Air force chief warns of ‘surprise war’ with Syria

End Of Days News

Amir Eshel says Assad’s ‘immense arsenal’ could be turned on Israel at any moment, accompanied by rockets from Gaza and Lebanon

The commander of the Israeli Air Force, which has reportedly bombarded targets in Syria several times in recent months, warned Wednesday that war could break out on Israel’s northern border at any moment, demanding the full engagement of the IAF’s resources.

“If tomorrow Syria collapses, and I am not saying that will happen, we could find ourselves in the thick of it very fast and in great number,” IAF commander Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel said, illustrating how the nature of surprise wars had changed for Israel since the Yom Kippur War in 1973.

Read More: http://www.timesofisrael.com/air-force-chief-warns-of-surprise-war-with-syria/

White House to Congress: Assad has used chemical weapons. Israeli jets down Hizballah drone opposite Haifa

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In a remarkable reversal, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said in Abdu Dhabi Thursday afternoon, April 25, that the US intelligence community believes the Syrian government has used chemical weapons against its own people, determining with "varying degrees of confidence" that Syrian President Bashar Assad's forces have used the nerve agent sarin against civilians and forces fighting to remove Assad from power.

The White House is informing Congress about the chemical weapons use now, Hagel said, hours after he voiced reservations about the assessment Tuesday by senior Israeli military intelligence officer Brig. Gen. Itai Brun that the Assad regime had begun to practice chemical warfare.

Earlier Thursday, Israel Air Force F-16 warplanes downed a Hizballah drone 8 kilometers out at sea from the big port of Haifa. It flew south from the direction of Lebanon. Witnesses on Haifa’s Mt. Carmel watched the smoke trails of the Israeli jets and heard exploding rockets.

Israeli Navy ships are out searching for debris in the Mediterranean Sea.

The Israeli army spokesman issued a statement: An attempt by an unmanned aerial vehicle to enter Israel’s air space was thwarted. The UAV was identified flying from the north past the coast of southern Lebanon and continuing south. It was tracked continuously until it was downed by Israeli fighter planes and attack helicopters.

They went into action after the drone was identified as not coming from a friendly source. The Air Force gave the order to shoot it down.”

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said: “We take an extremely grave view of this attempt to violate our borders and will continue to guard them and keep our citizens safe.” He added, “We are watching events in Syria and Lebanon with extreme concern. Syria is breaking up and Lebanon is unstable. Both places pose not inconsiderable perils to Israel – two emanating directly from Syria. The first is the possible transfer of sophisticated weaponry to terrorist organizations and the second, attempts by terrorists to break through our borders and attack our towns and villages. Israel stands ready to counteract any threats from Syria or Lebanon by sea, air and land.”

Read More: http://www.debka.com/article/22924/White-House-to-Congress-Assad-has-used-chemical-weapons-Israeli-jets-down-Hizballah-drone-opposite-Haifa

Assad set on arms transfers to Lebanon. Israel responds with no-fly zone

End Of Days News

 

Syrian ruler Bashar Assad has ordered the resumption of weapons transfers to the Lebanese Hizballah, debkafile’s exclusive military and intelligence sources report. This was agreed with Iran’s National Security Director Saeed Jalilee, who arrived in Damascus after Israel’s reported air strike last Wednesday, Jan. 30, inter alia, on Syrian trucks preparing to ferry to Lebanon for Hizballah the sophisticated Iran-supplied arms stored at the Jamraya military complex north of Damascus.

The Syrian ruler assured the Iranian official that he would not be deterred by what he called acts of “aggression.” It was up to Syria and Iran to put their heads together to find a safe method of getting the hardware across to Hizballah without exposing it to Israeli attack in truck convoys on the open road.

Jalilee is still in Damascus. He arrived Saturday to discuss with Syrian and Hizballah how to activate against Israel the secret mutual defense pact binding Iran, Syria, Hizballah and Hamas.

According to our sources, Israeli military tacticians believe that as winter weather starts clearing up, Syria and Iran will devise crafty methods for outwitting Israel and getting the weapons to Lebanon – for example, disassembling the missiles and launchers and disguising them as non-lethal merchandize. They could then be spirited across from Syria to Lebanon in small packages by the smuggling rings regularly operating on their common border.

In anticipation of such tricks, the Israeli Air Force has in recent days thrown a round-the-clock blanket over the border area. It is constantly monitoring the traffic moving across and is ready to prevent any arms traffic. Without going through any formalities, Israel has thus effectively imposed a no-fly regime over a buffer zone straddling the Syrian-Lebanese border and placed it under the control of its air force.

Israeli officials have been warning for months that the IDF will not allow the transfer of advanced Syrian weapons – including chemical and biological weapons – to terrorist groups such as Al-Qaeda affiliated Al-Nusra Front and Hezbollah.

 

Without directly confirming the Israel attack on the Jamraya military compound, defense minister Ehud Barak told the Munich security conference Sunday “…what happened in Syria several days ago… that’s proof that when we said something we mean it… and we say that we don’t think it should be allowed to bring advanced weapons systems into Lebanon.”

 

Israel’s actions to this end, including over flights by its air force which are widely reported by the Lebanese media, were undertaken after Assad was seen to be bent on testing Israel’s resolve to prevent arms transfers to Hizballah. These transfers were expressly prohibited under UN Security Council Resolution 1701 which ended the Israeli-Hizballah war in 2006.

 

http://www.debka.com/article/22737/Assad-set-on-arms-transfers-to-Lebanon-Israel-responds-with-no-fly-zone

Western sources: Israeli aircraft target Hizballah missiles in Zabadani. S. Syria

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Israeli warplanes carried out overnight sorties up until Wednesday, Jan. 30 against missile and arms convoys standing ready in southern Syria for transfer to Hizballah in Lebanon, according to Western sources.. debkafile’s military sources report that the consignments were destroyed. The Lebanese army reported the heavy presence of an approximate 12 Israeli jets over its territory during the night up until 0200 hours Wednesday. Our sources report that it was suspected in Israel that Syria and Hizballah would take advantage of the rainy and overcast weather conditions in the last 24 hours to push advance weapons systems across the border from Syria into Lebanon.

The operation aimed at giving teeth to Israel’s longstanding threat ever since 2011 to hit military targets in Syria if necessary to prevent the handover of those sophisticated missiles to Hizballah.

It was also a warning that Israel would again send its bombers to destroy chemical weapons or nerve gas to prevent them reaching the hands of Hizballah or any other terrorist groups.

http://www.debka.com/article/22722/Western-sources-Israeli-aircraft-target-Hizballah-missiles-in-Zabadani-S-Syria