Israel’s Syria Policy is a Model for the West

Dr. Jonathan Spyer was a guest on Secure Freedom Radio with Frank Gaffney yesterday. Spyer is Director of the Rubin Center for International Affairs at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Israel. He’s also a fellow at the Middle East Forum.

Gaffney asked Spyer how Israel has managed to navigate the Syrian civil war so effectively. Spyer answered:

“Israel doesn’t really have a dog in the fight so to speak in the Syrian civil war, which is effectively being fought on the ground by two brands of Islamists. The only group Israel would have some sympathy would be the Syrian Kurds and the Syrian Kurds are a long way from Israel’s borders and pretty much doing fine by themselves.. What that means then is that Israel doesn’t have a side to back. It has certain key security interests it has to defend, it defines them narrowly and pursues them actively and with great intent.”

Gaffney also asked Spyer about the feasibility of Obama’s  policy for deposing Assad. Spyer responded:

“Given the nature of the rebellion, Israel has not embraced that view because of course it’s very clear that if the Sunni Arab rebellion, led as it is on the ground by Sunni Islamist fighting forces, if that force, if those forces had rolled into Damascus, destroyed the Assad regime and then reunited Syria under their rule, the Syria that would have emerged would not have been an ally of the west but rather would be a brand new, very strong, very triumphant, very angry Sunni Islamist regime, probably aligned strongly with Erdogan in Turkey and probably aligned therefore with Hamas down in Gaza and therefore in no way friendly to Israel or to western interests.”

Finally, Gaffney asked Spyer what his prescriptions would be for the west in dealing with Jihadist terrorism,  particularly in the wake of Brussels. Spyer suggests that first, the magnitude and the nature of the threat have to be understood, that there has to be “an end to illusion.” Once that happens, Spyer continued:

“Then practical policy issues come into play and here I think the issue is often one of providing sufficient budgets and sufficient leeway and sufficient skills for equipping with sufficient skills, relevant security bodies, security services, police and so on.”

Spyer also says that these agencies must be given room to act against enemy groups and their supporters, something that has enabled Israel to have a good record on security in recent years.