Too late to stop Iran’s nuke program?

Too late to stop Iran’s nuke program?.

American weapons expert calls ‘Quds’ facility ‘very scary’

Published: 4 hours ago

One of the America’s foremost experts on nuclear weapons calls Iran’s secret “Quds” nuclear facility very scary and a sign the Islamic regime might be close to taking on the world.

In an exclusive March 20 report with updates on March 24, March 25 and April 10, WND revealed the vast “Quds” site. Iranian scientists are trying to perfect nuclear warheads at this underground facility previously unknown to the West.

According to WND’s source, an officer who has been assigned to the regime’s Ministry of Defense, the site, approximately 14 miles long and 7.5 miles wide, consists of two facilities built deep into a mountain along with a missile facility housing over 380 missile silos/garages that is surrounded by barbed wire, 45 security towers and several security posts.

The most significant information provided by the source is that the regime has succeeded in not only enriching to weapons grade but has converted the highly enriched uranium into metal.

Moreover, the source said, successfully making this metal neutron reflector indicates the final stages for a nuclear weapons design that would be a two-stage, more sophisticated and much more powerful nuclear bomb. Regime scientists are also working on a plutonium bomb as a second path to becoming nuclear-armed, the source said, and they have at this site 24 kilograms of plutonium, which is sufficient for several atomic bombs. The scientists are at the last stage of putting together a bomb warhead, he said.

The nuclear weapon-effects test expert, who could not be named but who served at the U.S. Defense Nuclear Agency and who inspected more than 200 tunnel structures of Russian nuclear test sites as well as Russian operational facilities and silos, viewed the imagery of Iran’s new secret facility.

“The site is similar to a common approach by several other nuclear-capable countries which have used advanced design in hardening these types of tunnels or garages for a quick deployable system,” he said. “I understand exactly what Iran has at the site … (including) a very important part of the structures … the apparent hardened underground stub tunnels for secure storage of mobile systems which can be quickly moved to launching sites.”

“… the overheads indicate there are many apparent tunnel portals designed to hold a weapon and/or an operational controlling element (support system) for the weapons, an indication of an advanced design for a quick deployable nuclear weapons system capable of surviving retaliation, very much similar to what the U.S. had in mind in the 1960s in its major confrontation with the Soviet Union. … And it is very scary because its defeat may not be as easy as attacking it with a couple bombers, even if they have nuke weapons. This layout is very scary because it is … ready for the operational weapon systems to be installed, and then they are ready to take on the world.”

The source said there is close collaboration among Iran, North Korea and key figures in China in working on the nuclear warheads and that he will soon reveal detailed information of this collaboration, along with the plans and the timing for both Iran and North Korea to arm their missiles with nuclear warheads. The source emphasized that the world does not have much time but the time for negotiations with the Islamic regime is over.

Other experts also viewed the imagery.

“(The satellite images) suggest the possibility that Iran may in fact be further along in its nuclear weapons program than is generally assumed,” said David Trachtenberg, who for 30 years served in the national security policy field and who, as principal deputy assistant secretary of defense, played a leadership role in nuclear forces and arms control policy. “It is clear they have gone to great lengths to bury and protect high-value assets at this site, which also complicates the possibility of direct military action and illustrates the risks of allowing years to pass while hoping diplomacy will work.

GoogleEarth 12-2012 Image, Quds secret nuclear facility

“An accelerating train is harder to slow and takes longer to stop. These images reinforce my concern that Iranian nuclear progress is accelerating. The more emphatically the U.S. declares its determination to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear weapons state, the harder it may be to ensure that outcome.”

Fritz Ermarth, who served in the CIA and as chairman of the National Intelligence Council, reviewed the satellite photos and said, “(This) imagery strongly suggests that Iran is working on what we used to call an ‘objective force’ … a deployed force of nuclear weapons on mobile missiles, normally based in deep underground sites for survivability against even nuclear attack, capable of rapid deployment.”

“This open-source analysis by itself illustrates that Iran is very serious about building survivable facilities for its nuclear enterprise,” said Dr. Peter Vincent Pry, the executive director of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security, a congressional advisory board. Pry, who has served with the House Armed Services Committee and in the CIA, also reviewed the imagery and added, “The location of the site amid an Iranian missile armory, protected by a vast array of defensive and offensive missiles, is consistent with the intelligence reporting that the site is for the final stages of nuclear weapons development. The complex appears to be the most heavily protected site in Iran.”

