Watchman Newsletter

Report: Hezbollah moves missiles from Syria to Lebanon, fearing fall of Assad regime

Haaretz (Link) - Barak Ravid (June 25, 2011)

In recent weeks, Hezbollah has moved hundreds of missiles from storage sites in Syria to bases in eastern Lebanon, the French newspaper Le Figaro reported on Saturday.

According to the report, Hezbollah moved the missiles due to the concern that the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad will fall and that a new Syrian government will cut off ties with Hezbollah.

The report quoted a “Western expert” as saying that intelligence agencies have monitored the movement of trucks from the Syrian border to Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley. The trucks contained long-range Iranian-produced Zilzal, Fajr 3 and Fajr 4 missiles.

Hezbollah had been storing these missiles in depots in Syria. Some of the depots are secured by Hezbollah personnel while others are located on Syrian military bases.

PM: We’ll aggravate Hamas prisoners’ conditions

YNet News (Link) - Ronen Medzini, Attila Somfalvi, Ahiya Raved, Elior Levy and Omri Efraim contributed to this report (June 24, 2011)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Thursday a plan aimed at pressuring Hamas into releasing captive soldier Gilad Shalit two days before the five-year anniversary to his abduction. Netanyahu said he has decided to change Israel’s policy towards terrorists incarcerated in the country.

The prime minister said that Israel has no other obligations beyond adhering to Israeli law, international law and international treaties. Speaking at the Presidential Conference in Jerusalem he said that the State will put an end to the Hamas prisoners’ excessive conditions.

He did not specify the steps the government will take to alter confinement conditions but noted that he has canceled the “absurd” protocol allowing terrorists to enroll in academic studies. “There will be no more doctorates of terror,” he said, “This party is over.”

In March 2009, a committee headed by then Justice Minister Daniel Friedmann recommended worsening Hamas prisoners’ conditions. No other decisions were made since. The committee recommended limiting family visits and denying physical contact, banning television, radio and newspapers and changing legislation to prevent administrative release and lawyer visits.

FAA investigation demanded of Delta’s Saudi ‘no-Jew’ deal

WorldNet Daily (Link) - Bob Unruh (June 24, 2011)

The Federal Aviation Administration has been asked to investigate, the Saudi Arabian government is denying it discriminates against Jews, and Delta Air Lines is getting incinerated by critics on its own website as the dispute over the airline’s plans for a cooperative program that would ban Jews from certain flights heated white-hot today.

WND reported two days ago on the plan to have Saudi Arabian Airlines join the SkyTeam Alliance with Delta, a move that would require the American carrier to ban Jews and holders of Israeli passports from boarding flights from New York or Washington bound for Jeddah.

Now at least two legal organizations are reviewing the possibility of legal action, and Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., reported he wrote to FAA Administrator J. Randolph Babbit requesting an investigation to determine “whether Delta violated American law.”

“I request your investigation into this matter to determine whether Delta Air Lines violated U.S. law or regulation and to ensure no U.S. citizen is denied their right to fly solely on the basis of their religion,” Kirk told the agency. “Since a core mission of the FAA is to promote civil aviation, I would expect the FAA to use its full statutory and regulatory power to ensure that America’s civil airways are not restricted for persons regardless of faith.”

Islam Buys Out Western Academia

Israel National News (Link) - Giulio Meotti (June 23, 2011)

It is no wonder that universities are so hostile to Jews and Israel, look at their funding.

Founded in 1789 by the Jesuits, Georgetown, the oldest Catholic university in the United States, must explain why it accepted $325.000 from the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which the FBI identifies as the US channel of Hamas.

The donation, revealed by Pajamas Media, was transferred to Georgetown by the Organization for the Islamic Conference for the purpose of organizing a symposium on “Islamophobia.”

The famous Catholic university already received 40 million dollars from the Saudi prince Alwaleed bin Talal and the Qatar Foundation in 2005.

The story of the Saudi donations in the United States dates back to 1976, when Riyadh transferred one million dollars to the University of Southern California.

China, Russia sign revised currency agreement

China Daily (Link) (June 23, 2011)

The People’s Bank of China, the country’s central bank, said on Thursday that it has signed a revised bilateral currency settlement agreement with the Central Bank of the Russian Federation.

According to the revised agreement, individuals and corporations from both countries will be able to conduct settlements and payments using the yuan, the ruble and freely convertible currencies, the central bank said in a statement on its website.

In addition to border trade, ordinary trade may also be settled in both countries’ official currencies, following the revision of the agreement.

The move will help promote bilateral financial cooperation, trade and investment, the statement said.

