A triangular bond is formed by Israel, Nicosia and Athens for joint gas field exploration and production secured by the shared umbrella of the Israeli Navy. On January 9, Cyprus Defense Minister Demetris Eliades arrived in Tel Aviv for the signing of two defense pacts with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak.

  Moscow and Rome are angling for contracts to build and operate the future pipeline to Europe. The Unites States holds the edge in the bidding.

The first exclusive rundown on US, Saudi and Israeli war preparations against Iran was offered in the latest DEBKA-Net-Weekly out Friday. This issue also studies the points of consensus and dispute among the three on goals and priorities: The US and Saudi Arabia are set to unblock the Strait of Hormuz, whereas the US and Israel focus on curtailing Iran's work on a nuclear bomb. Military coordination is marred by mistrust. So Riyadh and Jerusalem are capable of going it alone.

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Tehran plans an underground test of a one-kiloton nuclear device during 2012, debkafile reports. Underground facilities are under construction in great secrecy behind the clamor raised by the start of advanced uranium enrichment at Iran's fortified Fordo bunker-site. Yet, according to a Tel Aviv University think tank scenario, Israel is resigned to a nuclear Iran and would accept a US defense pact instead of retaliating. debkafile's Washington sources refute this:  Barack Obama is resolved to use force if need be to preempt a nuclear Iran.

Washington and Jerusalem were dismayed to discover last week that Egypt's transitional military rulers (SCAF) were preparing to drop the reins of government and hand them over - lock, stock and barrel, including the armed forces - to civilian rule, i.e., the Muslim Brotherhood, at the earliest opportunity. By staying mute while this process ripened, Israel emboldened Muslim Brotherhood leaders to reiterate that they were not bound by any pledges to Washington to uphold the 1979 peace treaty with Israel.

Iranian Defense Minister Brig. Gen. Ahmad Vahidi Monday, Dec. 26, replied to Sunday's debkafile report which revealed Tehran's plan to use its big 10-day naval drill east of the Strait of Hormuz to test its vaunted cyber intelligence prowess against US warships. He said Iran has great capabilities in "all fields of national defense, including the use of intelligence drones." The Islamic Republic, he said, could employ aerial drones to counter any potential US-led covert war. But he did not refer to a full-scale war offensive.

 

Cypriot President Demetris Christofias has warned Turkey to stop its warships shelling the strip of water dividing the Cypriot and Israeli gas exploration zones in the eastern Mediterranean.
debkafile's military forces report that Wednesday, Dec. 21, Turkish warships began turning their guns on the narrow strip dividing Israel's Leviathan gas field from Block 12 of Cyprus's Exclusive Economic Zone-EEZ. Estimates of the sizes of the two fields have been substantially upped of late. Both see prospects of becoming major gas suppliers to Europe.

Hours after US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told CBS that Iran could build a nuclear bomb in a year or less, Gen. Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint US Chiefs of Staff, issued a warning: "Iran is playing a dangerous game that could ensnare the Middle East, the Middle East and others into conflict and a renewed arms race. Don't push it." The loss of the drone is not the end of US efforts, he said, adding: "America is sharing intelligence with Israel."

"Despite the efforts to disrupt the Iranian nuclear program, they have reached a point where they can assemble a bomb in a year or potentially less," said US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta in a CBS interview Tuesday, Dec. 20 marking a radical change in US administration policy. "That's a red line for us and that's a red line, obviously, for the Israelis," he said. Instead of warning Israel against striking Iran, Panetta said: "If we have to do it we will deal with it."

Retired presidential adviser Dennis Ross in his first public appearance reveals that Barack Obama has charted a new Mid East policy which cares fully for Israeli, Saudi security needs but freezes them out of Washington policy-making. The Palestinian issue is put on ice indefinitely.

Iran's electronic trap for snaring the Lockheed Martin RQ-170 Sentinel, one of the world's most secret drone programs in almost perfect condition, must be accounted a huge military and intelligence coup and a landmark in the long tussle over Tehran's nuclear program. It may have acquired the technology for its ...

The US is to shelve its covert war against Iran's nuclear program and any plans for a direct military attack until it discovers how Iran came to capture the top-secret RQ-170 reconnaissance drone complete with its secrets. Israel too will have to revamp its plans of attack before risking ...

The actions and words of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Syrian ruler Bashar Assad in the last 72 hours indicate they are bracing for a regional war, including an attack on Iran, within a time frame between mid-December 2011 and mid-January 2012.
debkafile points to Syria's military exercise in "war conditions," Binyamin Netanyahu's war speech, Washington's heavy hand on Jerusalem to desist from attacking Iran and the hide-and-seek maneuvers of US and Russian fleets.

After spotting an attempted plot on the life of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran has launched a mega manhunt to ferret out the army of double agents and inside traitors suspected to have infested the upper reaches of its government, Revolutionary Guards and armed forces.

The West and Israel have no option but to admit the failure of a decade of sanctions, military threats, diplomatic penalties, cyber war and covert operations to abort Iran's drive for a nuclear bomb. Tehran has never wavered from its goal, citing the "Persian Carpet Doctrine" as its secret ...

Major US-Israel differences surfaced suddenly Thursday, Dec. 1, over the timing and circumstances of an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities, when Gen. Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint US Chiefs of Staff, said: "I don't know whether Israel would alert the United States ahead of time if it decided to take military action against Iran." Three hours later, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak maintained US policy would enable Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon without the possibility of attacking it. Meanwhile, facilities are being hidden underground.

The hidden wars the United States, NATO, Arab League members and Israel are waging against Iran, Syria and Hizballah rose to a record pitch in the last two weeks. Aspects of these covert operations are revealed exclusively in the latest DEBKA-Net-Weekly, out lat Friday.  In Syria, these operations teeter on the brink of overt combat. In Iran, unseen hands are eroding regime stability.  

Read also about the Western-Arab plan to bisect Syria into pro-and anti-Assad entities.

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Twenty-four hours before the Arab League Sunday, Nov. 27, clamped down sanctions on the Assad regime, the first ever against a member state, the armies of Syria's seven neighbors were already scrambling into position on standby for retaliation. debkafile: Israeli armored brigades moved up to the Lebanese and Syrian borders; Ankara placed three armored brigades, its air force and navy on the ready, likewise Hizballah and the Lebanese and Jordanian armed forces. Russia is sending Bashar Assad siege-breaking missiles.

It is within the next six months or never. Israel's defense minister has finally confirmed its time frame for an attacking Iran's nuclear sites, having given up on sanctions present or future and strong UN nuclear agency counter-measures having any effect.

After deploying three warships in Syrian waters, Moscow continues to beat war drums against the United States and Israel, followed closely by Tehran. Wednesday, Nov. 23, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced he had ordered "the armed forces to develop measures to ensure we can destroy the command and control systems" of the planned US missile-defense system in Europe. debkafile: Those systems also control Israel's missile defenses against Iranian, Syria and Hizballah missiles and the X-Band radar station in the Israeli Negev.

The protests in Cairo and other Egyptian cities do not count as the country's second revolution this year. The angry masses battling police in Cairo's Tahrir Square and the centers of Alexandria, Ismailia and Port Said for four days are not backed by any serious political entity, including the Muslim Brotherhood, which Tuesday, Nov. 22 threw in their lot with the military council. So will the protesters be satisfied with Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi's promise of a presidential election in mid-2012? Not so far.