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Locals inspected the wreckage left behind at the scene of a recent car bombing on the outskirts of Damascus, Syria, which killed 17 people and shattered the regime's confidence over its usually strong grip on internal security. (Associated Press)

by Claude Salhani www.WashingtonPost.com

Syria has long claimed it is tied to Lebanon in more ways than one. Over the last two weeks this statement has proven to be far more on the money than Syria would have ever imagined — or hoped for — as the wave of terrorist attacks that reared its ugly head in Lebanon has now exported itself to Syria.

Terrorist acts in Syria have been rare, but over the last two weeks a number of bombs have exploded in and around the Syrian capital. The government in Damascus remains tight-lipped, as always, when it relates to security matters; however, statements by President Bashar Assad allude to the origin of those attacks as Salafi groups based around the northern Lebanese port city of Tripoli.

Needless to say, Mr. Assad’s statements have set off warning bells in Beirut as the pro-Western government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora looks with great trepidation at the statements from Damascus as well as the recent deployment of about 10,000 Syrian troops backed by armor and rotary-wing aircraft along the Lebanese border, even if the official government line is to tone down those fears.

Speaking to this reporter, a Lebanese government spokesman repeated what the Syrians have been saying, that Syrian troops have deployed to the border area to fight smugglers. Asked if there was reason to worry, the spokesman told this reporter that the “Syrians are free to deploy their forces on their side of the border.” He added, however, that the government in Beirut has asked the Lebanese army to establish liaison with the Syrian military.

Lebanon has good reason to worry. Syria has long eyed Lebanon as a rebellious province rather than as an independent country. Damascus has yet to open an embassy in Beirut, despite promises by Mr. Assad to French President Nicolas Sarkozy last July when the Syrian president was brought out of years of isolation and invited by Mr. Sarkozy to attend the Bastille Day military parade in Paris. Yet, instead of one ambassador arriving in a shinning limousine, there are fears in Beirut that Damascus instead may dispatch several thousand envoys armed with AK-47s and traveling aboard T64 Soviet-era tanks.

How did the security situation deteriorate in Lebanon to this point? Things started going bad for Lebanon on two fronts. First is the growing strength of the Salafi movement in the country, but primarily in the north around the port city of Tripoli. This new development has Syria, which long has battled the Islamists, very worried.

Second is the growing power and influence of Hezbollah and absence of the Lebanese state’s authority in the country’s south. This has Israel very worried.

Washington is taking those fears seriously. The Pentagon is preparing to install X band radars in Israel’s Negev Desert early next year. The X band radar, once fully installed, would give Israel 2 or even 3 times the range in which it could track inbound Iranian and Hezbollah missiles. It also would give Israel the possibility of attacking Iran and Hezbollah without too much worry about retaliation.

And if Syria and Israel can agree on any one thing, it most likely would be that the weakness of the Lebanese state and its inability to control its own internal security are detrimental to the security of both Syria and Israel.

Speaking at a conference in Geneva last month organized by the International Institute for Strategic Studies, Maj. Gen. Giora Eiland, a former director of Israel’s National Security Council, told delegates that he advised that the Israeli Cabinet need not view negatively the re-entry of Syrian troops in Lebanon. His reasoning was that, with Syria in charge of security in Lebanon, Israel would have a return address to any terrorist activity coming its way across the Lebanese border. Damascus would be liable to retaliation and therefore would ensure that Hezbollah followed the new guidelines. A case in point is the calm that has existed on the Golan Heights since Syria and Israel signed a truce in 1973. Whereas with Hezbollah on its own in south Lebanon, retaliation, as demonstrated during the Second Lebanon War two summers ago, remains futile.

Having said that, Israel appears to be rearming its air force with new weapons designed to fight this new type of nonconventional war. Israel is acquiring 25 F-35 fighter jets made by Lockheed Martin. The plane comes in three versions: the conventional type, a carrier type, and the VTOL — vertical take-off and landing. This advanced technology would allow Israel to deploy its aircraft relatively closer to the Lebanese border, to protect conventional airfields — a difficult task, given that conventional airstrips would be prone to Hezbollah rocket attack.

While a renewed Syrian incursion into Lebanon would be a setback in terms of establishing democracy in the Middle East, it would address one of Syria’s and Israel’s major problems. Of course, Syria might not act on its urge to cross that international frontier into Lebanon without at least a tacit green light from Washington. And just how likely is Washington to turn the other way, given that Mr. Siniora’s government is considered pro-American?

Suffice it to remember one of Winston Churchill’s famous lines: “We have no lasting friends, no lasting enemies, only lasting interests.”

The Lebanese have been unable to consider themselves a unified nation, behaving instead as feuding clans. They have allowed outside political influences to give credence to another saying, from the Latin: “Divide et impera,” or divide and rule.

