'Brotherhood turning Middle East into Islamist bloc'

By BEN HARTMAN, YONI DAYAN

Dichter warns revolutions in could threaten Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Gulf states; Gilad: Hezbollah aiming 60-70 rockets at Israel.

The Middle East is on the path to becoming a single Islamist bloc run by the Muslim Brotherhood, Home Front Defense Minister and former Shin Bet chief Avi Dichter said Monday.

Speaking at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism’s World Summit, Dichter said “the Arab world in general and in particular the countries neighboring us have begun a long journey that will end with the Middle East being a bloc run by the Muslim Brotherhood, and possibly a single Islamist bloc.”

He also spoke about the civil war raging in Syria, saying that it is a question of when and not if the Assad regime will fall, adding that a massacre of the Alawite sect should be expected in such a case.
Dichter added that of great importance will be whether or not the new regime will be a liberal, secular leadership, or another regime based on the Muslim Brotherhood model.

In addition, he asserted that if Iran attains nuclear weapons it can be expected that Egypt and Saudi Arabia will follow suit.

Closer to home, Hezbollah has between 60,000 and 70,000 rockets aimed at Israel, Defense Ministry policy director Amos Gilad said Monday, speaking at the same conference.

Gilad said the Lebanese terrorist organization has stockpiled rockets of various types, and its arsenal is far more robust than the one it had prior to the Second Lebanon War.

“The next war will be aimed against the home front,” Gilad warned.

Gilad also blamed Hezbollah for a number of successful and unsuccessful terrorist attacks abroad.
Though admitting that the threat from Lebanon is growing, Gilad was largely optimistic about Israel’s security situation, citing positive developments in Syria, Egypt and the Gaza Strip.

“In Syria, there is good news,” Gilad said. “The Golan Heights remains the quietest region in the entire Middle East. Our deterrence capabilities are sufficiently, for the time being, keeping out warring parties in Syria.”

Gilad also warned that alQaida is starting to rear its head in Syria, with a view that the fall of Assad will allow it to open a new terror front against Israel.

Turning to Egypt, Gilad said that though there are many terrorist groups actively trying to strike Israel from Sinai, recently elected President Mohamed Morsy and his officials remain committed to peace.

Gilad called the situation in Gaza “relatively restrained,” with Hamas generally holding other Palestinian terror groups back from striking Israel.

Gilad also said that Israel is not facing a conventional military threat, a massive improvement over Israel’s historical security situation.

Focusing on Iran, Professor Uzi Arad, former national security adviser to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and head of the National Security Council, spoke of the coming year as being critical to the future of the Islamic Republic’s nuclear question.

“The first half of 2013 is when things must take place. There must be determination on the part of the Americans to act,” Arad said, adding that Israel reserves the right to turn to its allies for help, but also has the obligation to do what is necessary and that “one way or another, the Iranian nuclear program will be stopped in 2013.”

Arad said that the issue of “red lines” regarding Iran must be worked on between the US and Iran, but not through a public debate via the media.

The Arab Spring was a common theme at the conference, largely for bringing what speakers portrayed as ongoing disarray and instability to the Middle East.

Eitan Ben-David, director of Israel’s Counterterrorism Bureau, said that as a result of the Arab Spring, Israel can expect increased terrorism directed at its military and civilians “with an emphasis on [terror from] Sinai.”

“The threat faced to Israeli citizens traveling in Sinai is severe, as well as the threat posed by global jihad, cyberterror and unconventional terror,” Ben-David added.

Nitzan Nuriel, former director of the Counterterrorism Bureau said, “Gaza and Sinai present an operational threat from Eilat to Kerem Shalom and the Gaza Envelope, and this is increasing.”

Nuriel described Sinai as awash in widely available, cheap firearms and advanced weaponry, and home to a large number of terrorists looking to strike Israel.

Nuriel added that the threat could justify Israel launching the type of security on the southern border that it has on the northern border against the Hezbollah threat.

At the same time, he sounded an optimistic tone, saying that in Gaza and Egypt, there is a government and address to which Israel can potentially reach.