“Reza Kahlili (who revealed the Quds site) has provided the West with one of the most critical pieces of evidence of the Iranian government’s drive to break out its nuclear development into a fully operational capability,” said Maj. Gen. Thomas G. McInerney (Ret.). “All the red lines have been crossed. Beware America, Israel and the West, a nuclear Iran is here!”

The U.N. nuclear watchdog, the IAEA, said last week that a 10th round of talks with Iran over Tehran’s efforts to develop nuclear weapons had failed.

Reza Kahlili, author of the award-winning book “A Time to Betray,” served in CIA Directorate of Operations, as a spy in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, counterterrorism expert; currently serves on the Task Force on National and Homeland Security, an advisory board to Congress and the advisory board of the Foundation for Democracy in Iran (FDI). He regularly appears in national and international media as an expert on Iran and counterterrorism in the Middle East.

Iranian Factory Blows Up: Covert Op or Accident?

Iranian Factory Blows Up: Covert Op or Accident? | #1 News Site on the Threat of Radical Islam.

The complex is linked to the Defense Ministry and is next to a Revolutionary Guards’ Missile Research and an Air Force garrison.

By Ryan Mauro

Mon, May 20, 2013

Iranian President Ahmadinejad tour the Natanz nuclear facility. (Photo: © Reuters)

On May 7, three explosions were heard in the vicinity of the Raja-Shimi chemical complex in Tehran Province. Though the Iranian regime claims the site is privately owned and the explosions were part of planned detonations of out-of-date ammunition, local residents confirm that the site is related to Iran’s ballistic missile program.

The complex is linked to the Defense Ministry and is next to the Revolutionary Guards’ Center for Missile Research and an Air Force garrison. The site is suspected of producing ingredients for chemical weapons and fuel for surface-to-surface ballistic missiles, the delivery system for a nuclear warhead. Nearby residents indicate that it is also a missile storage center.

The National Council of Resistance in Iran, an opposition group, reports that off-site firefighters were blocked from having access to the site and that personnel were told not to discuss casualty numbers.

The explosion comes shortly after an Israeli airstrike destroyed an Iranian missile shipment to Hezbollah in Syria and during the same week that regime officials boasted of improving their ballistic missile technology, specifically in solid fuel development.

The Clarion Project has compiled this timeline of possible covert operations against Iran’s nuclear program in recent years:

May 7, 2013: Three explosions at the Raja-Shimi chemical complex in Tehran Province.

January 21, 2013: Iranian opposition sources report a large explosion at the underground uranium enrichment facility at Fordo. The Iranian regime denies the reports and the White House and International Atomic Energy Agency cast doubt. Anonymous international government officials confirm that an explosion happened and the Iranian opposition sources stand by their story.

May 2012: A new cyber attack dubbed “The Flame” is discovered in Iran. It is described as “the ultimate spy” and may be paving the way for acts of sabotage.

May 2012: Defense Onlinereports that at least 10 senior Revolutionary Guards officials have suffered mysterious deaths in recent months.

April 2012: The Iranian government states that its Oil Ministry and Kharg Island terminal, where the majority of Iran’s oil is exported from, were hacked into by foreigners. It denied that there was serious damage but admits that “data related to some of the users have been compromised.”

January 11, 2012: A fifth Iranian nuclear scientist, Mostafa Ahmad Roshan, is killed when two assassins attach a magnetic bomb to his car. The Iranian regime says he was “deputy in charge of commerce” at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility.

December 11, 2011: At least 7 are killed and 12 are wounded in an explosion at a steel plant in Yazd. The site had not been publicly identified as a nuclear or missile site. There are reports that the plant produced steel for making missile exhaust system and/or missile nose cones.

November 12, 2011: A Revolutionary Guards missile base at Bid Kaneh near Tehran is destroyed in a series of explosions. Iran’s top missile engineer is killed.

November 28, 2011: Massive explosions are heard near the Isfahan uranium conversion facility. The Institute for Science and International Security concludes that an underground storage site 400 meters from the facility was destroyed.

November 25, 2011: The Washington Postreports a “fivefold increase in explosions at refineries and gas pipelines since 2010.” The number of gas pipeline explosions increased from 3 in 2009 to 17 in 2010. The explosions undermine Iran’s ability to finance its weapons programs.

October 12, 2011: A Revolutionary Guards base at Khorramabad is destroyed because of an explosion at an ammunition depot. The base had launch pads and storage centers for Shahab-3 ballistic missiles, which Iran has researched how to develop a nuclear warhead for.

