Iranian Atomic Urgency
• Worried about reports that Iran discovered new uranium deposits? Forbes says Don’t Panic.
• AP: Iranian diplomat seeks asylum in Norway.
Arab Spring Winter
• Syrian rebels seized control of the al-Kibar nuclear facility, say they’ll allow IAEA inspectors to visit the site if certain unspecified demands are met. Writes YNet:
He further confirmed earlier reports of the facility’s takeover, saying that the rebels found it empty. He refused to tell the newspaper whether anything was found on the premises to suggest that the facility was used for nuclear work.
“Those details will be given only to the IAEA,” he said.
Hopefully, the access will be more meaningful than Bashar Assad’s laughable media tour back in 2007.
• Syrian Television’s Most Outraged Bystander: Since the civil war began, one particular pro-Assad bystander’s man on the street reactions has been featured 18 times.
• The stakes are high for Hezbollah not to allow Syrian rebels to take control of a highway leading to the Syrian village of Qusayr. The Christian Science Monitor explains why:
Some analysts suspect that the Shiite villages to the west of Qusayr could eventually form part of a corridor linking Hezbollah-controlled areas of Lebanon’s northern Bekaa Valley to the southern edge of an Alawite enclave that could stretch up the coastal mountain chain to the port town of Latakia. If such a corridor were secured, it would have significant strategic consequences. It would allow Hezbollah to help the remnants of the Assad regime defend the enclave from attacks by Sunni groups. It could also become a new conduit for the flow of arms to Hezbollah.
• The Daily Telegraph looks at Western plans seize and destroy Syrian chemical weapons.
Rest O’ the Roundup
• Turkish media reports say Jerusalem and Ankara are secretly negotiating a partial apology for the Mavi Marmara affair. Israel would, before President Obama’s visit, apologize for “operational errors.” The caveat:
‘’It does not seem likely that any step will be taken before the new Israeli government is formed and an official position adopted.”
• Israel’s ambassador to Australia, Yuval Rotem, is spending a lot of time putting out fires started by the Prisoner X brouhaha. Israel HaYom sums it up in an easily tweetable 72 characters.
It is a dirty job. It is unpleasant. But it is not necessarily terrible.
• This is not a Purim spoof headline. The story and song are real. ‘Nuff said.
Here’s the song Jefferson Airplane wrote about Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren’s wife
((Image of Europe via Pixabay/Geralt)
For more, see Thursday’s Israel Daily News Stream.
