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Arab/Muslim States

The next war is ?imminent?


By Stan Goodenough
November 07, 2006

Israeli news media reported this week that the next war between Israel and the Arabs is expected to break out in summer 2007, and that the IDF is doing everything to ensure it will be ready when the time comes.

But foreign journalists, also this past week, have estimated that Israel could clash with the Syrian army and Lebanon's Hizb'allah before the end of 2006.

In that event, given that this time-window closes in less than eight weeks's time, it is unclear how "ready" Israel's defense forces will be.

Ha'aretz said Monday that Syria and Hizb'allah - the former an Iranian ally, the latter an Iranian proxy force - "are likely to start a war against Israel next summer."

This is the assessment of Israel?s senior military echelon that, according to that paper is making "all preparations ? to ensure maximum preparedness in advance of summer 2007."

Reporting for London?s The Daily Telegraph on November 3, John Keegan said Israel would soon have to strike Hizb?allah hard.

The Lebanese terrorist organization had reconstructed its fortified zone in southern Lebanon and was racing to replenish its depleted missile supplies.

Hiz?ballah is ?also creating a fortified zone in the Gaza Strip and building up its stocks of missiles there.?

The outcome of all this arms buildup would soon see Israel once more facing a missile attack on two fronts.

Keegan?s deduction: ?The conflict is inevitable and unavoidable.?

?What is certain is that ? probably before the year is out ? Israel will have struck at Hizb?allah? in southern Lebanon,? he wrote.?

One reason the IDF believes in an inevitable attack is the Arab sense that Hizb'allah came out on top of the war last July.

The IDF's inability to stop the Katyusha and other missile fire from Lebanon into the north of Israel, and its ongoing powerlessness to put an end to Kassam rocket fire from the Gaza Strip, have badly eroded its deterrence.

Following the July war - in which Israel failed to achieve any of the goals it announced when it decided to attack southern Lebanon - Jordan's King Abd'allah told Time Magazine that, in the Arab mind, Israel was no longer considered an "invincible force."

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