Latest News Reports From Miscellaneous Sources for July 02/12
Assad to Kremlin: I can finish the revolt in two months, replaces army chiefs
Lebanon's Arabic press digest - July 2, 2012/The Daily Star
Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea mocks National Dialogue
Lebanese Army scraps plans to remove Assir sit-in just hours before operation
President Michel Sleiman takes off kid gloves on security challenges
Syrian troops briefly abduct two members of Lebanon's General Security
Lebanese Parliament convenes to discuss contentious issues
Syrian opposition talks open in Cairo
Rocket fired from Lebanon wounds two Syrian police
Saudi Arabia issues Lebanon travel warning
Saudi envoy: Travel warning does not aim to harm Lebanon
Culture Minister Gaby Layoun retorts to former culture ministers’ “misleading” criticism
Turkey: 205 on trial for alleged links to Kurdish rebels
Saudi Arabia issues Lebanon travel warning
Parliament discusses welfare issues, Syrian border crisis
UN envoy discusses Lebanon’s security and stability with Mansour
Syrian uprising death toll tops 16,500, Observatory says
Sanctions-hit Iran readies ballistic missile drill
Plumbly Reiterates Ban’s Call on Syria to Respect Lebanon Border
Qaouq: Some Sides Targeting Resistance to Divert Attention from their Arms Smuggling to Syria
German FM tries to reassure public in wake of anti-circumcision court ruling

Saudi Arabia issues Lebanon travel warning
July 2, 2012 /Saudi Arabia warned its citizens against travelling to Lebanon, the Saudi Press Agency quoted a Foreign Ministry official as saying. “Considering the unstable situation in Lebanon, the Foreign Affairs Ministry warns Saudi citizens against travelling to Lebanon… until further notice,” the source said. Other Gulf countries made a similar move in May as the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain urged their citizens to avoid travel to Lebanon.-NOW Lebanon

Saudi envoy: Travel warning does not aim to harm Lebanon
July 2, 2012 /Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Ali Awad Assiri said on Monday that Saudi Arabia’s warning against travel to Lebanon did not aim to harm Lebanon. “The decision does not aim to harm Lebanon, but Saudi citizens’ safety is our priority,” Assiri told the National News Agency. He also said that the Foreign Ministry’s decision came as a result of “recent incidents in which roads were blocked and tires were burned,” in addition to different security incidents in several Lebanese areas. Assiri voiced hope that Lebanon would become stable and safe and that dialogue among Lebanese political parties would yield positive results.-NOW Lebanon

Culture Minister Gaby Layoun retorts to former culture ministers’ “misleading” criticism
July 2, 2012 /Culture Minister Gaby Layoun on Monday responded in a statement issued by his press office to criticism launched against him by former Culture Ministers Tamam Salam, Tarek Mitri, and Salim Warde regarding his decision to axe from a heritage list a site activists allege is an ancient Phoenician port in Beirut. “Since [I] took charge of the Culture Ministry, a committee of political dignitaries was formed to incite [against the ministry], and the three [former] ministers are part of it,” Layoun said, adding that “this committee has misled public opinion, especially the civil society organizations which are concerned with heritage issues.” The statement sought to clarify the controversy surrounding Beirut’s Minaa al-Hosn site, saying that the decision by Warde during his tenure as culture minister to include the Phoenician site in the heritage list was based on false scientific conclusions. The archeological remains, according to the statement, did not provide overwhelming evidence as to the nature of the findings, which allow them to be considered as worthy of including in the Public Inventory List. “Was [Warde’s decision] to include the site in the heritage list [taken] innocently or as a preparation for a well-planned hostile campaign?” Layoun asked. The minister also said that he would “file a lawsuit against anyone who releases a statement against the Culture Ministry or myself.”
He also called on those who are interested in the issue of heritage “not to pay attention to misleading rumors.” On Thursday, protesters held a sit-in outside the Culture Ministry near Beirut’s Hamra neighborhood to protest Layoun’s decision to remove the site in Beirut’s Minaa al-Hosn area from the Public Inventory List protecting heritage locations. The following day, the former culture ministers held a press conference during which they lashed out at Layoun for axing the ancient Phoenician port from the heritage list. A high-rise building will reportedly be built in place of the site, which has sparked protests from Lebanese activists working to protect heritage sites in the country.-NOW Lebanon

Turkey: 205 on trial for alleged links to Kurdish rebels
July 2, 2012 /An Istanbul court on Monday began hearing a high-profile trial on the alleged links between some 200 suspects and outlawed Kurdish rebels, Anatolia news agency reported.
A total of 205 people, 140 of them arrested, stood accused of links with the Union of Kurdistan Communities, known as KCK, which authorities say is the urban wing of the outlawed rebels, The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Prosecutors accuse the defendants, including intellectuals, journalists and academics, of "aiding terrorism" and for putting out "separatist propaganda," according to Anatolia.
Suspects include members of Turkey's main Kurdish political organization, Peace and Democracy Party (BDP), as well as prominent academic Busra Ersanli and publisher Ragip Zarakolu.
The Istanbul trial is part of a wider crackdown that began in 2009. Since then, 700 people have been arrested pending trial over alleged links to KCK, according to government figures. Critics dispute the data, saying the actual number of people arrested across the country soar beyond 3,500. Ankara says the KCK wants to replace Turkish government institutions in the southeastern Anatolia region, which is majority Kurd, with its own political structures. Turkey, the European Union and the United States regard the PKK as a terrorist organization. -AFP/NOW Lebanon

