On the morning of September 6, 2007, Israel Air Force (IAF) planes penetrated deep into Syrian airspace and attacked a nuclear facility near the town of Dayr al-Zur in the northeastern part of the country. In an almost unprecedented fashion, the Israeli government and military refused to confirm the involvement of Israeli aircraft, the target, or the raid's success, with the first report of the operation coming from Damascus.[1] The lack of disclosure from Israel has been in inverse proportion to the raid's importance, which effectively called Bashar al-Assad's bluff. Since the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war in Lebanon, Assad had created a sense of fear that threatened to limit the Israeli military's options regarding Syria. After a decades-long status quo between Damascus and Jerusalem, Israeli leaders found themselves on the defensive. The strike on this suspect nuclear facility restored the status quo ante, and by doing so, Israeli leaders revealed Bashar's strategic weakness. While diplomats praised Bashar's restraint and maturity, his inaction undercut the image he sought to project. Despite his bellicose rhetoric, Assad feared a confrontation with Israel and was not prepared to pay the price of a conflict. Nevertheless, Damascus's covert flirtation with nuclear technology suggests Assad has not moved beyond rashness and that his judgement remains poor.

Syria: Calling for Peace, Preparing for War

On August 15, 2006, the day after a cease-fire ended fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, Assad claimed victory for himself and Syria.[2] The Israeli military had failed to achieve Jerusalem's stated aims: a return of the Israeli soldiers seized by Hezbollah and an end to Hezbollah's ability to fire rockets into northern Israel.[3] While the Syrian military had not participated directly in the fighting, Damascus did not conceal its support for Hezbollah. In a speech before the Fourth Annual Conference of the Syrian Journalists Union in Damascus, Bashar declared that he viewed the results of the battles as an important, and even historic, victory of the Hezbollah organization:

When we declare that we have chosen the path of peace and that peace is for us a strategic choice, this does not mean that we are renouncing all the other options. On the contrary, the more distant peace becomes, the more there is a need to seek other paths and solutions with the aim of regaining what is rightfully ours. Resistance in all its various forms is the alternative for regaining our rights.[4]

With a tone more forceful than in years past, Assad gave Israel the option of peace or confrontation: Either Israel could withdraw from the Golan Heights to the shores of the Sea of Galilee or risk a war of attrition on the Golan Heights similar to what Israel experienced with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.[5]

Assad's strident declarations raised questions about what operative conclusions he had drawn. His statements suggested that he believed that the "Israeli demon" was not so terrible. Hezbollah's missiles deterred Israel for years and, even when Israel did engage Hezbollah, they forced Israel to curtail the conflict without achieving Jerusalem's declared goals. Assad might conclude that Syrian missiles, more advanced than Hezbollah's arsenal,[6] could achieve the same effect should the Syrian regime sponsor a Hezbollah-like campaign on the Golan Heights. Syrian officials speaking to Western diplomats in Damascus even hinted that the possibility of all-out warfare might not restrain Bashar any longer.[7] While Hezbollah rained rockets on Haifa, Damascus possessed an arsenal including Scud-C and Scud-D missiles with respective ranges of 250 and 375 miles, capable of striking the entirety of Israel.[8]

Assad's threats, even if coupled with declarations of readiness to resume peace negotiations, received broad public exposure in the Syrian media. Senior Syrian officials amplified them in subsequent interviews, and columnists and political commentators repeated them in state newspapers, on the radio, and on television.

An August 16, 2006 editorial in the state-run Ath-Thawra daily declared that "just as Hezbollah fought against Israel, so will the Syrian people fight on the Hermon and at Mas'ada and Majdal Shams."[9] On September 4, 2006, Radio Damascus broadcast a political commentary in which it was declared that "the resistance option is available if the enemy refuses to return the land of the Golan."[10] The following month, Sulayman Haddad, a member of the Syrian People's Assembly, declared that "Israel understands only the language of resistance, and therefore it must understand that the bitter experience it suffered with the Lebanese resistance is liable to be repeated on the Golan Heights front if Israel continues its occupation of the Golan. It must understand," he added, "that we will do this, not because we love war, but because Israel is pushing us to the wall."[11] Then, on December 7, 2006, Syrian deputy foreign minister Faysal al-Miqdad declared in a speech to students at the University of Aleppo that "it must be understood that the patience of the Syrian people is running out" with regard to Israeli possession of the Golan.[12]

Syrian officials transmitted the same message to Arab and foreign journalists in Damascus. Syrian vice president Faruq al-Shar'a told the BBC, "Syria will do everything in its power to return the Golan Heights to its hands although it prefers to do this by means of negotiations for peace."[13] On July 13, 2007, the Qatari newspaper Al-Watan reported, "Syria has learned the lesson of the Lebanon war, so that if the peace negotiations with Israel are not renewed, then Syria will turn to adopt the option of resistance."[14] Senior Syrian officials told The New York Sun that Syria might establish a guerrilla organization to attack Israeli towns on the Golan and might rocket Israel Defense Forces positions there.[15] Such talk prepared Syrian public opinion for the possibility of confrontation with Israel.

