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Russia Predicts Israeli-Iranian Clash in Syria in 2021

Israeli soldiers take part in an exercise in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, near the ceasefire line between Israel and Syria, March 20, 2017. (Reuters)
Israeli soldiers take part in an exercise in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, near the ceasefire line between Israel and Syria, March 20, 2017. (Reuters)
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Russia Predicts Israeli-Iranian Clash in Syria in 2021

Israeli soldiers take part in an exercise in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, near the ceasefire line between Israel and Syria, March 20, 2017. (Reuters)
Israeli soldiers take part in an exercise in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, near the ceasefire line between Israel and Syria, March 20, 2017. (Reuters)

Russian media cautioned this week of a possible confrontation between Israel and Iranian forces in southern Syria.

Russia’s Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported Monday on Israeli preparations for an armed conflict on the border with Syria in 2021.

“Southern Syria could turn into the arena of the first northern war between Israel and the Iranian forces,” it wrote, citing the threat assessment for 2021 presented by the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University (INSS).

The daily said Israeli experts, most of whom are former representatives of the Israeli army and intelligence agencies, recommended that Israel be prepared for such a development, adding that pro-Iranian forces will be able to significantly increase the accuracy of their attacks against Israeli positions in 2021.

The experts did not rule out the “military option” should administration of US President-elect Joe Biden decide to rejoin the nuclear deal with Iran. Israel will work on easing the danger of the possible return to the bad deal, they said.

The report said that Israel must continue its operations to weaken pro-Iranian forces and prevent their entrenchment in Syria.

Observers believe that a chief threat is Hezbollah’s efforts to obtain precision-guided missiles that would pose a significant threat to Israeli air defenses.

The Russian daily noted that Israel has upped its attacks on Iranian positions in Syria in recent days, targeting Hezbollah and the Iranian Quds Force in the south and west.

At the same time, the Israeli military has boosted defenses in the south by deploying Iron Dome anti-missile batteries near the city of Eilat.

The daily linked the developments to predictions that Israel could be subject to rocket attacks not just from the Gaza Strip, but from northwestern Yemen.

The experts said that it remains to be seen just how successful Iran’s proxies have been in developing precision-guided missiles, but Yemen appears to be a potential location from where attacks can be launched against Israel.

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Palestinians Receptive to Lebanon’s Call to Limit Possession of Weapons in Refugee Camps

The Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee meets at the government headquarters. (Dialogue committee)
The Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee meets at the government headquarters. (Dialogue committee)
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Palestinians Receptive to Lebanon’s Call to Limit Possession of Weapons in Refugee Camps

The Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee meets at the government headquarters. (Dialogue committee)
The Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee meets at the government headquarters. (Dialogue committee)

Lebanon has started to exert serious efforts to restrict the possession of weapons inside Palestinian refugee camps in the country in line with President Joseph Aoun’s inaugural speech.

The president had demanded that the possession of weapons in the country and the camps be limited to the state.

The Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee met at the government headquarters in Beirut three days ago to discuss the issue.

All Palestinian factions attended the meeting, and the gatherers agreed to “completely” resolve the Palestinian possession of arms outside the camps. They also agreed to outline how to restrict weapons inside the camps in line with the president’s speech.

The Lebanese state has yet to come up with the mechanism to confiscate the weapons inside the camps.

A Lebanese security source told Asharq Al-Awsat that the arms will be tackled through a political approach drawn up by the government. “It will be carried out by the army with the security agencies and in coordination with the Palestinian factions in the camp, led by the Fatah movement, which is the official representative of the Palestinian people,” it added.

The Palestinians have expressed their “complete understanding” of the issue, it remarked.

The laying down of weapons by Palestinian factions is a step towards all illegal weapons throughout the country being turned over to the Lebanese state, it went on to say.

“There are no longer any excuses for weapons to remain in possession of any organization,” stressed the source.

Lebanese groups will be demanded to lay down their arms after the Palestinian ones do, it added.

In a first, the Palestinian factions have been very receptive to a Lebanese head of state’s demand to cooperate in limiting the possession of weapons in the refugee camps.

Member of the Palestinian National and Central Councils Haitham Zaiter said that the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) recognizes that the camps are part of Lebanese territories, so they come under the authority of the state and its laws.

He told Asharq Al-Awsat that “complete coordination” is ongoing between the Lebanese security agencies and PLO inside the camps where several wanted Lebanese and Palestinian suspects and others from other nationalities have been turned over to the authorities.

The suspects had sought refuge in the camps to avoid justice in the crimes they have committed, he acknowledged.

“The PLO is the sole representative of the Palestinian people inside Palestine and in the diaspora,” he stated.

Moreover, Zaiter explained that Palestinian weapons in Lebanon are either carried by the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command (PFLP-GC) outside the camps or by non-partisan individuals inside the camps.

The PFLP-GC laid down its weapons as soon as the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad collapsed in December.

Heavy weapons inside the camps had been previously brought in with the aim to undermine the PLO, he added.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas “has constantly called for coordination with Lebanese authorities to limit the possession of these weapons,” Zaiter said.