Alongside the usual Iran and Arab Spring talk, a number of speakers described the dangers facing Israel closer to home, namely, the dangers posed by a failure to reach a diplomatic solution with the Palestinians.

Kadima leader Shaul Mofaz went as far as to say “the threat to Israel of a future bi-national state is greater than the Iran threat,” while former Shin Bet chief Ya’acov Peri said that if a breakthrough doesn’t happen with the Palestinians, Israel is on the way to a bi-national state.”

Putin warns of worsening Syria conflict

By Anna Smolchenko / AFP

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Friday of an "extremely dangerous" situation in Syria and emerging signs of a civil war but rejected a military intervention as he met with European leaders.

Amid mounting pressure for Moscow to drop its resistance to tougher UN action on Syria, Putin met with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and had arrived in Paris for talks with newly elected French President Francois Hollande.

In Berlin, Putin appeared to strike a more conciliatory tone, warning of the escalating danger from the Syrian conflict and refraining from openly backing President Bashar al-Assad's regime.

"Today we are seeing emerging elements of civil war," Putin said after arriving in Berlin from Belarus. "It is extremely dangerous."

But he also continued to defy calls for tougher UN action to stop the violence, warning at a joint press conference with Merkel: "You cannot do anything by force and expect an immediate effect."

And he hit back at suggestions Moscow was supplying weapons for use in the internal conflict, after the United States condemned Russian arms deliveries to Syria as "reprehensible".

"As far as arms supplies are concerned, Russia does not supply the weapons that could be used in a civil conflict," Putin told reporters, as he continued his first foreign tour since returning to the Kremlin.

Putin's brief trips to Berlin and Paris came amid mounting outrage in the West against Assad's regime after a massacre of 108 people, including women and children, in the town of Houla last week.

UN rights chief Navi Pillay said the massacre could be a crime against humanity.

In Moscow the foreign ministry blamed the Houla massacre on foreign assistance to Syrian rebels, including arms deliveries and mercenary training.

"The tragedy in Houla showed what can be the outcome of financial aid and smuggling of modern weapons to rebels, recruitment of foreign mercenaries and flirting with various sorts of extremists," the ministry said in a statement.

Putin said Russia, Germany and their partners would do their utmost to stop the violence from escalating and help UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan, who has brokered a peace plan for Syria, achieve "positive results".

"We both made clear that we are pushing for a political solution, that the Annan plan can be a starting point but that everything must be done in the United Nations Security Council to implement this plan," Merkel said.

Putin said Moscow was not taking sides in the deadly strife rocking Syria, where the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says 13,000 people have been killed since Assad's regime launched a brutal crackdown on the opposition in March last year.

"There is a need to find a convergence of these interests and have them sit down at a negotiating table. That's the direction we are going to work in."

Merkel earlier greeted Putin with military honours as demonstrators waving Syrian flags shouted and whistled outside.

Putin was to hold a one-on-one meeting and dinner with Hollande, who has refused to rule out foreign military intervention as long as it is carried out with UN backing, followed by a press conference.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague also said Syria was on the verge of a civil war and risked collapsing into sectarian strife after meeting members of the Syrian opposition based in Istanbul.

Germany, France, Britain, the United States and other Western nations expelled Syrian diplomats in protest at the slaughter in Houla.

Syria allies China and Russia, which have both blocked previous attempts at the UN Security Council to condemn Damascus, joined other council members on Sunday in backing a statement condemning the Houla killings.

But US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday warned that Russia's policy of propping up the Assad regime could contribute to a civil war and even lead to a wider proxy war because of Iran's support for Damascus.

And she claimed Friday that Russia had continued to supply arms to the Assad regime, raising "serious concerns" in the United States.

"We know there has been a very consistent arms trade, even during the past year, coming from Russia to Syria. We also believe the continuous supply of arms from Russia has strengthened the Assad regime," Clinton told a news conference in Oslo.

Amnesty International demanded that Putin immediately stop Russian weapons deliveries to Syria, while Human Rights Watch called on Putin to make human rights a priority at home and abroad.