Indeed, on June 26, 2006, during a ceremony commemorating the 1974 return of the border town of Qunaytra seized during the previous year's war, Syrian officials announced the establishment of the Popular Resistance Committees for the Liberation of the Golan Heights.[16][17] Media reports in Israel mentioned these committees in connection to several incidents, such as setting fires and blocking roads in the Golan. It is doubtful that these committees have any connection to events, however, and appear to be little more than storefronts in Damascus for issuing propaganda communiqués.

Both the Syrian and Israeli militaries, meanwhile, readied for the possibility of renewed conflict with fortifications, rearmament, and robust training exercises.[18] With tensions so high, Israeli as well as Western analysts and journalists worried that any small incident might ignite a war.[19] What if a Syrian-supported terrorist group staged an attack in Israel, assuming that the Jewish state would not retaliate as it had in Lebanon because of Syrian missile deterrence? It was just such a flawed assumption that led Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah to order his men to kidnap two Israeli soldiers in July 12, 2006, sparking that summer's war.[20]

Until 2006, Israeli strategists calculated that they had room to maneuver against Syria. Israeli warplanes had buzzed Assad's palace twice, in August 2003 and June 2006, in response to actions by Syrian-backed terrorists. In October 2003, IAF planes attacked a deserted Palestinian training camp at ‘Ayn al-Sahab, 6 kilometers northwest of Damascus, after Palestinian Islamic Jihad, headquartered in Damascus, killed twenty-two Israeli civilians at the Maxim restaurant in Haifa. Israeli officials would not have conducted such operations had they believed a hot war would result. The 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war suggested that neither state had significant room to maneuver—that amid bellicose rhetoric, any spark might lead to conflagration. But, as Amos Yadlin, head of the Israel Defense Forces' Directorate of Military Intelligence, commented, the September 2007 raid restored Israeli deterrence vis-à-vis Syria.[21]

Israel's Air Raid

It was against such a backdrop that the IAF carried out its raid. Officially, Israeli spokesmen refrained from saying anything, perhaps to avoid humiliating Assad in such a manner that might force him to respond and provoke an all-out war. On September 19, twelve days after the strike, opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that the IAF had raided a site in Syria and that he had congratulated Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on the success of the operation.[22] Later, the Israeli military censorship board gave permission to all the media in the country to talk about the operation as a confirmed fact without having to state that their reports were based on Western sources, as previously required.[23]

Satellite images show before (L) and after shots of the suspect Syrian nuclear facility bombed by Israeli aircraft near the town of Dayr al-Zur. After an initial Israeli silence of twelve days, opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that the Israeli air force had raided a site in Syria. Syrian president Bashar al-Assad later told a Tunisian newspaper that the Israeli planes had targeted "a military installation in the process of being constructed."

Syria decided for its own reasons to publicize the attack. Perhaps Assad preferred not to wait for Israel to make an announcement as had happened in the past. Inconsistency in Syrian statements, though, intensified the mystery surrounding the strike. The Syrian military spokesman published a statement confirming that Israeli aircraft had penetrated Syrian airspace but said that they had been driven out by Syrian air defense units and forced to drop their bombs over unpopulated territory.[24] Several days later, Syrian foreign minister Walid Mu'alim denied that the intruding Israeli planes had attacked any targets inside of Syria.[25][26] Ten days later, he told a Tunisian newspaper that the Israeli planes had targeted, "a military installation in the process of being constructed, and [so] there were no military personnel or other persons in it, either before or during the time of the bombing."[27] The admission that the Israeli planes had indeed attacked something in Syria came in the end from Assad. He told the BBC that Israeli aircraft had attacked an "unused military building" but refused to say why he thought Israel would attack a target of "no value."

The Syrians could not have failed to notice the lack of international support for Syria. Even more problematic for Damascus was the lack of any Arab support, let alone solidarity. Every Arab country, without exception, chose to ignore the Israeli operation. The only leader Assad called after the attack was Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan,[28] whereas the Israeli prime minister contacted Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and Jordan's King Abdullah II to discuss the incident.[29]

Indeed, the only cause for concern for the Turkish government was the possibility that Israeli aircraft may have violated Turkish airspace on their way to their target—but a few days later, Ankara announced that it was satisfied with Israeli explanations.[30]

The U.S. and British media speculated initially that the operation was a dry run for a possible attack on Iran or that it was meant to intercept advanced weapons systems being transported overland to Hezbollah.[31] Reports soon emerged that the target was a nuclear facility being built with North Korean aid.[32] On April 24, 2008, this was confirmed by the U.S. government. Whatever the truth, it is clear that Jerusalem considered it imperative to destroy the target with the utmost speed. In response to Western allegations, Assad said he did not seek nuclear weapons and that, in 2001, he rejected an offer from middlemen answering to rogue Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadir Khan out of fear that it was an Israeli entrapment operation.[33]

