U.S., Arab Allies Nix Israeli Airstrike on Syrian Site
An Israeli plan to launch an airstrike against a Palestinian camp in Syria during its recent invasion of Gaza was vetoed by the George W. Bush administration using pressure from allies like Egypt and Turkey, according to administration officials.
"There was zip support for expanding the war," one State Department official said.
The targeted was the Hamas camp in the town of Yarmouk, Syria, some 15 kilometers east of Damascus, where Hamas opened an office in 1991 and which quickly became the operational nerve center for the group's military wing, these sources said.
More than a dozen senior Hamas leaders were to attend a meeting at the refugee camp, and the Israeli strike was designed to decapitate the group's top leadership at a single stroke including Khaled Meshaal, chief of the movement's political bureau, these sources said.
The United States got wind of the operation through its human sources in Israel as well as by technical means, former U.S. intelligence officials said. The National Security Agency (NSA) and other U.S. groups stepped up scrutiny of Israel during "Operation Cast Lead," launched in late December.
The NSA has a Ground Remote Listening Facility or GROF based on Cyprus which sends data in real time to the agency's headquarters at Ft. Meade, MD. Flights of Rivet Joint flights consisting of RC-135s, an extension of the former Senior Stretch program, which fly from Athens, were also stepped up. Such aircraft contain Hebrew linguists who send their take to Menden Hill in England where it is forwarded to the U.S. embassy in London.
Other NSA resources included Six Fleet ELINT aircraft and RC-135s based in Spain, these sources said.
The joint-run NSA/CIA listening post in the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv was also utilized, they said.
Since Syria had assisted the United States in killing a senior al-Qaida official in Lebanon recently, U.S. opposition materialized quickly.
"Syria was acting in strict neutrality during Cast Lead," suppressing any attempt by Hezbollah in Lebanon to aid Hamas, a U.S. official said.
Soon, Turkish President Abdullah Gul, a friend of Israel, and Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak bluntly told Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that extending the war to Syria would be "reckless," according to one U.S. official.
Although some in the administration warmly supported Israel's mauling of Hamas, several former U.S. intelligence officials expressed disapproval. "The Hamas-Israel cease-fire was not a useless cease-fire," said former U.S. Ambassador David Mack.
Hamas was exercising some restraint even though there were violations of it on both sides. For example, Hamas did fire rockets, and last November, Israel sent in a sizeable ground force into southern Gaza to destroy tunnels used for smuggling weapons, U.S. officials said.
But Mack blamed the severity of the Israeli economic blockade as a key cause of the Israeli-Hamas breakdown. "When you drive legitimate commerce underground and make it difficult for people to earn a living, it's clear the population will turn to other things like weapons smuggling. Israel never eased its economic blockade."
Meshaal has proved a particularly embarrassing thorn in Israel's side. On Sept. 25, 1997, in Amman, the capital of Jordan, Meshaal was attacked by two men as he got out of his car. One of them jabbed a hypodermic needle behind his ear and the other stuck a needle in his arm. Meshaal, gravely poisoned, soon found himself in an emergency room fighting for his life, and Israel was frantically trying to dig its way out of a mountain of embarrassment.
Meshaal's two attackers were agents of Israel's Mossad, and both had been captured by Meshaal's bodyguards in Jordan, a country with which Israel had a peace treaty. Jordan's King Hussein quickly announced that the Israeli agents would be executed if an antidote wasn't sent to Amman in 48 hours. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu quickly sent the antidote that would save Meshaal's life.
Jordan then pressured Israel into releasing Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the spiritual leader of Hamas who had spent eight years in prison for ordering killings of Israeli soldiers and executing Israeli spies among the Palestinians. A few years later, Israel assassinated Yassin.
As for Meshaal, Israeli had no intention of letting go. In 2004, Israel sent five agents into the camp at Yarmouk, where all were captured by the Hamas leader's bodyguards and interrogated. They confessed they had been assigned by Mossad to assassinate Meshaal and had entered Syria through Jordan.
In July of 2006 again Mossad sent agents into Syria, disguised as aid workers, to kill the Hamas leader, but Meshaal was tipped off and escaped.
The foiled airstrike would have been the third attempt on Meshaal's life.
Its real hard coming to grips with the fact that the world is just better off without some people in it, but its getting easier......
Regards,
CL
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