Syrian opposition talks open in Cairo
July 2, 2012 /Syria's main exiled opposition groups met in Cairo Monday to try to forge a common vision for a political transition in Syria after criticizing a blueprint agreed by the major powers last week in a compromise with China and Russia. Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi, who chaired the meeting attended by around 250 opposition figures, urged opposition groups "not to waste this opportunity" and to "unite." The Arab League chief also stressed the need for "a pluralist democratic system that does not discriminate between Syrians."
Nasser al-Qudwa, deputy to UN-Arab League peace envoy Kofi Annan, echoed Arabi's call. He urged the opposition to "unify your vision and your performance."
"This is not a choice, but a necessity if the opposition wants to gain the trust of its people in Syria," Qudwa told the meeting which was also attended by the foreign ministers of Turkey, Iraq and Kuwait.
The two-day meeting comes as violence continues in Syria. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Monday that more than 16,500 people have been killed in violence since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad broke out in March last year. Rebel fighters and activists based in Syria announced they would boycott the Cairo meeting, denouncing it as a "conspiracy" that served the policy goals of Damascus allies Moscow and Tehran. "We refuse all kinds of dialogue and negotiation with the killer gangs...and we will not allow anyone to impose on Syria and its people the Russian and Iranian agendas," said a statement signed by the rebel Free Syrian Army and "independent" activists.
The signatories criticized the agenda of the Cairo talks for "rejecting the idea of a foreign military intervention to save the people... and ignoring the question of buffer zones protected by the international community, humanitarian corridors, an air embargo and the arming of rebel fighters."The Cairo talks come after world powers meeting in Geneva on Saturday agreed a transition plan that was branded a failure by both the opposition and the Syrian state media.
The boycotters said the talks follow the "dangerous decisions of the Geneva conference, which aim to safeguard the regime, to create a dialogue with it and to form a unity government with the assassins of our children.""The Cairo conference aims to give a new chance to envoy Kofi Annan to try again to convince Assad to implement his six-point plan... while forgetting that thousands have been martyred since the plan came into force [on April 12]," they said. The transition plan agreed in Geneva did not make any explicit call for Assad to cede power, as urged by Western governments, after Russia and China insisted that Syrians themselves must decide how the transition takes place.
The Syrian National Council said in a statement on Sunday that "no initiative can receive the Syrian people's backing unless it specifically demands the fall of Bashar al-Assad and his clique."
Of the more than 16,500 killed since the start of the uprising, 11,486 were civilians, 4,151 government troops and 870 army defectors, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told AFP. In its running tolls, the watchdog counts as civilians those rebel fighters who are not defectors from the army.
In violence on Monday, at least five civilians were killed, the Observatory said. Four died in the eastern province of Deir az-Zour, when the car they were travelling in was shelled. A fifth was killed when troops shelled the rebel-controlled central town of Rastan.-AFP/NOW Lebanon

Secular rebels sidelined in Syria
Michael Weiss/Now Lebanon/, July 1, 2012
According to secular Syrian rebels interviewed in Istanbul, even though the insurgency to topple the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is increasing in size and sophistication, Gulf Arab states—chiefly Saudi Arabia—are empowering Islamists at the expense of majoritarian secularists. Rebels from the Idlib and Hama provinces fear that religious extremists will be harder to control or contain in a post-Assad state, a consequence they see as leading directly from continued American myopia and inaction on Syria.
I traveled to Istanbul last weekend to catch up with Mahmoud, a Syrian-American who joined the armed uprising several months ago and served as my fixer and translator in Antakya, Turkey, in early May. He was with Abu Shahm, a battalion commander from the Hama province, and Abu Shahm’s son, Shahm, who was recently featured in a front-page story on Syria by Austin Tice in the Washington Post. All three were there to raise money for the insurgency, liaise with members of the political opposition and, apparently, receive explosives-training tutorials by an unnamed Syrian (that last reason for a Turkish furlough turned out to be a dud).
Abu Shahm had run a successful rock mining company that he liquidated about a year ago to finance a small battalion of 150 men centered in the Hama suburbs. Shahm has his own unit based in Madaya, Idlib, though he still largely follows his father’s orders. He’s a Russian-trained civil engineer his mid-20s and speaks pretty good English.
Both Shahm and Mahmoud were explaining a complex four-day operation in the town of Kafr Zeita they took part in earlier this month. It started with about 500 fighters, but Mahmoud estimates that some 2,000 men eventually joined in from adjoining towns and villages before the rebels withdrew.
“I can tell you, we destroyed 13 BDMs [armored personnel carriers], two tanks and damaged an attack helicopter by firing from a pickup truck,” Shahm told me. “Do you see videos of any of this on the Internet? No. We don’t have the time to record anything, and buying a camera is money we would rather spend on ammunition.”
Shahm’s account tracks with cited gains in rebel coordination and sophistication in recent weeks, both at the regional and local levels. Battalions in Idlib, Hama, Homs, Daraa and Damascus have begun to form military councils—majlis askeri—which partner with local revolutionary councils—majlis thawra—in a kind of ad hoc administrative government. Whole swathes of territory have been liberated and held under rebel control, particularly in the northern and central rural areas of Syria. As a new report by Joe Holliday of the Institute for the Study of War finds, Syria is “approaching a tipping point at which the insurgency will control more territory than the regime.” The largest of what Holliday calls “de facto safe zones” is in the Idlib province, and its epicenter is Jisr al-Shughour, the town where the first instance of armed rebellion was documented last June when a handful of military defectors led by Lieutenant Colonel Hussain Harmoush joined up with lightly armed townsfolk to retaliate against the mukhabarat’s assault on civilians. (If the United States, NATO, or some consortium of Western and Turkish forces, do decide to intervene militarily in Syria, they should focus their attention on carving out this town and its adjoining districts as a viable rebel command center.)
One need only consider the Assad regime’s tactics of late to get a sense of its inefficacy and desperation on the battlefield. The army has taken to shelling whole cities or towns from a distance rather than sending in units to retake them for two reasons. First, the regime hasn’t got reliable manpower to deploy to every restive area in the country. Only about a third of the 230,000-strong army has been deployed to quash the rebellion because Assad fears the disloyalty of his Sunni rank-and-file soldiers, the bulk of whom have been confined to barracks and kept under surveillance. Second, even Fourth Division and Republican Guard units are terrified of close clashes with rebels, who are given succor and shelter by local populations. Recall that 7,000 Fourth Division troops invaded Baba Amr in late February after the 400 or so Free Syrian Army fighters announced their tactical withdrawal following four weeks of heavy artillery bombardment.
If anything, Holliday undershoots the mark in terms of numbers. He reckons 40,000 rebels now operate inside Syria. The rebels I was with say the real figure is closer to 100,000. YouTube videos and journalist dispatches only glimpse the surface of the war of liberation, they claim.
While Shahm and Abu Shahm say they have received some of the light weapons and ammunition now being discreetly dispensed by the Turkish military at the border in Antakya and handed off to “delegations” within Syria—mainly Kalashnikovs, light automatic rifles and RPGs purchased by Saudi Arabia and Qatar—they’re quick to add that this hardware is useless for waging offensive operations against the regime. “RPGs do not destroy T-72 tanks,” Shahm said. “The entire battle in Kfar Zeita cost us about $500,000 if you add up everything: the ammunition, the supplies and the food for our men. You know how difficult it is to raise this money in Syria? We are getting no help from the outside, yet the Salafists are being financed by Saudi Arabia and so they can buy the best weapons.” Iraqi smugglers, Mahmoud elaborated, are importing anti-tank and anti-aircraft armaments that only these religious extremists seem to be able to afford.
It’s a worrying trend that will only grow worse as Western powers continue to abstain from direct military involvement in Syria. According to the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, the CIA is now helping to funnel Saudi- and Qatari-bought materiel to vetted and acceptable rebel forces, but its apparent partnership with the Muslim Brotherhood indicates a lax standard for ideological permissiveness. As ever, the Obama administration believes that all the United States has to fear in the Middle East is al-Qaeda and that because “moderate” Islamists are the best financed and organized, they’re the most deserving of US assistance. And so secular battalions such as Abu Shahm’s are left to scrape and scrounge, while the Brotherhood, using the Syrian National Council as its cover, hoovers up influence on the ground with millions in cash and a happy coordination with both Washington and Ankara. Riyadh, meanwhile, remains the Salafists’ closest ally.
So far, Salafists still only account for a slender minority of Syrian rebels, and the majority refuses to work with them because, as Mahmoud put it, “that would mean praying five times a day, not drinking beer and preventing Christians and minorities from joining the ranks.”
The Ahrar al-Sham Battalion, which operates in Hama and Idlib, is the largest Salafist battalion in Syria with a foothold in the central-north of the country. These fighters are well equipped and even better financed. Mahmoud’s seen them disburse wads of never-ending Syrian lira out of bags to designated arms buyers with instructions to buy “300,000 bullets” or advanced anti-aircraft guns from Iraqi smugglers. Salafists are also engaged in suicide bombings, such as this one. According to Mahmoud, it shows a 17 year-old boy, whose three older brothers were killed by the regime, driving a truck into the al-Salam checkpoint in Idlib and blowing it and himself up.
The tragedy in all this is that the US still has the capacity to rescue the opposition from radicalization and deeper internal fracture along ideological lines. The current policy of directing or orchestrating Gulf state supply lines in a covert fashion should end. Going along with further diplomatic kabuki with Russia and China—which now seek to enlist Iran’s help for solving the Syria impasse—insults both Syrian patriots and common sense. President Obama should announce the formation of a US task force dedicated to training and equipping select rebel battalions for conventional and guerilla warfare, including intelligence and counterintelligence, and gendarmerie law enforcement for areas that have already been liberated from the regime. He must also begin to marshal international political backing for safe zones and air campaigns in Syria, even if he deems these only feasible once his own campaign for re-election is over.
**Michael Weiss is communications director at the Henry Jackson Society.

