The only way the Arabs can pump up their own moral and blend out their failures & miserable lives is blaming Israel. The 'Arab Spring' changing that view would mean having been a liar & failure all the time and who want's to confess to that?

Always someone else's fault whenever they cannot continue with their favourite activity....murdering each other with impunity. Hey ho! What a lovely culture longing for admiration across the world denied them by the wickedness of "islamophobia"!

Israel has stated its objective on quite a number of occasions -- no transfer of game-changing weaponry to Hezbollah or any other of the terrorist elements arrayed against Israel. Whether the attempted transfers come from Assad or from any of the rejectionist and Islamist factions numbered among the "rebel" groups doesn't matter. No game-changing weapons will reach Hezbollah. How difficult is that to understand? As to the Arab and Islamic world, whose silence has been deafening while nearly 100,000 people have been killed in Syria, hypocrisy on that wide a scale falls considerably short of being taken seriously. Israel is in the business of protecting the State of Israel and the Jewish people. The opinion in the Arab "street" (actually, just a lot of garbage-strewn alleys) is really entirely irrelevant. Israel has an affirmative duty to protect and defend its citizens. We will do precisely that, and it matters little -- if at all -- what the rest of the world thinks. We know what the rest of the world thinks; we've had -- literally -- a front-row seat to the carnage in Syria, which the international community has largely ignored except for a few plaintive bleats. The international community thus has absolutely no right to criticize Israel for protecting its citizens. But they can blather away as much as they like; it won't change a thing.

You have no idea how important is your article for the world. Shalom

Intriguing, sectarian rivalry, and unrest boiling over has always been the true fatal flaw and hallmark of the Arab lands through the ages. Wise to simply monitor from afar.

We also have many divisions within Jewish society but if an Arab attacks one of us these differences magically disappear. We have more trust in a Jewish enemy than we do in an Arab friend. This is even more pronounced in the Arab world. If you look at the Lebanese civil war you see they changed allies routinely, one dday killing each other, one day brothers in arms. This is part of the Arab psyche you need to learn to survive in the neighbourhood.

to everyone. It is up to everyone to acknowledge it or not.

we dont hack our fellow Jews and murder 120k of our own. we dont eat our own peoples hearts or talk joyously about murdering fellow Jews. Stop buying the far left political bullshi sauce.

it's quite understandable that assad, hezbollah, and iran condemned the israeli attack. after all, it was their ox which was being gored. and it's not surprising that they are desperate to try to exploit any move by israel to their advantage. but it's the response of supposedly "moderate" sunnis, like jordan, egypt, and turkey that was surprisingly vicious and anti-israel. after conferring not-so-secretly with israel about "the syria problem", their feigned outrage sounds particularly hypocritical. whether it is the result of pan-arab sentiment, or a reaction to the humiliating fact that israel dares to do what they do not, it should be a warning to israel (and america) that alliances in the arab world (and including turkey and iran) cannot be relied upon to ensure israel's security.

The USA cannot defend the entire world. The two Syrian sides need to negotiate a truce and agreement to end the civil war. Israel's bombing was designed to stop the transfer of chemical weapons to Hezboallah.

Last time the whole Arab world was crying for Israel to bomb Assad's forces , now they hate Israel, lol......

Israel can provide medicine to help millions of Arab and she'll then be accused of trying to poison the Arabs. My advice to Israel - stay out of this and let the Syrians kill themselves - nothing you do will ever be appreciated. Best bet - mind your own business - unless weapons are pointed toward you.

An interesting summary of the positions of the ME factions and countries. The surprise would have been if any anti-Assad supporters had applauded Israel's actions.Which once again just shows their hostility to Israel always comes before their inaction when Arabs are butchering each other. They do not seem to appreciate that Israel's actions are not governed by so called Arab Springs or by the weakness of Egypt. Israel is playing this one well,by only becoming involved when detecting a threat and by letting them get on with their killing of each other. The US/West have also acted wisely by keeping their distance.

There is no need for Israel or US to get involved. Neither side in the Syrian conflict can be considered "non-hostile". They are pretty darn far from even remotely friendly. If Assad stays in power and continues to prop Hezbollah and channel supplies to them from Iran - it's bad. If the "free syrian army" topples Assad's regime they will start slaughtering Alawites, Shhias, Druze and the tiny number of Christians left in short order. Nothing good will come out of this, one way or another. The most likely scenario is this: Assuming Sunni support for FSA does not stop, after a few years the the Alawis and shias will control the piece along the cast, north of lebanon, Druze will control a couple of enclaves near Golan, Kurds will have a few areas in the North and the rest will go to Sunnis. They will form alliances, switch sides and slaughter each other with great amount of enthusiasm. It will be a replay of the Lebanese civil war, and it may well last a quarter of a century.

Arab intervention in Syria is providing a close up view of how these countries internal divisions lead to constant turmoil. Syria should be blaming Arab nations for not helping them. If the west gets involved they will unite against the west. Arab intervention to establish peace in Syria...I'm dreaming again

the only thing that unites them is their anti semitic values. Let this civil war continue and hope that all of assad's army, all the islamists, hezbolla and the rest of the islamic human trash fight to the death

...and Israel alike, is that they for far too long - for decades! - have chosen to support tyrants in the name of stability. Therefore, all the talk about al-Assad's cruelty, un-justified Arab rage and the need for freedom to spread, is shallow and people will role their eyes and stop listening before anyone has the chance to say Mubar....... You reap what you sow. Dr. Friedman is 100% right is this article but, obviously, that's an entirely different story....

the world how important Arabs re

Israel has been trying to torch the whole middle east since its birth. However, people take notice. As the plots fail, in spite of causing a large carnage, Israel is becoming more erratic and hysterical.

For the past two years they have been condemning Assad telling him he must stop but despite the fact most of them are armed to the teeth with American and European weapons the do nothing but watch and condemn. Israel destroys arms convoys and nothing more serious than that but the arabs are up in arms and now Assad is the good guy they need to get behind and support. Even Turkey which most the Israel has reasonable relations with even if they are cold right now condemns it. The Europeans and Obama urged restraint to avoid damaging chances of reaching a diplomatic solution to end the war. Everybody who is anti Assad one day is anti Israel the next because it tried to stop advanced weapons falling into terrorist hands.

If Israel had never come into being the araab world would be much more backward than it is today because they would be spending all their time killing each other like they used to do. Israel unified the arabs by giving them a common enemy. Israels creation was the best thing that ever happened to the arabs. The other country who got a good deal thanks to Israel's creation is the US whose arms industry has earned well over $1 trillion over the past 65 years selling weapons to both sides.

As so eloquently described in "Skyfall" where hungry rats in a confined space are devouring each other until only one is left standing. It is the perfect analogy to what is happening within the confines of Syria. The world and Israel are waiting to see who that last rat is.

Why is it that Muslims are so indifferent to Muslims slaughtering Muslims at a a genocidal scale? Do you Muslims think Allah isn't watching? Do any Muslims reading this have enough integrity to answer me?

YEAH! Don't you love it?

Something is terribly wrong with your reasoning. Israel is not IN it. They are defending their borders and preventing WMD passing into the hands of the Islamist terrorists hezbollah who has vowed to destroy Israel. Also, you obviously have not been following the news. Assad has aimed his weapons at Tel Aviv with orders to attack if Israel defends herself. How blind can you be, or, how anti Israel can you be?

The Sunni consider Shi'ites to be subhuman, only a little better than Jews. Jihad is their religious obligation to make the world a better place by getting rid of the subhumans.