Middle East Intelligence Bulletin
Jointly published by the United States Committee for a Free Lebanon and the Middle East Forum
  Vol. 5   No. 10 Table of Contents
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October 2003 


Implications of the Israeli Reprisal in Syria
by Gary C. Gambill

Ariel Sharon

In launching Israel's first attack on Syrian soil in nearly three decades earlier this month, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon unveiled a sweeping change in the Jewish state's defense policy. While the October 5 air strike on a terrorist training camp northwest of Damascus came in retaliation for a devastating suicide bombing in Haifa a day earlier, the decision to expand Israel's battle against Palestinian terrorist groups beyond the West Bank and Gaza Strip was months in the making. Henceforth, in the words of Sharon's advisor, Dore Gold, "no one can strike Israel with impunity."[1]

These words, as Sharon's critics and supporters in Israel have both hastened to point out, have been heard before. Fifty years ago, the future eleventh prime minister of Israel was hand-picked by its first, David Ben Gurion, to lead a special operations unit tasked with retaliating for the cross-border raids of Palestinian guerrillas by striking into Jordan, which tolerated their activities, and Egypt, which openly sponsored them. Although the roughly two dozen raids carried out by Sharon's commandos over the next three years were criticized for violating international law and causing civilian casualties, the scale and frequency of violent Palestinian infiltration into Israel dramatically declined.

Although the challenge faced by Sharon today is far more deadly - over 870 Israelis, mostly civilians, have been killed since the beginning of the "Al-Aqsa Intifada" in September 2000[2] - the underlying problem is strikingly similar: terrorists financed, trained, and equipped by enemy states are infiltrating Israel's borders and indiscriminately murdering civilians. Iran provides most of the funding, but the terrorist groups are trained in Syria and Syrian-occupied Lebanon and most maintain operational headquarters in Damascus.

For nearly three decades, Syria enjoyed de facto immunity from direct Israeli retaliation because the risks (or, more precisely, expected costs) of undertaking direct retaliation against Syria were viewed by most in the Israeli political establishment as less acceptable than the costs of continued restraint. According to the prevailing conventional wisdom, direct retaliation against Damascus was more likely to provoke Syrian escalation than de-escalation, perhaps even an all out war. Having staked its political legitimacy at home on "resistance" to Israel, Syria's Baathist regime might fear the consequences of backing down in the face of an Israeli attack on its soil more than the consequences of defeat on the battlefield (similar considerations drove its Iraqi counterpart to fight a war it couldn't win in 1991). While Israel would undoubtedly be the victor of a full-fledged war, even a lopsided military triumph would be Pyrrhic if Syrian chemical weapons were used, or if the Assad regime collapsed in its aftermath.

Until the outbreak of the Al-Aqsa Intifada, the costs of Syrian-sponsored terrorism remained relatively low by comparison. Even as the death toll mounted after September 2000, there remained for some time a prevalent belief in Israel that Syrian-sponsored terrorist groups could be contained by other means. Israel's decision to retaliate on Syrian soil reflects a growing consensus that alternative means cannot get the job done.

Diplomacy

There is a widespread agreement in Israel that diplomacy alone - either with Syria or the Palestinian Authority (PA) - cannot bring an end to the violence. Even if an agreement could be reached with the PA on terms acceptable to a majority of Israelis, the past three years have led most Israelis to doubt that it can be trusted to make good faith efforts at containing terrorist groups. Many believe that the PA would be incapable of doing so even if it made good faith efforts - there is simply no track record for this.

Moreover, many in the Israeli establishment fear that making diplomatic concessions in the face of unrelenting terrorist violence may embolden Palestinian extremists. Israel's September 2000 withdrawal from south Lebanon did not strengthen moderates within the Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah movement - the departure under fire of Israeli forces was seen as a defeat, vindicating radicals in the group who advocate unrelenting armed struggle against the Jewish state. It also provided an inspiration for the outbreak of the second Palestinian intifada four months later.

Blockades

While the Israelis have been able to bring a halt to suicide bombings emanating from the Gaza Strip by sealing it off and carefully inspecting all incoming and outgoing traffic, this method of containing terrorist groups cannot be applied to the West Bank, due to its much larger size and terrain, without constructing a physical barrier to prevent infiltrators from bypassing Israeli checkpoints. However, the construction of such a barrier presents Sharon with a political Catch-22: A barrier built to protect citizens living both inside Israel's 1967 borders and in major settlements on the other side of the "green line" would encounter substantial international opposition, while the construction of a barrier along the green line would never be accepted by Sharon's governing coalition (because it would be seen as inherently discriminatory in its provision of public security and as weakening Israel's claim to the settlements). Although Israel began construction of the barrier, it cannot be completed until the Sharon government finds an acceptable compromise between these two extremes.