It is plausible, though, that Assad had changed his mind. For more than three decades, Damascus and Pyongyang have enjoyed intimate relations. It was North Korea that, following the Soviet lead, supplied Syria with advanced missiles and, later, with technology to enable Syria to improve significantly its arsenal of long-range ground-to-ground missiles.[34] The experience of both North Korea and Libya shows that small, backward states can procure nuclear arms if they set that objective as a top priority. Perhaps the only reason Libya is not a nuclear state today is because Libyan strongman Mu'ammar Qadhafi believed the U.S. military might launch a preemptive strike on his regime.[35] Committed by its own diplomacy to cease nuclear work at Yongbyon, the North Korean regime may have looked favorably upon the opportunity to simply outsource its research and development.

Assad may also have decided that he wished to gain the immunity that nuclear weapons provide to any regime holding them. U.S. forces ousted Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq but offered concessions to North Korea in the face of the Hermit Kingdom's nuclear defiance. Assad may feel his regime faces regional if not international threats to its stability to which nuclear weapons could be an antidote. He may have alluded to this in the wake of the Israel-Hezbollah war when on August 15, 2006, he declared, "When we strengthen the resistance, our aim is to achieve peace, and not to advance war. The way to advance peace is by means of deterrent power that will enable us to prevent aggression against us."[36] He later told the German magazine Der Spiegel, "As far as I myself am concerned, I do not believe in war. But I do believe in deterrence, that is, in the principle of deterrence."[37] Such a policy would be a natural continuance of his father's attempts to achieve strategic balance between Israel and the Arab states. While Hafez al-Assad may have conceived this balance in terms of conventional military strength, by the beginning of the 1990s, he had adjusted his strategy to achieve parity based on a balance of terror—that is, Damascus strived to equip itself with unconventional weapons, such as chemical weapons.[38]

As time passed, it became clear that Bashar al-Assad had no interest in a flare up, let alone war. The Syrian leader told the BBC, "When we say to respond or to repay [Israel for its aggression], we do not necessarily mean to send a missile for every missile or a bomb for every bomb. We have our own ways of responding, for example, a political response, or perhaps a response by other means and in other ways. It is clear that it is our right to respond, but if we respond militarily, then we will be acting in accord with the Israeli agenda, which we are not interested in doing."[39] Seldom do Arab statesmen forget slights; it is possible that Assad will seek to attribute a future transgression to revenge.

Conclusions

The September 2007 IAF raid may well be the most formative event of recent years in Israeli-Syrian relations. Jerusalem surprised Assad and compelled him to recognize that the Israel-Hezbollah war had not changed the strategic balance as much as he believed. Not only had Israeli forces reached deep into Syria, but Jerusalem had also won diplomatically by focusing international attention on Syrian nuclear intentions. First, exposure of his nuclear adventurism cancelled any plaudits Assad had won for maturity and judgment; second, the raid exposed Assad's posturing to be false, not only for his domestic Syrian constituency but also for Arab and Islamic states.

Quite a few Israeli observers have claimed that one of the results—even if indirect—of the IAF attack in September was Syria's decision to participate in the Annapolis peace conference in November 2007.[40] Still, the dynamic between Syria and Israel remains negative. In the absence of any genuine prospects for a peace process, and despite the temporary relaxation of tensions between the two countries, it would seem that their relations will continue to be marked by accumulating tension, military preparations, and forecasts of war—if not in the spring, then in the summer, and if not in 2008, then in 2009.

Eyal Zisser is the director of the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University.

“It is very alarming for me the way Senator Obama voted, the way he spoke about his desire to negotiate with Ahmadinejad, and the way some of his advisers think. “I was at AIPAC. He made a very strong speech, speaking about a Jewish state, defensible borders, a united Jerusalem, then the next day he started correcting himself.”

Natan Sharanksy feels very uneasy about the prospect of Senator Barack Obama as President of the United States, from his lack of a track record, his flip-flops and his anti-Israel advisers. The former Soviet Prisoner and stalwart promoter of democracy in the Middle East, Sharansky was interviewed by Newsmax right after this week's terrorist Bulldozer attack, and just a few blocks from where the bloodbath occurred:

Sharansky: ‘Big Concern’ About Obama; Warns Iran of ‘Inevitable’ Attack

Wednesday, July 23, 2008 6:23 PM

By: Christopher Ruddy

Jerusalem — An Israeli businessman I met described Natan Sharansky as having an “inner strength.” Indeed he has. We might say in America he is a man of a quiet charisma.

