrian rebels, Hizballah may move Scuds into Lebanon
- Iran opposition: Nuclear bomb-making is advancing fast
- Obama’s blockade plan for Iran delays Israeli strike
DEBKA-Net-Weekly #539
Ayman al-Zawahiri is challenged by the Syrian jihadist ideologue Abu Musab al-Suri, who preaches the "multi-pede" concept which would end centralized control of the al Qaeda terrorism organiztion and distribute authority for independent decision-making among its franchises. Zawahiri is fighting back.
Read moreDEBKA-Net-Weekly #538
Israel’s war preparations are based on the estimate that by the end of 2012, Iran will be able to produce a crude nuclear device as well as a dirty bomb. It calculates as high the risk that Tehran will decide to use those devices for war against Israel in the short term and not wait until it has complete nuclear warhead ready for a ballistic missile.
Read moreDEBKA-Net-Weekly #537
President Barack Obama's proposals are primed to pre-empt war as his first priority before even pre-empting a nuclear Iran. The deal he is offering Tehran will be hard to refuse because it virtually relieves its nuclear program of effective international oversight. Tehran is nonetheless holding out for an end to sanctions.
Read moreDEBKAfile Exclusive Report
President Barack Obama's proposals are primed to pre-empt war as his first priority before even pre-empting a nuclear Iran. The deal he is offering Tehran will be hard to refuse because it virtually relieves its nuclear program of effective international oversight. Tehran is nonetheless holding out for an end to sanctions.
Read moreDEBKAfile Exclusive Report
US Navy, Air Force, ground, intelligence and special forces units based at home, in Europe and the Middle East, took part this week in a special exercise ordered by President Barack Obama to simulate reactions to a potential US/Israel strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, DEBKAfile reports. Advanced US stealth F-22 fighter bombers were also transferred to the Al Dhafra Air Base in the UAE. Washington is thinking of attacking core elements of Iran’s nuclear program to weaken its hand in negotiations.
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Israel Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu acted Thursday, April 26, to correct the damaging impression of divided and conflicting perceptions of the Iranian nuclear threat left by statements delivered in the last two days by himself and Defense Minster Ehud Barak. Israel’s chief of staff Gen. Benny Gantz rallied to the task. He commented Thursday that “other countries have readied their armed forces for a potential strike against Iran’s nuclear sites to keep Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons.”
Read moreDEBKAfile Exclusive Report
Bashar Assad has stepped in directly to halt the covert war his Western and Arab foes are waging against his regime through Lebanon. DEBKAfile’s military sources disclose he is now sending Lebanese army commanders direct orders for cutting arms, money, fighters and medical supplies to the rebels, especially in Homs. Last week, Lebanese Chief of Staff Gen. Jean Kahwagi was given a crude ultimatum: Take care of the Syrian rebels’ backers in Tripoli, or else the Syrian army will enter Lebanon and do the job.
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