Rocket fired from Lebanon wounds two Syrian police
July 2, 2012 /A rocket fired from Lebanon wounded two Syrian border police on Monday, Lebanon's General Security agency said. "On Monday at dawn, gunmen fired a rocket from Bqaiaa, in Lebanese territory, towards Syria, hitting a Syrian immigration post and wounding two border police," a statement from the agency's general directorate said. It is the first time the agency has reported firing from Lebanon into Syrian territory. Bqaiaa is located in the Akkar district, 185 kilometers (115 miles) north of Beirut. "The Syrians pursued the gunmen and, during the pursuit, a Lebanese General Security post was hit," the statement added. "A Syrian unit arrived at the Lebanese post and apprehended two members of General Security, taking them into Syrian territory before releasing them." The men who fired the rocket managed to escape, a General Security spokesperson told AFP on condition of anonymity. No Lebanese personnel were wounded, the spokesperson added. A local official said: "Armed men, riding a motorcycle, shot a rocket towards the Syrian village of Mcherfe at 3 a.m." "The Syrian forces immediately returned fire with automatic weapons, and the shooting lasted about 10 minutes. There were no casualties on the Lebanese side but one house was damaged." The statement added that an investigation was underway after Interior Minister Marwan Charbel was informed of the incident. Charbel told OTV that the incident should be discussed by the cabinet. Syrian troops have carried out a number of cross-border raids into Lebanon since the outbreak of the revolt against President Bashar al-Assad's rule in March last year, sparking fears of a spillover of the conflict.-AFP/NOW Lebanon

The Salafist is Hezbollah’s best friend
Al-Assir and Nasrallah’s love-hate relationship
Hanin Ghaddar, July 2, 2012/Salifist Sheikh Ahmad al-Assir gives a sermon during a sit-in in Saida on June 29. Al-Assir is arguably a rising star on the Sunni street, gaining from both Saad Hariri’s absence and Hezbollah’s need to present its supporters with a boogeyman to fear. (NOW Lebanon)
No one could be happier with Sheikh Ahmad al-Assir’s rising profile than Hezbollah and its leadership in Iran. Al-Assir’s sectarian statements, bullying attitude and defiance of all state authority make Hezbollah look decent, at least to its constituency.
Hezbollah has been suffering from serious setbacks in the past year, due to its stance against the Syrian revolution, corruption within its ranks and the fact that the current government, which it formed in 2010, has not delivered. The party of God desperately needs to connect with its support base in a new way, and they’ve been looking for a new enemy for a while, with Israel on the backburner since 2006.
For more than a year now, Hezbollah’s followers have stopped speaking about the threat of Israel and started to disseminate a new kind of fear: the fear of the Salafists. The Salafists and the Islamists are the new enemy; an enemy that is now, according to the Hezbollah community, the worst threat facing the Shia.
So far, it has been much talk about this new “threat” without tangible evidence. Of course the rise of Islamists in the region, mainly Egypt, has raised certain concerns within the Shia community. However, this “threat” was still far from Lebanon, until al-Assir came out.
And what a pleasant surprise he was for Hezbollah. Suddenly, this new enemy that threatens the Shia community more than anything else in the region is now at the gate of the South. From the middle of Saida, the nearest Sunni city to the South, al-Assir emerged to threaten Hassan Nasrallah and Nabih Berri, while starting a sit-in to demand the disarmament of Hezbollah, blocking the highway at Saida's northern entrance and preventing cars from passing.
Hezbollah will probably not do anything to stop al-Assir. They need him now to scare the Shia community and rally it around the party that will protect them from this enemy as it had protected them from other enemies before. At the same time, al-Assir gained popularity and fame only because of Hezbollah’s power and supremacy.
They need each other as they thrive on each other’s sectarian rhetoric and empty threats. Because of Nasrallah’s intimidation of the Sunni street during the May 7 events of 2008, hatred was born under the surface, and al-Assir is today harvesting the results of four years of humiliation. Four years during which the March 14 camp consented to a national unity government and then watched Hezbollah completely take over nearly all state institutions.
Four years in which former PM Saad Hariri left Lebanon, essentially abandoning the Sunni street without actual leadership, until al-Assir and his likes came to fill the gap. Four years during which we all saw people in the Arab world rising up to demand freedom and dignity while we had to watch in silence and frustration.
Of course al-Assir will find attentive ears and welcoming arms within the Sunni community. March 14 politicians abandoned the street and stopped listening when moderate rhetoric could still work. Hezbollah silenced them, and they did not protest. Fear ate them up when people around the region were tearing down walls of fear. March 14 failed.
Now people like al-Assir are taking advantage of both March 14’s failure and Hezbollah’s power. He is the result of both. March 14 will probably face more difficulties now in convincing the Sunnis that they are better than al-Assir. March 14 will also find it hard proving to the Christians that Islamists are not much of a threat as Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun has been saying they are for the past few years.
However, because of al-Assir’s threats and fiery rhetoric, Hezbollah will only get stronger because its leaders and allies are going to build on fears of Islamists until the upcoming elections in 2013.
Those who feel disillusioned by March 14 should reconsider support for al-Assir. When he escalated his rhetoric against Hezbollah, his popularity rose everywhere, even outside the Sunni community. The Lebanese should know better; the enemy of my enemy is not always my friend. A leader who places women in a segregated area cannot be a good example. His fierce attack against Hezbollah and its arms is not enough for us to endorse him or support his movement.
Both al-Assir and Hezbollah are using their communities to advance personal and political agendas, as much as they are using each other. Frustration with Hezbollah’s arms is understandable, but al-Assir is certainly not the best solution. Both Nasrallah and al-Assir feed on our fears and instincts. One tells his people that they are the most honored and the other lobbies his supporters around the importance of their dignity. Between honor and dignity, we seem to be losing our common sense.
**Hanin Ghaddar is the managing editor of NOW Lebanon