Claude Salhani is editor of the Middle East Times.

Random House banned the book because it feared Muslim ire. See Patrick Cox’s related story in the October 2008 issue of the Levitt Letter, pages 12-13.
By Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu www.IsraelNationalNews.com

London anti-terrorist police officers arrested in late September three people suspected of trying to torch the home of a London publisher who is printing a novel that was rejected by the large Random House firm because of fears it would upset Muslims.

The attack on the house was linked to the upcoming debut of The Jewel of Medina, an historical novel on the Muslim prophet Mohammed and his first wife. Author Sherry Jones said that “to claim that Muslims will answer my book with violence is pure nonsense.”

Following Random House’s cancellation of the publication of the book, Gibson Square publisher Martin Rynja said, “In an open society there has to be open access to literary works, regardless of fear.”

Expected Muslim anger prompted London police to warn publisher Rynja that he might be targeted.

Police had staked out his house and arrested the three-man gang after its members pushed what apparently was a small firebomb through the house mail slot. A fourth suspect, a woman, later was arrested during a search of houses in the London metropolitan area.

The publication of The Satanic Verses by Iranian author Salman Rushdie in 1988 sparked violent Muslim protests that forced him into hiding and resulted in the murder of the Japanese translator of the book.

The Jewel of Medina is scheduled to be released for publication on October 30 in 15 countries. Random House’s Ballantine Books subsidiary had described the novel as “a fascinating portrait of A’isha, child bride of the Prophet Muhammad, who overcame great obstacles to reach her full potential as a woman and a leader.”

The Wall Street Journal has reported that the prospective publisher said printing the book “could incite acts of violence by a small, radical segment.” Incitement spread after a University of Texas associate professor wrote that the book was “an ugly, stupid piece of work” and “soft-core pornography.”

The author defended her book, which she said “has been inappropriately and inaccurately characterized as a soft-porn book, which is the most inflammatory rhetoric anyone can use when talking about the subject matter, given the sensitivity of any religious group toward their sacred figures.”

By Gil Ronen and Hillel Fendel www.IsraelNN.com

Israel’s leadership resolved, in top-level strategic discussions four months ago, to do whatever it takes to prevent Iran from having nuclear bombs.

Ben Caspit, veteran political reporter of Israeli newspaper Maariv, stops short of detailing the precise solution Israel will implement to put an end to Iran’s nuclear program, but writes, “Preparations for an Israeli military option intended to stop Iran’s nuclear program are underway.”

The results of the series of highest-level discussions are thus clear: “The debate between those who believe in doing everything, including a military operation, to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear bomb, and those who think we can live with Iranian nukes, has been settled.”

Not only that, but “if the ayatollahs’ regime does not fall in the next year, if the Americans do not strike militarily, and if the international sanctions do not break the Iranian nuclear plan, Israel will have to act forcefully.”

Olmert: Home Front and Air Force
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert gave a strong hint of Israel’s intentions when he said in a closed forum recently that the IDF has only two truly important commands: the Home Front Command and the Air Force.

Caspit writes that at present, the U.S. is refusing to cooperate with the Israeli plan and will not give Israel the necessary permission and codes it needs to overfly Iraq in order to attack Iran. “We’ll help you defend yourselves,” the Americans say, offering special radar systems, “but we won’t let you attack.”

A security source put it this way: “The Americans have accepted the fact that Iran will be a nuclear power, and are trying to get us to accept it too.” But we will not, says Caspit.

Sneh’s Bloodless Plan
Former Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh proposes a third option: A total international embargo on spare parts for Iran’s oil industry and a complete international boycott of Iran’s banks.

Others have called for an end to investments and an international divestment capaign from Iran and countries doing business with Iran, including Opposition Leader Binyamin Netanyahu.

Sneh sent an eight-clause memo to both U.S. presidential candidates outlining the plan that he says will be the “most rational and cheap, and will not cause bloodshed.” If the U.S. recruits all of Europe to take part in these “genuine” sanctions, Sneh says, Iran’s regime will be toppled from within. The time to implement this program is within the next 18-24 months; otherwise, Sneh warns, the only alternative will be an Israeli military strike.

Sneh, who recently resigned from the his Labor Party Knesset seat to form a new party, recently visited Switzerland and Austria – two countries that have announced plans for huge oil and gas investments in Iran in the coming years.

Hearing his hosts describing their future investments, Sneh said he told them quietly, “What a shame, because Ido will set it all on fire.” Ido is Maj.-Gen. Ido Nehushtan – Commander of the Israel Air Force that would carry out the air strikes on Iran.

“Investing in Iran in 2008,” Sneh told the Austrians, “is like investing in Germany’s Krups plant in 1938; it’s a high-risk investment.” The Austrians turned pale, Sneh said.