News From The Middle East

First we turn to Syria:

Syrian forces storm Damascus suburb

Syrian writers issued a declaration on Monday denouncing a bloody crackdown on protesters, a sign of outrage surging through the intellectual elite as violence has escalated dramatically in recent days.

Security forces and gunmen loyal to President Bashar Assad stormed the large Damascus suburb of Douma early on Monday, shooting at unarmed civilians and arresting residents, rights campaigners said.

Also Monday, a senior diplomat in Amman said Syria had closed all its land border crossings with Jordan, following the deployment of Syrian army tanks in Deraa. An official told Reuters the "timing is related to what appears to be a major security operation that is taking place right now".

At least 18 said killed as Syrian forces in tanks, APCs fire on protesters

Syrian President Bashar Assad's security forces opened fire on pro-democracy protesters across the country Monday, reportedly killing 13 in the coastal town of Jabla and another five in the southern town of Daraa.

Security forces backed by armored vehicles entered Daraa overnight and opened fire, a resident told Al Jazeera television Monday. Eight tanks were deployed in the old quarter of Daraa, a witness said, adding that several bodies were lying in the main street.

Despite Assad's caoncellation of decades-long emergency laws, his forces have continued to clash with protesters, killing more than 100 Syrians on Friday in the most brutal crackdown since the pro-democracy protests began some six weeks ago.

Syrian security forces detained dozens of opposition activists and protesters in raids on Sunday, yet another indication that Assad has little intent of relinquishing his authoritarian rule.

Assad is 'World's Most Dangerous Man'

Syrian President Bashar Assad is the world’s “most dangerous man,” according to Pulitzer Prize winner journalist Joel Brinkley, who added that the Obama government has “delusional views” of the dictato

Writing for Tribune Media Services, Brinkley said Assad overshadows Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for being dangerous because the “duplicitous dictator…has duped presidents and prime ministers into believing he is their indispensable friend - even as he facilitates the killing of American troops, collects weapons of mass destruction and serves as the supply master for terrorist groups.”

[Assad] has been the best friend of Islamic extremists transiting into Iraq. They've crossed the Syrian border by the busload, in full view of U.S. spy satellites

“He sells missiles to Hizbullah, the terrorist group in southern Lebanon that is the avowed enemy of Israel and the United States.

“Khaled Mashaal, the Hamas leader, actually lives in Damascus and does his murderous business openly from a storefront.

Persecution in the Middle East:

A Mideast Devoid of Christians

This is the goal of the Muslim world. In every Muslim nation there is an official systematic policy to destroy every Christian church, community, life in order to free themselves of the blight they see within their midst. This isn’t a new phenomena in these countries, they rid themselves of Jews decades ago.

This is the saddest Easter in the long epic of Arab Christianity: The cross is near extinction in the lands of it origin. The much-vaunted diversity of the Middle East is going to be reduced to the flat monotony of a single religion, Islam, and to a handful of languages.

The numbers are telling. Today there is only one Middle Eastern country where the number of Christians has grown: Israel. As documented in the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics, the Christian community that numbered 34,000 people in 1949 is now 163,000-strong, and will reach 187,000 in 2020.

In the rest of the Middle East, the drive for Islamic purity is going to banish all traces of pre-Islamic pasts. This has affected not only Christians, but other non-Islamic communities too, such as the Zoroastrians and Baha’is in Iran (the late also found refuge in Israel, in Haifa.)

The silence of the global forums, the flawed conscience of human rights groups, the self-denial of the media and the Vatican’s appeasement is helping facilitate this Islamist campaign. According to a report on religious freedom compiled by the US Department of State, the number of Christians in Turkey declined from two million to 85,000; in Lebanon they have gone from 55% to 35% of the population; in Syria, from half the population they have been reduced to 4%; in Jordan, from 18% to 2%. In Iraq, they will be exterminated.

Should the exodus of Christians from Bethlehem continue in the next two or three decades, there may be no clergy left to conduct religious services in Jesus’ birthplace. In Iran, Christians have become virtually non-existent since 1979, when Khomeini ordered the immediate closure of all Christian schools. In Gaza, the 3,000 who remain are subjected to persecution. In Sudan, Christians in the South are forced into slavery.

Has a new computer virus weapon been unleashed?

After Stuxnet: Iran says it's discovered 2nd cyber attack

TEHRAN - Iran has been targeted by a second computer virus in a "cyber war" waged by its enemies, its commander of civil defense said on Monday.

Gholamreza Jalali told the semi-official Mehr news agency that the new virus, called "Stars", was being investigated by experts.

"The particular characteristics of the Stars virus have been discovered," Jalali said. "The virus is congruous and harmonious with the [computer] system and in the initial phase it does minor damage and might be mistaken for some executive files of government organizations."

Iran says targeted by second computer virus

Iran has been targeted by a second computer virus in a "cyber war" waged by its enemies, its commander of civil defence said on Monday.

Gholamreza Jalali told the semi-official Mehr news agency that the new virus, called "Stars", was being investigated by experts.

Some defense analysts say the main target was more likely to be Iran's uranium enrichment program. Enrichment creates fuel for nuclear power plants or, if pursued to a much higher degree, can provide material for an atomic bomb.

Back to Israel:

PA will defer UN statehood bid if 'serious talks begin'

Abed Rabbo says PA is determined to achieve statehood but will delay UN plan if negotiations based on '67 borders start before September

The Palestinian leadership will defer its plan to seek a declaration of statehood in the United Nations this September if "real and serious" negotiations begin before that point, PLO Executive Committee Secretary-General Abed Rabbo told London-based Al-Hayyat on Monday.

Describing what the Palestinian Authority would find acceptable in negotiations, he said they must be based on benchmarks set by the Quartet, notably, being based on pre-1967 lines with minimal land exchanges without any population transfer.

Rabbo added that if the United Nations does confer statehood on a Palestinian state, that one of its first moves would be to ask the international community to force Israel to withdraw its military forces from Palestinian territories.

Speculating on the level of support the Palestinians can expect to receive in their planned statehood bid, he told Al-Hayyat that "the vast majority of influential countries, including European countries, will recognize the state of Palestine," predicting near unanimous support.

Palestinian police open fire on pilgrims visiting Joseph's Tomb

A group of Breslov Hassidim's regular twilight visit to Palestinian controlled Joseph's Tomb in Nablus came to a tragically violent end Sunday: According to one of the Breslovers, Palestinian police officers fired at the convoy as they were on their way in to the Tomb.The fire continued as they drove out, killing Ben-Yosef Livnat, a 24 year-old father of four from Jerusalem and the nephew of Minister Limor Livnat, and injuring five others.

The Palestinians and the IDF are investigating the incident but it seems unlikely that pilgrims on the way to kiss the Tomb of one of Judaism's most revered figures would be armed - especially since the visit was a regular occurrence and they apparently had no trouble previously in making the pilgrimage. Apparently, the pilgrims did not "register" with the Palestinians their intent to visit the Tomb, but even if they did not follow the rules, was this any reason to shoot them?

One therefore must come to the inescapable conclusion that this was a deliberate Palestinian provocation.

Just one more piece of evidence of how serious they are at reaching a peace agreement.