Israel wants Russia to help prevent Iranian base in Syria. Russian President Vladimir Putin. Illustrative. Photo courtesy of the office of the President of Russia.
Iran’s military is getting physically closer to Israel, warned the Israeli Prime Minister on Sunday, just two days after Iran threatened that not just some of their missiles are able to hit Israel—but thousands of them. Iran’s semi-official Fars News Agency quoted senior Iranian army commander Brigadier General Fereidoun Nouri as saying late last week that all the Israeli government facilities are within their range. He also threatened that if Israel does a “thing” of aggression against them, Iran could fire “several thousands missiles” at Israel and “raze down” the Israeli government “forever.”
The latest existential threat from Iran comes as Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu plans to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow this week to talk about not only Iran’s current aggression in neighboring Syria, but Iran’s future plans to threaten Israel permanently from next door.
Netanyahu noted that the focus of talk with Putin will be efforts to hammer out an agreement in Syria’s bloody civil war.
“In the context of this agreement, or without it, Iran is trying to establish itself permanently in Syria, with a military presence on the ground and at sea, and also a gradual generic viagra w polsce attempt to open a front against us on the Golan Heights,” warned Netanyahu in comments released by his office, speaking of the mountain range that sits along the Israel-Syrian border. “I will express to President Putin Israel’s sharp and vigorous opposition to this possibility.”
Iran has long threatened Israel via proxy—Hezbollah in Lebanon and Syria are both allies of Iran—but Iran’s efforts to support the Syrian dictatorship in that nation’s civil war has also opened the door to a more open Iranian military presence in Syria.
It has also created the potential for unintentional conflict with the Russians, who have run a bombing campaign in Syria to back the regime there. Israel and the Russians have had to coordinate to avoid accidental fire in a war that has already spilled into scattered attacks in nearby nations, including Israel. Russia and Israel haven’t had any run-ins so far and want to keep it that way.
To that end, Netanyahu noted that such coordination with Russia will also be on his agenda with Putin. “I hope we will be able to reach certain understandings in order to reduce possible friction between our forces and theirs,” he said, “as we have successfully done up until now.”
(By Joshua Spurlock, www.themideastupdate.com, March 5, 2017)