The people who were seen nearby mostly arrived on motorcycles; it looked as though the structure stood empty at night. At the 5th National Ba'ath Party Congress, held on 8 May 1962, it was decided to reestablish the party and keep Aflaq as Secretary General of the National Command. The tension is liable to lead to an unplanned deterioration in the situation, and in order to prepare for that possibility the IDF must increase its level of readiness. The first research breakthrough occurred in November 2006. Shkedi, a man of profound historical awareness, went up to Olmert at the end of the meeting and said to him: Mr. The 1963 Syrian coup d'tat, referred to by the Syrian government as the 8 March Revolution (Arabic: ), was the successful seizure of power in Syria by the military committee of the Syrian Regional Branch of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party. The prevailing conspiracy theory held that Barak was waiting for the final version of the Winograd commission investigative report on the second Lebanon war, which was to be published within a few months, in the expectation that the commission would obligate Olmert to resign. [8][9] The Arab countries eventually abandoned their project. [4] Though the Unified Plan failed to be ratified, both Jordan and Israel undertook to operate within their allocation limits. A lot of people told him that it wasnt possible that there was a reactor, and that it would be a pity to waste the resources and the time. Shallal is situated nearby to Kur Udani and Ranhebas. People realized that there was something bigger here. Between June and September, the operational planning became more detailed, additional precise information about the destination came in, different methods of action were assembled and finally the crews were slotted into the operation. The detailed intelligence helped convince those countries of the justice of the Israeli move and neutralized the possibility that the attack would become the cause of an international scandal. [citation needed]. Israel has fired several missiles at Syrias border province of Quneitra, causing material damage. The following afternoon, the Syrian news agency issued a laconic statement to the effect that during the night its air defense system had chased away Israeli planes that had penetrated Syrias air space. [24], On 8 February 1963, the Iraqi Regional Branch, led by Ali Salih al-Sa'di, took power in Iraq by overthrowing Abd al-Karim Qasim. Its a very long flight, secret, on a dark night and a low altitude of 100 meters above sea level. An estimated three thousand families owned half of the land in Syria. Defense Minister Ehud Barak, two days after the Israeli atrike. At a distant and isolated site called Al Kibar, less than a kilometer west of the Euphrates River, the Cube aroused their interest in particular. We made certain five times that it was all systems go., Even today, he remembers the moment of impact. Even after the reactor was bombed, ripples in the Syrian-Iranian axis continued, with the incessant involvement of Hezbollah. This is right next door. We had hundreds of miles to fly, some of them in an area full of missiles. If the ground-to-air-systems wake up, you are in a vipers nest. Efrat will know about it only now, when the articles and interviews are published. A structure built on top of the reactor to conceal it. After the coup, the Ba'athist Military committee initiated a series of purges that altered the structure of the Syrian armed forces; by replacing 90% of its officer corps with Alawites. By no stretch of the imagination will you come back without the reactor having been destroyed. In the Israeli defense establishment, the concern was that if the diplomatic channel were employed, Assad was liable to position anti-aircraft batteries near the reactor or even to establish something like a kindergarten there as a human shield. The prime minister was also afraid of a leak to the media by American officials who opposed an Israeli attack. It was one of the Israeli army's most successful operations, but was censored for over a decade. Syrian nuclear reactor attack: Step by step, The Intelligence Failure Surrounding the Syria Strike, The Real Fallout From Israel's Attack on Syrian Reactor. The leading members of the military committee throughout the planning process and in the immediate aftermath of taking power were Muhammad Umran, Salah Jadid and Hafez al-Assad, who belonged to the minority Alawite community. Olmert did not ask Bush for authorization of an Israeli attack but let the president understand that he was of a mind to order the IDF to act. The prime minister was concerned about two possibilities that could thwart the operation a prior leak to the media or the reactor becoming hot (activated) a development that intelligence assessed was liable to happen toward the end of September. The prime minister, who managed to take a two-hour nap, went on to Tel Aviv to follow the operation from the air force underground command post together with Barak, Livni, the chief of staff and the air force commander. [9], It was in this environment that the ideology of Ba'athism came into being. [17] In an international context, the revolution took place because the state boundaries established by France were artificial and the hostility within the newly established Syria to the creation of Israel. [24] Qasim's downfall changed the rules of Arab politics the Nasserists had monopolised the Arab nationalist movement since the UAR, but the takeover made the Ba'ath Party a force to be reckoned with. Baraks behavior, says one of the top defense people, was simply deplorable, Especially taking into account the disagreement about bombing the nuclear sites in Iran, which erupted two years later. Prime Minister, trust the air force pilots. A U.S. airstrike targeting facilities used by Iran-backed militias in Syria appears to be a message to Tehran delivered by a new American administration still figuring out its approach to the Middle East. So why was it chosen? There was a crazy high all around him, said one of those who were present. Shayrat airbase is located in Homs province, about 25km (15 miles) south-east of the city of Homs. Gates was pretty much in shock. The prime ministers two close advisers, Yoram Turbovich and Shalom Turgeman, flew to Washington to brief top administration people. There was successful cooperation here among the intelligence organizations and between us and the government. Y. reached the conclusion that they were looking in the wrong place. The prime minister was imbued with a sense of urgency and a desire to act. As far as is known, it was carried out without the advance permission or involvement of Iran or Syria. According to David Makovsky, a researcher at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, in addition to eight attack planes, a number of other aircraft also took part in the operation. We were very focused on the escape route because it could elicit