Debka 29-Nov-13
When US Secretary of State John Kerry arrives in Israel and Ramallah next week, he will find the Palestinians sidestepping the peace negotiations he initiated with Israel and striking out on their own behind everyone’s backs on a key element of the dispute: The Palestinian refugees’ “rights” to return to their homes in pre-1948 Israel.
DEBKA Weekly’s Middle East sources reveal that Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has broken away from the talks to collude with Bashar Assad and Hamas on a secret resettlement program for the transfer of half a million Palestinians from war-torn Syria to the Gaza Strip,
Taking advantage of Israel’s preoccupation with the Iranian issue, Abbas, the Assad regime and Hamas’s prime minister of Gaza, Ismail Haniyeh, have in the last two weeks moved around a thousand Palestinian refugees from Syria into the Gaza Strip through Egypt.
The Haniyeh administration is providing them with accommodation, work, medical services and schooling; the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah, the funding.
Israel has flatly and consistently opposed recognition of the Palestinian refugees’ “right of return” as a maneuver for swamping the Jewish state to extinction by a Palestinian majority.
The refugee transfer is part of a wider cooperation accord the Palestinian leader reached with the Syrian ruler and revealed exclusively by debkafile on Oct. 23. Abbas pledged then that Palestinian fighters would withdraw from Syrian rebel ranks, lay down their arms and stop confronting the Syrian president and his army.
Assad, for his part, agreed to pull his troops out of Palestinian refugee camps in Damascus and Latakiya and provide them with armed protection.
He also promised to release Palestinian inmates from Syrian prisons.
Without Washington’s knowledge, Abbas made himself the first Arab leader to agree to deal with the Syrian ruler.
Wholesale Palestinian migration from Syria has begun
Our intelligence sources now report that the Abbas-Assad deal was a package which also covered the refugee issue. The Syrian ruler acceded to the Palestinian leader’s request to allow Palestinians resident in Syria to leave the country through Lebanon, provided their final destination was the Gaza Strip.
>From Lebanon, they are transferred to Egypt, where the authorities, happy to see the back of them, wave them straight through to the Gaza Strip.
At the start of the operation, only small batches of Palestinians embarked on this journey so as not to attract Israeli notice and possible interference. But when nothing happened, the numbers were boosted and thousands of Palestinian refugees are now on their way from Syria to the Gaza Strip.
The secret operation is organized by a special Palestinian Authority command center.
Israeli security sources are worried that this wholesale migration could become a destabilizing factor in the Gaza Strip and also cloak the infiltration of Iranian, Syrian and Hizballah secret agents and terrorist operatives into the Gaza Strip to spy on Israel and develop terrorist attacks.
Sunday, Nov. 24, an expanded IDF division carried out a large-scale maneuver in the South simulating the capture of Gaza City, capital of the Hamas-ruled Palestinian regime.
It was conducted from Sunday to Wednesday under the command of Brig.-Gen Micky Edelstein on orders from Chief of Staff Gen. Benny Gantz.
Conscripts fanned out through the Israeli coastal town of Ashkelon and its environs to simulate the capture of Gaza City and surrounding villages. It was the first time Israeli armed forces had ever carried out a mock exercise for taking Gaza City.
HOT POINTS
A Digest of DEBKAfile Round-the-Clock Exclusives in Week Ending Nov. 28, 2013
November 23, 2013 Briefs
Egypt and Turkey expel ambassadors, downgrade relations
Relations between Cairo and Ankara went into crisis Saturday when Egypt downgraded its relations with Turkey and declared Turkish ambassador persona non grata. Ankara responded in kind. Egypt accuses the Turkish prime minister of crudely interfering in its internal affairs by is campaign to restore the deposed president Mohamed Morsi.
November 24, 2013 Briefs
Rebel battle to break out of Damascus siege costs 150 lives
Heavy fighting erupted Sunday when rebel forces tried to break the long Syrian army siege of their strongholds in the Ghouta area east of Damascus. They were brought by famine and desperation to fight to break the stranglehold.
More than 11,000 children killed in Syria’s civil war
In nearly three years of civil war, more than 11,000 children have died, hundreds targeted by snipers, others killed in summary executions or by torture – some as young as one, the London-based Oxford Research Group reports.
Tehran will scrap interim deal if Congress enacts new sanctions
debkafile’s Iranian sources report that Iran has warned Washington that if the US Congress legislates new, harsher sanctions, it will treat the interim accord signed in Geneva Sunday as null and void.
Kerry: The new nuclear accord makes Israel safer
On a visit to London, Secretary of State John Kerry remarked that the interim accord signed Sunday in Geneva would make Israel safer during the next six months of negotiations.
