| New York Times | - |
JERUSALEM
- For more than two years, Israeli leaders have insisted they had no
intention of intervening in the civil war raging in neighboring Syria, but they vowed to stop sophisticated weapons from being transferred to Hezbollah, the Lebanese ...
Israel Finding Itself Drawn Into Syria’s Turmoil
Ariel Schalit/Associated Press
An Israeli soldier at a
training ground in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights, near the
increasingly volatile border with Syria.
By JODI RUDOREN
Published: May 22, 2013
JERUSALEM — For more than two years, Israeli leaders have insisted they
had no intention of intervening in the civil war raging in neighboring
Syria, but they vowed to stop sophisticated weapons from being
transferred to Hezbollah, the Lebanese militia group, and to respond to
intentional fire into their territory.
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Now, having followed through with a pair of airstrikes on weapons
shipments this month and, on Tuesday, the destruction of a Syrian Army
position, Israelis are asking what their options are, as if they feel it
has become impossible to avoid deeper involvement.
Already, the language has grown more heated on both sides, with Syrian
officials declaring they are prepared for a major confrontation with
Israel — and Israel’s military chief warning of dire consequences.
“Clearly, a policy that functions successfully for more than two years
for Israel, that policy is not working because Syria, Iran, Hezbollah
and Russia have all upped the ante,” said Itamar Rabinovich, Israel’s
former chief negotiator with Syria, mentioning that Russia continues to
send advanced weaponry despite American and Israeli protests. “They
created new rules of the game that Israel needs to figure out. It’s a
policy in formation; the answers are not definitive.”
Several senior government officials, as well as half a dozen experts on
Syria and the Israeli military, said on Wednesday that there was no new
policy in Jerusalem, but there was a growing awareness that continuation
of the current policy was likely to yield different results.
The next time Israel strikes a weapons convoy, they say, President
Bashar al-Assad of Syria is much more likely to retaliate, given the
recent statements from Damascus. That could lead to further Israeli
reaction, and a spiraling escalation.
“I think we’re being very measured and very cautious in a very volatile
situation,” one Israeli official said, speaking on the condition of
anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
Another, speaking under similar restrictions, said, “Up until now there
is no change,” hinting that there could be one any day — or any minute.
Israel and Syria remain in a technical state of war, but have maintained
a wary calm along the 43-mile cease-fire line between the two countries
since it was established in 1973. Tuesday was the first time Syria
acknowledged it had intentionally attacked an Israeli target, a military
vehicle. Officials said the jeep had crossed into its territory near
the Golan Heights, something Israel vehemently denied.
Analysts on Wednesday dismissed the possibility of Israel’s establishing
a new buffer zone on the Syrian side of the line, and not just because
doing so would be seen as a major incursion into Syrian territory.
Two rivers that are close to the line in the southern Golan Heights
create geographical challenges, they said, and in other areas there are
several key Syrian Army positions.
“A buffer zone doesn’t work there,” said Ehud Yaari, an Israel-based
fellow for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “If you would
try to create a buffer zone, it immediately gets you into proximity and
friction with main Syrian military forces and camps.”
Another idea being discussed here is Israel’s establishing a sort of
proxy force inside Syria, by arming or otherwise supporting residents of
villages close to the cease-fire line, perhaps led by the Druse, a
minority sect in Syria that also has some 20,000 members living in
Israeli-controlled territory.
Several Israelis who follow Syria closely said Israeli security forces
had already been quietly working with villagers who support neither the
government nor the rebels, supplying moderate humanitarian aid and
maintaining intense intelligence activity.
But they said any notion of arming such villagers was far off if not
far-fetched, noting that the main Druse leadership in Syria has so far
stayed steadfastly out of the conflict.
“Much, much premature,” Mr. Rabinovich, who is now vice chairman of the
Institute for National Security Studies, said of a proxy force. “This is
what you do if the state collapses and you have to deal with anarchy on
the border. We’re not there yet.”
But while those ideas have been discounted, there is little consensus
about what Israel might do next. Most here agree that the landscape has
shifted, if only because of the newly heated threats from all sides.
“The Syrians are tying their own hands with their own tongues,” Mr.
Yaari said.
For Mr. Assad, engagement with Israel could distract attention from his
massacre of his own people and win him support at home and across the
Arab world. On the other hand, Mr. Assad would be risking severe
retaliation by Israel that could devastate his military, possibly
shifting the balance of power in his fight against the rebels.
For Israel, deeper involvement in the Syrian conflict could lead to an
unwanted result: hastening the fall of the Assad government, leaving
areas close to the cease-fire line in the hands of radical jihadi
groups.
It could also have dire diplomatic consequences for Israel’s complicated
relationship with Russia. And many here believe Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu wants to conserve his military resources and public support
for the continuing possibility of an attack on the Iranian nuclear
program.
“Whenever we tried in the past to influence the internal problems of a
neighboring country, the results were very poor,” said Giora Eiland, a
former Israeli national security adviser, citing Israel’s gambit in
South Lebanon in 1982, which led to a two-decade occupation and the
creation of Hezbollah. “Sometimes there is a tension between two things.
First is the situation that might affect your important interest, and
second is your inability to do something in order to change it.
Sometimes the only thing you can do is to do nothing.”
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