The news in Israel tonight was all about Syria. Foreign reports today focused on an Israeli attack of a Syrian base last night (where a large stockpile of weapons were allegedly destroyed). It seems this stockpile contained newly delivered Soviet missiles. The Syrian government remains mum on the subject. They appear willing to accept the destruction of their missiles without taking any action, since the last thing the Syrians want is a confrontation with Israel at the moment. According to foreign reports Israel attacked very specific targets in Syria– at least four times– this year. Once again making a joke of the stated concerns by the American military that it would be costly for the US to attack Syria.
The other news today was the fact that the U.N. Chemical Weapons Commission announced they had met their scheduled deadline for destroying all of the Syrian chemical weapons production facilities. This has proved the skeptics wrong, both here and abroad. Of course, destroying the facilities is easy compared with destroying the actual weapons.
Henry Kissinger famously once said that Israel has no foreign policy, only domestic political policy. That was proved true yet again yesterday. After releasing Palestinian prisoners the government announced new building in the West Bank– including locations beyond the separation fence. Netanyahu is much more worried about keeping Israel's right wing satisfied, than developing a positive atmosphere for any negotiations.
Lastly, today the Defense Ministry got most of the budgetary allotments they wanted. Four months ago, (when the budget was passed), the Defense Ministry agreed to a 4 billion shekel cut. Now that tax revenues have been a little higher than projected, they are complaining that with the current (previously agreed upon) budget they cannot defend Israel properly and they must have an increase. The government agreed to give them 2.5 billion.
