A Worried Israel Prepares for War

Six months ago, as rocket fire was falling on Tel Aviv, my six-year-old daughter had to pay her first visit to a bomb shelter. On Monday, she had to pay her second and third visits.

On Sunday night, before she went to bed, we had reminded her that sirens would be going off the next day, and that she shouldn’t be afraid of them. Yes, yes, she said, impatiently brushing us off; she knows it’s a drill.

Along with all Israeli children, and the small part of the adult population willing to play a role, at 12:30 p.m. Monday she was duly marched by a teacher to the shelter. At 7:05 p.m. it was our turn as parents to run through the drill at home.

Such drills are not a novelty to Israelis, but the more a potential war seems imminent, the more sober they become. All day, radio announcers remind us: “In case of real emergency, another siren will be heard.”

Indeed, in recent weeks there was hardly a day without someone discussing the possibility of real war. Israel, as the New York Times reported less than a week ago, is reluctantly being dragged into Syria’s turmoil.

Israel’s imperative is clear: to prevent the transfer of game-changing weaponry from getting into the wrong hands. It can’t permit Syria to send chemical weapons to Hezbollah in Lebanon, nor can it allow Syria to receive missiles or other weapons systems that will make it harder for Israel to defend itself against future aggression.

Nir Elias/Reuters Israeli children at a school in Pisgat Zeev evacuated their classroom during a drill on Monday.

Earlier this month, Israeli warplanes attacked targets in Syria to prevent a delivery of Iranian missiles to Hezbollah. There were two Israeli airstrikes in Syria within two days — the second being the third this year, after more than five years without Israeli attacks in Syria.

Given these recent Israeli strikes and Israel’s vows to act “with determination” to achieve its goals, the escalation of rhetorical threats against Israel was probably unavoidable. There are Syrian threats to use missiles against Israel, and  Hezbollah has warned that it may launch a “popular-resistance campaign’’ in the Golan Heights.

In turn, Israel has been making more of its own threats. While Israeli leaders keep saying that they don’t want any part in Syria’s war — and there’s no reason to doubt their sincerity — their message can be contradictory at times.

“Israel wants to both eat a cake and keep it untouched,” said Professor Eyal Zisser of Tel Aviv University, Israel’s leading expert on Syria. The Israeli government, he added, wants to attack Syrian installations and convoys when it deems necessary, yet it also wants to prevent a war from breaking out.

As it tries to hold together a fragile peace, Israel has its citizens conduct drills and prepare for the worst. “These days a number of scenarios can lead to a surprise war,” the chief of the Israeli Air Force, Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel, declared a week ago. A “Somalization” of Syria — a scenario that both Israeli and Arab diplomats see as a real possibility — would present Israel with a whole new set of security challenges.

Israeli leaders should be telling the public the truth. Choosing to attack Syria is not opting for a good option over a bad one but rather picking a bad option — the risk of war — over another bad one — the risk of letting Israel’s enemies get new weaponry. “A severe case of brinkmanship is being played at the moment,” said a former U.N. peacekeeper in Lebanon. When such game is going on, a sudden state of war can hardly be considered a “surprise.”



 http://latitude.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/28/a-worried-israel-prepares-for-war/