It’s Wednesday, the day after a crazed man went on a rampage using a bulldozer in a suicidal attempt to kill and maim innocent Israelis. In the end, 16 civilians were injured before the terrorist was shot dead.

All of this took place not far from Sharansky’s Jerusalem office at the Adelson Institute for Strategic Studies, where he serves as its chairman. Sharansky appears calm and safe, even unshakable. But he sees real threats to the state of Israel.

“There must be a serious punishment,” Sharansky says of the suicidal terrorists. First, the Israeli government should demolish the homes of suicidal terrorists, a tactic he describes as a “deterrence” that is “one of the most effective ways of social pressure” to thwart future acts.

Sharansky quickly qualifies this remedy as a “micro-therapy.”

The attacks of radical Islamics do not come in a vacuum, Sharansky posits.

He says the backers of the fundamentalist ideology that foments terror, Wahabism from Saudi Arabia, as well as the military sponsors of Hezbollah and Hamas (he names the Iranians and Syrians), need to pay a price for their support.

“I think one of the biggest failures, of shortsightedness, of all American administrations, Democratic and Republican alike, is their attitude toward Saudi Arabia,” he says.

Sharansky’s comments carry great weight here and for policy-makers in the West. Though he resigned from the Knesset as a stalwart Likud backer in 2006, he has remained active in the political debate.

The real problem for his country, he says, slowly sipping a cup of tea as he sits behind his desk, is that the Arab world sees Israel as vulnerable.

“Our adversaries have a growing feeling that we are weak and they are strong. This has to be changed,” he says. To do so, he would punish, including with military retribution, states and networks that back terrorists.

Obama and Iran

As we talk, Barack Obama is here visiting Israel. Sharansky is dubious of the candidate.

“He is definitely a big concern for me,” he says.

Sharansky thinks Obama has “a little record or almost no record, while the one who he is competing with is McCain, and we know for sure his principles.”

Sharansky continues the train of thought: “It is very alarming for me the way Senator Obama voted, the way he spoke about his desire to negotiate with Ahmadinejad, and the way some of his advisers think.

“I was at AIPAC. He made a very strong speech, speaking about a Jewish state, defensible borders, a united Jerusalem, then the next day he started correcting himself.”

Still, Sharansky feels having Obama as president is not as dangerous as having a weak Israeli government.

The threats, as the bulldozer incident showed, are constant, but none is more serious than the one Israel now faces from Iran.

“With any government of Israel, it becomes inevitable, if this [Iranian] regime becomes nuclear, that we will have to act because for us that is a question for the survival of our Jewish civilization,” he explains.

“If Iran will not change, Israel will have to act. I think it will be very tragic if Israel has to act alone.”

He is not sure that if Israel does attack Iran alone, it will solve the problem.

“The only chance it would be 100 percent successful is if the free world, and first of all the United States of America, will be supportive of Israel.”

Indeed, there is a consensus among Israeli elites — left and right — that a nuclear Iran is a direct threat to the existence of the Jewish state. The question now is whether Israel acts alone or in conjunction with the U.S. and other Western states.

The Larger Issue: Identity

The survival of the West depends on democracy, Sharansky argues. His best-selling book, “The Case for Democracy: The Power of Freedom to Overcome Tyranny and Terror,” made his case and figured into President Bush’s second inaugural address.

Taking his lead from Sharansky, Bush declared in the speech, "The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world.”

Bush also said during a February 2005 trip to Europe that Sharansky’s book “confirmed what I believe.”

But Sharansky believes democracy does not mean unlimited freedom overnight, especially for states that have no history of democratic institutions.

Instead, he argues for the gradual development of democratic institutions.

“First you must have the beginnings of a free society, have institutions that guarantee individuals some basic freedoms,” Sharansky says. “Elections are the end result of democracy, not necessarily the beginning of the process.”

And existing democracies, in Europe and the United States, not to mention Israel, face significant challenges. Sharansky tackles this subject in his newest book “Defending Identity: Its Indispensable Role in Protecting Democracy.”

The thesis of his book is that democratic society, if it has any hope for long-term survival, must offer an identity for its citizens.

Looking out at the world, he says “our enemies look so dangerous because they have a strong will.” This means they have beliefs they are ready to die for.

“The free world, if it does not have values for which people are ready to die, will be powerless, its people decadent. It will be doomed to failure.”

Identity, he says, gives people these values. It is not the enemy, as many in the West believe.

“Europe is suffering the most from a loss of identity. Faith and patriotism have weakened as it embraces a super-identity — all in an effort to avoid war.”

Europe has become John Lennon’s song “Imagine,” a world, Sharansky paraphrases, “where there is no hell and no paradise, no borders, no nations, in a world where there is nothing to die for.

“Less than two generations [after Lennon’s song], Europe is helpless and powerless against a small group of Islamic terrorists.

“It is the tragedy of Europe,” Sharansky declares, but he says of America, “in general, its society is still healthy.”