October 2011: A new cyber attack, Doqu, is discovered in Iran and nicknamed “Son of Stuxnet.”

July 23, 2011: A fourth nuclear scientist, Darioush Rezaei, is killed when he is shot near his home by assassins on motorcycles. He specialized in neutron transport, the type of expertise needed in triggering nuclear explosions.

November 29, 2010: Motorcycle-riding attackers use magnet bombs to target two nuclear scientists in two different locations. Majid Shahriari, a specialist in neutron transport, becomes the third nuclear scientist to die. Fereidoun Abbasi, who the U.N. had linked to Iran’s nuclear program, survives and is promoted to director of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization.

June 2010: A cyber weapon dubbed “Stuxnet” is discovered in Iran. It is believed to have destroyed one-fifth of the 5,000 centrifuges at the Natanz enrichment facility by speeding up their spins.

In November 2009, only 3,900 centrifuges were operating, down about 1,000 from May. The ones that did operate only produced about half of the uranium they should have. One study found that Iran’s centrifuges were only operating at 20 percent efficiency. Only about half of the centrifuges at Natanz were working, and they were breaking faster than they were being replaced.

The cyber attack may also have targeted the Bushehr nuclear reactor.

January 12, 2010: A second nuclear scientist, Masoud Ali-Mohammadi, is killed when a remote-controlled bomb attached to a motorcycle goes off in Tehran. The Iranian regime compliments him as a “staunch supporter of the Islamic Revolution,” but some opposition sources suspect the regime was behind his death instead of a foreign government. It is reported that a Lebanese Hezbollah operative was seen near the explosion. The scientist was a known supporter of President Ahmadinejad’s rival in the presidential election.

October 2009: David Ignatius of the Washington Postreports on a story in Nucleonics Week that malfunctioning equipment at the Isfahan conversion site led to the contamination of uranium at the Natanz enrichment facility, as far back as 2005.

Summer 2009: An explosion occurs at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility. The chief of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization is subsequently fired.

January 2007: A scientist who works at the Isfahan uranium conversion facility dies. The Iranian regime says he “suffocated by fumes from a faulty gas fire” but a foreign role is widely suspected.

2006: An explosion at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility destroys 50 centrifuges. The Iranian regime blames it on “manipulated equipment.”

After the al Qusayr victory, Syria and Hizballah plan war on Israel

After the al Qusayr victory, Syria and Hizballah plan war on Israel.

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report May 20, 2013, 9:58 PM (IDT)

Al-Qusayr laid waste by Syrian-Hizballah troops

Syria and Hizballah, flushed with the success of breaking the rebel hold on the strategic town of al Qusayr, Sunday, May 19, are making no secret of their plans for the “great confrontation,” i.e. military confrontaiton with  Israel after they win the Syrian civil war.  Israel’s military leaders are taking with the utmost seriousness the words of Ibrahim al-Amin, editor of the Hizballah organ Al Akhbar, and a close buddy of Syrian president Bashar Assad, who wrote Monday:
“The rope is taut. It is taut to the limit. Anyone at either end [Israel at one end, Syrian and Hizballah, at the other] need only flex a finger and it will break, and the great confrontation will take place. This is neither a threat, nor an exaggeration or interpretation. This is the situation on the enemy’s northern front. Now means today; it means this hour,” al-Amin wrote.
Israeli intelligence experts have no doubt that the writer penned those words at the behest of his master, Hizballah’s Hassan Nasrallah, and Bashar Assad.
Israeli spokesmen and media tried hard Monday to play down the scale of the joint force’s success in capturing al-Qusayr, which sits on Syria’s main road to Lebanon and the Damascus high road to the Mediterranean, by harping on the heavy battle losses sustained by Hizballah – 50 dead and many more gravely injured.

But these losses do not detract from the Iranian Lebanese proxy’s pivotal role in the Syrian rebels’ resounding defeat and the Syrian army’s decisive victory.

It cannot be denied that the fateful setback suffered by the Syrian rebels resulted from their being abandoned to their fate at the most critical moment of their uprising by their backers, the US, Turkey, Jordan and the Arab Gulf emirates.

Syrian and Hizballah forces are getting ready to turn east for their next major offensive, the destruction of rebel strongholds in Homs and its outlying villages. Our military sources report the Syrian army has deployed its 14^th Division and an expanded unit of self-propelled artillery for this joint effort. Rebel spokesmen warn that a massacre is in store.

