Missions would include the demolition of the vast stores of conventional and unconventional weapons in Syria to prevent their falling into the hands of militants, he said.

“If Syria collapses tomorrow we could find ourselves in the thick of it — very fast and in great numbers (of planes),” he said during a security conference at the Institute for Air and Space Strategic Studies in Herzliya. “There is an immense arsenal parked there, just waiting to be looted. It could spread with each gust of wind and you will find yourself having to act very fast.”

Eshel said the Assad regime could fall at any moment and many groups were eager to lay their hands on its weapon stockpiles.

Unlike the month-long cross-border war with Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia in 2006, in which Israel used only a small portion of its air strength, the air force would this time use every plane at its disposal in order to achieve its operational goals in a matter of days, he said.

These goals include opening a path for the ground army to advance on targets across the northern border.

Rhetoric in Israel has escalated in recent days with unusual intensity following statements by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad that Syria would no longer ignore Israel’s air attacks inside Syria on weapons bound for Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Additionally, the Syrian government took responsibility this week for firing at an Israeli jeep in the Golan Heights. The attack was seen as an attempt to restore injured national pride. Israel said its return fire killed three Syrian soldiers.

Officials in Jerusalem have warned that Israel might be drawn into the Syrian civil war despite its stated desire to stay on the sidelines. If war breaks out, the officials warned, Israeli cities would this time be on the front line.

“The question is no longer whether rockets will be fired at densely populated areas in Israel,” Home Front Minister Gilad Erdan was quoted as saying in the Times of Israel and elsewhere Tuesday. “The question is when it will happen.”

Maj. Gen. Eyal Eisenberg, in charge of Home Front Command, said Israeli cities would be subjected in the next war to an unprecedented barrage of missiles. It was “a certainty,” he said, that Israel would be hit with large warheads in a confrontation that would test the mettle of the civilian sector.

However, he warned Hezbollah and Syria that they would pay a heavy price for any such attack.

“Israel possesses far greater destructive power than our enemies,” he said, according to Israeli media reports. “And I would advise them to weigh the odds once more before warming up the engines.”

AMMAN (Reuters) – About 30 Lebanese Hezbollah fighters and 20 Syrian soldiers and militiamen loyal to President Bashar al-Assad have been killed in the fiercest fighting this year in the rebel stronghold of Qusair, Syrian activists said on Monday.

If confirmed, the Hezbollah toll from Sunday’s battles in Qusair near the Lebanese border would highlight a deepening intervention in Syria by the guerrilla group set up by Iran in the 1980s to fight Israeli occupation troops in south Lebanon.

The reported Hezbollah losses also reflect the extent to which the Syrian conflict is turning into a proxy war between Shi’ite Iran and U.S.-aligned Gulf Arab states such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar, which back Assad’s mostly Sunni foes.

Western countries and Russia, an ally of Damascus, back opposing sides in this regional free-for-all which is also sucking in Israel. Three times this year Israeli planes have bombed presumed Iranian arms stocks destined for Hezbollah.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country was “preparing for every scenario” in Syria and held out the prospect of more Israeli strikes inside Syria to stop Hezbollah and other opponents of Israel getting advanced weapons.

Israel has not confirmed or denied reports by Western and Israeli intelligence sources that its raids targeted Iranian missiles stored near Damascus that it believed were awaiting delivery to Hezbollah, which fought a war with Israel in 2006.

FOG OF WAR

Syrian opposition sources and state media gave widely differing accounts of Sunday’s ferocious clashes in Qusair, long used by rebels as a supply route from the nearby Lebanese border to the provincial capital Homs. Hezbollah has not commented.

The air and tank assault on the strategic town of 30,000 people appeared to be part of a campaign by Assad’s forces to consolidate their grip on Damascus and secure links between the capital and government strongholds in the Alawite coastal heartland via the contested central city of Homs.

The government campaign has coincided with efforts by the United States and Russia, despite their differences on Syria, to organize peace talks to end a conflict now in its third year in which more than 80,000 people have been killed.

