IDF Chief: Israel will prevent terrorist groups from gaining strength

IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot declared, in an address to the Meir Dagan Conference at the Netanya Academic College, that Israel will continue to “prevent terrorist groups from gaining strength or acquiring advanced weapons,” in reference to the recent Israeli airstrikes against weapons shipments in Syria that were destined for the Iranian-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon.

 

Nevertheless, Lietenant General Eizenkot stressed that since the 1973 Middle East war, Israel’s border with Syria maintained relative quiet, that in the midst of the 6 years of raging chaos in Israel’s northern neighbor. “After the victory of the Yom Kippur war in 1973 on the Syrian front, the quiet has been maintained in the north. Even though almost six years of a chaotic civil war, with some 500,000 casualties, six and a half million refugees, seven million displaced and two million wounded, we succeed in securing the border as a quiet border,” IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gadi Eisenkot said.

 

During the Security Conference, which was established in memory of Israel’s former Mossad Chief Meir Dagan, the Israeli Intelligence Chief, Mossad Director Yossi Cohen declared that as long as the Iranian Ayatollah leadership remains in power, the Islamic Republic would remain Israel’s prime enemy and will continue to be the focus of efforts by Israel’s security establishment. “As long as the current regime exists, the extreme Ayatollah regime, with the nuclear agreement or without it, Iran will continue to be a treat and a top challenge for the state of Israel, for Israel’s security establishment and the Mossad,” Mossad director Yossi Cohen said.

 

Israel’s top defense officials have declared in the past year the Islamist Hezbollah organization to be the most imminent threat the Jewish state, as the militant organization that reportedly holds thousands of rockets directed, which are directed at Israel, is perceived as the long-arm of the Islamic Republic of Iran that is situated on the border with Israel.