Eight missiles, the air becomes hot, Salman and the Sunnis with the West
martedì 10 aprile 2018 English 0 commenti
Il Giornale, April 10, 2018
It took two F-15 fighter jets (probably Israeli "according to foreign sources" although Israel remains silent) and their eight missiles fired at dawn to feel that the butcher Assad can, yes, receive a blow after again massacring children. At first everyone thought America had carried out the aerial strike, given Trump’s comments in the aftermath of the Syrian regime’s chemical attack in Douma; then it was suggested that France did it. But while the UN and the EU made statements expressing their utter horror and while we all saw the images on our TV screens of those tiny children in the throes of the toxic gas that in many cases caused their deaths, it became clear that neither France nor the US had acted. And Trump's denial is to be believed: it would have been fully in his interest to contradict his senseless declaration a few days earlier regarding his decision to leave Syria; he has since reversed his position. Instead, the valiant gesture was probably carried out by Israel, according to foreign sources, single-handedly, out of necessity but also by choice.
It certainly wasn’t just because Israel’s Sephardi Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Yosef stated the following on Sunday after the massacres: "... what’s happening in Syria is genocide of women and children. As Jews who have experienced genocide we have a moral obligation not to keep quiet and to try and stop this massacre". This feeling is important for a people who experienced the unbelievable slaughter of innocents during the Shoah, and whose Remembrance Day will be celebrated this coming Thursday in Israel.
However, it is the entire geopolitical situation of the area that violates all the moral and strategic red lines that the Jewish State can allow, and poses a threat to its security.
Israel has already struck Syria several times since 2007, when it then destroyed a nuclear reactor under construction. Israel already hit the T-4 airbase two months ago when a very sophisticated Iranian drone violated its airspace. It could have contained a camera, a bomb, or even nerve gas ready for use. This time there were seven Iranians besides the Syrians who were killed in this recent raid.
Iran exerts its power over Syria through intensive military support and the delivery of advanced weapons. The airport has become Iran’s major transit point: most of the weapons are headed directly into Hezbollah’s hands who threaten Israel not only from Lebanon, but also from new bases on the Syrian Golan.
The Iranians are protected by Russia and sure therefore of enjoying an ironclad shield. Syria is for them an indispensable base for threatening Israel and guaranteeing its expansion throughout the Middle East, first and foremost in Iraq and Yemen. Assad’s massacres have little effect on the Russians, Putin has made Syria part and parcel of his supremacy in the Middle East, a clear sign of victory over the United States, especially after Obama failed to enforce his solemn red line on Syria’s use of chemical weapons, which he turned his back on fleeing.
This time the situation is different from that of the dozens of times in which Israel has undertaken strikes in reaction to violations in Syria of its security. Now it risks big: Russia, which has never reacted, now has done so, and Lavrov, the foreign minister, has classified the gesture as "a dangerous development".
Attention, he says, our delicate relationship in which Netanyahu has free access to Putin can implode: do you want a confrontation with us? Do not violate the ground rules. Russian planes based in Syria could respond by returning fire. Russia wants respect for its choice of Ankara; it has made the Iranians and Turks part of its Middle East axis.
A Soviet choice, that is now challenged, paradoxically, not by the US as by Mohammad bin Salman, the Saudi who dares to say that Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is the “new Hitler of the Middle East" and that every terrorist attack carries the Muslim Brotherhood's stamp. Curious, but today Israel has as its allies the Sunni Muslims of Egypt, Jordan, Gulf states... From afar Trump is perhaps now rethinking his hasty announcement of a few days ago to withdrawal from Syria. The air heats up.
Translation by Amy Rosenthal