Brief, because preparations for
Shabbat call...
I'll start with the good news that
is so appropriate before Shabbat: An update on Noam Jay ben Inbar, for whom some
of you have been praying.
This is the boy of nine with
cancer growing around his heart, who was thought to be terminal but is now
receiving an experimental drug. The family was thrilled this week, because
he came home from the hospital for Shabbat, as he has before, but was coping so
well he was allowed to stay home until Tuesday. There is
definite improvement in his condition. Please God, let it
continue. (If you would like to make a donation to help with the
expense of the experimental drug, let me know.)
~~~~~~~~~~
Yesterday, the Security Cabinet
approved the deployment of five attack helicopters in the Sinai, in accordance
with a request from Defense Minister Barak. As to the Egyptian
military taking out terrorists, Barak said, they are acting "to an
extent and with a determination that I cannot previously recall."
Although, of course, it's not over yet, this is good news for Israel. What
must be seen in coming days is a sustained effort on the part of Egypt, rather
than a short-term flurry of activity for the sake of revenge or public
relations.
It would be difficult for Israel
to demand that Egypt gain control of the region if they were not permitted the
equipment they need. And, I have to assume, denying the Egyptian the
means to act against terrorists that also threaten them would be severely
detrimental to an already shaky Israeli-Egyptian
relationship.
There is great unease here with
regard to allowing such equipment into the "demilitarized" Sinai -- don't
imagine otherwise. What I'm seeing, however, is that the concern
about a "mega-attack" from jihadist terrorists trumps this unease.
Had the terrorists succeed on Sunday evening, it would have been a national
horror. And the prospects of this happening -- if there is no
concerted effort on the part of the Egyptian military -- far outweigh
the prospects of an attack on Israel now by the Egyptian
military.
~~~~~~~~~~
Egyptian President Muhammed Morsi
has now fired his intelligence chief, Maj. Gen. Murad
Muwafi. Muwafi -- who was responsible for maintaining relations with Israel -- had failed to act on
intelligence Israel had supplied prior to Sunday's attack.
The urgency Morsi felt to act
has nothing to do with the fact that the terrorists were intent on
murder in Israel on a large scale -- this is about the murder of Egyptian
soldiers.
The Egyptian public is greatly
agitated that this happened. During the funeral for the slain
Egyptian soldiers on Tuesday, relatives threw shoes
at newly-appointed Prime Minister Hesham Qandil, while
shouting, "You killed them, you dogs." Other people in the crowd
carried signs that read, "Our condolences to the Egyptians, but not to the dogs
of the Muslim Brotherhood and their President." Wisely, Morsi had decided not to
attend the funerals.
All of this feeds the
speculation in some quarters that the military action now in the Sinai may be
intended to assuage public anger and little more.
What it also tells us is that the
Brotherhood is not in a good place in Egypt right now, with public
sentiment apparently with the military.
~~~~~~~~~~
A report made the news yesterday
indicating that Saudi Arabia has said it would shoot down any Israeli planes in
its airspace that were on their way to an attack on Iran. Allegedly this
information was delivered by US officials visiting here -- this was not a direct
message from the Saudis.
YNet cited senior Israeli
officials who said that "the Americans are leveraging the Saudi threat in an
attempt to dissuade Israel from launching a unilateral offensive on Iran's
nuclear facilities."
That would be my take, because I
know that the Saudis greatly fear the prospect of a nuclear Iran and, while
unwilling to go public with support for Israel, would not be unhappy if Israel
did the job that needs to be done. It has been my understanding that the
Saudis would simply look away. And so, I was fairly astonished and
wondered what the dynamic was -- what the US was holding over
Saudi Arabia.
~~~~~~~~~~
Responding to these news reports,
Barak then denied that Israel has received any such message from the US.
Speaking on Israel Radio, he
said:
"We should not
react or respond to these reports. The issue of attacking Iran is too important
to let a report like this decide in which direction it goes.
"Saudi Arabia is a sovereign state that is
permitted to act based on its own understanding."
A whole lot of
ambiguity in this statement. "Saudi Arabia is a sovereign state..."
Meaning, perhaps that they do not have to proceed according to the will of
the US? That the US should give up on trying to manipulate the situation?
There's a great deal we don't know here.
Barak's
insistence on proceeding is as it should be. He indicated, in fact,
that the latest intelligence makes it all the more important that Iran be
confronted.
~~~~~~~~~~
And then there's
the response of Bahrain to an article that Israel's Ambassador to the US Michael
Oren wrote recently in the Wall Street Journal, in which he said
that sanctions are not working and time is running out.
I wrote about
this earlier this week. Oren's article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443687504577567051040668984.html?mod=googlenews_wsjBahraini Foreign Minister Khalid bin Ahmed bin Mohammed Al Khalifa tweeted a link to this, which is fairly remarkable. A strong indication of where the Gulf States stand with regard to Iran, this suggests that the Saudis would indeed not want to take down Israeli planes.
~~~~~~~~~~
From the time of the horrendous attack in Bourgas, Bulgaria, which killed five Israelis and their Bulgarian bus driver, PM Netanyahu has been saying that this was the work of Iran, via its proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon. Things have been quiet for a while -- with little progress reported on identifying the perpetrator(s) of the terror attack.
Now, according to the NYTimes, "Israeli intelligence has evidence of many telephone calls between Lebanon and Bourgas in the two months before the bombing, according to a senior government official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the information is classified, with the volume intensifying in the three days leading up to it."
To reveal what is known is to expose sources in the field, and so this is a sensitive investigation. But the link seems clear.
~~~~~~~~~~
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Arlene Kushner. This material is produced by Arlene Kushner,
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