Posted on 01/08/2002 2:45:27 PM PST by Axion
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Arms Seizure Backfires, Wounds Israel Summary Israeli naval commandos seized a vessel loaded with arms in the Red Sea on Jan. 4. Israel claims the weapons came from Iran and were bound for the Palestinian territories. But the circumstances surrounding the shipment and details that emerged after its seizure have raised questions about the entire incident and, more importantly, about Israel's credibility. Audiences in Europe and the United States now will be more likely to question other Israeli claims concerning Palestinians. Analysis In a daring nighttime raid on Jan. 4, Israeli commandos seized a vessel in international waters of the Red Sea that was carrying 50 tons of weapons, including Katyusha rockets, anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles, sniper rifles and mortar launchers. Israeli government officials said the next morning that the Palestinian Authority had purchased the weapons from Iran and was intending to smuggle them into the territories. The circumstances surrounding the shipment and details that emerged after its seizure have cast doubts on Israel's report of the incident, however. Both the Palestinian Authority and Tehran have denied any connection to the Karine A, and a report in a prestigious British shipping journal contradicts Israeli allegations regarding the vessel's ownership. Rather than validating Israel's claims of Palestinian duplicity, the incident has damaged Israel's credibility. Audiences in the West, especially in Europe and the United States, are now more likely to question other Israeli charges against the Palestinians. American and European distrust of Israeli allegations will give the Palestinian Authority more room to maneuver in the short term. PA leader Yasser Arafat can continue to argue that he wants peace and to cite Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's aggressive policies as the root cause of continuing violence in the Middle East. Israel had hoped to achieve a double whammy with the ship seizure. First, it sought to throw a wrench into peace talks. It aimed to ensure that the United States would not push Israel into negotiating a truce at a time when it has the upper hand with Arafat. Implicating Iran would advance yet another goal -- containment of the emerging Persian Gulf power. Immediately after announcing the capture of the vessel, Israel called on the European Union to declare Iran a state sponsor of terrorism. The United States already does so. But the seizure of the Karine A instead has mushroomed into a full-scale embarrassment for Israel. Several details undermine claims that the Palestinian Authority was directly involved in the purchase and smuggling of weapons. For example, the timing of the seizure provided a convenient means of thwarting progress toward peace talks during a four-day visit by U.S. envoy Anthony Zinni. Despite claims to the contrary, Zinni failed to achieve any real steps toward resuming peace talks. In fact, Sharon plans to re-evaluate Israel's relations with the Palestinian Authority, Haaretz reported Jan. 7. He has pointed to the vessel seizure to justify the move and to validate his labeling of Arafat as a terrorist unwilling to work toward peace. At the same time, logic argues against the idea that the Palestinian Authority was involved in the incident: The presence of Palestinian naval officers aboard the vessel, including one who later directly fingered two of Arafat's top lieutenants, limits plausible deniability. Though the Palestinian Authority does not govern a state, it nonetheless must behave as a government -- and governments engaged in covert or illegal operations usually act in a manner that allows plausible deniability. It would be either extremely stupid or sheerly lunatic for the Palestinians to think that a weapons-laden ship might transit the Red Sea and the Suez Canal undetected at a time when both are under heightened surveillance. Furthermore, there are contradictory reports about the vessel's ownership. Israel claims Palestinians owned the ship, but Lloyd's List, a premier shipping publication owned by Lloyd's of London, reported Jan.7 that it was owned by an Iraqi national. According to Lloyd's, it was a Lebanese-flagged vessel operated by the Beirut-based Diana K. Shipping Co. and was sold in August 2001 to Ali Mohammed Abbas for $400,000. The ship was then re-registered in Tonga as the Karine A. Although a Lebanese Transport Ministry official has disputed the Lloyd's report, it lends credence to the Palestinian denials and countercharges that Israel manipulated the seizure to derail peace talks. Ultimately, it matters little whether the Israeli assertions are true. The many apparent discrepancies, the illogic of the idea that the Palestinian Authority would attempt such an operation and finally the Lloyd's List report have combined to cast doubt on the Israeli claims. Even the United States has failed to endorse Israel's version of events, The Jerusalem Post reported Jan. 8. As far as Israel is concerned, the best thing that can happen now is for the whole incident to blow over. Politicians and military leaders are all pointing fingers at each other, blaming everyone but themselves for what is seen as a public relations debacle. The internal debate, however, overlooks the larger issue: Israel's credibility has taken a blow, giving the Palestinians leverage in the short term. Now the Palestinian Authority can ask Europe and the United States to pressure Sharon to come to the negotiating table. More important, few will take future Israeli claims about Palestinian arms-smuggling at face value. Israel's burden of proof just got a lot heavier. |
By BARRY SCHWEID, AP Diplomatic Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - Switching gears, the State Department accepted as ``credible'' Israel's allegations that the Palestinians were trying to smuggle in rockets and other weapons by sea.