surprises.. On 17 April a new stage-based unity agreement was reached that would include the three states in a federal union with Nasser as President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces. Secondly, it caused huge embarrassment vis--vis Turkey, which at the time was a country friendly to Israel, even though Recep Tayyip Erdogan was already serving as prime minister. As was its wont, Damascus denied everything, and the IAEA did nothing about all this despite Syrias blatant violation of a treaty to which it was a signatory. The then-newly appointed chief of staff, Gabi Ashkenazi, found an army that was depressed and mired in a deep crisis after some of its top brass had resigned, while others were still fighting the conclusions of the internal investigations and on edge about what might be said about them in the final report on the Second Lebanon War. WebShelling and a rocket attack killed at least nine people and wounded dozens of others in Al-Bab, Aleppo Governorate, Feb. 2. The dilemma Israel faced with respect to the choice between effectiveness and secrecy did not end with the question of the operation itself. Authorize the operation.. Trump: "Assad choked out the lives of helpless men, women and children". [7] The same elite that had governed Syria during the mandate continued in power, and they ruled in the same manner. State media initially described the Damascus attack as a roadside bombing. In the week the prime minister went to Washington, a person who did not share Bushs enthusiasm for Olmert returned to the core of decision-makers in Israel: Ehud Barak. Dagan asked: Mr. The Syrian branch of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party was able to recruit youth from radical peasant movements and thus was able to mobilise large sectors of the population. Therefore, the findings from the reactor were presented as findings at a low level of certainty. In Israel they were surprised by that conclusion. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was recommending a diplomatic move to thwart the reactor by means of applying pressure on Assad. [27], The first act of the new rulers of Syria was to establish the twenty-man National Council for the Revolutionary Command (NCRC), composed of twelve Ba'athists and eight Nasserists and independents. All his arguments, he says, were to the point. Ba'athism. At the cabinet meeting, Ashkenazi presented the various alternatives and recommended attacking. The intelligence people say they told him: There are no more question marks. From the beginning, the military committee members formed state policies behind the backs of other NCRC members when the civilian leadership found out, al-Atrash said: "Why do not these gentlemen speak? Its a story that ended well, says Amos Yadlin. When he looked outside, he saw larges areas on fire, he said. WebThe "War over Water", also the Battle over Water, refers to a series of confrontations between Israel and its Arab neighbors from November 1964 to May 1967 over control of We set out around 10:30 P.M., recalls Amir. In 1962, Aflaq convened a Ba'ath Party congress and re-established the party. Caught in a pincer movement, the commander of the 70th Armoured Brigade, Lieutenant General Abd al-Karim surrendered to the plotters Umran took over as acting commander of the 70th Armoured Brigade. [8] The failure in the 1948 ArabIsraeli War led to the downfall of the traditional elite and the rise of the military in politics. It had never happened that they came to an Israeli prime minister and told him: Very close to your home something is being built that could destroy the state. On December 19, 2003, a Saturday morning, I turned on the radio and heard on a news broadcast that the Americans and the British had persuaded Libya to dismantle its nuclear program, says Amnon Sufrin, who was then head of the intelligence division at the Mossad. The national struggle was shaped by ideologies such as Arab nationalism, pan-Islamism and Greater Syrianism. Middle East. Olmert quoted one of Assads speeches from early June in which the Syrian president predicted that toward the end of the summer there would be a development that would completely change the reality of the Middle East. The planning and the unfolding conspiracy was inspired by the Iraqi Regional Branch's successful military coup. In the air force, they characterized the release of the fuel tank into Turkey as an operational error, although tactically it was possible to have justified the crews considerations. WebAbdulaziz al-Shalal (Redirected from Abdulaziz Al-Shalal) Major General Abdulaziz al-Shalal ( Arabic: ) was chief of the Syrian military police. Bash Dulki Village, 5 km southeast; WebBy ALBERT AJI and BASSEM MROUE October 20, 2021. Its only rarely that a Mossad chief calls and says: I have to see you. The Mossad chief arrives and sits in my office. Though the relations between Olmert and Barak were fairly good, and it appeared that Olmert wanted Barak in Defense, Barak had voiced some harsh criticism of the prime ministers conduct during the war in Lebanon. Accordingly, the Arab states have to prepare the plans necessary for dealing with the political, economic and social aspects, so that if necessary results are not achieved, collective Arab military preparations, when they are not completed, will constitute the ultimate practical means for the final liquidation of Israel.[5]. [36] While al-Hariri was away, the Committee used the opportunity to undertake a purge of about 30 elite officersmostly political independentsunder al-Hariri's command. While the conspirators of the military committee were all young, the sitting regime had been slowly disintegrating and the traditional elite had lost effective political power.[20]. Nevertheless, the Arab states were not prepared to coexist with a project which seemed likely to make a major contribution to Israel's economic growth. Many of the people involved in the action deserve to get credit and also demand it, said one person who played a key role in planning the operation. We were over the target for two or three minutes. And before that, at the end of 2008 and beginning of 2009, came the Israeli military operation known as Cast Lead against Hamas in Gaza. [13], The Ba'ath Party faced a significant dilemma: take power through competitive elections or forceful takeover. [31][32], However, between 28 April-2 May, the Ba'athist-dominated Military Committee virtually renounced the agreement when it purged over 50 Nasserist officers from their high-ranking positions in the armed forces, leading to a wide-scale propaganda campaign by Egypt via radio denouncing the Ba'ath (Nasserist-leaning newspapers had been previously shut down.) [37], The Nasserists still maintained a relatively high level of strength in the military, despite the purges, and on 18 July, under the leadership of Jassem Alwan and the help of Egyptian intelligence, they attempted to launch a daytime coup against the new government.