A total of 100 combatants from both sides were killed in Sunday’s offensive, according to opposition sources, including the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Troops have already retaken several villages around Qusair and have attacked increasingly isolated rebel units in Homs.

“If Qusair falls, God forbid, the opposition in Homs city will be in grave danger,” said an activist who called himself Abu Jaafar al-Mugharbil.

State news agency SANA said the army had “restored security and stability to most Qusair neighborhoods” and was “chasing the remnants of the terrorists in the northern district”.

However, opposition activists said rebels in Qusair, about 10 km (six miles) from the Lebanese border, had pushed back most of the attacking forces to their original positions in the east of the town and to the south on Sunday, destroying at least four Syrian army tanks and five light Hezbollah vehicles.

The Western-backed leadership of the Free Syrian Army, the loose umbrella group trying to oversee hundreds of disparate rebel brigades, said the Qusair fighters had thwarted Hezbollah with military operations it dubbed “Walls of Death”.

Syrian government restrictions on access for independent media make it hard to verify such videos and accounts.

“NO DIALOGUE WITH TERRORISTS”

The fighting raged as Western nations seek to step up pressure on Assad – Britain and France want the European Union to allow arms deliveries to rebels – while preparing for the peace talks brokered by Russia and the United States next month.

Assad has scorned the idea that the conference expected to convene in Geneva could end a war that is fuelling instability and deepening Sunni-Shi’ite rifts 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 Syria’s mainly Sunni rebels.

Assad ruled out “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 fractured Syrian opposition is to discuss the proposed peace conference at a meeting due to start in Istanbul on Thursday, during which it will also appoint a new leadership.

Attacks by troops and militias loyal to Assad, who inherited power in Syria from his father in 2000, have put rebels under pressure in several of their strongholds in recent weeks.

Assad, from Syria’s minority Alawite sect, has been battling an uprising which began with peaceful protests in March 2011. His violent response eventually prompted rebels to take up arms.

Hezbollah has supported Assad throughout the crisis but for months denied reports it was fighting alongside Assad’s troops.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights put the Hezbollah casualties on Sunday at 23 dead and more than 70 wounded, while 48 rebel fighters and four civilians were also killed.

Tareq Murei, an activist in Qusair, said six more people were killed on Monday as Syrian army artillery and Hezbollah rocket launchers bombarded rebel-held parts of the town.

Video footage purportedly showed a Syrian tank on fire at a street corner in the town. In another video a warplane was shown flying over the town amid the sound of explosions.

Lebanese security sources said at least 12 Hezbollah fighters were killed in Qusair on Sunday. Seven were to be buried in the Lebanese town of Baalbek and nearby villages on Monday.

“Using the full range of tools, the United States will continue to work toward achieving our goal of ending the violence and helping the Syrian people transition to a post-Assad authority,” Hagel said during the Washington Institute for Near East Policy’s Soref Symposium, an annual Washington, D.C., gathering that focuses on tracking unrest in the Middle East.

Hagel stopped short of saying the U.S. would commit military forces. However, he said the Obama administration will not permit Assad to continue killing citizens.

Toppling Assad “will help restore stability, peace, and hope for all Syrian people,” Hagel said, according to his prepared remarks. “That goal is shared by our allies in the region—not only those bordering Syria, but also our partners in the Gulf.”

Hagel warned that the longer the conflict drags on, the more likely extremist jihadis are to gain a foothold in the country.

“As you all know, the conflict in Syria is intensifying and becoming more sectarian,” he said. “The possibilities of state fragmentation are increasing, as are the risks of extremism and proliferation.”

While the Obama administration has been sharply criticized for not providing weaponry to the Syrian opposition, Hagel maintained it is “leading the international community in organizing and applying sanctions.”

The United States is the single largest provider of humanitarian aid in Syria, committing nearly $510 million to date, Hagel said.

“We have given non-lethal assistance to the Syrian opposition, including the armed opposition, and that support is growing,” he said. “The U.S. military has been very involved in delivering those supplies. We are also urging Russia and China to do more to help resolve this conflict, because it is also in their interests to end the war.”

