War Preparations In The Middle East

We know these wars are coming. It's just a matter of time. Meanwhile, all we have to do is scan the news and we can easily see just how extensive the war preparations are - and we can see the build-up is continuing and will do so until the very day that the prophetic wars begin:

Israeli Forebodings Over Widening Russian-Hizballah-Iraqi Intervention In Syria


Forebodings were voiced Wednesday, May 29, by senior Israeli military officers in the face of the widening military intervention in the Syria civil war by Russia, Iran, Hizballah and latterly Iraq too. They have made Syria’s civil war the platform for a Russian contest against the West and a ladder up which Iran and its proxy Hizballah are climbing to top Middle East regional power spot.

Russia, Iran and Hizballah are winning the contest by default against an unresisting US-led West and a hesitant Israel.

A senior IDF officer acknowledged on Wednesday, May 29, that Israel’s government and military leaders are at a loss on how to proceed. They have yet to recover from the calamitous miscalculation that Bashar Assad’s days were numbered to which they clung stubbornly for almost eighteen months.


And we can also see the complete lack of U.S. Support for Israel, predictably:



At a time that the US and Israel should be using their heaviest military guns to slow Iran’s race for a nuclear bomb, Tehran with Moscow's backing has brought its military assets up close to Israel’s borders in Syria and Lebanon and openly threatens to use them.


Unlike Syria and Iran, Israel can’t count on military intervention against an aggressor by supportive big powers.  According to DEBKAfile's Washington sources, no part of the Obama administration, including its military and intelligence arms, favors military action in Syria.

Even the direct evidence of chemical warfare already afoot in Syria is unavailing.

In Addis Ababa, US Secretary of State John Kerry repeated the administration’s mantra Wednesday by denying “concrete evidence” of the use of chemical weapons in Syria.

The Secretary and the rest of NATO were deaf to the vivid testimony brought toLe Monde Wednesday by two reporters, who risked their necks by spending two months concealed in the Jobar district of Damascus. They discovered Russia or Iran had developed a chemical weapon that does not explode. The release of its poisonous gases sounds like popping the top off a can of soda and has "no odor, no smoke, not even a whistle to indicate the release of a toxic gas."

So what does happen?

The Le Monde reporters provided a graphic first-hand description.

"The men cough violently. Their eyes burn, their pupils shrink, their vision blurs. Soon they experience difficulty breathing, sometimes in the extreme; they begin to vomit or lose consciousness. The fighters worst affected need to be evacuated before they suffocate."
Wednesday morning, the Israeli Home Front rehearsed an attack on a Jerusalem suburb by a chemical-tipped missile.

Syrian and Hizballah leaders are declaring loud and clear that a war front against Israel is already operating from the Syrian Golan and Lebanon.
The question is who in Israel is listening. And what is being done to make sure that Assad will be prevented from using chemical weapons against Israeli military and civilian targets at a time of his convenience.


So who is feeding the flames of the Syrian conflict with a generous supply of military hardware? Who but Russia, the self-styled "stabilizing factor”

The senior Israeli officer interviewed by DEBKAfile put all these forebodings into words when he said: "A military and strategic catastrophe for the West and Israel is in full flight in Syria, and no one in Washington or Jerusalem is lifting a finger. Israel’s government and military heads never imagined that the Syrian war would take this turn. But we had better wake up at this eleventh hour - before it is too late.”
 



U.S. Backed Syrian Rebels Reportedly Massacre Christian Village



Members of the Free Syrian Army reportedly attacked the Christian-dominated al-Duvair village in Reef on the outskirts of Homs on Monday, where they massacred its citizens, including women and children, before the Syrian Army interfered.

While the sources describing Monday's massacre are supportive of Assad, it's possible that it occurred since the rebel groups fighting the Assad regime are composed mainly of members of al-Qaeda and al-Qaeda affiliated groups and have committed war crimes and atrocities in the past.

Jabhat al-Nusra, the branch of al-Qaeda that fought and killed American and allied troops in Iraq, have positioned themselves in Syria and control the rebel movement.

