<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
<b><big><big><strong><font size="3"><big><big>Israel rescues Mujahid
Obama</big></big></font></strong></big></big></b><br>
By Pepe Escobar <br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-01-070513.html">http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MID-01-070513.html</a><br>
<br>
Just when the red line charade was reaching fever pitch - but still
buried in the sand - and he had to choose between the US "exercising
restraint" or "directly involving itself" in the Syrian war, (see <a
href="http://www.atimes.com/atimes/World/WOR-01-020513.html">The
Syria-Iran red line show</a>, Asia Times Online, May 2, 2013) President
Obama was saved by Bibi Netanyahu's Israeli government. <br>
<br>
The temptation was oh so great for Obama to replay Ronald Reagan and
gloriously wear the mantle of Obama The Syrian Mujahid, just as Reagan
did in the 1980s with his beloved freedom fighters of the Afghan jihad.
That will have to wait - perhaps not too long. <br>
<br>
<b>Israel's motives </b><br>
Let's cut to the chase. Israel's bombing of Syrian army installations
at Jamraya near Damascus is a provocation and an act of war. Israel
acted as a Washington proxy - which may have even provided the list of
targets. And Washington - not to mention those useless puppets in
Brussels - won't condemn the bombing, which for the umpteenth time
makes a mockery of international law. <br>
<br>
Israel insists the targets were ground-to-ground Iranian Fateh-110
missiles bound for Hezbollah. Damascus says the targets were a military
technology institute as well as troop training grounds; there are a lot
of apartments nearby, whose tenants the CIA always wanted to recruit as
assets. There are no chemical weapons at Jamraya. According to Syrian
medical sources, 42 soldiers may have been killed. <br>
<br>
Israel's Hezbollah angle is murky. There's no confirmation anywhere
that Hezbollah bought Fateh-110s. Since 2009, Hezbollah has Syrian
versions of the Fateh-110 - the M600, with a range of about 250
kilometers and a decent guiding system. <br>
<br>
The usual gaggle of anonymous Washington "sources" insists that the
Syrian Army itself needs those missiles against the armed mercenary
strands of the self-described Free Syrian Army (FSA). So it would make
no sense dispatching them to Lebanon. <br>
<br>
But for Israel it makes sense smashing a supply of Fateh 110s - or even
M600s. Israel thus directly helps the FSA; one of its spokesmen, by the
way, real or fake, went on Israeli TV to praise the bombers. And Israel
at least for now prevents more missiles from reaching Hezbollah. <br>
<br>
Cutting through the fog is the fact that Israel has a bunch of serious
motives to once again go rogue. <br>
<br>
It craves a weak, chaotic Syria - deprived of advanced military
technology. It craves most of all an all-out Somalization of Syria - a
sectarian dystopia. What better justification for Israel to be up in
arms 24/7 than hardcore Wahhabi terrorism right across its
(non-delimitated) borders? On top of it, Israel wants to drag Syria,
Hezbollah and ultimately Iran into all out war. It wants the whole
package - and the sooner and better. <br>
<br>
Damascus for its part can play chess - and not respond. At least for
now. Or let Hezbollah respond - in the near future. <br>
<br>
It's not by accident that the bombing happened after 1) Pentagon head
Chuck Hagel's tour of Israel and the Gulf petro-monarchies; 2) the
Syrian Army's advances during the past few weeks in the Homs corridor
against the foreign-sponsored mercenaries/jihadis; 3) Hezbollah's
Sheikh Nasrallah's "secret" trip to Tehran; afterwards Nasrallah, a
fine geopolitical mind, stressed that what "they" really want is the
destruction of the infrastructure, economy and social fabric of Syria -
to "destroy Syria as a people, an army, a whole nation". <br>
<br>
If there are further attacks - and there may well be - to deplete the
arsenals of the Syrian army, it will be a gift of providence for the
mercenaries/jihadis. Nasrallah is absolutely correct that the key
objective of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization-Gulf Cooperation
Council-Israel coalition of the willing is to try to drag Syria into a
total war. After an eventual Syrian response, the "solution" would be
to carpet-bomb it to Iraqi levels. <br>
<br>
<b>Obama the Mujahid's options </b><br>
Whether the US/Israeli gambit will be successful is an open question.
