Brink of a Middle East crisis

According to local people, the Ein Sabeh training camp for terrorists just north of Syria's capital of Damascus that Israel attacked this week hasn't been used for a long time. Of course, the locals may not have known what was going on at Ein Sabeh, or they may have been lying. Yet, it's certainly odd that the only casualty of the Israeli air strike was a security guard who was wounded. Demolishing a few buildings used to house trainees, no matter if these are filled up with the kind of low-grade weapons that terrorists use, is no more than a symbolic gesture. So why, for so little, would Israel risk so much -- the certainty of some kind of terrorist response and of widespread international criticism, as has happened, including, as is rare, by Canada? Certainly, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's government had to meet public demand that it "do something" in retaliation for the Palestinian suicide bomber's murder of 19 Israeli citizens in Haifa last weekend. But why escalate the conflict to Syria and thereby break a ceasefire between the two countries that has lasted for 30 years? The extent of Syria's involvement in supporting terrorism -- today, as opposed to the past, when it was clear -- is at least questionable. It's impossible to fit all the known aspects of the event into a plausible, pat political equation. Except for one possibility: We're looking at the wrong political equation. What's happened, that is, wasn't a warning signal to Syria to stop its support for terrorism. It was, instead, a warning signal to Iran to stop its nuclear weapons program. This would explain why Israel risked so much for so little. And it would explain U.S. President George Bush's quick approval of Israel's act of aggression, even though it rips another hole into his tattered "road map" for Middle East peace. Iran matters; Syria does not. It's a major Middle East power, rather than a bankrupt little state. Most definitely, a nuclear weapons program, no matter whether it is just a potential one or one already fully underway, matters, as one more dusty training camp does not. A so-called "Islamic bomb" in Iran's hands that could be passed on to terrorists (at least the crude form of a "dirty" bomb that could spread radioactivity), would represent the ultimate threat to Israel's existence. Iran denies its nuclear program has any military purpose or potential. But, unlike the case of Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction, there is widespread support for U.S. and Israeli suspicions about Iran. At the United Nations, France, Germany and Britain have co-sponsored a resolution requiring Iran to halt its nuclear program by the end of October and to allow International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors to verify that no weapons-grade uranium or plutonium is being stockpiled. A UN report released last week calculates that Iran could acquire a bomb within two years. This report draws attention to a huge nuclear power complex capable of holding large amounts of weapons-grade material in Natanz, which is 35 feet underground and has walls eight feet thick. A diplomatic solution to the nuclear crisis in Iran is always possible. So far, though, Iran has refused to accept the kind of stringent regulations that the IAEA imposed on Iraq and is expanding its program of Russian-built nuclear power plants. The attack on Syria thus only makes sense -- at least, makes the best sense -- as a dress rehearsal for, and a warning to, Iran of a possible attack on it by Israel. In exactly the same way, Israel in 1981 attacked and destroyed Iraq's partially completed Osirik nuclear power reactor on the grounds that it was a precursor to a nuclear weapons program (as it was). Israeli Chief of Staff Moshe Ya'alon has already publicly warned such an attack could happen. In turn, Bush's support for the Israeli sideshow in Syria makes best sense as a way of ratcheting up the pressure on Iran by signalling that any Israeli attack would have full U.S. support, from the technological and logistic to the diplomatic. Effectively, Bush is also signalling that he no longer cares about Middle East peace, an attitude he's already made pretty plain by his indifference to the fence the Israelis are constructing as a combination security buffer and land grab from the Palestinians. We are approaching the brink of a major Middle East crisis that could send the entire region up in flames. gwynR@sympatico.ca. The Hill Times

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Brink of a Middle East crisis

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