With such powerful ideas about the future of his nation and the West, is Sharansky ready for a political comeback?

He says yes, if there is a government that stands for something, has found its identity, he would consider it.

JERUSALEM INTIFADA
Hamas:'This Is Now Jerusalem Intifada With More Attacks On The Way

Shabak chief Yuval Diskin calls for sealing-up or demolishing terrorists' homes... The second tractor attack this month should not have come as a surprise. Following the first incident on July 2nd, IsraCast immediately quoted an Israeli security expert as saying:'Greatest concern now is that of copycat effect-other potential terrorists may now try vehicle attacks!' That assessment was soon to be realized. And then just hours before the latest assault ,Shabak security chief Yuval Diskin told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that although there were no specific alerts, he expected more attacks. He pointed to what he called a 'power vacuum' in some parts of east Jerusalem where some 250,00 Palestinians reside.

For example,'it was more complicated for Israeli security forces to enter the Shuafat refugee camp in the capital than it was for the IDF to go into the Jenin refugee camp on the West Bank. Diskin called on Israel's political leadership to address the situation. It appears then that Israel's goal of maintain control over all of Jerusalem as a free and open city, for Jews and Arabs alike, is not without its problems.

The Arab residents, although they are not Israeli citizens, carry Israeli identity cards and enjoy total freedom of movement in the capital, where thousands of them are employed in the Jewish part of west Jerusalem. The vast majority are interested solely in earning a living but the potential terrorists have both the 'means and motivation' to carry out vicious surprise attacks on unsuspecting Israeli civilians. The spate of recent Jerusalem violence-two tractor rampages, a mass shooting spree and several other minor shootings and stabbings now poses a new challenge on several levels. Security paradox of Israel's successful suppression of suicide bombers from West Bank...

Paradoxically, the unconventional tractor tactics in Jerusalem illustrate the success of Israeli counter-terror operations on the West Bank. In 2002, the IDF launched operation Defensive Shield that stifled the wave of suicide bombers which had murdered scores of Israeli civilians. Since then, the security forces have carried out a relentless campaign; Diskin said the terror infrastructure on the West Bank has been smashed while many of the terrorists have been killed or captured. Moreover, the security fence has also blocked the previous ease with which suicide bombers walked into Israel.

The figures speak for themselves... in 2002, fifty-three Israelis were killed by suicide bombers compared to last year when there was only one fatality. So now stymied on the West Bank, the terrorists have popped up in Jerusalem. As one security expert puts it :' It's like pressing a balloon in one place and it expands in another'. However, there is obviously a major difference between the ' quality ' and quantity of the terror attacks. What's to be done? At present, it is estimated that dozens of Palestinian drivers from east Jerusalem are now driving tractors and bulldozers on the streets of the capital.

How to identify those potential terrorists who will exploit the opportunity to suddenly turn their vehicle into a deadly weapon. Public Security Minister Avi Dichter has talked about better security checks but if the terrorists are not known members of organizations and act on their own, it is nigh impossible for advance intelligence to sift them out of the other drivers who pose no risk. The terrorist simply climbs into his vehicle as he does every day and then goes on his rampage smashing into as many cars and buses as he can. The motivation could be Islamist fundamentalism or even personal pique.

Obviously, one counter-measure could be to bar all east Jerusalemites from driving heavy vehicles in the western part of the capital, but this would be collective punishment penalizing the overwhelming majority who simply want to earn a living.And it would also undermine the goal of a unified Jerusalem. The tractor terrorists and the shooter at the Mercaz Harav religious seminary are a new type of suicide killers. Therefore, there is no question of 'making the punishment fit the crime' with these shahid martyrs who are reconciled to their act and the sojourn with their seventy-two virgins in Paradise.

There is one other alternative measure that is now on the agenda - the sealing-up or demolition of the family homes of the terrorists. This was a punitive step taken by Israel but it was halted after an official Israeli study found that it was ineffective in halting suicide bombers. Its opponents also contended it would anger other potential terrorists to take action. But the counter argument is there is no way of knowing if the punitive may have deterred other attacks. In any case, Shabak security chief has called on the government to reimpose home demolition or seal-up; otherwise he said Israel has no deterrent to would-be terrorists who become Jerusalem's enemy within. Hamas co-opts 'Jerusalem intifada'...

Although the Jerusalem terrorists have not been linked to any known organization, Hamas has now co-opted the current wave branding it the 'Jerusalem intifada'. Although Hamas is maintaining the Tahadiya cease- fire in the Gaza Strip, it still wants to stay in the terrorist limelight. And while most of Israel has enjoyed 'relative quiet' lately, Jerusalem has now become the hotspot and both the political and security echelons are racking their brains over what's to be done to prevent the current the recent violence from escalating into a real 'Jerusalem intifada' with all the wide-ranging implications in perhaps the most disputed city on earth.