Official: Israel may not have answer to Syrian missiles

Official: Israel may not have answer to Syrian missiles – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Ex-Military Intelligence senior worried Iron Dome may fail against strike on Tel Aviv. ‘Assad losing control of arsenal,’ claims Major-General (res.) Dayan. Russian long-range missiles shipment raises tensions

The Media Line

Published: 05.20.13, 17:41 / Israel News

Israelis awoke to reports that Syrian President Bashar Assad has placed advanced surface-to-surface Tishreen missiles on standby with orders to strike at Tel Aviv if Israel launches another air strike on Syrian targets.

The report was based on reconnaissance satellite photos said to show preparations for the deployment of the missiles, which Israeli analysts say could cause extensive damage to the country.

“I’m not sure Israel has an answer to some of the missiles which the Syrians have and I’m not sure that the (anti-missile system) Iron Dome can be successful here,” Mordechai Kedar, a former senior military intelligence official and professor of Middle East Studies at Bar Ilan University told The Media Line.

Russian S-300 missiles (Archive Photo: AFP)

“So Israel might be exposed to all kinds of attacks by Syria which could use weapons which are not allowed,” he said referring to chemical weapons.

“In short, Israel might face a very big problem, especially where there are large concentrations of population like Tel Aviv,” he continued. The difference between this and all out war with what’s left of the Syrian regime is very close.”

But other experts believe that Syrian President Bashar Assad is not interested in opening another front against Israel while engaged in his battle to survive.

“Syria today is much weaker than it used to be and it will take a long time to regain its military strength,” Major-General (res.) Uzi Dayan, former head of Israel’s National Security Council, told The Media Line. “Assad is losing more and more control of the periphery of the country and parts of his arsenal.”

From Israel’s perspective, he says, the best option for now is for the stalemate between Assad and rebel fighters to continue.

“We don’t want to take sides in what’s happening in Syria but we also don’t want to do anything to accelerate the fall of Assad,” Dayan said. “It’s not good guys vs. bad guys.”

Israel has still not confirmed it was behind two recent strikes on weapons that were reportedly on their way to Hezbollah terrorists in south Lebanon. But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his cabinet that Israel will do whatever is necessary to stop Hizbullah from obtaining more advanced missiles.

“Our policy is to stop, as much as possible, any leaks of advanced weaponry to Hezbollah and other terrorist organizations,” Netanyahu said. “We will continue to act to ensure the security interests of the citizens of Israel.”

Israel is also concerned about the S-300 Russian air defense system which Moscow has pledged to deliver to Syria. Netanyahu himself flew to Russia last week in a failed mission to try and stop the sale.

“These weapons are dangerous,” senior Defense Ministry official Amos Gilad said. “If Hezbollah and Iran support Syria, why shouldn’t (the Syrians) transfer these weapons to Hezbollah? It’s a threat to us, a threat to the Americans and a threat to the Persian Gulf.”

The reference to the Persian Gulf seemed to be implying that Iran could also gain control of this system, either from Hezbollah or directly from Russia.

According to Kedar, it is even possible that Iran could take over Syria if it feels its proxy, Bashar Assad, is losing his grip on Syria.

“Iran can very easily send troops into Syria to take this country (Syria) because Iraq would allow Iranian troops to cross through on their way into Syria,” Kedar said. “This is a feasible scenario. Though the world will object and condemn it, I don’t see any other army which would try to invade Syria only to fight the Iranian army.”

Both Kedar and Dayan say the Assad regime will eventually fall, although it could take many more months. Yet, from Israel’s perspective, what will come after Assad may be even worse.

This article was written by Linda Gradstein

Hezbollah steps up fighting in Syria, Israel threatens more strikes

Israel Hayom | Hezbollah steps up fighting in Syria, Israel threatens more strikes.

Hezbollah fighters reportedly sustain casualties while battling alongside Syrian troops in strategic town of Qusair, bordering Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley • We will act to ensure the security interest of Israel’s citizens, says Netanyahu.

Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff

Syrians inspect the rubble of damaged buildings caused by government airstrikes in Qusair on Saturday | Photo credit: AP

As Hezbollah fighters battled alongside Syrian troops in a Syrian rebel-held town on Sunday, Israel threatened more attacks on Syria to rein in the terrorist group, highlighting the risks of a wider regional conflict if planned peace talks fail.

Activists in Syria said it was the fiercest fighting involving Hezbollah in the country’s two-year civil war. They said that Hezbollah appeared to be helping Syrian President Bashar al-Assad secure a vital corridor in case Syria fragments.

