by Daniel Siryoti and News Agencies
Defense minister: Escalating violence shows Syria’s disintegration “is coming” • Syrian security source says the suicide bomber who killed three of President Bashar al-Assad's top security officials on Wednesday was bodyguard for his inner circle.Israel will stop Syrian refugees from entering the Golan Heights if they try to flee there, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Thursday, while on a tour of the area amid the ongoing crisis in Syria.
Barak told reporters that Syrian refugees, who have already started fleeing to Turkey and Jordan, might also start fleeing toward the Israeli-held territory.
"If we have to stop waves of refugees, we will stop them," he said.
Barak also repeated the military's assessment that the Golan area could become a haven for militant groups. In his comments to reporters, Barak restated Israel's frequently voiced fear that, in the chaos, Syrian weapons would fall in the hands of Lebanese Hezbollah terrorists.
"After the possible collapse of the Assad regime, Hezbollah will try to move advanced weapons systems from Syria to Lebanon, including heavy surface-to-surface missiles and chemical weapons, and we are closely monitoring this," Barak said.
He said that Wednesday's suicide bombing in Damascus and the escalating violence in the country "shows how Syria's disintegration is not abstract, it is real, it is coming, and what happened yesterday in Damascus will greatly accelerate the fall of the Assad family."
"This is a heavy blow also for the radical axis which includes the Iranians and Hezbollah, who are the only supporters of the Assad family," Barak said.
He noted that Syrian rebels are becoming bolder in their actions, saying, "The more the rebels become disorganized, the more daring they are. They are already holding large parts of Syria and they freely enter into clashes around the country, including in big cities such as Damascus."
Meanwhile, a Syrian security source said the suicide bomber who killed three of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's top security and military officials at a meeting of ministers on Wednesday was a bodyguard for the president's inner circle.
The bomb killed Assad's powerful brother-in-law, the defense minister and a top general, bringing the battle to the heart of Assad's powerbase and sparking fighting across Damascus.
The unprecedented blow to the ruling dynasty could mark a turning point in the civil war, suggesting that those once close to Assad are turning against him. The bombing follows some of the worst bloodshed in Damascus of the 17-month uprising, a growing list of high-ranking defections and mounting frustration by world leaders over their inability to find a diplomatic solution.
Rebels claimed responsibility for the attack, saying they had been planning it for two months.
State television said Defense Minister Gen. Daoud Rajiha and Assad's brother-in-law, Deputy Defense Minister Assef Shawkat, had been killed in a "terrorist bombing," and pledged to wipe out the "criminal gangs" responsible. It also said Gen. Hassan Turkmani, a former defense minister and senior military official, had died later of his wounds. Intelligence chief Hisham Bekhtyar and Interior Minister Mohammad Ibrahim al-Shaar were wounded but in "stable" condition.
A day after the suicide bombing, mystery surrounded the whereabouts of Assad as rebels closed in on the center of Damascus, vowing to "liberate" the capital. The Syrian leader made no public appearance and no statement after the bombing.
Some reports said Assad had left Damascus by helicopter and was staying in the port city of Latakia. His wife Asma reportedly fled to Russia. The Syrian Defense Ministry rejected the reports.
By the early hours of Thursday, residents had reported no let-up in the heaviest fighting to hit the capital in fighting against Assad's rule. The fighting came within sight of the presidential palace, near the security headquarters where the bomber struck a crisis meeting of defense and security chiefs.
Intense clashes were reported in the capital's central districts of Mezze and Kafar Souseh, while a police station in the Hajar al-Aswad district was in flames. The army was shelling its own capital from the surrounding mountains as night fell. Government troops, having vowed retaliation for the assassination, fired machine guns into the city from helicopters.
Washington, which fears a spillover into neighboring states, said the situation seemed to be spinning out of control. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said "the decisive fight" was under way in Damascus.
The U.N. Security Council put off a scheduled vote on a Syria resolution and U.S. President Barack Obama phoned President Vladimir Putin of Russia, Assad's main protector, to try to persuade Moscow to drop support for him.
"As we continue to pursue the political option the realities on the ground may have overtaken us, therefore I think the clock is ticking and have we ... reached the point where the political option is too late?" King Abdullah of Jordan said in an interview with CNN. "I think we should continue to give politics their due, but if we haven't already passed that window I think we are getting very close to it."
The generals killed and wounded in the bombing form the core of Assad's crisis unit to crush the revolt, which grew out of protests inspired by Arab Spring uprisings that unseated leaders in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya.
The armed forces Chief of Staff, Gen. Fahad Jassim al-Freij, quickly took over as defense minister to avoid giving any impression of official paralysis.
"This cowardly terrorist act will not deter our men in the armed forces from continuing their sacred mission of pursuing the remnants of these armed terrorist criminal gangs," Freij said on state television. "They will cut off every hand that tries to hurt the security of the nation or its citizens."
The explosion appeared to be part of a coordinated assault on the capital that has escalated since the start of the week. Rebel fighters call it the "liberation of Damascus" after months of fierce clashes which activists say have killed 17,000 people.
"This is the final phase. They will fall very soon," Abdelbasset Seida, a leader of the opposition Syrian National Council, told Reuters in Qatar. "Today is a turning point in Syria's history. It will put more pressure on the regime and bring an end very soon, within weeks or months."
Ahmad Zaidan, spokesman for the Higher Council of the Revolution's Leadership, an opposition group, said the blast was a major blow to the morale of the army. The opposition estimates that some 50,000 out of 280,000 soldiers had deserted.
"It's the beginning of the breaking of the chain, the regime has lost control now and those around Bashar al-Assad, on whom he relied, are gone. The regime's foundations have been shaken. It's just Bashar now who's left," said Zaidan.
Rebels were jubilant at their success in penetrating into the capital and at the deaths of the security chiefs. Abdullah al-Shami, a rebel commander based in Turkey, said: "I expect a speedy collapse of the regime ... and it means we will not be in need of outside intervention, with the regime beginning to crumble much faster than we envisaged."
Yet some opposition figures said victory would still not be easy.
"It is going to be difficult to sustain supply lines and the rebels may have to make a tactical withdrawal at one point, like they did in other cities," veteran opposition activist Fawaz Tello said from Istanbul. "But what is clear is that Damascus has joined the revolt."
Meanwhile, Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi accused Israel, the West, and Western-backed Arab countries of being behind the Damascus attack, Syria's official news agency SANA reported on Wednesday.
Zoubi said Qatari, Saudi, Turkish and Israeli agents were accountable for the terrorist bombing, according to the report.
The attack is "the last chapter of the U.S.-Western-Israeli conspiracy against Syria," Zoubi was quoted by SANA as saying, adding that Syria's enemies are wrong in their assessment of the strength of the strength of Syria's army.
"Unfortunately, Zionist and American agents received help and collaborated with Saudi and Qatari intelligence agencies, who are just as responsible for this act," he said.
Zoubi added Arab and Western governments were "legally, politically and morally responsible for the killing, assassination and sabotage acts taking place in Syria" by "sending money and arms to the terrorists," and they "will be punished for their crimes."
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=5113
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