Destruction of Terrorist Infrastructure

Although Israel's April 2002 West Bank offensive, code-named Operation Defensive Shield, wiped out much of the human and material infrastructure of terrorist groups in the territories, this blow to their operational capacities was quickly overcome - Iranian supplies of weapons and explosives still found their way into the West Bank, as did newly-trained recruits.

Targeted Killings

There is a consensus in Israel that the targeted killing of alleged terrorist leaders in the West Bank and Gaza has been effective, at least in some cases. Assassinations and near misses on the lives of Hamas leaders in recent months "brought them to the understanding that Israel knows every minute where they are," according to Israeli terrorism specialist Shalom Harari. "That has led them to much deeper hiding than before, which paralyzes their ability to coordinate."[3]

The problem with this strategy is that it only works if Israel is capable of targeting the operational leadership of a terrorist group. In the case of Hamas, the group's spiritual and political leaders inside the territories exert enough influence over terrorist operations for the strategy to be effective. However, the operational leadership of Islamic Jihad is centered squarely in Damascus and sends instructions directly to cells in the territories that operate autonomously. As a result, targeted killings of Islamic Jihad personnel inside the territories cannot effect a broad change in the group's operations.

Exiling Arafat

Although some in the Israeli government have advocated sending PA President Yasser Arafat into exile (or killing him), few expect that this would have an appreciable impact on Syrian-sponsored terrorist groups, and it would cause an unprecedented international uproar.

American pressure

Meanwhile, Israeli hopes that increased American pressure would lead Syria to reduce its support for terrorist groups have been dashed. According to senior American officials who spoke to the New York Times on condition of anonymity, the Central Intelligence Agency had compiled a convincing array of human and satellite intelligence showing not only that the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) was still using the Ain Saheb camp for training earlier this year, but that the camp was being renovated. According to one official, the nature of the "structural improvements" being made to the camp suggested that it "was being fixed up for someone else to use," probably Islamic Jihad. This information was presumably shared with the Israelis.[4]

The Ain Saheb Raid

Israel's decision to abandon its moratorium on direct retaliation on Syrian soil was formally made in the immediate aftermath of two deadly suicide bombings on September 9 and a list of prospective reprisal targets, including Ain Saheb, was approved. However, Israel had been sending warnings to Syria through European and American intermediaries for several weeks. In August, after Hezbollah shells killed an Israeli teenager, Israeli fighter jets buzzed Assad's family home in the coastal region of Latakia, breaking the sound barrier at low altitude - a message apparently intended to convey to the Syrian president that Israel knows where he sleeps each night. When Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for an October 3 suicide bombing in Haifa that left 20 dead, Sharon ordered an air strike on Ain Saheb the following day.

Although no direct military response was forthcoming from Damascus, unidentified guerrillas in south Lebanon opened fire across the border the next day, killing an Israeli soldier. Given that the Israeli raid took place just ahead of the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur, when tens of thousands of Israeli tourists normally flock to northern Israel, the Syrians probably considered authorizing the launch of Hezbollah rockets but decided against it.

Syrian officials adamantly insisted that the base was a civilian facility, while Islamic Jihad declared that it does "not have any camps or military positions in Syria."[5] However, rather than attempting to prove this claim, Syria quickly sealed off the site and has refused to allow any media to access the area. Asked why her government was doing this, Syrian foreign ministry spokeswoman Boushra Kanafani said that there was no reason to subject Syria's credibility to scrutiny.[6]

Although the White House faced pressure from Europe to criticize the raid, President George W. Bush declared that Israel "must not feel constrained" in defending itself. After the attack, Syria submitted a draft resolution to the UN Security Council condemning the strike, but was able to win little support for it in the Council. Interestingly, a majority of the Council's members, including France and Germany, signaled to the Syrians that they would support a resolution strongly denouncing the Israeli raid as long as the text included a brief condemnation of the Haifa suicide bombing, but Syrian Ambassador to the United Nations Faysal Mekdad adamantly refused, saying that the insertion of any reference to the Haifa attack in the resolution was "impossible to accept."

Implications

Israeli officials have made it quite clear that the raid on Ain Saheb inaugurated a new reprisal doctrine. "Every location where Palestinian terrorists train is a legitimate target as far as we are concerned," said a senior Israeli military source. "Whether it's in Syria or in other places, as far as we are concerned, no one has immunity."[7] To underscore the point, on October 7 the Israeli military released a map showing the locations of terrorist offices and leadership residences in Damascus.

Although some general threats of retaliation have also been made, the only prospective targets specified in Israeli public statement are terrorists and terrorist facilities - there is little to suggest that Syria's military or infrastructure will come under attack. The "impunity" that Israel has withdrawn is that of foreign operatives sheltered on Syrian soil, not Syria itself - at least not yet.