Speaking from Qusair, near the border with Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, activist Hadi Abdallah said Syrian warplanes bombed the town in the morning and shells were hitting the town at a rate of up to 50 per minute. At least 52 people were killed.

“The army is hitting Qusair with tanks and artillery from the north and east while Hezbollah is firing mortar rounds and multiple rocket launchers from the south and west,” he said.

Assad rejected the idea that a U.S. and Russian-sponsored peace conference planned for Geneva next month would end fighting that is deepening the sectarian fault lines between Sunnis and Shiites across the Middle East.

“They think a political conference will halt terrorists in the country. That is unrealistic,” he told the Argentine newspaper Clarin, in reference to the mainly Sunni groups seeking to unseat him.

Assad declared “no dialogue with terrorists,” but it was not clear from his remarks whether he would agree to send delegates to a conference that may falter before it starts due to disagreements between its two main sponsors and their allies.

The Syrian opposition will formulate its stance on the proposed peace conference in a meeting due to start in Istanbul on Thursday, during which it will also appoint new leadership.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, said Israel was “preparing for every possible scenario” in Syria and held out the prospect of more Israeli strikes inside Syria to stop Hezbollah from receiving advanced weapons.

“We will act to ensure the security interests of Israel’s citizens in the future as well,” Netanyahu said.

Israel has neither confirmed nor denied foreign reports that it attacked Iranian-supplied missiles stored near Damascus this month that it believed were awaiting delivery to Hezbollah.

Attacks by troops and militias loyal to Assad have put rebel brigades under pressure in several of their strongholds across the majority-Sunni country of 21 million people.

In one attempt to strike back, opposition sources said rebel fighters had kidnapped the father of Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad in the province of Deraa, one of many tit-for-tat abductions being carried out by both sides.

“Mekdad’s nephew was taken before, and exchanged for Free Syrian Army (rebel) prisoners. The speculation is that a similar deal will be struck for his father,” said activist Al-Mutassem Billah of the opposition Sham News Network.

In the fighting near Lebanon, rebel fighters clashed with mechanized Syrian army units and Hezbollah guerillas in nine points in and around Qusair, 10 kilometers (six miles) from the border, activists said.

The region is needed by Assad to secure a route from Hezbollah’s strongholds in the Bekaa to areas near Syria’s Mediterranean coast where many Alawites live, they said.

Opposition sources say Syria’s coastal region could serve as an Alawite statelet if Assad should lose control of Damascus, while a potential fragmentation of Syria along ethnic and sectarian lines raises the prospect of many more deaths.

Sources in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley said shells fired by rebels had hit the edges of the town of Hermel, a Hezbollah stronghold, but no casualties were reported.

Syrian Television said troops “leading an operation against terrorists in Qusair” had reached the town center.

“Our heroic forces are advancing toward Qusair and are chasing the remnants of the terrorists and have hoisted the Syrian flag on the municipality building. In the next few hours we will give you joyous news,” the television outlet reported.

But the al-Siddiq Brigade, one of several Islamist units defending Qusair, including the al-Qaida-linked al-Nusra Front, said in a statement that attempts to storm the town had failed and that 45 government troops and Hezbollah guerrillas had been killed in the battles.

Abu Imad, another activist in the Qusair region, said the rebel grip was tenuous but the army was far from in control.

“If Qusair falls, it will be a big problem because the regime will be in control of most of the countryside south of the city of Homs and the rebel forces holding Old Homs will be squeezed,” he said.

The United Nations says at least 80,000 people have been killed so far in the conflict.

Russian rock, American hard place

Israel Hayom | Russian rock, American hard place.

Dr. Reuven Berko

The root of Sunni Muslim absurdity lies in its expectation of being saved by the “Crusader” West.

In their current view, the West is supposed do their dirty work for them in Syrian and Iran. In the meantime, the Arab media continues to discuss how both sides have failed to fight Israel and to describe the events in Syria as a “Zionist plot.” In the Arab media’s eyes the Arab spring is dying in Syria and Israel is the beneficiary.

The inter-religious and inter-ethnic blood feud in Syria outlines a picture of the future “statelets” taking form once the country crumbles: Kurdish, Sunni, and Alawite-Christian. It appears likely that in any future scenario Assad will be unable to rule over his people, not even through his campaign of continued slaughter and oppression.