Analysts said the move will be of great significance in reducing reliance on the U.S. dollar in bilateral trade, lowering exchange rate risks and promoting the internationalization of the yuan. †

US warns Syria over troop movement at Turkey border

BBC News (Link) (June 23, 2011)

The US has expressed concern over reports that Syria is moving troops near the border with Turkey, and warned of a possible escalation of conflict.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the reported Syrian troops movements were “very worrisome.”

She said it could increase the risk of a border clash with Turkey and worsen the plight of refugees.

Syrian tanks and snipers reportedly entered the village of Khirbet al-Jouz, forcing residents to flee to Turkey.

More than 1,300 people are said to have been killed since a crackdown on anti-government protests began in March.

Thousands more protesters have been detained, opposition activists say.

Several Syrian cities - including Homs and Hama - have declared a general strike after deadly clashes with security forces and supporters of President Bashar al-Assad earlier this week.

The Greek crisis brings us even closer to the long-planned European empire

The Telegraph UK (Link) - Norman Tebbit (June 23, 2011)

A long time ago, when I spent a lot of time at the Council of Ministers in Brussels, my good friend Otto Graf Lambsdorff and I would wearily raise our heads and mutter “Beware the Greeks when they come demanding gifts” when confronted by yet another plea for a subsidy from our Greek colleague. It would be very easy to think that current events in Greece are just a continuation of that same problem.

That would be to misunderstand the grand strategy being pursued in Brussels. It is designed to achieve, without recourse to war, the realization of a dream unfulfilled since the fall of Rome, the first pan-European Empire. Spain, France and Austro Hungary failed in their attempts to build such an Empire and after yet another destructive European war, the founding fathers of the EU swore to achieve through politics what warfare had failed to deliver.

The creation of a common, or to be correct, sole currency, the euro, was not an end in itself, but a weapon to achieve by economic means, a European government. It was about politics, not economics.

Federal Reserve cuts its US economic growth forecast

BBC News (Link) (June 22, 2011)

The Federal Reserve has cut its growth forecast for the US economy in the face of the impact of higher energy prices.

It now estimates that the US economy will expand between 2.7% and 2.9% this year, down from its April forecast of 3.1% to 3.3%.

The US central bank also warned that unemployment would remain stubbornly high throughout 2011.

Fed chairman Ben Bernanke said higher prices had hit consumer spending, but that they should start to fall.

Yet he further cautioned that weakness in the financial sector, and the continuing slump in the housing market, could also be holding back the economy - problems he said “may be stronger and more persistent than we thought.”

Hizbullah May Attack Israel to Take Spotlight off Syria

Israel National News (Link) - Gavriel Queenann (June 22, 2011)

Lebanese terror organization and political force Hizbullah is preparing for a possible war with Israel as a means of shifting Western pressure away from the regime of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, the Lebanon Daily Star reported Wednesday.

The report comes as IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz says he does not expect war in Israel’s near future and IAF commander Major General Ido Nehoshtan says the region has entered ‘a frantic arms race.’

Citing sources close to the radical Shiite terror organization, which has a powerful militia armed by Damascus and Iran, the Star said Hizbullah is watching the unrest in Syria with alarm and is determined to prevent Assad, their ally and protector, from being ousted from power.

Hizbullah supported pro-democracy movements that toppled Western-backed leaders in Tunisia and Egypt as a means of furthering radical Islam, but officials close to the movement say it will not stand idly by as international pressure mounts on Assad to yield to protesters.

“This is a battle for existence for Hizbullah and it is time to return the favor of Syria’s support. It will do that by fending off some of the international pressure [on Syria],” A Lebanese official close to the movement recently told Reuters.

Israel served as ‘main course’ at EU dinner, official says

The Jerusalem Post (Link) - Herb Keinon (June 22, 2011)

Quartet envoys are expected to meet in Brussels at the end of the week amid increasing concern in Jerusalem that the EU hopes to avert a Palestinian statehood bid at the UN in September by, as one senior Israeli official said on Wednesday, “giving something” significant to the Palestinians.

According to the official, the concern was that the EU is pushing for the adoption of US President Barack Obama’s formula of restarting negotiations using the pre-1967 lines with mutually agreed land swaps as a baseline, but without pressing the Palestinians to elaborate on security arrangements of any future accord with Israel.

The official also said the Palestinians wouldn’t be pressed to acknowledge Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people as a baseline for negotiations.

Many in Europe feel that something significant must be given to the Palestinians to get them to back down from their bid to get the UN General Assembly to recognize Palestinian statehood, the official said.