From Ahmet of Tunisia: "Asad,
Elliott Abrams is giving his inside story on 2007 Israeli attack on Syria 's
Deir Zoor reactor (Operation Orchard); guess they knew about the
Assad Doctrine and what stuff the man is made of, and that still holds true in
2013:
"The Israeli assessment of Syria’s likely
reaction was correct. The Israelis believed that if they and we spoke about the
strike, Assad might be forced to react to this humiliation by trying to attack
Israel. If, however, we all shut up, he might do nothing—nothing at all. He
might try to hide the fact that anything had happened. And with every day that passed, the possibility that
he would acknowledge the event and fight back diminished. That had been the
Israeli theory, and the Israelis knew their man. We maintained silence
and so did Israel—no leaks. As the weeks went by, the chances of an
Israeli-Syrian confrontation grew slim and then disappeared. Syria has never
admitted that there was a reactor at the
site.""