Even though the Russians have made a desperate gamble on Assad, despite understanding that his fate is sealed, it is increasingly apparent that the Russians won’t have a solid foothold in Syria for the foreseeable future. The Syrian people, the majority of whom are Sunni, harbor a searing hatred toward the Russians fighting against them. The Russians, however, don’t have a choice. They need to protect their weapons-purchasing client and their access to the Mediterranean Sea; in other words their Middle East outpost. They don’t believe in democracy and won’t be enticed into just letting their darling Assad fall.

The air attacks in Syria, attributed in foreign reports to Israel, signaled to the West that Iran can also be hit and exposed the Syrian arsenal as a paper tiger. The attacks forced the Russians to display more advanced capabilities and provide their ally with a means of deterrence. So, they armed the Syrians with modern weaponry and reinvigorated the Cold War. By taking this step the Russians signaled to the West that outside intervention in Syria and Iran will not be feasible.

Israel’s desire to defend itself has dragged it into the middle of a fight between two global superpowers, with only hesitant support from its American “protector.” The possibility that Russia will allow a pro-American government to rise in Syria only exists in the imagination of naïve statesmen such as U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.

Regarding the Iranians, the situation in Syria points to the disintegration of the Shiite axis and highlights the Syrian people’s undying hatred toward them. The violent conflict is also inevitable between Sunnis and Shiites in other axis countries, such as Iraq and Lebanon. Iran, meanwhile, is relishing the spotlight’s shining on Syria, as it quietly continues developing a nuclear bomb and sending troops and weapons, along with Hezbollah, to Assad.

The situation in Syrian exposes the a-symmetrical nature of the “Cold War” between Russia and the West. This stems from America’s track record of tentativeness, on the Iranian front as well. The Russians brazenly support the Syrian regime as part of the Iran-Iraq-Hezbollah axis, defiantly transfer lethal weaponry to the Syrian regime and disregard Israel. America’s weakness has led to the strengthening of Russia’s deterrence.

In contrast to the Russians, the Western-led alliance of the United States, NATO, Turkey and the Arabs, provides the Syrian opposition with funds, training, material support and non-lethal arms, but has avoided direct involvement. The Western dilemma stems from the radical Islamic elements comprising the Syrian opposition, which are not preferable to Assad.

The Americans have learned the hard way as Islamists they once helped eventually turned their guns toward them. However, just as the Iranian nuclear program is not aimed only at Israel, the Russian armament of Syria isn’t aimed only at the U.S. Therefore, similar to Iran — here, too, the Americans have the right to be heard. In regard to Syria, there is much to say.

Hezbollah suffers heavy losses in Syria

Hezbollah suffers heavy losses in Syria – Israel News, Ynetnews.

At least 20 members of Shiite group fighting alongside Syrian troops killed in battles in Qusair. Meanwhile, IDF post observes firing directed at Israel from Syrian side of border

Yoav Zitun, Maor Buchnik

Published: 05.20.13, 08:39 / Israel News

An IDF observation post in the border area in the Golan Heights reported detecting small arms firing from the Syrian side of the border at an open area in Israel. No injuries or damage were reported.

A complaint was lodged with the United Nations. The army is checking whether fire had indeed been directed at Israel.

Meanwhile, Al-Arabiya TV reported that at least 20 Hezbollah fighters were killed in battles in the Syrian rebel-held town of Qusair. Their bodies were transported to hospitals in Beirut. One of those killed was senior Hezbollah official Fadi al-Jazar.

According to the report, al-Jazar had previously been held in Israel and released as part of a prisoner exchange deal. In addition, 62 wounded, many of them Hezbollah combatants, were taken to hospitals in Lebanon.

Rebels in Qusair (Photo: AP)

On Sunday, Syrian troops aided by Hezbollah launched a massive assault on the rebel-held city near the Lebanese border.

Speaking from Qusair, activist Hadi Abdallah said Syrian warplanes bombed Qusair in the morning and shells were hitting the town at a rate of up to 50 a minute. At least 52 people were killed, he said.

“The army is hitting Qusair with tanks and artillery from the north and east while Hezbollah is firing mortar rounds and multiple rocket launchers from the south and west,” he said.

“Most of the dead are civilians killed by the shelling.”

The region near the Orontos River has been segregated into Sunni and Shiite villages in the civil war that grew out of protests against Syrian President Bashar Assad.

It is vital for Assad, who belongs to the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam, to keep open a route from Shiite Hezbollah’s strongholds in the Bekaa to areas near Syria’s Mediterranean coast inhabited by co-religionist Alawites.