Footnote: If Israel does opt for the more drastic punitive steps of sealing - up or demolishing terrorists' home in an attempt to halt the deadly attacks on Jerusalem's civilians, it should also add a provision meting out the same punishment for any Israeli citizen who may carry out a deadly act of terrorism against Palestinians. This in the interest of equality before the law in Israel's capital city.

Rasmussen-While Barack Obama has touted his travel to the Middle East and Europe this week as a “fact-finding” trip, 63% of Americans do not believe it makes the Democratic candidate any more qualified to be president.

A new Rasmussen Reports national survey, taken Monday night, also finds that less than a third (32%) think Obama will learn from his trip to Iraq. Forty percent (40%) say his mind is already made up about policies to deal with the war there. The Democrat has been accused by liberals in his party of softening his long-standing opposition to the war in Iraq in an effort to appeal to more moderate voters.

Obama on Tuesday at a press conference in Jordan defended his plan to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq over a 16-month period. Gen. David H. Petraeus, the U.S. commander in Iraq, with whom he met, opposes a timeline of any kind, but Obama said more forces are needed in Afghanistan. He outlined these positions in the days prior to his visit to Iraq.

The partisan divide is clear throughout the new survey. The responses of self-designated Democrats and likely Obama voters generally mirror their candidate’s actions and positions, although at times very narrowly. Republicans and likely voters for John McCain support the GOP candidate much more emphatically.

For example, while 74% of Republicans say it is not right for a candidate to make political statements contrary to government policy while in a war zone, only 40% of Democrats disagree. Nearly as many Democrats (38%) agree with the overwhelming majority of Republicans, as do 50% of unaffiliated voters.

In a separate survey this week, 45% said Obama is too inexperienced to be president. This number has risen from 41% over the past week. But the same number -- 45% -- believe the Democratic candidate does have the necessary experience.

Slightly more than half (53%) of Americans in the new poll do not approve of candidates making statements contrary to U.S. government policy while visiting U.S. troops in a war zone. Only 29% believe that it’s okay to do so.

But 49% say it’s fine for a presidential candidate to make a highly-publicized trip to a war zone, while only 26% disagree.

Less than half (47%) believe it is better to have a president with military experience directing a war, but 38% say it doesn’t matter. Seventy-three percent (73%) of Republicans see military experience as a plus, but 57% of Democrats do not. Obama has not served in the military, while McCain was a Navy combat pilot in the Vietnam War. He was shot down on a bombing mission, imprisoned and tortured in the infamous “Hanoi Hilton” for six years.

Among those who have members of their immediate family in the military, 48% say military service makes a president better able to conduct a war, while 36% disagree.

Another Rasmussen Reports survey this week finds that while voters trust Obama more on most issues, McCain has a double-digit lead on his rival when it comes to national security and the war in Iraq. Overall, Obama and McCain remain very close in the popular vote contest as measured by the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll.

Only 39% of Democrats say Obama’s travels this week make him more qualified to be president, while 42% disagree. Eighty-six percent (86%) of Republicans and 67% of unaffiliateds feel the same way. The gap widens when how an individual plans to vote is factored in: 44% of likely Obama voters see the travel as a positive, while 89% of those who plan to vote for McCain disagree.

Fifty-eight percent (58%) of likely Obama voters say he will learn from his trip to Iraq, but 66% of potential McCain supporters say he made up his mind before traveling there. Democrats overall are a bit more skeptical, with 49% saying he will learn on the trip. Among unaffiliated voters, a key bloc in the upcoming election, 28% think Obama will learn from the trip, but 38% think he made up his mind before going to Iraq.

The US Geological Survey announced that the Arctic holds about 90 BILLION barrels of Oil, more than Nigeria, Kazakhstan and Mexico combined about one third of the reserves are in Alaskan Waters. In the graph below the darker the blue the better the probability of Oil. In the diagram below the darker the green the more oil. The Dark green area between five and six o'clock is in Alaska territory, which is just under 30 Billion Barrels of Oil. And just like anything else in this world, politics will play a huge part in how soon we can get to it:

By Joe Carroll

One-third of the undiscovered oil is in Alaskan territory, the agency found in a study released today. By contrast, a geologic formation beneath the North Pole claimed by Russian scientists last year probably holds just 1.2 percent of the Arctic's crude, the U.S. report showed.

Energy producers such as Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Chevron Corp. have accelerated exploration of the northernmost regions for untapped reserves amid record prices and receding access to deposits in more hospitable climates. Russia's move to scrap a United Nations convention and carve out an exclusive Arctic zone sparked protests from Canada, the U.S., Norway and Denmark.

``Most of the Arctic, especially offshore, is essentially unexplored with respect to petroleum,'' Donald Gautier, the project chief for the assessment, said in the report. ``The extensive Arctic continental shelves may constitute the geographically largest unexplored prospective area for petroleum remaining on Earth.''

