March 20, 2014 | Quote
Three Years Into Syrian Civil War, Neighboring Israel Faces Familiar and Emerging Threats
March 15 marked the third anniversary of the beginning of unrest that led to the ongoing Syrian civil war. As the conflict drags on into its fourth year with no end in sight, Israel—which shares a contentious United Nations-patrolled border with Syria in the Golan Heights region—finds itself in a precarious situation due to new threats such as al-Qaeda-affiliated rebel terror groups, as well as old foes like Hezbollah, Iran, and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
“None of the sides are capable of a decisive victory to end the war and rule over the entire country,” Amos Yadlin, a retired Israeli Air Force general and former head of the Israel Defense Forces Military Intelligence Directorate, told JNS.org. “It has been a moral disaster.”
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the conflict has resulted in more than 146,000 deaths, while more than 2.5 million Syrians have fled abroad and another 6.5 million have been internally displaced, resulting in the worst humanitarian disaster of the early 21st century.
Despite the massive humanitarian toll and the use of chemical weapons against his own people, over the last year Assad has seen his fortunes improve as Western and Arab countries have been unwilling to directly intervene in the conflict or to successfully end the conflict diplomatically.
Lebanese-born Middle East analyst Tony Badran, a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, blamed U.S. President Barack Obama for indirectly strengthening Assad’s position with his handling of the chemical weapons situation last fall.
“The Obama administration, by brokering this chemical weapons deal, has strengthened Assad’s position,” Badran said. “Because Assad now understands there is not going to be any threat of direct involvement of outside powers against him. It also validated him as a partner and gave him free reign to pursue all avenues of destruction up to weapons of mass destruction.”
“The direct threat to Assad that existed a year ago, thanks to the Obama administration policy, it has been taken off the table for now,” he said.
…
The Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Badran explained that Hezbollah is feeling pressure in a number of areas besides the high casualty rates. Badran told JNS.org that Hezbollah is facing domestic pressure from the Sunni opposition in Lebanon that has been bolstered by the influx of Sunni refugees from Syria, domestic attacks such as a January car bombing in south Beirut, and economic pressure from its base support of Shi’a Muslims who are fleeing to other areas from south Beirut.
Nevertheless, despite the setbacks for Hezbollah and the growing jihadist threat, Badran argued that Hezbollah and Iran are still the top enemies for Israel.
“The Iranians are a state, a state on the threshold of a nuclear program, with vast resources. [Meanwhile] the Sunni jihadi movement doesn’t have a state anywhere near the capabilities of Iran that is supporting them,” he said.
Badran added that the only way to truly weaken Hezbollah and Iran is to remove Assad from power.
“The only way you can truly weaken Hezbollah as well as Iran is to get rid of Assad. If you get sidetracked by focusing on the Sunni Jihadist threat, and look at ways to cooperate with Assad to attack them, then you have completely conceded the strategic advantage to the Iranians,” he said.