HOLY LAND: SYRIAN TROOP BUILD UP ALONG ISRAELI BORDER

'Syrian troops move closer to Israel border'

JERUSALEM - Syrian armed forces appear to be moving closer to the border with Israel and the military is being strengthened with Iranian help, an Israeli newspaper reported on Thursday.

“The Syrian armed forces are being strengthened in an unprecedented way in recent memory with the help of generous funding from Iran,” wrote Zeev Schiff, the military affairs correspondent for the liberal Haaretz daily.

“The main emphasis of the efforts has been missiles and long-range rockets to compensate for the weak air force,” he added.

“It appears that the Syrians have moved forces closer to the border with Israel on the Golan Heights.”

Schiff pointed to similar movements prior to a Syrian offensive on the same front during the Arab-Israeli Yom Kippur War in October 1973.

Reserve general Amos Gilad, an advisor to Defence Minister Amir Peretz, told public radio there was nothing to indicate an imminent Syrian attack but neither did he deny the Haaretz report.

“There is no information indicating that the Syrians are preparing to attack us in the coming months,” said Gilad.

“The fact that Syria is strengthening its military capabilities does not mean we’re going to be attacked tomorrow but certainly we need to be prepared,” he said.

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Israel gripped by Syria war fears

JERUSALEM - A reported Syrian troop build-up near the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights has fuelled speculation in Israel about a future conflict, more than three decades after the two enemies last went to war.

Syrian armed forces appear to be moving closer to the armistice line as Damascus spearheads an unprecedented armaments drive, shrieked Israel’s Haaretz newspaper from its front page Thursday.

“The Syrian armed forces are being strengthened in a way unprecedented in recent memory with the help of generous funding from Iran,” wrote military affairs correspondent Zeev Schiff.

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Syria is also close to concluding a deal with Russia to procure thousands of advanced anti-tank missiles, of the sort Hezbollah used to such lethal effect against Israeli armour last year, Haaretz reported.

“It appears that the Syrians have moved forces closer to the border (armistice line) with Israel on the Golan Heights,” wrote Schiff, noting similar movements prior to Syria’s offensive during the 1973 Arab-Israeli war.

Three decades ago, a coordinated Egyptian and Syrian assault caught Israel totally off guard on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, triggering its deadliest conflict since independence in 1948.

Syria has test-fired ballistic missiles, such as a Scud-D surface-to-surface missile, which would put most of Israel within range, Haaretz reported.

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Senior defence ministry official Amos Gilad said he saw no immediate danger of war but added that Syrian weapons purchases highlighted the need for Israel to maintain its combat-readiness.

“The fact that Syria is strengthening its military capabilities does not mean we’re going to be attacked tomorrow but certainly we need to be prepared,” Gilad told public radio.

“There is no danger of war. There is no deployment of forces indicating that Israel would be threatened by an offensive tomorrow.”

A source in the northern command agreed that Syria had beefed up its troops along the armistice line as Israel did following the outbreak of war in Lebanon.

“There was a clear rise in tension... with Syria, which bolstered its forces along the border. We then also heightened our alert level and beefed up our military presence in the Golan Heights and on Mount Hermon,” the source said.

“Since the end of the war, tension has remained high on both sides and at a much higher level than it was before the war. There is much more Israeli and Syrian daily military presence along the border today.”

But a source in the UN force in the Golan Heights charged with monitoring the armistice denied any Syrian troop build-up and lashed out an “alarmist Israeli media that repeatedly brings up the topic”.

“We haven’t noticed any change in the deployment of the Syrian forces along the armistice line,” the official said.

On Wednesday, Israel launched war games on the Golan Heights that Defence Minister Amir Peretz flatly denied were connected to fears of a new conflict with Syria.

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Pertinent Links:

1) 'Syrian troops move closer to Israel border'

2) Israel gripped by Syria war fears