Word: assads
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
There were reports last week that Assad and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had agreed to name emissaries to talk about common problems, like resuming the pumping of Iraqi oil through Syria to the Lebanese port of Tripoli. In exchange for reopening the pipeline, Iraq would replace Iran as a source of inexpensive oil to Syria. By brokering the deal, King Hussein would gain Iraqi support in his drive to undermine Arafat and isolate the P.L.O. In time, the shifting alliances might also help ease the situation in Lebanon, where fighting last week between Shi'ite Muslims and Palestinians was particularly...
...said Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres last week, for the moment allaying fears that Israel might be on the verge of making a pre- emptive strike against its strongest Arab neighbor. Almost simultaneously, Syria's Vice President Abdel Halim Khaddam declared that the Damascus government of President Hafez Assad "is not seeking aggression," though he added that Syria would "respond with all the potential it possesses" if attacked. Those statements were intended to put to rest, at least temporarily, a flurry of war talk that has rocked the region for the past fortnight. But they hardly resolved the mounting problems...
...latest crisis was sparked by fresh allegations that Syria may have played a role in recent terrorist attacks in Europe and the Mediterranean, even though in the past the Assad government has consistently deplored such assaults against civilians. The charges, pressed by the Israelis but confirmed in some particulars by some Western intelligence agencies, link Syria with the recent attempt by a Jordanian-born Palestinian to plant a bomb aboard a London-Tel Aviv El Al flight with 360 passengers aboard. Evidence also surfaced that could tie the Syrians to a West Berlin explosion that destroyed the German-Arab Friendship...
...attacks in West Berlin, the close call at London's Heathrow Airport, where an alert Israeli security agent found an explosive device in the luggage of a terrorist's unsuspecting Irish girlfriend, raised questions about the war risks the Damascus regime may be willing to undertake --and about Assad's motives. Had the plane been destroyed, with hundreds of casualties, the tragedy would almost certainly have led to some kind of Israeli military response...
Though Syrian President Hafez Assad has so far been cleverer than Gaddafi in covering his tracks, revelations of a possible Syrian role in the El Al attempt have raised the already high level of tension between Israel and Syria. Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin told TIME last week that he believed "the decision about this crazy murderous act was taken at a relatively high level" in the Syrian government. Syria's support of terrorism "increased the danger" of a military confrontation, he warned, but he stressed that Israel does not intend to go to war with its neighbor...