Assad & Netanyahu: BFFs (says Jerusalem Post)Joanna Paraszczuk and Scott Lucas write:
Step up, Jerusalem Post....
"Israel, Hezbollah, Iran are working with Assad"
Really? We get Hezbollah and Iran the part. But Israel?
Yes, without pausing to reflect --- days after Israeli warplanes struck President Assad's military installations --- the Post is into its lead paragraph:
A Syrian opposition commander has accused Israel of working with Iran and Hezbollah to support Syrian President Bashar Assad in his two -year effort to topple opposing forces, Turkish news network Today's Zaman reported on Sunday.
Ah, so the Post is relying on the credibility of a Turkish newspaper. Over to the Today's Zaman interview with Free Syrian Army officer Abdulkader Saleh:
Iran and Hezbollah are cooperating with Israel to be able to support Assad. Assad has protected Israel's border for 40 years.
Any further explanation? Evidence? Israel Defense Forces mysteriously appearing near Damascus, hand-in-hand with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and waving pictures of Hassan Nasrullah?
No pictures, but Saleh offers this:
The opposition was going to take over arms, so Israel attacked...There were some high-ranking officers with whom [the opposition forces] got into contact. [Those officers] were going to defect from [the Assad administration], handing over arms to the opposition. Israel hit these posts in fear that the opposition would take over the arms. The arms included heavy artillery as well as air defense systems. This assault, of course, was intended to support the Assad administration.
Got it? Israel had no intention of degrading the military capabilities of Assad or blocking weapons to Hezbollah. They were supporting its long-time Syrian friend Bashar --- you know, the one whose proto-nuclear facility was bombed by Israel in 2007, presumably to help Iran and stop the Bomb reaching the "opposition" --- by preventing the insurgency from getting the anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons they have been craving.
Saleh does not explain exactly how Israel knew 1) that high-ranking officers were going to defect or 2) that the officers were going to smuggle out entire air-defense systems under their jackets and many miles across the Jordanian border.
But never mind. Back to the Post:
Despite previous media reports that last week's airstrikes in Syria were an Israeli initiative to aid rebel forces and stop Hezbollah from helping Assad attain destructive weapons, Saleh apparently told Zaman that these reports were false.
Now I don't want to ruin an exclusive report, taken from a Turkey newspaper which interviewed one insurgent officer who may or may not have been making stuff up, but....
Could it possibly be that the Free Syrian Army wanted to distance itself from any notion that it supported Israel, even if Israeli operations damaged its foes? Could it just possibly be that shouting, "Boom! Bang! Brilliant!" after the explosions might have been bad PR?
Could it that Commander Saleh got a bit carried away and ripped out a leaf from The Protocols of the Elders of Zion?
And that the Jerusalem Post just thought, "Boom! Bang! Brilliant! A Conspiracy Story!"?
Just asking.