The U.S. and other Western governments that are backing the FSA have acknowledged the presence of jihadists but insist that they're only a small part of the rebel movement. However, al-Qaeda and other Islamic extremist groups have been at the front of the rebel movement since day one of the Syrian war that began two years ago. According to German intelligence, 95 percent of the rebels aren't even Syrian.






A Worried Israel Prepares For War

Indeed, in recent weeks there was hardly a day without someone discussing the possibility of real war. Israel, as the New York Times reported less than a week ago, is reluctantly being dragged into Syria’s turmoil.

Israel’s imperative is clear: to prevent the transfer of game-changing weaponry from getting into the wrong hands. It can’t permit Syria to send chemical weapons to Hezbollah in Lebanon, nor can it allow Syria to receive missiles or other weapons systems that will make it harder for Israel to defend itself against future aggression.

Earlier this month, Israeli warplanes attacked targets in Syria to prevent a delivery of Iranian missiles to Hezbollah. There were two Israeli airstrikes in Syria within two days — the second being the third this year, after more than five years without Israeli attacks in Syria.

Given these recent Israeli strikes and Israel’s vows to act “with determination” to achieve its goals, the escalation of rhetorical threats against Israel was probably unavoidable. There are Syrian threats to use missiles against Israel, and  Hezbollah has warned that it may launch a “popular-resistance campaign’’ in the Golan Heights.

As it tries to hold together a fragile peace, Israel has its citizens conduct drills and prepare for the worst. “These days a number of scenarios can lead to a surprise war,” the chief of the Israeli Air Force, Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel, declared a week ago. A “Somalization” of Syria — a scenario that bothIsraeli and Arab diplomats see as a real possibility — would present Israel with a whole new set of security challenges.

Israeli leaders should be telling the public the truth. Choosing to attack Syria is not opting for a good option over a bad one but rather picking a bad option — the risk of war — over another bad one — the risk of letting Israel’s enemies get new weaponry. “A severe case of brinkmanship is being played at the moment,” said a former U.N. peacekeeper in Lebanon. When such game is going on, a sudden state of war can hardly be considered a “surprise.”

Israel's Hope For Peace Not Reciprocated



Israeli leaders went on the offensive against anti-Zionism on Tuesday during speeches at the opening session of the Global Forum for Combating Anti-Semitism in Jerusalem, conflating it with Jew-hatred and defining it as the contemporary manifestation of classical anti-Semitism.

According to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, anti-Semitism is “becoming fashionable again.”

During his pre-taped address, which opened the gathering, Netanyahu said that despite the fact that “anti-Semites took a respite after the Holocaust,” such sentiment was again becoming socially acceptable.

Netanyahu’s sentiments were echoed by Diaspora Affairs Minister Naftali Bennett and Deputy Foreign Minister Ze’ev Elkin, both of whom gave opening remarks at the conference.

Delegitimization of the State of Israel, Bennett said, is always a prerequisite for physical attacks against the Jews. The “phase of dehumanization” came before the Holocaust, and “that’s the exact same M.O. today,” he said, in a reference to the Iranian regime.

Also see:





WHO Calls Middle Eastern Virus, MERS, 'Threat To The Entire World' As Death Toll Rises

Calling it a “threat to the entire world,” the head of the World Health Organization sounded the alarm over the Middle Eastern virus that has so far killed 24 people.

Speaking on Monday in Geneva at the global health monitor’s annual conference, Dr. Margaret Chan did not mince words about the SARS-like novel coronavirus that researchers call MERS.

“Looking at the overall global situation, my greatest concern right now is the novel coronavirus. We understand too little about this virus when viewed against the magnitude of its potential threat. Any new disease that is emerging faster than our understanding is never under control,” Dr Chan said. “These are alarm bells and we must respond. The novel coronavirus is not a problem that any single affected country can keep to itself or manage all by itself. The novel coronavirus is a threat to the entire world.”

One day after Chan’s speech, health officials in France announced the death of a 65-year-old man who had apparently contracted the MERS virus after traveling to Dubai.

French Patient Dies Of New SARS-Related Respiratory Virus