``We have some of the evidence. We don't have all of it,'' spokesman Richard Boucher said Tuesday.
``We're waiting to hear a full explanation of the incident'' from Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, Boucher said. On Wednesday, Israeli military intelligence officials are due to call at the State Department.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld expressed unqualified support for Israel in its seizure of the ship.
``They clearly had very good intelligence that those weapons were going to be used against them and they intercepted the ship by pre-empting that ship from landing and unloading and then providing those weapons to be used against Israel,'' Rumsfeld said on C-Span.
``The United States has done a similar thing with respect to various ship interceptions and maritime interceptions as they're called, and it is something I think that is not unusual or not uncalled for when one thinks of the magnitude of the weapon stash that was on that ship.''
On Monday, four days after the ``Karine A'' was captured by Israeli naval commandos in the Red Sea some 300 miles from Israel, Boucher said the State Department had not assembled the facts and could not determine whether the ship was making a delivery for the Palestinian Authority.
Boucher gave reporters a revised account after Israel's justice minister, Meir Shitreet, told Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage that 50 tons of weapons aboard the intercepted vessel were intended for delivery to Palestinian fighters.
``There is no doubt Arafat is responsible,'' Shitreet said.
Boucher did not link Arafat to the smuggling. ``I would say we're waiting to hear a full explanation of the incident from Chairman Arafat,'' he said.
``We are deeply concerned about the situation, about the involvement of Palestinians in this arms shipment,'' Boucher said. ``We have expressed that concern directly and early to Chairman Arafat. We've told him we need a full explanation. He's now promised a full investigation.''
Boucher said U.S. diplomats had examined some of the weapons. ``The quantity and the quality of these shipments are of serious concern. I think we find the fact that there are Palestinians involved in shipping these weapons deeply troubling,'' he said.
An Israeli official said the arsenal included armor-piercing weapons designed to disable Israeli tanks. And Shitreet said 3,400 pounds of C4 explosive, a common terrorist weapon, were in the cargo.
``We have no doubt about the connection to Arafat,'' Shitreet said. Echoing Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites), he called Arafat a liar and said Israel had intercepted three other such shipments in the past, but that a fourth succeeded in arming guerrillas in Lebanon.
Shitreet said the weapons seized last week were not bound for the Hezbollah fighters, who are conducting a cross-border, low-level war with Israel, since Iran, which Israel accuses of providing the weapons, is able to arm the guerrillas through Syria easily.
The weapons, which included rockets, would have posed a high danger to Tel Aviv and other Israeli cities, he said.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi, speaking Monday on Iranian TV, said Israel made up the allegations to ``intensify a crackdown on the Palestinian intefadeh,'' or uprising.
Despite it all, Shitreet said Israel was prepared to resume negotiations with the Palestinian Authority once there have been seven days of calm.
He said Israel's dispute was not with the Palestinian people; the minister said Israel was making sure they had sufficient food, electricity and other supplies.
The ship's captain, Omar Akawi, has said in jailhouse interviews that he picked up the weapons at Iran's Qeys island, just off the country's southwest coast.
Akawi said he works in the Palestinian Transportation Ministry, and agreed to smuggle the weapons because ``it's the Palestinian right to defend ourselves.''
In the 1993 Oslo Accords with Israel, the Palestinian Authority agreed to limit the kind and amount of weapons it would amass. The arms aboard the ship went beyond those limits.
``I don't want to say the Oslo Accords are dying,'' Shitreet said. ``But they are very sick.''
Of course most days, they concentrate on the guava crop in Bolivia and other world-critical issues.
File this article in the local trash bin along with this comment.
Stratfor is not uniformly stupid, but lately they are making lots of mistakes, and this one tops the rest.
Have you ever read a more incompetent analysis than this ?
Could it ? have been ? Nah, that would be too rich.
Did Pat Buchanan write this ?
Not once does the author state a single FACT to support his biased claim that the ship wasn't destined for the Palis. Meanwhile (back on earth) I saw the captain of the ship on national television this morning stating explicitly that he was ordered by a very high level Arafat cronie to pick up the weapons from Iran and deliver them to the Palestinians.
Now, what in the world would Israel have to gain by releasing misinformation !!
Stratfor.com with egg on it's face! <-;
Who are these bozos?
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