Putin hails the deal with Iran as a breakthrough
Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed the newly-signed first-step nuclear accord with Iran as a breakthrough and “just the beginning!”
Iran says deal recognizes Iran’s enrichment right. Kerry denies
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani announced Sunday that the deal reached in Geneva means the world powers recognize Tehran's “nuclear rights.” Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi wrote on Twitter that Iran’s enrichment rights had been recognized in the negotiations.
But US Secretary of State John Kerry denied this, saying, “The first step, let me be clear, does not say that Iran has a right to enrich uranium." Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov confirmed the Iranian interpretation.
Netanyahu: Deal lets Iran gain a nuclear bomb. Israel not bound
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu slammed the interim nuclear deal signed in Geneva early Sunday as “a historic mistake that makes the world a more dangerous place.” Israel is not obligated by this agreement.” Iran is committed to Israel’s destruction, he said and "I want to make clear… Israel will not allow Iran develop a military nuclear capability. For the deal, Iran made “cosmetic concessions that it can do away with in a matter of weeks,” the prime minister said.
Seven loopholes favoring Iran in the new nuclear deal
24 Nov. The first preliminary nuclear deal the six world powers (US, Russia, China, UK, France and German) signed with Iran before dawn Sunday, Nov. 24, failed to address the most suspicious elements of Iran’s nuclear program, i.e. its clandestine military dimensions. The expanded UN inspections were not linked, for instance, to Iran’s concealed nuclear sites or even Parchin, where Iran is suspected of testing nuclear-related explosions. Israel, the Gulf States and others are therefore dubious of the accord’s capacity to freeze Iran’s nuclear program. debkafile lists seven of the most glaring loopholes
Nuclear deal reached between Iran and six world powers in Geneva 24 Nov.
After all-night talks, a first-step nuclear deal was struck Sunday in Geneva between Iran and the six powers. Obama said key aspects of Iran’s nuclear program will be rolled back in return for limited sanctions relief. No new centrifuges will added to the enrichment process, work will stop at the Arak nuclear reactor and the UN will expand inspections to daily visits to Natanz and Fordo to ensure that Iran was unable to make a nuclear bomb. The core sanctions architecture will remain in place pending a comprehensive solution to be negotiated in the next s six months, said the president, but no new sanctions will be imposed.
debkafile: None of the measures revealed so far deal with the concealed military features of Iran’s nuclear program, or the details of expanded inspections. Israel is not expected to accept any document with those omissions. Israel and Saudi Arabia said they would not be bound by the deal’s provisions and reserved their military options.
November 25, 2013 Briefs
Tehran reports US released $8 billion of Iran’s assets
Iranian government spokesman Mohammad-Baqer Nobakht reported Monday night that the US had released $8 bn of Iran’s frozen assets, the day after it reached a first-step nuclear deal with six world powers.
Netanyahu to send national security adviser to Washington
Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu is sending his national security adviser, Yossi Cohen, to Washington for talks on the nuclear accord just signed in Geneva.
Syrian peace conference set for Jan. 22
UN Secretary Ban Ki-moon announced Monday that the Syrian peace conference, “Geneva II,” has been scheduled for Jan. 22.
Saudis warn they will strike out on their own after Iran nuclear deal
Senior Saudi royal adviser Nawaf Obaid Monday accused Western allies of deceit in striking a nuclear accord with Iran and declared Riyadh would follow an independent foreign policy. “We were lied to, things were hidden from us,” he said. “The problem is not with the deal struck in Geneva but how it was done.” In Riyadh, the Saudi government cautiously welcomed the Geneva nuclear accord hoping it was a first step towards a comprehensive solution for Iran’s nuclear program.
Canada deeply skeptical of the six-power nuclear deal with Iran
Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird said Sunday that Canada will not lift any of its sanctions against Iran until the Islamic regime fully abandons its nuclear weapon ambitions. He said he is deeply skeptical of the deal closed in Geneva between the six world powers and Iran, given Tehran’s record of defying the UN Security Council and the International Atomic Energy Agency.
In Washington, the White House announced after a telephone call from President Barack Obama to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu that they had agreed to stay in close touch during the next six months of negotiations on a comprehensive solution of the Iranian nuclear issue.
France backpedals, doesn’t expect Israeli strike on Iran
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius estimates that Israel will not now take preemptive military action against a nuclear Iran while the world was in mid-negotiation with Tehran on a comprehensive nuclear agreement. Two Arab emirates break ranks with Saudi Arabia: The UAE said that the interim deal could support “the stability of the region,” and Bahrain found it “removes fears from us, whether from Iran or any other state.”