Hagel went on to discuss the multiple regional challenges the United States faces in combatting extremism and maintaining close relationships with a region in flux.

“The old order in the Middle East is disappearing, and what will replace it remains unknown,” Hagel said. “There will continue to be instability in the region as this process plays out, and we all must adjust accordingly.”

Hagel said, “The best hope for long-term stability relies on countries like Egypt, Libya, and Syria making transitions to democratic rule.”

Hagel also discussed the details of two wide-ranging arms deals the United States recently signed with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

“While in Saudi Arabia and the UAE, I finalized agreements to provide their Air Forces with access to significant new capabilities,” he said.

Saudi Arabia, for instance, will be given “84 Boeing F-15SA fighter aircraft,” Hagel

The United Arab Emirates will “purchase … 25 F-16 Desert Falcons, which will further enhance their ability to participate in coalition operations such as Libya and Afghanistan, where they have made important contributions,” Hagel said.

Iran also remains a top U.S. concern in the region.

The Defense Department has recently moved “high-end air, missile defense, and naval assets” to the Persian Gulf in order to “deter Iranian aggression and respond to other contingencies,” Hagel said.

The defense secretary also warned that while terror groups such as al Qaeda may be declining in strength, other radical groups are quickly taking its place.

“Al Qaeda has been substantially weakened in recent years,” but “affiliated terrorist groups like the al-Nusra Front are seeking new footholds in the region,” Hagel said.

He also discussed his recent trip to Israel, where the United States and the Jewish state cemented news arms deals.

“One of the core principles of U.S.-Israel security cooperation is America’s commitment to maintain Israel’s qualitative military edge—its capacity to defeat any threat or combination of threats from state or non-state actors,” Hagel said.

“Beyond rocket and missile defense cooperation, DoD has been working for more than a year to increase Israel’s ability to confront and respond to a range of other threats,” he explained.

The United States agreed last month to give Israel a slew of new weapons that will help it combat the threat from Iran and other hostile nations.

These include “anti-radiation missiles and more effective radars for its fleet of fighter jets, KC-135 refueling aircraft, and the V-22 Osprey,” Hagel said. “Along with Israel’s status as the only Middle Eastern nation participating in the Joint Strike Fighter program, this new capabilities package will significantly upgrade their qualitative military edge.”

Hagel also praised Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood just hours after opposition leaders and other experts slammed the group for shirking its democratic responsibilities.

“Among the most important of these relationships [in the Middle East] is our defense partnership with Egypt,” Hagel said, noting that the Defense Department is working directly “with the Egyptians to help them improve their capabilities to deal with these challenges, and counter terrorism.”

Hagel affirmed “America’s continued commitment to our strategic partnership” during recent meetings with Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi and other senior government figures.

He also expressed  “continued desire to work together to achieve common security objectives.”

“As President Morsi and the Egyptian government work to implement political and economic reform, they will find a strong partner in the United States,” Hagel said.

Iran responded to cables from the United States and Russia over the weekend by saying that Syrian forces aligned with President Bashar al-Assad have been instructed to immediately retaliate against Israel, according to Israeli news site Ynet, which translated a report first published in a Hezbollah-aligned Lebanese newspaper.

The instructions followed Israeli strikes on Syrian weapons facilities that contained Iranian-made weapons waiting to be shipped to Hezbollah forces in Lebanon.

“Iranian officials have warned that their reaction to preceived [sic] aggressions would likely would be expressed in one of two ways,” Ynet reported. “The first, one of the sources said, would be ‘a blow below the belt in more than one location’” both within and outside of Syria, as they approached ‘the Day of Judgment.’

Iran has issued “a final decision” to turn “the Golan Heights in the ‘Fatahland,’” the source told Ynet. Syrians, Palestinians, and “all who want to fight Israel” would be encouraged to storm the northern front.

Iran is also planning a conference on the Syrian crisis in Tehran, according to Ynet.

“Preparations are currently underway for a far-reaching Syria conference, to be held in Tehran, in which the Syrian regime will be represented by Syrian Minister for National Reconcilation [sic] Ali Haider and by the Syrian Deputy Prime Minister Qadri Jamil,” according to the report.