UN envoy discusses Lebanon’s security and stability with Mansour
July 2, 2012 /United Nations Special Coordinator for Lebanon Derek Plumbly met on Monday with Foreign Affairs Minister Adnan Mansour and discussed with him the issues pertaining to security and stability in Lebanon, according to the former’s press office. “I had a fruitful meeting with [Mansour]. I briefed him on the report of the Secretary-General on the implementation of Security Council Resolution 1701, which has just been circulated to Security Council members. The report highlights the calm which thankfully prevails in South Lebanon and across the Blue Line, but also the remaining steps that need to be taken to fully implement the resolution,” Plumbly said in a statement. Plumbly also said that the report “addresses issues of security and stability in Lebanon, which are crucial to the implementation of the resolution... It commends the efforts of Lebanon’s leaders to protect the country from the negative effects of the Syrian crisis, and specifically the initiative of President [Michel Sleiman] in pursuing national dialogue.” The UN envoy added that he also discussed with Mansour “the results of the Syria Working Group meeting held in Geneva at the weekend, and the importance of all parties in Syria engaging on the conclusions of that meeting and bringing an end to the violence and initiating a political process there.”
In answer to a question about a report of a cross border attack in northern Lebanon, Plumbly said he had no information on it but that the Secretary-General’s report addressed the general issue of the importance of all parties respecting Lebanon’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and specifically called on Syria to respect the border.
He added that the report also made the point that even where there was uncertainty as to the precise delineation of the border, there could be no justification for the killing or abduction of citizens.
Since the outbreak of protests in Syria in March 2011 against President Bashar al-Assad's rule, the Lebanese-Syrian border has seen a number of shootings and incursions from the Syrian side.
-NOW Lebanon

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea mocks National Dialogue
July 02, 2012 /The Daily Star/BEIRUT: Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea mocked the outcome of the recent National Dialogue session at Baabda Palace and said Hezbollah only wanted to appear as though it was willing to discuss its weapons. “We are with any serious dialogue, but in fact the Baabda declaration reminded me of civics lessons we used to take at intermediate school,” Geagea said in an interview with Saudi newspaper Al-Riyadh. During their first National Dialogue session in over 18 months, rival political leaders agreed to commit themselves to dialogue and avoid actions that fuel sectarian incitement. In their second meeting, political leaders called on the government to set up a mechanism for disarming Palestinian groups outside refugee camps and agreed to discuss a platform for a national defense strategy, ostensibly to include Hezbollah’s weapons, to be presented by President Michel Sleiman in July. Geagea said Hezbollah was not serious about the dialogue even though Sleiman was trying hard to reach concrete results on the national defense strategy. “Hezbollah is not ready for a serious dialogue and the party is sitting at the table ... to present itself as being supportive of dialogue,” he said.
March 14 parties are seeking a defense strategy that would eventually integrate Hezbollah’s arsenal into that of the Lebanese Army, but the party is adamant about keeping its arms.
Also Sunday, Hezbollah official in the Bekaa Mohammad Yaghi reaffirmed that his party’s weapons would not be taken from their hands.
“We say that the resistance’s weapons will remain in our hands until the land is liberated and no one should think that they can do anything about it,” he said at a meeting in Baalbek.
Yaghi said he did not condone people’s efforts to incite sectarian strife, and added that the party had suffered slights in the past without bringing the specter of internal war.
“Some people today want to take the country to the fires of sectarian strife, we are aware that they are acting under delusional and frail notions that they think will take them somewhere,” he said.
Yaghi said Hezbollah had remained calm without resorting to sectarian incitement. “We have been silent about our injuries. We endured insults and conspiracies, we suffered a lot and paid high prices for that.” Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun also weighed in on dialogue and current events Sunday, saying the need for internal security and stability superseded discussions over a national defense strategy and Hezbollah’s arsenal. “[Talk] on a national defense strategy or the removal of weapons will serve no purpose if the internal stability and national unity is being targeted,” Aoun told a local newspaper in an interview published Sunday. “I don’t talk about the resistance and the defense strategy now before there are discussions on security and stability, subjects which I give priority to because they are an open fire,” he said, referring to his engagement in the recently relaunched National Dialogue. “They [on the other hand] stress on the weapons of the resistance and the government,” he said.
Aoun described the National Dialogue sessions as a positive step. “They [talks] need to be given a chance. This attempt is a positive thing and we lose nothing by it, even if we are not able to achieve anything, at least we can say we tried.”

