Arab
Sources: A Major Military Surprise Is Close
War
preparations are reported by debkafile's
military sources in Tehran and Damascus, debkafile's
military sources report. In Tehran, Iran's
Revolutionary Guards announced Friday, Aug.
20: "IRGC is in full readiness to
encounter firmly with the stupidity of the US
and the Zionist regime." In
Damascus, Syrian prime minister Naji al-Otari
gathered his ministers and heads of security
and emergency services Thursday and ordered
them to place all their services on immediate
war readiness. And sources close to the
Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas
quoted him as saying that direct talks with
Israel were not in the offing because "a
big military surprise awaits the Middle
East." On Thursday, too, Tehran pitched
its threat level high by warning that any
attack on Iran's nuclear sites would be met by
the IRGC "targeting the interests of the
enemies in any part of the world." Some
Iranian sources have suggested that Israel's
obsessive preoccupation with the Galant
scandal (over a forged document designed to
influence the choice of the next Israeli chief
of staff) is a smokescreen for masking
preparations for an imminent attack on Iran's
nuclear facilities.