Meanwhile, a top Iranian envoy blamed the United States and Israel for spurring the civil war in Syria on Wednesday.

“The U.S. and the Zionist regime are the main plotters of the Syrian crisis and the recent attack of the Zionist regime’s warplanes on the country is the best evidence for this claim and proves that the Takfiri groups, which have come to Syria from abroad, are fully coordinated with the (Zionist) regime,” Iranian Ambassador to Beirut Qazanfar Roknabadi was quoted as saying by Iran’s Fars News Agency.

Roknabadi’s comments were made during a meeting of “international human rights activists” held at the Iranian embassy in Beirut, according to Fars.

Roknabadi went on to warn the United States against intervening in Syria.

“The Islamic Republic of Iran opposes any foreign interference in Syria and has called on all foreign sides to stop weapons and financial aids to armed groups and remain committed to their international responsibility for settling the Syrian crisis,” Roknabadi said.

A top Syrian army strategist also speculated that pro-Assad forces would retaliate against Israel.

“This move will not remain unanswered,” Syrian military analyst Turki Hassan said on Wednesday.

“In Israel … there is no place out of the range of the Syrian army and no Patriot or Iron Dome missiles (shield) can stand up to Syria’s reprisal,” Hassan said, explaining that forces are waiting on attack orders from Assad.

Kerry was touting United States and Russian cooperation in finding a solution to end the Syrian civil war when he admitted that removing Assad is not the top priority.

“There’s actually more agreement even though our position has been that it’s impossible for me as an individual to understand how Syria could possibly be governed in the future by the man who has committed the things that we know have taken place,” Kerry said after meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Moscow.

“But that’s not—I’m not going to decide that tonight,” Kerry said. “And I’m not going to decide that in the end.”

The State Department has repeatedly said Assad’s “days are numbered.”

President Barack Obama released a statement Tuesday that called for Assad to step down, saying that the Syrian regime needs to end its “violent war” and “step aside to allow a political transition in Syria.”

Obama first called on Assad to resign in August 2011, saying that it should be done “for the sake of the Syrian people.”’

Stepping back from the administration’s insistence on Assad stepping down comes as an attempt by the United States and Russia to work together on options for Syria, according to Foreign Policy:

Kerry framed his refusal to say that Assad should step down as in line with the June 2011 Geneva communiqué, which was supposed to provide a roadmap for a negotiated settlement in Syria. The communiqué, which was agreed to by both Russia and the United States, ducked the issue of Assad’s future by saying that each side — the Syrian opposition and the regime — would be able to veto candidates for an interim government who they found unacceptable. Presumably, the opposition would veto Assad while the regime would veto radical Islamist groups like the al Qaeda-linked Jabhat al-Nusra.

Washington and Moscow seem prepared to move quickly to get both sides to the negotiating table. Kerry said that Russia would try to arrange a conference as early as this month.

TAMRON HALL: Senator John McCain says, quote, I think it is pretty clear, obvious that a red line has been crossed. What is your response to his remark?

ROBERT MENENDEZ: Well, if we nailed down what we believe, that Assad did in fact have a limited use of chemical weapons against his own people, yes. [...]

]]> http://freebeacon.com/menendez-if-intel-correct-i-agree-with-mccain-on-assad-crossing-red-line/feed/ 0 http://freebeacon.com/u-s-believes-assad-regime-used-chemical-weapons/ http://freebeacon.com/u-s-believes-assad-regime-used-chemical-weapons/#comments Thu, 25 Apr 2013 18:07:17 +0000 Washington Free Beacon Staff http://freebeacon.com/?p=96271 The United States now believes the Assad regime has used small amounts of chemical weapons in Syria, administration officials said Thursday.

The White House confirmed that U.S. intelligence agencies “assess with varying degrees of confidence” the use of chemical weapons, in a letter to Sens. Carl Levin (D., Mich.) and John McCain (R., Ariz.).