Syrian troops briefly abduct two members of Lebanon's General Security
July 02, 2012/The Daily Star
The Bqayaa border crossing, the only official border crossing in the Wadi Khaled region, north Lebanon. BEIRUT: Syrian soldiers briefly kidnapped two members of Lebanon’s General Security after entering the country through a northern border crossing and firing randomly at offices belonging to the security apparatus, Lebanese security sources said. Syrian soldiers also fired at the offices of a joint Lebanese Army task force at Lebanon’s Bqayaa crossing, the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, added. The offices as well as two cars were damaged in the incident.
The Syrian soldiers, who crossed 100 meters into the country and stayed in Lebanese territory for 30 minutes, warned their Lebanese counterparts not to allow armed men to shoot at Syria from the Bqayaa area and threatened to escalate their measures in the future should their instructions not be met. Meanwhile, Interior Minister Marwan Charbel condemned the incident and said the Cabinet should discuss the violation during its upcoming session. "The two General Security members are with us after the Syrian side released them and we should discuss this incident in Cabinet," Charbel told reporters outside Parliament in Nejmeh Square. Hours after the incident, General Security released a statement saying that their center was attacked by gunfire while the Syrian Army was pursuing gunmen, adding that the Syrian force briefly “took” two members of the security agency. “The General Security center at the Bqayaa border crossing in the north was attacked by gunfire while a force from the Syrian Army was pursuing gunmen who had fired a missile from Lebanese territory at a Syrian customs center in the area that led to the wounding of two people from the [Syrian] center,” the statement said.
“During the operation, the Syrian force arrived at the Bqayaa General Security and took two members from the [Lebanese] center into Syrian territory and then released them,” it added.
The statement also said that the General Directorate of General Security was conducting necessary investigations and had informed the Interior Ministry of the incident.
Commenting on the day’s event, the U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Derek Plumbly said he had no information on the incident but that U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon’s 19th report on the implementation of the UNSCR 1701 addressed the “general issue of the importance of all parties respecting Lebanon’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and specifically called on Syria to respect the border.”
In a statement from his office, Plumbly also said that the report stressed that “even where there was uncertainty as to the precise delineation of the border, there could be no justification for the killing or abduction of citizens.” Plumbly’s statement’s came following a meeting with Foreign Affairs Minister Adnan Mansour.

Lebanese Parliament convenes to discuss contentious issues
July 02, 2012/The Daily Star/BEIRUT: Lebanon’s Parliament convened Monday, kicking off a two-day legislative session to discuss 33 draft laws including two contentious bills for the 2012 state spending and the fate of contract workers at Electricite du Liban.Among the bills are two proposals allocating LL11.561 trillion ($7.67 billion) to cover public spending for 2012 and a draft proposal aimed at making contract workers at EDL full-time employees. The Cabinet overcame its spending crisis last month when ministers approved advanced payments and treasury loans to cover public administration expenses and finance projects in Tripoli and Beirut. The March 14 coalition has rejected extra-budgetary spending by Prime Minister Najib Mikati's Cabinet, arguing that overspending by previous governments should be legalized as well. As for the draft proposal aimed at making EDL contract workers full-time employees, MPs from the Change and Reform Parliamentary bloc reject the Parliament’s joint committees’ draft law approved last month allowing all EDL contract workers to take examinations that would give them the chance to become full-time employees. Energy Minister Gebran Bassil had proposed allowing 700 out of the 2,800 workers into the selection round while the rest would be employed by private sector service providers for a three-month probation period.Other proposals include a draft law authorizing the government to issue treasury bills in Lebanese pounds or in foreign currencies; a proposal to sign a loan agreement between Lebanon and the World Bank to finance the implementation of the second Educational Development project; and a draft proposal aimed at including notaries public in the civil service as well as draft laws call for settling the reconstruction of buildings devastated by the 2006 Israeli aggression on Lebanon. The lawmakers will also be discussing an urgent draft law that calls for making contract teachers full-time employees at the Education Ministry.

Before bombing Iran, Netanyahu should think twice
July 02, 2012/ By David Ignatius
The Daily Star
A popular new slogan making the rounds among government ministers in Jerusalem is that in dealing with Iran, Israel faces a decision between “bombing or the bomb.” In other words, if Israel doesn’t attack, Iran will eventually obtain nuclear weapons.This stark choice sums up the mood among top officials of the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: It’s clear that Israel’s military option is still very much on the table, despite the success of economic sanctions in forcing Iran into negotiations.
“It’s not a bluff, they’re serious about it,” says Efraim Halevy, a former head of the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service. A half-dozen other experts and officials made the same point in interviews last week: The world shouldn’t relax and assume that a showdown with Iran has been postponed until next year. Here, the alarm light is still flashing red.
Israeli leaders have been warning President Barack Obama’s administration that the heat isn’t off for 2012. When an Israeli politician visited Washington recently and was advised that the mood was calmer than in the spring, the Israeli cautioned that the Netanyahu government hadn’t changed its position “one iota.”
The negotiations with Iran by the “P5+1,” group rather than easing Israel’s anxieties, may actually have deepened them. That’s not just because Netanyahu thinks the Iranians are stalling. He fears that even if negotiators won their demand that Iran stop enriching uranium to 20 percent, and export its stockpile of fuel already enriched to that level, this would still leave more than 6,000 kilograms of low-enriched uranium that, within a year or less, could be augmented to bomb-grade material.
Netanyahu wants to turn back the Iranian nuclear clock by shipping out all the enriched uranium. And if negotiations can’t achieve this, he may be ready to try by military means.
For Obama, the trigger for military action would be a “breakout” decision by Iran’s supreme leader to go for a bomb. For Netanyahu, the red line is preventing Iran from reaching “threshold” capability where it could contemplate a breakout. He isn’t comfortable with letting Tehran have the enrichment capability that could be used to make a bomb even under a nominally peaceful program.
Netanyahu sees his country’s very existence at stake, and he’s prepared for Israel to go it alone because he’s unwilling to entrust the survival of the Jewish state to others. But some Israeli experts, including several key supporters of his government, don’t like this “existential” rhetoric warning of another Holocaust, arguing that it nullifies Israel’s defense capabilities.
Though most members of Netanyahu’s government would probably support him, there are some subtle nuances of opinion. U.S. officials say Defense Minister Ehud Barak’s focus is stopping Iran before it enters a “zone of immunity” when it begins full operation of centrifuges buried under a mountain near Qom. Iran probably will enter this zone sometime later this year. As Israeli officials have put it, the deadline for action “is not a matter of weeks, but it’s not a matter of years, either.”
American officials think Barak may also be more willing than Netanyahu to accept a deal in which Iran retains some modest enrichment capability but can’t accumulate enough material to make a bomb. Some Israeli experts are skeptical about the “zone of immunity” timeline. They believe that no facility, even the hardened site at Qom, is invulnerable to a clever attack: Iran will have immunity only with an actual nuclear-weapons umbrella.
While I understand Netanyahu’s concerns, I think an Israeli attack could be counterproductive. It would shatter the international coalition against Iran, collapse the sanctions program when it is starting to bite, and trigger consequences that cannot be predicted, especially during a time of sweeping change in the region.
Before he rolls the dice, Netanyahu should recall the shattering experience of Menachem Begin, a prime minister no less devoted to Israel, who was haunted in his final days in office by the sense that his invasion of Lebanon in 1982, intended to protect Israel’s security, had been a mistake. The potential costs and benefits of an attack on Iran are unknowable, but it would be, as Halevy says, “an event that would affect the course of this century.”
*David Ignatius is published twice weekly by THE DAILY STAR.

