Iran warns of new rules of engagement with Israel
By Times of Israel staff
The Times of Israel website
Hours after Hezbollah terror chief Hassan Nasrallah warned that his terror group would not be “deterred” and that any Israeli action against it would not go unpunished, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps said Israel “learned a lesson” from Wednesday’s attack in which two IDF soldiers were killed.
Speaking in Beirut at a ceremony for the “martyrs of Quneitra” – the 12 Hezbollah and Iranian operatives, including a general, who were killed in an airstrike attributed to Israel on the Syrian side of the Golan Heights on January 18 – General Mohammad Ali Jafari was quoted by the IRNA news agency as saying that Iran’s and Hezbollah’s responses to any future Israeli attack would be “the same.”
Wednesday’s attack, in which Major Yochai Kalangel and Staff Sergeant Dor Chaim Nini were killed when anti-tank missiles fired by a Hezbollah unit hit their convoy, was largely seen as a response to the alleged Israeli air raid the previous week near Quneitra.
Both Iran and its proxy Hezbollah effectively outlined a new policy on Friday, according to a report on Channel 2, in which any Israeli operation in Syria would be met with a powerful response. Both indicated “new rules of engagement” on Friday during respective remarks in Beirut.
According to the Channel 2 report, Iran was seeking to solidify its hold on southern Syria and open a new front using Hezbollah members operating under an Iranian umbrella.
Earlier Friday, Nasrallah gave his first speech since Wednesday’s deadly attack, warning that Hezbollah did not seek war but did not fear it, and boasting of Lebanese, Iranian and Syrian unity.
“We don’t fear war [against Israel] and we don’t hesitate in facing it if it is imposed on us and we will be victorious, God willing,” he said.
Powerful Iran general met with Hezbollah chief after Golan strike
By Times of Israel staff
The Times of Israel website
A top Iranian general met with Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah late last month, following an air strike that killed several operatives in Syria according to Lebanese reports.
Qassem Soleimani, a shadowy commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps’ Quds Force, also visited the graves of Hezbollah fighters killed in the January 18 airstrike on the Golan Heights widely attributed to Israel.
Soleimani traveled to Lebanon a day after the strike, which killed six Hezbollah men and an IRGC brigadier general, Mohammed Ali Allahdadi, according Lebanese media reports.
Israeli media reported at the weekend that Soleimani appointed two Quds Force members to help orchestrate Hezbollah’s response to the strike, last Wednesday, in which two IDF soldiers were killed and 7 injured in a cross-border missile attack.
The January 18 attack highlighted the increasingly public Iranian involvement in Hezbollah’s activities, both in southern Lebanon and in Syria, where the Lebanese group is fighting in that country’s civil war to support the forces of the Assad regime.
Among the dead in the Golan strike was Jihad Mughniyeh, son of the late Hezbollah military chief Imad Mughniyeh, who was wanted in Europe and the US for terror activities and was assassinated in Syria in February 2008 in an operation believed to have been conducted by Israeli and possibly other Western intelligence agencies.
Soleimani “is thought to have been the mentor of Jihad Mughniyeh,” the Lebanese newspaper The Daily Star reported.
Quoting the news outlet As-Safir, The Daily Star reported Soleimani conducted a meeting with several Hezbollah leaders in his mid-January visit, followed by a visit to the Mughniyeh family home to offer condolences.
“At midnight, the senior commander visited Rawdat al-Shahidayn cemetery in Beirut’s southern suburbs and laid wreaths at the graves of Jihad and Imad Mughniyeh before heading back to Tehran the same night,” it reported.
Noble Energy team in Egypt for talks on importing Israeli gas – sources
By Reuters
The Times of Israel website
A delegation from American oil firm Noble Energy is in Egypt for talks with the state gas company about importing Israeli gas to energy-starved Egypt, sources at the airport and the oil ministry said on Sunday.
Gas shipments could come from Israel's offshore Tamar gas field, which Noble operates, and whose partners have floated plans to connect the field with Egypt's Damietta LNG plant.
Israel's Delek Drilling, one of the partners in the field, said in November that if an agreement is signed, gas supplies to Egypt could start flowing in 2017.
Egypt has signed several deals in past months to import natural gas, which powers most of its homes and factories, but imports from Israel are potentially more sensitive because of the countries' rocky history.
The oil ministry source said Sunday's talks concerned the technical procedures for bringing natural gas from Israeli fields into Egypt.
Rivlin lauds Israeli ambassador to Latin American countries
By Greer Fay Cashman
The Jerusalem Post, Page 7
President Reuven Rivlin on Sunday voiced warm appreciation for the work being carried out by Israel's ambassadors to Latin American countries.
Rivlin told a group of 26 present and future ambassadors to South American countries: "What you do is important and often extraordinary and does not receive sufficient recognition. You often work under the most difficult of circumstances and people in Israel do not understand what an exemplary job you are doing.
Netanyahu sends condolences to Japan’s Abe over IS killings
By Times of Israel staff
The Times of Israel website
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sent a condolence letter Sunday to his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe, as Japan grappled with the killings of two Japanese journalists by the Islamic State terror group in faraway Syria.
“Please accept my heartfelt condolences following the tragic deaths of Haruna Yukawa and Kenji Goto,” the letter read.
The Islamic State group said Saturday it had beheaded Goto, drawing outrage from Tokyo and condemnation from Washington.
The claim was made in a video released online that included no mention of a Jordanian pilot also being held by IS, whom the jihadist group has also threatened to kill.
“These despicable, cold-blooded murders by ISIS are a chilling reminder of the need for all free nations to join hands in an uncompromising battle against the Islamist terrorism that is plaguing the Middle East and the entire world,” Netanyahu wrote in the Sunday letter, using an alternate acronym for the group.
“Kindly convey our deepest sympathies to the families of the victims. Our thoughts and prayers are with them and the Japanese people at this difficult time.”
Abe was in Israel on a state visit last month when the Islamic State first announced it was holding Goto and Yukawa, an aid worker who was killed in a video released last week.
In an appearance before reporters in Tokyo Sunday, a visibly upset Abe vowed to “never forgive terrorists.”
“I am extremely angry about these heinous and despicable terrorist acts. We will never forgive terrorists,” Abe said.
Dermer, Shapiro back Pats in Bowl
By Justin Jalil
The Times of Israel website
Ambassadors Ron Dermer and Dan Shapiro have not had much to agree about these past few weeks. However, the two were in lock-step over one thing: Cheering for the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl.
In a tongue-in-cheek Twitter remark, Israeli Ambassador to the US Ron Dermer said he was supporting New England during Sunday’s football championship.
Referring to the recent row over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s acceptance of an invitation to speak before Congress without consulting the White House, Dermer said he would “break protocol” and side with the Pats.
US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro, a Chicago native, jumped into the Super Bowl spirit shortly after Dermer’s remarks, tweeting his own support for the Tom Brady-led squad 46 minutes after his Israeli counterpart.