“Our intelligence community does assess with varying degrees of confidence that the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale in Syria, specially the chemical agent sarin,” the letter reads. “This assessment is based on physiological samples. Our standard of evidence must buildon these intelligence assessments as we seek to establish credible and corroborated facts. For example, the chain of custody is not clear, so we cannot confim how the exposure occurred and under what conditions.”

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Thursday that administration believes the Assad regime, rather than opposition fighters, is responsible for the weapons.

“I have been in contact with senior officials in Washington today and most recently the last couple of hours on this issue,” Hagel told reporters in Abu Dhabi. ”We cannot confirm the origin of these weapons, but we do believe that any use of chemical weapons in Syria would very likely have originated with the Assad regime.”

Blood samples from multiple people have tested positive for sarin, a nerve agent, officials told Danger Room Thursday.

President Barack Obama has repeatedly isolated the use of chemical weapons as an action that would cross a “red line” required for U.S. military action.

The White House said Thursday “intelligence assessments alone are not sufficient” in the Congressional letter for administration “decision-making.”

“Only credible and corroborated facts that provide us with some degree of certainty will guide our decision-making,” the White House director of legislative affairs, Miguel Rodriguez, writes in the letter.

Hagel told reporters the United States will move to “fully investigate” the assessments through allies and the United Nations.

“The president has made it clear that the use of chemical weapons or the transfer of such weapons to terrorist groups would be unacceptable,” Hagel said. ”The United States has an obligation to fully investigate – including with all key partners and allies, and through the United Nations – evidence of chemical weapons use in Syria.”

More than 70,000 people have died in the Syrian civil war, which began more than two years ago.

Update (2:14 p.m.): A senior White House said Thursday it is not yet clear whether the administration’s red line has been crossed during a conference call with reporters, Foreign Policy’s Josh Rogin reports:

A senior White House official said on the conference call that the intelligence community’s assessment was not enough to determine that President Obama’s red line regarding U.S. intervention in Syria has been crossed.

“We are continuing to do further work to establish a strong, firm, evidentiary basis to determine whether or not the red line has been crossed,” the official said. “If we make a determination that the red line has been crossed… what we will be doing is consulting with friends and allies as to the next steps forward.” [...]

“It is crucial, given our own history with intelligence assessments, including intelligence assessments on weapons of mass destruction… that we are able to present evidence that is airtight,” the official said. “It is absolutely the case that the president’s red line is the use of chemical weapons or the transfer of chemical weapons to terrorist groups. Our standard of evidence has to build on these intelligence assessments. We want to continue to investigate.”

The white House official also declined to say what options might be on the table.

A senior Israeli intelligence official, Brig. Gen. Itai Brun, told a security conference Tuesday that “in our assessment, the (Syrian) regime has used, and is using, chemical weapons.”

Israel has warned it will take action if it discovers Syria has transferred chemical weapons to “hostile forces,” an apparent reference to Hezbollah or jihadi militias battling the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, but it has never issued warnings regarding the regime’s use of such weapons against the rebels.

However, the United States has issued such warnings: President Barack Obama cautioned the Assad regime in a speech last month, “We will not tolerate the use of chemical weapons against the Syrian people. … The world is watching, and we will hold you accountable.”

Gen. Brun, who heads the research department of Military Intelligence, said the Syrian army had used lethal chemicals, probably based on Sarin nerve gas, against rebels “on a number of occasions”. Photographs, he said, had shown victims foaming from the mouth and with decreased pupil size, signs of a chemical attack.

Brun said the absence of international condemnation “could signal that such use is legitimate.” His remarks are the first time an Israeli official has given backing to charges of chemical warfare emanating from Syria.

Hagel said two days ago that U.S. intelligence agencies are still assessing whether chemical weapons were used in Syria. “The Syrian government’s use of chemical weapons would be a game changer,” he said. There was no immediate American reaction to Brun’s statement.

The aim of Hagel’s visit was to coordinate the positions of Jerusalem and Washington, particularly on Iran, and to assure Israel of America’s support by an infusion of weaponry.