Lebanese Army scraps plans to remove Assir sit-in just hours before operation
July 02, 2012/ By Mohammed Zaatari, Van Meguerditchian
The Daily Star
Assir receives a bouquet of white flowers from Sidon business owners.
SIDON, Lebanon: Lebanese Army plans for a dawn operation to dismantle Sheikh Ahmad Assir’s sit-in in Sidon were called off hours before it was due to take place Sunday, according to a security source.
The senior source told The Daily Star that the Army had laid careful plans to surprise demonstrators at dawn Sunday to dismantle the tents, potentially bringing soldiers and protesters into confrontation.
“All steps were in place, and the Civil Defense teams were ready to assist the Army in the reopening of the highway by spraying defiant demonstrators with water,” said the official who asked to remain anonymous.
But according to the source, shortly after midnight Sunday, orders were changed and the Army was asked to abort the mission. The source added that the Army had canceled its initial plan as it had failed to receive necessary political coverage.
A visit by Sidon’s business owners to the sit-in over the weekend may lead Assir to relocate his movement to another location in the city that would do less harm to area businesses. But as Assir’s sit-in against Hezbollah’s arms entered its sixth day Sunday, the preacher vowed to continue it, describing the demonstration as the beginning of an “intifada against arms.”
“Sidon can live on olives, Sidon can live with little food but Sidon cannot live without dignity,” Assir told reporters Sunday.
Following a series of condemnations by Sidon’s political and religious leaders of Assir’s sit-in and their calls for the reopening of Sidon’s southbound highway, the preacher remained defiant, continuing the sit-in which he said was aimed at pressuring Hezbollah to surrender its arms to the Army.
Although Assir said that his protest would take escalatory measures in the coming days without disclosing any details, he appeared to have shifted positions after a group of business owners from nearby stores visited and sat with him for more than half an hour.
In greeting Assir, the business owners handed him a bouquet of white flowers and told him that they agree with his demands but are against his method of blocking roads.
Following the meeting, Assir told reporters that he would think about finding a new location for the sit-in on condition that it would be a significant spot and that the demonstration would remain influential.
“My meeting with businessmen was a positive one and I will think about relocating the sit-in if and only if I find a good place ... but the demands will remain the same,” said Assir.
An attempt by business owners last week to complain to the city’s politicians and political figures backfired and the number of protesters at the sit-in increased.
A source said that despite the caution exercised by Hezbollah and the Amal Movement in response to Assir’s statements against Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah and Speaker Nabih Berri, high-level talks were under way between officials to bring an end to the sit-in before it gained more popularity.
“These attempts have failed so far, and Berri’s calls with separate senior officials and Sidon’s Popular Nasserite Movement leader Osama Saad have failed to end the problem,” the source added. “Prime Minister Najib Mikati has stopped answering phone calls and almost everyone in the country is silent in the face of Assir’s defiance and charisma which has allowed him to gain more supporters.”
Public workers atop bulldozers and accompanied by the Internal Security Forces were working Sunday morning to create a detour that would bypass the road blocked by the preacher’s supporters. Meanwhile, more tents were erected by the demonstrators and others were seen working to place fences at an area meters away from the current sit-in.
Assir held multiple meetings of his so-called Shura Council throughout the day to monitor developments and decide the direction of his movement in the face of local reaction.
Apologizing for the inconvenience the sit-in had caused the people of Sidon, Assir expressed his willingness to compensate for everyone’s losses.
“We apologize to people whose lives have been disrupted by the sit-in and we will compensate them for [financial] losses. We will sell some land for that,” he said over the weekend.
Travelers were caught in heavy traffic on the highway in both directions at Sidon’s northern entrance Sunday afternoon.
Meanwhile, Grand Mufti of the Republic Sheikh Mohammad Qabbani denounced any road closures and said demonstrators should be allowed to protest as they like but without disrupting the lives of others.
“I am not with any demonstration that disturbs life in the country. Everyone has the right to demonstrate in the way they see fit for their cause but without getting in the way of people’s lives,” said Qabbani, who was speaking during a meeting with the families of the Lebanese kidnapped in Syria,
A number of supporters of the Popular Nasserite Movement in Sidon took to the streets Sunday to distribute flyers condemning the weeklong sit-in led by Assir. The movement’s head, Saad, said that demands for Hezbollah to surrender its arms were in line with U.S.-Israeli demands.
In a news conference at his residence in Sidon, Saad said that Assir’s sit-in was only provoking Hezbollah and the sheikh’s demands failed to provide any alternative to the weapons of the resistance.
“Blocking roads will only open the way to violence instigated by third parties that would like to see the security situation spin out of control,” said Saad.
But he also refused to use force to end the sit-in, saying that his movement did not want to see any casualties on the street as a result of a confrontation between the Army and the protesters.
Hezbollah official Hashem Safieddine welcomed calls by Sidon politicians and religious figures to end Assir’s sit-in. “What we heard from Sidon’s figures is a positive stance because first these protect Sidon and second they demonstrate that Sidon is a historic place of coexistence between its families and the resistance.”

Sanctions-hit Iran readies ballistic missile drill
July 02, 2012/By Farhad Pouladi/Daily Star
TEHRAN: Iran on Monday said it was readying ballistic missile war games simulating a counter-attack against U.S. or Israeli targets in the region in the event of air strikes on its nuclear facilities.
The three-day drill in Iran's central desert region was starting days after the European Union and the United States imposed severe new sanctions, and on the eve of another round of negotiations with world powers seeking to curb Tehran's nuclear ambitions.
"All units and missile bases have commenced their preparation and movement to the designated areas," the Revolutionary Guards, Iran's powerful elite military force conducting the exercise, said in a statement published by the official IRNA news agency.
It said the "tens of different missiles" to be used included the Shahab-3, a ballistic missile with a range of 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles) capable of hitting Israel.
The other ballistic missiles it said would be used -- the Fateh, Tondar, Zelzal, Khalij Fars and Qiam -- have lesser ranges of 200 to 750 kilometers.
The exercise, dubbed Great Prophet 7, was to target a "replica air base" in the Kavir Desert, the statement said.
Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh, the head of the Guards' aerospace division handling missile operations, announced the war games Sunday by saying they showed Iran "will decisively respond to any trouble" caused by "adventurous nations".
He intimated the mock air base was modeled after U.S. military bases in neighboring Afghanistan, Bahrain, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
Iran has previously warned it would target those U.S. bases if Israel or the United States made good on threats to attack it.
IRNA quoted Hajizadeh as saying: "If they (the Israelis) make a move, they will give us a pretext to obliterate them from the face of the Earth."
He asserted that Israel needed U.S. help for any military action against Iran, adding: "Since the U.S. bases are within the range of our missiles and weapons, they (the Americans) definitely will not be pressured to go along with this regime (Israel)."
The maneuvers will take place during negotiations in Istanbul on Tuesday between representatives from Iran and from the P5+1 group comprising the five permanent U.N. Security Council members, the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia, plus Germany.
The talks have faltered through three rounds held this year, with it becoming clear that a vast distance divided the two sides. As a result, they have now been downgraded from a political director level to that of experts. Iran chafes under the West's "carrot and stick" approach aimed at rolling back its nuclear program through bargaining in the negotiations, and through the harder tactics of sanctions and the U.S. threat of military action if all else fails. Tehran has defiantly forged on with its atomic activities, particularly its highly sensitive uranium enrichment program, while repeatedly denying Western suspicions that it is seeking a nuclear weapon "break-out" capability. A sanction regime imposed by the U.N. Security Council and extended through punishing additional Western sanctions was reinforced last week.
The United States on Thursday bolstered restrictions on foreign companies doing business with Iran's central bank, unless their nations were granted exemptions on the basis of reduced Iranian oil imports.
And the European Union on Sunday enacted a bloc-wide embargo on Iranian crude that also blocked EU companies from providing insurance for tankers carrying Iranian oil anywhere in the world -- a move affecting 90 percent of that market. Iran disputes data from the International Energy Agency that suggest the Western sanctions have already cut its vital oil exports by around 40 percent.