When US Secretary of State John Kerry arrives in Israel and Ramallah next week, he will find the Palestinians sidestepping the peace negotiations he initiated with Israel and striking out on their own behind everyone’s backs on a key element of the dispute: The Palestinian refugees’ “rights” to return to their homes in pre-1948 Israel.
DEBKA Weekly’s Middle East sources reveal that Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has broken away from the talks to collude with Bashar Assad and Hamas on a secret resettlement program for the transfer of half a million Palestinians from war-torn Syria to the Gaza Strip,
Taking advantage of Israel’s preoccupation with the Iranian issue, Abbas, the Assad regime and Hamas’s prime minister of Gaza, Ismail Haniyeh, have in the last two weeks moved around a thousand Palestinian refugees from Syria into the Gaza Strip through Egypt.
The Haniyeh administration is providing them with accommodation, work, medical services and schooling; the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah, the funding.
Israel has flatly and consistently opposed recognition of the Palestinian refugees’ “right of return” as a maneuver for swamping the Jewish state to extinction by a Palestinian majority.
The refugee transfer is part of a wider cooperation accord the Palestinian leader reached with the Syrian ruler and revealed exclusively by debkafile on Oct. 23. Abbas pledged then that Palestinian fighters would withdraw from Syrian rebel ranks, lay down their arms and stop confronting the Syrian president and his army.
Assad, for his part, agreed to pull his troops out of Palestinian refugee camps in Damascus and Latakiya and provide them with armed protection.
He also promised to release Palestinian inmates from Syrian prisons.
Without Washington’s knowledge, Abbas made himself the first Arab leader to agree to deal with the Syrian ruler.
Wholesale Palestinian migration from Syria has begun
Our intelligence sources now report that the Abbas-Assad deal was a package which also covered the refugee issue. The Syrian ruler acceded to the Palestinian leader’s request to allow Palestinians resident in Syria to leave the country through Lebanon, provided their final destination was the Gaza Strip.
>From Lebanon, they are transferred to Egypt, where the authorities, happy to see the back of them, wave them straight through to the Gaza Strip.
At the start of the operation, only small batches of Palestinians embarked on this journey so as not to attract Israeli notice and possible interference. But when nothing happened, the numbers were boosted and thousands of Palestinian refugees are now on their way from Syria to the Gaza Strip.
The secret operation is organized by a special Palestinian Authority command center.
Israeli security sources are worried that this wholesale migration could become a destabilizing factor in the Gaza Strip and also cloak the infiltration of Iranian, Syrian and Hizballah secret agents and terrorist operatives into the Gaza Strip to spy on Israel and develop terrorist attacks.
Sunday, Nov. 24, an expanded IDF division carried out a large-scale maneuver in the South simulating the capture of Gaza City, capital of the Hamas-ruled Palestinian regime.
It was conducted from Sunday to Wednesday under the command of Brig.-Gen Micky Edelstein on orders from Chief of Staff Gen. Benny Gantz.
Conscripts fanned out through the Israeli coastal town of Ashkelon and its environs to simulate the capture of Gaza City and surrounding villages. It was the first time Israeli armed forces had ever carried out a mock exercise for taking Gaza City.
HOT POINTS
A Digest of DEBKAfile Round-the-Clock Exclusives in Week Ending Nov. 28, 2013
November 23, 2013 Briefs
Egypt and Turkey expel ambassadors, downgrade relations
Relations between Cairo and Ankara went into crisis Saturday when Egypt downgraded its relations with Turkey and declared Turkish ambassador persona non grata. Ankara responded in kind. Egypt accuses the Turkish prime minister of crudely interfering in its internal affairs by is campaign to restore the deposed president Mohamed Morsi.
November 24, 2013 Briefs
Rebel battle to break out of Damascus siege costs 150 lives
Heavy fighting erupted Sunday when rebel forces tried to break the long Syrian army siege of their strongholds in the Ghouta area east of Damascus. They were brought by famine and desperation to fight to break the stranglehold.
More than 11,000 children killed in Syria’s civil war
In nearly three years of civil war, more than 11,000 children have died, hundreds targeted by snipers, others killed in summary executions or by torture – some as young as one, the London-based Oxford Research Group reports.
Tehran will scrap interim deal if Congress enacts new sanctions
debkafile’s Iranian sources report that Iran has warned Washington that if the US Congress legislates new, harsher sanctions, it will treat the interim accord signed in Geneva Sunday as null and void.
Kerry: The new nuclear accord makes Israel safer
On a visit to London, Secretary of State John Kerry remarked that the interim accord signed Sunday in Geneva would make Israel safer during the next six months of negotiations.
