Iran Trumps Syrian Peace Bid
By MICHAEL D. EVANS
Published: July 23, 2007
It was a bad weekend for peace, if reports are true that visiting Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promised to provide his ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad, with approximately $1 billion worth of arms, plus help with Syria’s nuclear and chemical weapons research. All this in exchange for cutting off all peace feelers with Israel.
The reports say Iran will provide new combat aircraft, tanks, and anti-ship missiles to the tune of $1 billion. The rest of Iran’s part of the deal is apparently agreeing to support Syrian subversion in Lebanon; which it is already doing anyway by backing Hizbullah. In fact, Hizbullah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah flew back to Teheran with Ahmadinejad on his plane.
Leaks from the leaders’ Damascus meeting were provided by an Iranian source to the Lebanese Arabic daily A-Sharq on Saturday.
Why is this Iranian-Syrian pact a danger to peace? For one thing, Ahmadinejad reportedly promised Assad to help bring down Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora and restore Syrian hegemony. Nasrallah’s trip to Teheran could very well be for the purpose of working out the details.
In addition, Syria is moving ever closer to becoming a wholly owned Iranian subsidiary. While the deal with Ahmadinejad is said to include economic, scientific, and cultural benefits, Assad is becoming more and more dependent on Iran for upgrading the mainstay of his regime, the military.
The Iranian weapons deal reportedly includes a vast array of Russian and North Korean weapons, including some 400 advanced Russian T-72 tanks, 18 Russian MiG 31s, as well as eight M-8 helicopters, and other military equipment – and possibly North Korean missiles.
A-Sharq also reported that Iran has agreed to build Syria a factory for medium-range ballistic missiles. In addition to the Russian T-72s, Iran will supply its home-made tanks and armored personnel carriers. Not to be left out, the Syrian Navy is to receive Chinese-designed, Iranian manufactured shore-to-ship missiles. Hizbullah hit an Israeli missile cruiser with one of these missiles during last summer’s war, killing four sailors.
One aspect of the war that continues unabated since the cease-fire, despite the presence of UN troops, is the smuggling of arms from Syria to Hizbullah in Lebanon. The situation has so deteriorated that the United States told the UN Security Council last week that it has "clear evidence" of Syrian arms smuggling across the border. Confirming this mockery of the cease-fire, the UN team responsible for inspecting border integrity between Syria and Lebanon announced that security measures are incapable of preventing arms smuggling.
Apparently part of the Teheran-Damascus deal was put in motion well in advance of Ahmadinejad’s visit. The Iranian-supported, al-Qaida-inspired terrorist group Fatah al-Islam has been skirmishing with the Lebanese Army at the Nahr a.-Bared Palestinian refugee camp for almost two months. The paper reported that a captured Lebanese man, Ahmed Merie, had testified in military court that he had been a liaison between Fatah al-Islam leader Shaker Abssi and the head of Syrian Military Intelligence, Gen. Asef Shawkat.
Just to make thinks even cozier, Shawkat is Assad’s brother-in-law and also a prime suspect in the murder of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri. In the same rogues’ gallery is Abssi, whom Jordan condemned to death in absentia for helping to murder US diplomat Laurence Foley in Amman in 2002. His partner in the slaying was the late Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former leader of al-Qaida in Iraq.
The real strategic winner in the Teheran-Damascus deal is Iran. On the one hand, it is recouping its losses in last year’s war by re-supplying Hizbullah with more arms than before. On the other, it is maneuvering Syria into position as its proxy for a showdown with Israel. Ahmadinejad knows that Israel takes his threats of annihilation seriously, and hopes to balance the threat of an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure with the threat of another war across northern Israel.
Published: July 23, 2007
It was a bad weekend for peace, if reports are true that visiting Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promised to provide his ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad, with approximately $1 billion worth of arms, plus help with Syria’s nuclear and chemical weapons research. All this in exchange for cutting off all peace feelers with Israel.
The reports say Iran will provide new combat aircraft, tanks, and anti-ship missiles to the tune of $1 billion. The rest of Iran’s part of the deal is apparently agreeing to support Syrian subversion in Lebanon; which it is already doing anyway by backing Hizbullah. In fact, Hizbullah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah flew back to Teheran with Ahmadinejad on his plane.
Leaks from the leaders’ Damascus meeting were provided by an Iranian source to the Lebanese Arabic daily A-Sharq on Saturday.
Why is this Iranian-Syrian pact a danger to peace? For one thing, Ahmadinejad reportedly promised Assad to help bring down Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora and restore Syrian hegemony. Nasrallah’s trip to Teheran could very well be for the purpose of working out the details.
In addition, Syria is moving ever closer to becoming a wholly owned Iranian subsidiary. While the deal with Ahmadinejad is said to include economic, scientific, and cultural benefits, Assad is becoming more and more dependent on Iran for upgrading the mainstay of his regime, the military.
The Iranian weapons deal reportedly includes a vast array of Russian and North Korean weapons, including some 400 advanced Russian T-72 tanks, 18 Russian MiG 31s, as well as eight M-8 helicopters, and other military equipment – and possibly North Korean missiles.
A-Sharq also reported that Iran has agreed to build Syria a factory for medium-range ballistic missiles. In addition to the Russian T-72s, Iran will supply its home-made tanks and armored personnel carriers. Not to be left out, the Syrian Navy is to receive Chinese-designed, Iranian manufactured shore-to-ship missiles. Hizbullah hit an Israeli missile cruiser with one of these missiles during last summer’s war, killing four sailors.
One aspect of the war that continues unabated since the cease-fire, despite the presence of UN troops, is the smuggling of arms from Syria to Hizbullah in Lebanon. The situation has so deteriorated that the United States told the UN Security Council last week that it has "clear evidence" of Syrian arms smuggling across the border. Confirming this mockery of the cease-fire, the UN team responsible for inspecting border integrity between Syria and Lebanon announced that security measures are incapable of preventing arms smuggling.
Apparently part of the Teheran-Damascus deal was put in motion well in advance of Ahmadinejad’s visit. The Iranian-supported, al-Qaida-inspired terrorist group Fatah al-Islam has been skirmishing with the Lebanese Army at the Nahr a.-Bared Palestinian refugee camp for almost two months. The paper reported that a captured Lebanese man, Ahmed Merie, had testified in military court that he had been a liaison between Fatah al-Islam leader Shaker Abssi and the head of Syrian Military Intelligence, Gen. Asef Shawkat.
Just to make thinks even cozier, Shawkat is Assad’s brother-in-law and also a prime suspect in the murder of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri. In the same rogues’ gallery is Abssi, whom Jordan condemned to death in absentia for helping to murder US diplomat Laurence Foley in Amman in 2002. His partner in the slaying was the late Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former leader of al-Qaida in Iraq.
The real strategic winner in the Teheran-Damascus deal is Iran. On the one hand, it is recouping its losses in last year’s war by re-supplying Hizbullah with more arms than before. On the other, it is maneuvering Syria into position as its proxy for a showdown with Israel. Ahmadinejad knows that Israel takes his threats of annihilation seriously, and hopes to balance the threat of an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure with the threat of another war across northern Israel.
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