President Michel Sleiman takes off kid gloves on security challenges
July 02, 2012/By Antoine Ghattas Saab
The Daily Star
President Michel Sleiman, right, heads a session of the National Dialogue at the Presidential Palace in Baabda, east of Beirut, Monday, June 11, 2012. (The Daily Star/Mohammad Azakir)
Most ambassadors to Lebanon are urging political leaders to continue National Dialogue, driven by a belief that talks on a defense strategy, one that includes Hezbollah’s arms, will eventually lead to a resolution that satisfies all Lebanese factions, according to Western diplomatic sources.The ambassadors have been surprised by the sheer number of weapons popping up across the country and the security incidents that have come as a result, the most recent being last week’s attack on the Al-Jadeed TV station.
They also expressed surprise at the trend of blocking roads with burning tires, so much so that one Western ambassador said in his weekly report to his government that he was amazed at how many tires there were to burn, joking that it’s as if they’re being imported from abroad in order to weaken Lebanon’s stability.
This security crisis has pushed President Michel Sleiman to break his silence and take a decisive position. Ministerial sources close to Sleiman said they had never in their life seen the president in “this state of agitation,” brought on by his fear of the country sliding toward the fires of civil war. The sources added that while Sleiman has been known to be calm and patient in resolving delicate issues, both when he was commander of the Army and in his position as president, he has pounded the table and decided to be firm, refusing to let the government collapse under his watch.
His options are open; when the state and its authority are at risk of collapse there can no longer be room to abide by constitutional texts, the ministerial sources added. They said that most Lebanese would support any decision that Sleiman seeks and that the people are the real constitution in this case.
But they denied that in the last Cabinet session the president threatened any political group that prevents the implementation of the security plan launched by Interior Minister Marwan Charbel.
The sources also said Sleiman’s responsibility was greater now than at any other time to this point.
Political sources said that Sheikh Ahmad Assir’s actions – blocking roads and holding sit-ins – have actually gotten in the way of his intended message: instead of the arrows striking at illegitimate arms, which are the target of his group, they have instead struck at efforts to bring the arms under control, especially at the Dialogue and the office of the president.
During his sit-in, the controversial sheikh said that holding Dialogue to discuss the national defense strategy was “a waste of time.”
Many have asked Assir to open the road, but he has remaineddefiant, with his group’s aim shifting from challenging Hezbollah’s arms to the government, said political sources.
Assir has now trapped himself in a campaign which has no chance of success since it swerved off course and started inciting sectarian strife, they added.
Meanwhile, high-ranking political sources told The Daily Star that the relationship between Sleiman and Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun’s has warmed, especially after the last Dialogue session when Aoun supported the president’s proposal for a national defense strategy based on suggestions previously present at the Dialogue table.
The sources are waiting to see if this development, the return to a positive relationship, has an effect on long-awaited appointments, especially those that have been a point of contention between Aoun and Sleiman.

Lebanon's Arabic press digest - July 2, 2012
The Daily Star
Lebanon's Arabic press digest.
Following are summaries of some of the main stories in a selection of Lebanese newspapers Monday. The Daily Star cannot vouch for the accuracy of these reports.
As-Safir
2012 spending faces new requests
While Sheikh Ahmad Assir continues to block the northern part of the highway of the city of Sidon where he is holding his sit-in, Parliament will attempt Monday and Tuesday to try and open a path for the approval of a draft law regarding public spending for 2012 amid several proposals ranging from one with March14 comments and the withdrawal of their MPs.
Placing the draft law up for a vote is in itself a test of the government’s unity and reactivation of its work.
Efforts to resolve the spending issue went on until the late night hours and are ongoing.
Meanwhile, supporters of Sheikh Assir continued their sit-in which has lost purpose following objections from Sidon figures and most of its businessmen.
Sidon-based sources said the interior minister needed to come to Sidon to head the security meeting in order to take the appropriate decisions and prevent protesters from dragging the city and the whole country into strife.
An-Nahar
Berri's meeting with Siniora [might help in] by approval of spending
Before Parliament convenes Monday, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri is expected to meet with a March 14 delegation headed by former Prime Minister Fouad Siniora to discuss the draft law on spending proposed on the agenda.
Efforts were under way over the weekend, particularly with MP Walid Jumblatt who informed concerned parties that he would vote for the draft law and that he would not take any steps aimed at a loss of quorum during the session.
Sources close to March 14 coalition said that approving the draft law negates the government’s need for a budget and allows it to spend for the 2013 Parliamentary elections without any burden of taxes and additional fees. The sources added that it was in the interest of the opposition to go along with the draft law because voting against it would not prevent its passing.
In response to a question on whether Jumblatt would change his stance, ministerial sources distinguished between the proposed draft law for Monday for the general committee and the previous one and told An-Nahar newspaper that that the previous draft law of LL8.9 trillion was for covering expenses in 2011 and it was linked to over-budgetary spending by previous governments. The draft law proposed Monday is limited to the 2012 spending which means that the issue of spending between 2006 and 2011 has not been resolved and requires a conclusive settlement.
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said that Monday's session was very important because it is dealing with proposals related to people’s lives.
He added that after the session, “what is needed is for the government to be active and approve the budget and settle the oil issue.”
Al-Liwaa
Parliament today: [Issues of] spending and ‘contract workers’ could be appealed
Interest in the sit-in by Sheikh Ahmar Assir on the northern highway of Sidon has declined and the sit-in has become limited to one kilometer. The attention of the opposition and the majority has now been directed to the issue of spending and Electricite Du Liban contract workers as Parliament is to convene Monday and Tuesday.
Although the weekend in the south was calm - without any tensions given the measures by the Lebanese Army and police to divert traffic away from the sit-in – Sidon figures and traders affirmed that the road should reopen.
Meanwhile, efforts by the head of the Progressive Socialist Party Movement MP Walid Jumblatt to find a settlement for the spending issue between the March 14 parliamentary bloc, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, Prime Minister Najib Mikati failed.
The dispute now awaits last-minute discussions prior to the parliamentary meeting.
Al-Manar television quoted Jumblatt as saying that former minister and advisor to Fouad Siniora, Mohammad Shatah, had informed him of some comments by Siniora with regards to the draft law on spending and suggested a rethink to the proposal in terms of limiting the spending allowed for a month or two and not the whole year and decrease the amount required.
Al-Mustaqbal
Future Movement reiterates moderation as means to build a state
At a time when the Future Movement reaffirmed, via its Secretary-General Ahmad Hariri, on moderation as a way to rebuild the state and preserve its responsibilities, Sheikh Ahmad Assir remained adamant on continuing with his sit-in. In parallel, a meeting of Parliament is scheduled for Monday with a 33-item agenda, including covering the 2012 spending via treasury loans of LL11 trillion and a draft law related to Electricite Du Liban's contract workers.
Sources close to Prime Minister Najib Mikati told Al-Mustaqbal that the legislative session will be characterized by a positive atmosphere and that there are ongoing contacts that will continue Monday morning as well to find a solution for the spending issue.
The sources added that efforts are ongoing by all parties to find a solution.
The sources said that both the issue of spending and the EDL contract workers are under discussion.
Sources also said that Tuesday’s Cabinet session in Baabda Palace headed by President Michel Sleiman would be dedicated to discussing the draft state budget while the second one is expected to be held Wednesday and will be a normal session. Meanwhile, a source close to the opposition said that the March 14 movement would not vote for the spending issue in Parliament, expecting the issue to be resolved via a decree, citing a promise by Speaker Berri to the opposition not to put the spending draft law up for a vote and just to mention it.