Putin hails the deal with Iran as a breakthrough
Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed the newly-signed first-step nuclear accord with Iran as a breakthrough and “just the beginning!”
Iran says deal recognizes Iran’s enrichment right. Kerry denies
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani announced Sunday that the deal reached in Geneva means the world powers recognize Tehran's “nuclear rights.” Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi wrote on Twitter that Iran’s enrichment rights had been recognized in the negotiations.
But US Secretary of State John Kerry denied this, saying, “The first step, let me be clear, does not say that Iran has a right to enrich uranium." Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov confirmed the Iranian interpretation.
Netanyahu: Deal lets Iran gain a nuclear bomb. Israel not bound
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu slammed the interim nuclear deal signed in Geneva early Sunday as “a historic mistake that makes the world a more dangerous place.” Israel is not obligated by this agreement.” Iran is committed to Israel’s destruction, he said and "I want to make clear… Israel will not allow Iran develop a military nuclear capability. For the deal, Iran made “cosmetic concessions that it can do away with in a matter of weeks,” the prime minister said.
Seven loopholes favoring Iran in the new nuclear deal
24 Nov. The first preliminary nuclear deal the six world powers (US, Russia, China, UK, France and German) signed with Iran before dawn Sunday, Nov. 24, failed to address the most suspicious elements of Iran’s nuclear program, i.e. its clandestine military dimensions. The expanded UN inspections were not linked, for instance, to Iran’s concealed nuclear sites or even Parchin, where Iran is suspected of testing nuclear-related explosions. Israel, the Gulf States and others are therefore dubious of the accord’s capacity to freeze Iran’s nuclear program. debkafile lists seven of the most glaring loopholes
Nuclear deal reached between Iran and six world powers in Geneva 24 Nov.
After all-night talks, a first-step nuclear deal was struck Sunday in Geneva between Iran and the six powers. Obama said key aspects of Iran’s nuclear program will be rolled back in return for limited sanctions relief. No new centrifuges will added to the enrichment process, work will stop at the Arak nuclear reactor and the UN will expand inspections to daily visits to Natanz and Fordo to ensure that Iran was unable to make a nuclear bomb. The core sanctions architecture will remain in place pending a comprehensive solution to be negotiated in the next s six months, said the president, but no new sanctions will be imposed.
debkafile: None of the measures revealed so far deal with the concealed military features of Iran’s nuclear program, or the details of expanded inspections. Israel is not expected to accept any document with those omissions. Israel and Saudi Arabia said they would not be bound by the deal’s provisions and reserved their military options.
November 25, 2013 Briefs
Tehran reports US released $8 billion of Iran’s assets
Iranian government spokesman Mohammad-Baqer Nobakht reported Monday night that the US had released $8 bn of Iran’s frozen assets, the day after it reached a first-step nuclear deal with six world powers.
Netanyahu to send national security adviser to Washington
Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu is sending his national security adviser, Yossi Cohen, to Washington for talks on the nuclear accord just signed in Geneva.
Syrian peace conference set for Jan. 22
UN Secretary Ban Ki-moon announced Monday that the Syrian peace conference, “Geneva II,” has been scheduled for Jan. 22.
Saudis warn they will strike out on their own after Iran nuclear deal
Senior Saudi royal adviser Nawaf Obaid Monday accused Western allies of deceit in striking a nuclear accord with Iran and declared Riyadh would follow an independent foreign policy. “We were lied to, things were hidden from us,” he said. “The problem is not with the deal struck in Geneva but how it was done.” In Riyadh, the Saudi government cautiously welcomed the Geneva nuclear accord hoping it was a first step towards a comprehensive solution for Iran’s nuclear program.
Canada deeply skeptical of the six-power nuclear deal with Iran
Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird said Sunday that Canada will not lift any of its sanctions against Iran until the Islamic regime fully abandons its nuclear weapon ambitions. He said he is deeply skeptical of the deal closed in Geneva between the six world powers and Iran, given Tehran’s record of defying the UN Security Council and the International Atomic Energy Agency.
In Washington, the White House announced after a telephone call from President Barack Obama to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu that they had agreed to stay in close touch during the next six months of negotiations on a comprehensive solution of the Iranian nuclear issue.
France backpedals, doesn’t expect Israeli strike on Iran
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius estimates that Israel will not now take preemptive military action against a nuclear Iran while the world was in mid-negotiation with Tehran on a comprehensive nuclear agreement. Two Arab emirates break ranks with Saudi Arabia: The UAE said that the interim deal could support “the stability of the region,” and Bahrain found it “removes fears from us, whether from Iran or any other state.”
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