This includes tankers for midair refueling, which would help sustain an attack on Iran by the Israeli air force, as well as the V-22 Osprey, an aircraft capable of vertical lift-off like a helicopter and the high-speed flight of a conventional aircraft. The Osprey could be useful for rescuing downed pilots in Iran or for inserting special forces behind Hezbollah lines if war breaks out with Lebanon.

Israeli commentators see Washington’s gift as coming with strings attached.

“The military and diplomatic aid from the United States, which is slated to grow, will also require Jerusalem to coordinate fully with Washington in the most sensitive matter, the handling of the Iranian nuclear threat,” wrote Ha’artez’s military correspondent Amos Harel. “[This] will limit Israel’s ability to act independently on this issue despite the lip service paid by Hagel and U.S. President Barack Obama a month before him to Israel’s right to act independently to protect itself.”

The Assad regime in Syria has large quantities of chemical weapons spread throughout the country capable of being deployed on missiles, according to the written reports of Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and Gen. Michael Flynn, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency.

Clapper refused to provide an assessment of whether the Syrian regime had used chemical weapons against the opposition and crossed the “red line” set by President Barack Obama.

His testimony comes as American intelligence agencies are seeing credible evidence of chemical weapons use for the first time.

Seventy-five thousand people have been killed in the civil war and an al Qaeda affiliate has established a presence in the country, Clapper and Flynn testified.

The collapse of the Assad regime would be a “huge strategic loss for Iran,” Clapper said. Iran has sent forces into the country to support the regime’s fight against the insurgents.

Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.) expressed exasperation that the United States has not intervened in the conflict.

“All of this might have been avoided if we hadn’t sat by and watched it happen,” McCain said.

The ongoing conflict in Syria was part of the larger discussion of the range of threats against the United States.

“In almost 50 years of intelligence, I don’t remember when we’ve had a more diverse array of threats and crisis situations around the world to deal with,” Sen. Jim Inhofe (R., Okla.) said, quoting Clapper.

The discussion ranged from the threats posed by different countries—like Libya and Mali, Iran, China, and North Korea—as well as other threats common to several countries, like cyber warfare.

Multiple senators asked about the recent leak of a classified assessment by the Defense Intelligence Agency that North Korea likely had the ability to mate a nuclear warhead and a missile.

Clapper sought to qualify the assessment by emphasizing that the intelligence community does not agree on this point. The Defense Intelligence Agency is more confident about this point than the other intelligence agencies, Clapper said.

Flynn stood by his intelligence agency’s assessment but emphasized that it was only one line in a seven-page, classified report.

Clapper did say North Korea is moving in the direction of a nuclear missile.

“They have what appears to be the basic ingredients for nuclear missiles,” he said.

Clapper also said North Korean decision-making lies with one person, Kim Jong-un.

“I think he’s driven by the need to prove his position, consolidate his power, and a lot of what he’s doing and saying are driven by messages to a domestic audience and the international audience,” Clapper said.

The senators also asked about Iran’s nuclear capability. Clapper said the most likely route Iran would take to a nuclear weapon is covert—a path that would slow down their ability to make a weapon. A rush to a nuclear weapon, known as a “breakout,” would be more easily detectable but would still take several months, not years, Clapper said.

Clapper and Flynn declined to answer many questions in open session—including whether Pakistan’s nuclear weapons are secure—preferring instead to discuss them in a classified setting.

Flynn and Clapper also criticized the cuts to the military and intelligence agency currently being implemented in the mandatory federal spending cuts. Clapper drew a parallel between the current cuts and the “peace dividend” that President Bill Clinton pursued in the 1990s that resulted in the gutting of the intelligence services—a gutting that was only reversed after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an anti-Assad group based in Britain with a network of contacts inside Syria, said military forces had started the assault against Sanamayn on Wednesday, shelling and shooting randomly and burning or wrecking at least 20 houses. Victims included at least seven women and five people under the age of 18, the group said. [...]

Syria’s main political opposition group, the National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, described the reported killings in Sanamayn as a massacre by a military that “slaughters civilians in retaliation for its defeats.”

According to the United Nations, more than 70,000 Syrians have been killed in the  civil war.