| New York Times | - |
JERUSALEM - Israeli warplanes carried out a strike deep inside Syrian
territory on Wednesday, American officials reported, saying they
believed the target was a convoy carrying sophisticated antiaircraft
weaponry on the outskirts of Damascus that was ...
Arms Shipment Was Target as Israel Bombed Syria, U.S. Says
By ISABEL KERSHNER, MICHAEL R. GORDON and RICK GLADSTONE
Published: January 30, 2013 62 Comments
JERUSALEM — Israeli warplanes carried out a strike deep inside Syrian
territory on Wednesday, American officials reported, saying they
believed the target was a convoy carrying sophisticated antiaircraft
weaponry on the outskirts of Damascus that was intended for the
Hezbollah Shiite militia in Lebanon.
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The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the Israelis
had notified the Americans about the attack, which the Syrian government
called an act of “Israeli arrogance and aggression” that raised the
risks that the two-year-old civil conflict in Syria could spread beyond the country’s borders.
In a statement, the Syrian military said a scientific research facility
in the Damascus suburbs had been hit and denied that a convoy had been
the target.
Israeli officials declined to comment on the airstrike. But they have
been warning that they are monitoring the possible movement of weapons
in the Syrian conflict, including chemical weapons, and would take
action to thwart any possible transfers into Hezbollah’s possession.
It was the first time in more than five years that Israel’s
air force had attacked a target in Syria, which has remained in a
technical state of war with Israel although both sides have maintained
an uneasy peace along their decades-old armistice line.
Hezbollah, which plays a decisive role in Lebanese politics, has long
relied on Syria as both a source of weapons and a conduit for weapons
flowing from Iran. Hezbollah has supported the Syrian government of
President Bashar al-Assad throughout the uprising against him in part
because it does not want to lose that weapons corridor, and some
analysts say that Hezbollah may be trying to stock up on weapons now in
case Mr. Assad falls. Other analysts say that Hezbollah would be
cautious now about receiving arms from Syria because it does not want to
risk drawing an Israeli attack or destabilizing its political position
in Lebanon.
Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, recently urged Lebanese citizens
to welcome Syrian refugees regardless of their political affiliation, a
move widely interpreted as aimed in part at preserving its relationship
with Syria in the event of a rebel takeover, in addition to maintaining
political calm in Lebanon.
Hezbollah is believed to have replenished and increased its weapons
stocks after the 2006 war with Israel, in which Israeli bombardments
destroyed some of its arms and other missiles were used to unleash a
barrage that killed Israelis as far south as Haifa and drove residents
of northern Israel into shelters.
The Syrian statement, carried by state television, said an unidentified
number of Israeli jets flying below radar had hit the research facility,
killing two people and causing “huge material damage.”
“Israeli warplanes violated our airspace at dawn, bombing directly one
of the research scientific centers in the Jimraya district in rural
Damascus,” the Syrian statement said, calling it a “breach of Syrian
sovereignty.”
It cast the attack as “another addition to the history of Israeli
occupation, aggression and criminality against Arabs and Muslims.”
“The Syrian government points out to the international community that
this Israeli arrogance and aggression is dangerous for Syrian
sovereignty and stresses that such criminal acts will not weaken Syria’s
role nor will discourage Syrians from continuing to support resistance
movements and just Arab causes, particularly the Palestinian issue,” the statement said.
Israelis have expressed increasing concern in recent days about what
they called the threat of chemical or advanced conventional weapons
leaking from Syria to Hezbollah in Lebanon or into the hands of
extremist Islamic rebel groups as a result of the turmoil in Syria.
The Lebanese Army said in a statement on Wednesday that Israeli
warplanes had carried out two sorties, circling over Lebanon for hours
on Tuesday and before dawn on Wednesday, but made no mention of any
attacks.
Jerusalem has long maintained a policy of silence on pre-emptive
military strikes. It would not comment after Sudan accused the Israel
military of carrying out an air attack that destroyed a weapons factory in Khartoum, the Sudanese capital, in October. Israel also never admitted to the bombing of a Syrian nuclear reactor
in 2007, and Syria kept mum about that attack. The ambiguity allowed
that event to pass without Syria feeling pressure to retaliate.
The heightened sense of alert in Israel this week had focused on the
Syrian government’s precarious hold on its stockpiles of chemical
weapons. But Israeli officials and experts have also voiced worry about
the fate of what they describe as conventional “strategic weapons” in
Syria, including advanced ground-to-air missiles, shore-to-sea missiles
and anti-tank missiles. They say such weapons in the hands of Hezbollah
could upset the current balance of forces in the region.
Amnon Sofrin, a retired brigadier general and former Israeli
intelligence officer, told reporters in Jerusalem on Wednesday that
Hezbollah, which is known to have been storing some of its more advanced
weapons in Syria, was now eager to move everything it could to Lebanon.
He said Israel was carefully watching for convoys transferring weapons
systems from Syria to Lebanon.
Israel’s air force chief, Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel, said on Tuesday that
Syria was a prime example of “the weakening governance in neighboring
countries that heralds greater exposure to hostile activity.”
Speaking at an international space conference in Israel, General Eshel
said: “We work every day in order to lessen the immediate threats, to
create better conditions so that we will be victorious in future wars.
This is a struggle in which the Air Force is a central player, from here
to thousands of kilometers away.”
There have been reports in the last week of feverish security
consultations between Israel’s political and security chiefs, and at
least one Iron Dome anti-rocket missile defense battery was deployed in
northern Israel. Israel’s national security adviser, Yaakov Amidror, was
in Moscow for talks with Russian officials on Monday.
Israel has made it clear that if the Syrian government loses control
over its chemical weapons or transfers them to Hezbollah, Israel will
most likely be compelled to act. Avi Dichter, the minister for the home
front, told Israel Radio on Tuesday that options to prevent Syria from
using or transferring the weapons included deterrence and “attempts to
hit the stockpiles.”
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