Israel Declares Determination To "Change Behavior" Of Syria

by Ferry Biedermann

At a briefing for diplomats and journalists this week, Major General Amos Gilad, a senior political adviser to Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, described last Sunday's air strike as part of a deliberate campaign to change the policies of the Syrian government.

He characterized these as supporting terror in Israel and in Iraq. He said, he did not think that the 'messages' that had been sent so far would do the job.

"The question is whether Syria will continue to support terror in Iraq and in Israel through Lebanon," Gilad said.

Last Sunday's attack inside Syria had been agreed upon in defense circles weeks ago, well before the suicide attack in Haifa last Saturday that killed 19 people, Gilad said.

He nevertheless referred to Syria's support for the Islamic Jihad movement that claimed responsibility for the explosion as one of the reasons for the attack.

Israel is determined to "change the behavior" of the Syrian government, Gilad said, adding that there was no intention "for the moment" to achieve a "regime change" in Damascus.

The air strike last weekend was carefully aimed at what Gilad described as an "operational Palestinian terrorist training camp" near Damascus. "We did not strike any Syrian property. We respect the Syrians."

It was the second "warning" that Israel had sent to the Syrian government, said Gilad. Last month the air force over-flew President Bashar al-Assad's presidential palace in the port city of Latakia.

"But I'm sure that Assad will continue his support for terror," said Gilad. "He will need more warnings."

Gilad expected the situation along Israel's borders with Syria and Lebanon to remain stable "for a couple of weeks" but hinted that Israel will then again take action against Syria.

In Damascus there is a feeling that Syria's young president is vulnerable but at the same time unlikely to budge.

Recent events in the Middle East and beyond, particularly 9-11 and the U.S. invasion of Iraq are seen as a severe challenge to his government. Syria has said it cooperates with the United States on the war against terror, in particular the campaign against Al-Qaeda.

The U.S. Administration acknowledges that. But in its view this is too little to being a counterweight to what Washington calls Syria's continued support for other organizations that are regarded as terrorist by the U.S.

Syria is still on the State Department's list of countries that support terrorism.

The war in Iraq has exacerbated the situation by bringing a large U.S. force to the country's borders and by Syria's opposition to the U.S. invasion.

This opposition was manifested in the facilitation of the transit of fighters, Syrian and otherwise, to battle the U.S. forces in Iraq.

During the war late last March, all these elements came together and Islamic Jihad operatives in Palestinian refugee camps in Damascus were actively involved in recruiting and sending fighters to Iraq, one Jihad commander who did not wish to be named, told IPS at the time.

Syria, which is thought to be militarily weak after it lost the backing of the then Soviet Union in the early 1990's, sees its support for these groups as legitimate and practical. It allows the countries to engage Israel in particular by proxy, rather than risking a direct fight which it will lose.

"Of course we have cards. Otherwise we would be idiots and we're not idiots and frankly one of those chips is (the Lebanese movement) Hezbollah," said Mohammed Shukri, a professor of international relations at Damascus University this week.

Hezbollah in particular is seen by the Syrians as one of the few levers they have to get Israel to return the Golan Heights that it occupied in 1967. "Why should we give up Hezbollah for no promises from the Americans about a return by Israel to negotiations," said Shukri.

Even so there is no denying that both the government and the people have been shaken by first the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the increasingly bellicose statements coming out of Washington and the recent Israeli escalation.

As in its support for the war on terror, Syria is alleged to have made an outward show of responding to other U.S. pressures. In May this year it said it had closed down the offices of militant Palestinian groups such as Islamic Jihad and Hamas.

According to Damascus, those groups had only been engaged in media-related activities.

Israel however says that in reality these groups still operate freely inside Syria with the difference that their leaders now travel to neighboring Lebanon, which is effectively controlled by Damascus, to give media interviews and conduct other business.

Syrian commentators expect that it will be very difficult for the current government to change the tactics that have served it well in the past. This is reinforced by the presence of much of the same faces in the government as under Bashar al-Assad's father, Hafez al-Assad, who died in 2000.

Their presence has so far served as an excuse for what many in Damascus regard as the disappointing performance by the young and more modern Bashar, who was partly educated in Britain.

Initial democratic reforms have largely been turned back and economic reforms have been extremely slow in coming.

Assad has to fight the conservatives at every turn and external pressures only make him more vulnerable, as one prominent economist and businessman puts it.

"Every time there are outside threats, whether by Israel or the U.S., this strengthens the old conservatives and the hard-liners," argues Nabil Sukkar. "The external aggression on Syria does not help economic reform at all."

Syria, it seems, will once again be able to use the external threat as a way of postponing domestic reforms. Even so, people do increasingly wonder about the direction of their country, particularly as Israel seems to ride roughshod over its army that swallows up some 70 per cent of the national budget.