Russia dispatched a nuclear-powered icebreaker to the Arctic Ocean last year to map a subsea link between Siberia and the North Pole as part of a bid to refute a UN convention limiting resource claims beyond 200 miles (321 kilometers) offshore. Canada said earlier this month that it plans to counter the Russian overture with ``a very strong claim'' to Arctic exploration rights.

No Time Estimate

The U.S. report didn't include an estimate for how long it will take to bring the reserves to markets. Offshore fields in the Gulf of Mexico and West Africa can take a decade or longer to begin pumping oil.

The geologists studied maps of subterranean rock formations across the 8.2 million square miles above the Arctic Circle to find areas with characteristics similar to oil and gas finds in other parts of the world.

The study also took into account the age, depth and shape of rock formations in judging whether they are likely to contain oil, Gautier said today during a conference call with reporters. Seismic data doesn't yet exist for most of the Arctic, he said.

``Petroleum doesn't just occur anywhere,'' Gautier said. ``It requires a very narrow set of burial conditions.''

U.S. oil executives such as Exxon Mobil Corp.'s Rex Tillerson and Chevron Corp.'s David O'Reilly have urged lawmakers to relax prohibitions against offshore drilling, including much of Alaska. Democratic leaders in both houses of Congress rejected President George W. Bush's July 14 effort to end a 25-year moratorium on drilling in most coastal waters.

West Siberia Basin

The region above the Arctic Circle also holds an estimated 1,669 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, equal to 27 percent of the world's known gas reserves, the study showed. Almost 40 percent of the gas reserves are in Russia's West Siberia Basin.

About 84 percent of the oil and gas reserves probably lie offshore, the report showed. The region also has an estimated 44 billion barrels of natural-gas-liquids such as propane and butane, which are used by chemical producers, oil refiners and for home heating.

The study encompassed all areas north of 66.56 degrees north latitude and only included reserves that could be tapped using existing techniques. Experimental or unconventional prospects such as oil shale, gas hydrates and coal-bed methane weren't included in the assessment.

Data Contributors

Contributors of data to the study included the Geological Survey of Canada, the U.S. Interior Department's Minerals Management Service, the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate, the Cambridge Arctic Shelf Program and researchers in Denmark and Greenland. No Russian institutions took part in the study.

The survey only applied to undiscovered reserves. Exxon Mobil, Shell, Gazprom OAO and other energy producers have already found 400 oil and gas fields that hold the equivalent of 240 billion barrels. On a combined basis, the undiscovered reserves of oil and gas in today's report amount to 412 billion barrels.

Most of those discoveries remain capped because of a lack of pipeline or shipping facilities to haul the petroleum to markets.

Crude for September delivery fell $3.98, or 3.1 percent, to $124.44 a barrel at 2:59 p.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Oil climbed 66 percent in the past year on its way to a record $147.27 a barrel on July 11.

Global Demand

Global crude demand is expected to rise by 1 percent this year to 86.85 million barrels a day, after a 1.3 percent increase in 2007, the International Energy Agency said in a July 10 report.

Kazakhstan, site of the world's two biggest oil discoveries of the past three decades, has 39.8 billion barrels of crude reserves, according to London-based BP Plc. Nigeria's reserves amount to 36.2 billion barrels and Mexico holds 12.2 billion. Russia, the world's largest producer last year, has 79.4 billion barrels of oil reserves and 1,577 trillion cubic feet of gas.

The U.S. is expected to use about 7.39 billion barrels of crude this year, according to the Paris-based IEA.

Robert Mugabe's murderous iron-fisted rule has subjected Zimbabwe to a reign of terror for almost three decades. While the MSM reported the way he used violence to overturn an election that he lost, his horrors did not start with this most recent election:

• Lela Kogbara, Chair of ACTSA (Action for Southern Africa) has said: "As with every oppressive regime women and workers are left bearing the brunt. Please join us as we stand in solidarity with the people of Zimbabwe in their struggle for peace, justice and freedom."

• Mugabe has waged a violent campaign against homosexuals, arguing that prior to colonization Zimbabweans did not engage in homosexual acts.In September 1995, Zimbabwe's Parliament officially approved persecution of homosexuals. In 1997 a court found Canaan Banana, Mugabe's predecessor and the first President of Zimbabwe, guilty of 11 counts of sodomy and indecent assault. Banana's trial proved embarrassing for Mugabe, when Banana's accusers alleged that Mugabe knew about Banana's conduct and had done nothing to stop it.