Assad to Kremlin: I can finish the revolt in two months, replaces army chiefs
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report July 2, 2012/ In a phone call to the Kremlin Sunday, July 1, Syrian President Bashar Assad said he needed just two months to finish off the revolt against his regime. “My new military tactics are working,” he said in a secret video-conference with Russian intelligence and foreign ministry officials who shape Moscow’s policy on Syria.
Reporting this exclusively, debkafile’s intelligence sources also register the fleeting life span of the new plan for ending the Syrian war which UN envoy Kofi Annan announced had been agreed at a multinational Action Group meeting in Geneva on Saturday, June 30. Within 24 hours, the principle of a national unity transitional government based on “mutual consent” was rejected by the regime and the Turkish-based opposition leaders alike, as the violence went into another month.
On the first day of July, 91 people were reported killed in the escalating Syrian violence after a record 4,000 in June.
The new military tactics to which Assad referred are disclosed here:
1. The sweeping removal of most of the veteran Syrian army commanders who led the 16-month bloody assault on regime opponents and rebels. They were sent home with full pay to make way for a new set of younger commanders, most of them drawn from the brutal Alawite Shabiha militia, which is the ruling family’s primary arm against its enemies.
The regular commanders had shown signs of fatigue and doubts about their ability to win Assad’s war. Their will to fight on was being badly sapped by the mounting numbers officers and men going over to the opposition camp in June.
One of the tasks set the new commanders is to stem the rate of defections.
To keep the veteran commanders from joining the renegades and reduce their susceptibility to hostile penetration, the officers were not sacked but retired on full pension plus all the perks of office, including official cars.
2. But a higher, unthinkable level of violence is the key to Assad’s “new tactics.” He has armed the new military chiefs with extra fire power - additional tank and artillery units, air force bombers and attack helicopters - for smashing pockets of resistance and unlimited permission to use it. Already the level of live fire used against the rebels has risen to an even more unthinkable level which explains the sharp escalation of deaths to an average of 120 per day.
On the Syrian-Turkish border, tensions continue to mount. Monday morning, Turkey was still pumping large-scale strength including tanks, antiaircraft and antitank guns, artillery, surface missiles and combat helicopters to the border region.
Saturday, half a dozen Turkish jets were scrambled to meet Syria helicopters approaching their common border.
In Tehran, Brig. Gen. Amir-Ali Hajizadeh, commander of Iran’s IRGC Aerospace Division, warned Ankara that if its troops ventured onto Syrian soil, their bases of departure would be destroyed. The threat was made during Hajizadeh’s announcement of a three-day missile exercise starting Monday in response to the European oil embargo. He reported that long-, medium- and short-range missiles would target “simulations of foreign bases in the northern Semnan Desert,” without mentioning any specific nation except Turkey.

German FM tries to reassure public in wake of anti-circumcision court ruling
State court in Cologne rules that the child's right to physical integrity trumps freedom of religion and parents' rights.
By The Associated Press | Jul.02, 2012 /Germany's foreign minister on Sunday offered assurances that Germany protects religious traditions after a court ruled that circumcising young boys on religious grounds amounts to bodily harm even if parents consent. Last week, a state court in Cologne ruled that the child's right to physical integrity trumps freedom of religion and parents' rights. The ruling was strongly criticized by the head of Germany's Central Council of Jews, Dieter Graumann, who urged Parliament to clarify the legal situation to protect religious freedom. Muslim leaders also expressed concern.
Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said that a legal debate "must not lead to doubts arising internationally about religious tolerance in Germany."
"The free exercise of religion is protected in Germany. That includes religious traditions," Westerwelle said in a statement. "All our partners in the world should know that."
Volker Beck, a senior lawmaker with the opposition Greens, left open whether a "correction" of the Cologne ruling should be sought through the court system or through new legislation, but he said the result should be clarity that circumcision on religious grounds is justified so long as hygienic and medical standards are adhered to.
Graumann has pointed out that the circumcision of newborn Jews has been practiced for thousands of years. Muslims also circumcise young boys, while many parents request it on health grounds.
The European Jewish Congress added its voice to the criticism on Sunday.
"We would hope that in Germany of all places ... Jewish life would be allowed to flourish without restriction," said the group's president, Moshe Kantor. He urged the German government "to exercise its authority and take a clear stand against this ruling and in line with the German constitution which guarantees religious freedom."
The case in Cologne involved a doctor accused of carrying out a circumcision on a 4-year-old, approved by his Muslim parents, that led to medical complications. The doctor was acquitted, however, and prosecutors said they won't appeal.
Unlike female circumcision, there is no law prohibiting the practice and the ruling isn't binding for other courts - but it creates a potentially tricky legal situation for doctors who perform the procedure on parents' orders.