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Arab/Muslim States

Syria may or may not be preparing for war


By Ryan Jones
March 11, 2007

Depending on who you ask in the IDF and Israeli government, Syria either is or isn't preparing to engage in hostilities against the Jewish state.

Ever since the end of last summer's war against the Lebanese terror group Hizb'allah, IDF intelligence officials and Israeli military correspondents have been reporting on potentially hostile Syrian militry movements that mirror the nation's behavior prior to the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

At the same time, Syrian dictator Bashar Assad has on several occasions stated that his government is tired of trying to retrieve the Golan Heights through negotiations, and is ready to turn to open warfare.

On Friday, the Agence France Presse tried to clarify the situation by questioning three senior IDF officers and two Israeli government officials.

All five concurred: Syria is redeploying its forces and readying its civilian population in preparation for war with Israel.

The most obvious sign of what is going on is the movement of Syrian ballistic missiles.

"We have noticed that in recent months Syria has deployed hundreds, possibly thousands, of medium and long-range rockets along the border," said one IDF officer. "Many of the rockets are hidden in underground chambers and in camouflaged silos, which make them very difficult to locate."

Despite the open evidence, the government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has been pressing officials to stop speaking of conflict with Syria as inevitable.

Olmert is eager to engage the anti-Israel Arab world diplomatically on the basis of the Arab League-adopted Saudi peace proposal, which includes Israel's full surrender of the Golan Heights to Syria.

And so, possibly on direct orders from the Olmert government, a different set of IDF officials spoke to Ynet on Saturday denying that there is any proof that Syria is threatening Israel.

The unnamed sources reportedly said there have been no major Syrian troop movements of late and that there is no intelligence suggesting that Damascus' intentions toward Israel are hostile.

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