• In 2005, Mugabe ordered a raid conducted on what the government termed "illegal shelters" in Harare, resulting in 10,000 urban poor being left homeless from "Operation Drive Out the Rubbish." The authorities themselves had moved the poor inhabitants to the area in 1992, telling them not to build permanent homes and that their new homes were temporary, leading the inhabitants to build their own temporary shelters out of cardboard and wood. The UK's Telegraph noted that Mugabe's "latest palace", in the style of a pagoda, was located a mile from the destroyed shelters. The UN released a report stating that the actions of Mugabe resulted in the loss of home or livelihood for more than 700,000 Zimbabweans and negatively affected 2.4 million more.

• Veteran human rights activist and author Judith Todd, daughter of former South Rhodesia prime minister Garfield Todd, said in an interview published last year that she was raped by a Zimbabwean army officer after criticizing President Robert Mugabe's regime.

• In the rape camps of Zimbabwe, young girls are horrifically abused—often to punish Mugabe's political opponents. . . . Mugabe has stationed two officers from his feared Central Intelligence Organization in every village; merely talking to a murungu, or white man, can lead to interrogation or beatings. Christina Lamb, Sunday Telegraph, London, August 25, 2002

• According to the World Health Organization (WHO), life expectancy at birth for Zimbabwe men is 37 years for men and 34 for women, the lowest such figures for any nation in the world
  

Who could ever praise a disgusting animal like that? Only another "sub-human" Like those who run the Syrian Government. Last month the Syrian government daily Al-Thawra published an article by columnist Dr. Ibrahim Za’ir expressing satisfaction with the election outcome. The article calls Mugabe a "patriot with a sacred mission," and how pleased they were that the Western countries had failed in their attempt to incite the Zimbabwean people against him and to remove him from power. An excerpt of the article follows:

Article in Syrian Government Daily Praises Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe

Robert Mugabe - A Patriot with a Sacred Mission

Dr. Ibrahim Za'ir wrote in Al-Thawra: "Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe was inaugurated on Sunday, June 29, 2008, after winning over 85% of the votes in the second round of elections. Opposition head Morgan Tsvangirai, his main rival in the elections, announced his withdrawal [from the race] only a few days before the second round. According to some sources, he withdrew not because he feared for the lives of his supporters, as he claimed, but because he knew, in his heart of hearts, that he had no chance of winning…

"Tsvangirai... counted from the very start on the support of the U.S., the West and the international community, whereas Mugabe counted on the people of Zimbabwe. The landslide victory [of the latter] was a deadly blow to the so-called 'forces of reform, democracy, and renewal' which are supported by the [Western] superpowers…

"The U.S. and Britain did not succeed in ruining Robert Mugabe's good name, despite all their efforts with their propaganda machine. There wasn't a single insult that they did not hurl at him, [from] 'dictator,' 'tyrant' and 'enemy of democracy' [to] 'murderous [leader]' and 'oppressing despot.' But none of this swayed the will of the Zimbabwean people, who reelected their patriotic leader Mugabe [for another term in office]…

"[Mugabe] has always seen himself as a man with a sacred mission that transcends the borders of his country - namely, liberating Africa from imperialism and from the racist regimes… Subordination to the West has brought the Black Continent nothing but hunger, disease, wretchedness, and poverty. With its vast resources, Africa could have seen an economic revival and solved its main problems - had it not been for the plundering Western imperialists.

"Mugabe became a problem for the U.S. and Britain in Africa. Therefore, they had no choice but to use every means at their disposal [in attempt to] remove him from the African political arena. The U.S. exerted pressure on his country, placed it under economic siege, and waged an undeclared war against it.

"[In fact,] the economic crisis in Zimbabwe was deliberately created [by the West] in order to generate dissatisfaction and anger towards Mugabe's regime. But the Zimbabwean people have a good memory. They have not forgotten [Mugabe's] economic reforms, and especially his agrarian reforms which are considered a historic achievement of his regime. [Mugabe] wrested the fertile lands away from the British whites and returned them to their rightful owners - [the Black Africans] from whom they were taken during the era of British imperialism.

"Tsvangirai received considerable [support] in the [first round of] the presidential elections, but not enough to win. The undeniable discovery that he received support from the U.S. and Britain caused the Zimbabweans to renounce him. [This time around,] he was afraid to run [for president], because he was certain of his defeat. [However], from the moment [Tsvangirai withdrew his candidacy], and even after the results were announced, Washington and other Western [capitals] never stopped threatening Mugabe. Even Bush himself threatened sanctions against Zimbabwe, claiming that the elections had not been fair, neutral, and democratic.

"This incredible hypocrisy on the part of the U.S. is nothing new. Anyone who fails to succumb to its [dictates and promote its] interests is accused of being against democracy and human rights - even if he is the greatest of democrats - while the worst of dictators are hailed as great [supporters of] democracy if they [promote America's] interests.

"Mugabe was elected by the sweeping majority of his people. This is also true of [Venezuelan President] Hugo Chavez and of [many] other patriotic presidents throughout the world who devote all their strength to [ensuring] the freedom and independence of their people."

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Al-Thawra (Syria), July 2, 2008.