Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of the Iraqi exiles in Syria had turned to the sex trade for survival. In Damascus, refugees were not permitted to hold jobs. As resources dwindled, many were led into the underground economy. Female-headed households accounted for almost a quarter of the refugees registered with the U.N. refugee agency. Widowed, divorced, or [...]

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Syria has defied Israel’s caution that handing over new strategic weapons to the Lebanese Hizballah would compel Israel to strike targets inside Syria. debkafile’s military sources disclose that Damascus has just smuggled across the border a number of Russian-made IGLA-S surface-to-air missiles capable of intercepting low-flying F-16 warplanes, drones, helicopters, cruise missiles, transports and surveillance [...]

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Iran further consolidated its anti-US coalition and honed its hard edge against Israel this week with two important defense treaties signed with Syria (covering Lebanon) and Qatar, home to the biggest US air base outside America. These treaties opened doors for Iranian troops to be stationed in all three countries. According to debkafile’s military sources, [...]

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North Korea provided about 45 tons of ”yellowcake” uranium to Syria in September 2007 for production of fuel for an undeclared nuclear reactor, diplomatic and military sources knowledgeable on North Korean issues said Saturday.
N. Korea provided raw uranium to Syria in 2007: sources

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Ahmadinejad is due to meet all three of Iran’s allies in Damascus Thursday: Assad, Nasrallah and Hamas political secretary Khaled Meshaal. He will find them refusing to go to war against Israel without clear guarantees from Tehran that Iranian military forces will fight alongside them. They want Tehran to abide by their mutual defense pact [...]

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Syria’s prime minister warned Israel Saturday that any new Middle East war would be catastrophic for the region and beyond.
Premier Naji al-Otari told reporters after meeting with French Prime Minister Francois Fillon in Damascus, that a new war will have dangerous repercussions not only in the Middle East but also on the international level.
Syria’s [...]

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Uranium particles found by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Syria are an indication that a site bombed by Israel in 2007 could indeed have been a nuclear reactor, the organization said in a new report Thursday.
‘Syria site bombed by Israel in 2007 likely to have been a nuclear reactor’ – Haaretz – Israel [...]

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Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem recently told Israelis that “you know that war at this time will reach your cities.” The statement bolsters the recognition that the Syrian strategy in a future war will be based on targeting population centers in Israel. It seems that after the enemy’s attempts to act through conventional military means [...]

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Syria also presents a regional threat. It has several hundred SCUD-class and SS-21 SRBMs and may have chemical warheads available for a portion of its SCUD missiles. All of Syria’s missiles are mobile and can reach much of Israel and large portions of Iraq, Jordan, and Turkey from launch sites well within the country.
PDF: The [...]

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Syrian President Bashar Assad on Sunday vowed to stand by Lebanon’s side against any Israeli “aggression,” in an escalating war of words between Damascus and Jerusalem.
Assad’s remarks to Lebanon Parliament Speaker Nabil Beri were the latest in a renewed round of threats and counter-threats that began last week.
Syria vows to respond to any Israeli ‘aggression’ [...]

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