2013 Briefing Book - Print Version - Aipac

ISRAEL AT RISK
The Egyptian military’s inability—or unwillingness—to stem terrorist attacks from Sinai against
Israel is also a worrisome trend, although it has stepped up actions after an August 2012 attack
in which terrorists killed 16 Egyptian soldiers in the Sinai before ramming an explosives-laden
military vehicle through the Israeli border.
In August 2011, eight Israelis were killed when terrorists entered Israel from Egypt and fired at
an Israeli bus travelling near the border. Israel is nearing completion of a security fence along its
border with Egypt to help prevent future attacks.
Civil War in Syria
In 2011, Syria underwent a dramatic shift as mass protests aimed at bringing down the regime of
President Bashar al-Assad resulted in a brutal crackdown and the mass killing of tens of thousands
of civilians. Despite the lack of an official peace treaty, the relationship between Israel and Syria had
proven remarkably stable for more than three decades under the regime of the current ruler’s father,
President Hafez al-Assad, who conducted serious U.S.-hosted peace talks with Israel in 2000.
The pragmatic foreign policy of Hafez al-Assad has given way to the more strident and provocative
posture of his son, who has attempted to develop a clandestine nuclear program with help from
North Korea and has continued to supply advanced weapons from Iran to Hizballah in violation of
U.N. Security Council resolutions.
As violence has escalated and the international outcry grows, these worrisome policies, coupled
with concerns that a desperate regime could lash out, have caused Israel to dramatically
recalculate the threat from Syria and
plan for potential conflict.
President Bashar Assad has sought to
distract attention from his brutality by
blaming the United States and Israel
for stoking the internal dissent. The
Assad regime has encouraged violence
against Israel by having Palestinians
and other regime supporters try to
rush the border with Israel. Israeli
defense officials have raised the threat
level along the Syrian border.
Syrians inside and outside the country are rebelling against the Assad
regime amid its brutal crackdown on anti-government protestors.
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