What it did was to postpone the crowning of Obama The Mujahid. <br>
<br>
The netherworlds of US Think Tankland were oh so excited with the
prospect of Obama bypassing the UN Security Council (as in Russia and
China) a la Bush and unilaterally impose a no-fly zone over Syria - so
the US could engage in the requisite "suppression of the enemy air
defense campaign". <br>
<br>
Nonsense, although the Brits and France have not given up within the
European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, in fact even
trying to bypass NATO in imposing a no-fly zone. <br>
<br>
The no-fly zone was being spun in Washington as a means to secure
Syria's chemical weapons. The problem is that Washington has lousy
intel on where these chemical weapons are actually stockpiled. And to
top it off, chemical weapons were probably used not by the government
but by the "rebels" - according to widely respected UN investigator <a
href="http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSBRE94409Z20130505?irpc=932">Carla
del Ponte</a>. <br>
<br>
The Obama administration was also flirting with "direct lethal aid" to
the rebels - as in anti-tank guided missiles and surface-to-air
missiles. <br>
<br>
Washington believes its own myth that it is "indirectly" involved in
vetting and arming opposition groups in Syria. Since 2011, the
weaponizing of Syrian mercenary/jihadi gangs has been sourced through
the black market, stockpiles in Libya, and in Croatia. The CIA has been
up to its neck all along. Many of these weapons are now in the hands of
hardcore jihadis of the Jabhat al-Nusra kind. <br>
<br>
The notion that the CIA is capable of vetting and weaponizing those
gangs/mercenaries/jihadis to Washington's benefit after the Bashar
al-Assad government collapses is THE joke of the early 21st century.
Just take a trip down memory lane to Afghanistan. <br>
<br>
Or imagine these Syrian McJihadis, or You Tube mujahideen, equipped
with some fine shoulder-held heat-seeking missiles wreaking havoc all
across Southwest Asia. <br>
<br>
So after much huff and puff, Obama ended up with something way more
comfortable than a no-fly zone: targeted strikes - with jets and/or
missiles, conducted by the Israelis. The blueprint could be Operation
Desert Fox (the Bill Clinton-ordered bombing of Iraq in 1998.) The
objective, to "send a clear message" to Syria. <br>
<br>
The next bombings may target airfields, concentrations of aircraft,
more weapons depots, tanks and artillery. Collateral damage,
inevitably, will soar, proportionately to the level of provocation. <br>
<br>
Former US ambassador to the UN Bill Richardson, very close to the
Clinton clan, has already gamed on ABC News that Obama is "leaning
towards aerial strikes". Yes; this is just the beginning. Mini-Shock
and Awes await. <br>
<br>
<b>Just follow the roadmap</b><br>
The question is why did it take so long. The destruction of Syria - as
conceptualized by Sheikh Nasrallah - with the West once more
collaborating with jihadi gangs, has been in the cards for years. See
how Seymour Hersh outlined it <a
href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/03/05/070305fa_fact_hersh?currentPage=all">
in 2007</a>. And see how badly the bipartisan Washington establishment
craves <a
href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/108893509/brookingssyria0315-syria-saban">
regime change</a>. <br>
<br>
And Damascus, of course, is just a stop towards Tehran. The proverbial
anonymous sources have leaked to the Rupert Murdoch-owned Sunday Times
in London that a "<a
href="http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/world_news/Middle_East/article1255088.ece">Defense
Crescent</a>" is becoming a reality. <br>
<br>
It's the same GCC-Israel element in the coalition of the willing in
Syria, in this case ganging up to "counter Iran's nuclear ambitions".
Turkey, the House of Saud, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Israel
merrily partying in joint command-and-control centers to detect evil
Iranian ballistic missiles. <br>
<br>
Don't know much about history. But what a wonderful world this would
be. Presided by Obama The Mujahid.
<br>
<br>
<i><b>Pepe Escobar</b> is the author of </i><a
href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0978813820/simpleproduction/ref=nosim">Globalistan:
How the Globalized World is Dissolving into Liquid War</a> <i>(Nimble
Books, 2007), </i><a
href="http://www.amazon.com/Red-Zone-Blues-snapshot-Baghdad/dp/0978813898">Red
Zone Blues: a snapshot of Baghdad during the surge</a> <i>(Nimble
Books, 2007), and </i><a
href="http://www.amazon.com/Obama-Does-Globalistan-Pepe-Escobar/dp/1934840831">Obama
does Globalistan</a> <i>(Nimble Books, 2009).
<br>
<br>
He may be reached at <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:pepeasia@yahoo.com">pepeasia@yahoo.com</a></i>
<div class="moz-signature">-- <br>
Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
415 863.9977
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.freedomarchives.org">www.freedomarchives.org</a>
</div>
</body>
</html>