The most frequently-voiced criticism of the raid among Israeli media commentators was that it was too small-scale, "Syria is literally chock full of high-impact operational terrorist targets - everything from the homes of terrorist leaders to their headquarters," noted Caroline B. Glick "But instead of attacking actual targets, we went after an empty camp."[8] Alex Fishman the security commentator of Yediot Aharonot, wrote that the kind of signal relayed by the October 5 raid was unlikely to convince Syria to change course and "was aimed more at placating Israeli public opinion than changing the Syrian mind-set."[9]

While American intelligence data shows that the camp was hardly disused, some Israeli officials have said the air strike was timed to hit the training facility when it was "between classes." Thus, the raid was probably intended to be more a warning than an attempt to degrade terrorist capabilities. Sharon's supporters say that this strategy enables Israel to ratchet up its retaliation policy gradually without losing US support, but the main impetus is probably the belief that Syria's regime does not adjust well to big changes. This is very true (Syria is still adjusting to the fall of the Soviet Union), but it does not immediately follow that a policy of graduated escalations of reprisals would be more effective. Plenty of time to acclimate to changing circumstances can also pave the way for no adjustment in behavior.

If Syria fails to reduce its sponsorship of terrorist groups, Israeli reprisals will still serve the purpose of degrading their operational capabilities, though perhaps not decisively. Some have expressed concern that Israel would become "locked" into a reprisal policy that cannot easily be abandoned if Syria acclimates. This could lead Israel to broaden the scope of its reprisals to include Syrian military targets. There is a precedent for this. In April 2001, following a deadly Hezbollah rocket attack, Israeli fighter jets struck a Syrian radar station in Lebanon, killing three Syrian soldiers, and carried out a similar reprisal raid a few months later (the frequency of Hezbollah attacks dropped dramatically as a result).

Journalist Dan Margalit, among others, expressed concern that this will draw Israel into a policy of "depth bombings" like the kind that failed to subdue Egypt during the 1969-70 War of Attrition.[10] However, while Israel sustained heavy losses of aircraft in the War of Attrition, it won't over the skies of Damascus. Syria's air defenses are two generations old and its air force is virtually obsolete. What has always crippled Syrian military power the most, however, is incompetence (Syria lost 79 aircraft and failed to inflict any Israeli losses in their 1982 confrontation over Lebanon) and over-centralized decision-making (it is said that Syria's military command structure requires a senior general to authorize the firing of an air defense missile).[11] The only area in which Syrian military strength has increased since the end of the Cold War is ballistic missiles, but these would be of little use in a war of attrition because their launching would bring about total war. The other major difference is that Egyptian President Gamal Abdul Nasser was a popular leader, while Syrian President Bashar Assad isn't.

Israel nevertheless faces some broad unknowns. Whether an Israeli-Syrian military crisis will positively or negatively affect Assad's hold on power is very difficult to predict, as is the young dictator's propensity for risk-taking under pressure. Whether the United States will, as has often been the case, reverse course down the road and once again pursue constructive engagement with Damascus - leaving Israel holding the ball - may be the greatest unknown of all.

What is known about the alternatives, however, makes Israelis more willing to step into the unknown. "We were waiting for them in Jenin," a senior Islamic Jihad leader said after the Haifa raid early this month, referring to a refugee camp in the West Bank where the group's operatives inflicted heavy casualties on Israeli soldiers in April 2002, "but they attacked Ain Saheb."[12] It is for this reason that the daily Ha'aretz applauded the raid on its editorial page: "If those who sent the suicide bomber . . . hoped to drag Israel into a mess in the Palestinian arena on Yom Kippur, one can say that this time, the political and military echelons side-stepped the trap."[13] Unlike Jenin, Ain Saheb has the benefit of not having been tried.

Notes

  [1] "Israeli Airstrike Hits Site in Syria," The Washington Post, 6 October 2003.
  [2]"Israeli Airstrike Hits Site in Syria," The Washington Post, 6 October 2003.
  [3] "Hamas Leaders Keep Low Profile," The Los Angeles Times, 9 October 2003.
  [4] "Construction Was Spotted at Syrian Camp Hit by Israel," The New York Times, 10 October 2003.
  [5] Interview with Ramadan Shallah, Al-Manar Television (Beirut), 5 October 2003.
  [6] Syria warns Israel of retaliation, BBC, 11 October 2003.
  [7] Ma'ariv (Tel Aviv), 7 October 2003. FBIS Translation.
  [8] Caroline B. Glick, "Maddening predictability," The Jerusalem Post, 11 October 2003.
  [9] "Israeli press views Israeli bombing raid in Syria as 'ineffective step'," BBC Worldwide Monitoring, 7 October 2003.
  [10] "Israeli press views Israeli bombing raid in Syria as 'ineffective step'," BBC Worldwide Monitoring, 7 October 2003.
  [11] "New Rules for Israel and Syria," The New York Times, 13 October 2003.
  [12] Al-Hayat (London), 13 October 2003; "Sharon sets his sights on Syria," Mideast Mirror, 13 October 2003.
  [13] "Israeli press views Israeli bombing raid in Syria as 'ineffective step'," BBC Worldwide Monitoring, 7 October 2003.


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