By Stan Goodenough
Syrian dictator Bashar el-Assad does not believe Israeli officials when they say they do not want a war with their north-eastern neighbor.
This is the IDF's official assessment of Damascus' response to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's repeated assertions that Israel does not want war.
According to a report in The Jerusalem Post Monday, Olmert's attempts over the last few weeks "to calm Syrian jitters have not been overly successful," and Assad still believes Israel plans to attack.
Israeli military officials have warned that Syria is in a position to bombard Israeli cities with hundreds of missiles in an hour. The conventional warheads of some of these missiles are powerful enough to damage blocks of buildings.
The Post said officials have warned off the record that the Israel Air Force would have a problem thwarting such a bombardment. IDF ground forces would have to be moved deep into Syria in order to stop the rocket firing at its sources, they said.
Israel's surface-to-surface missile capability was not mentioned in the report.
There is wide-spread speculation among Middle East watchers that, in the event of conflict, Assad could bring his non-conventional weaponry into play against Israel, forcing Israel to respond with weapons of mass destruction on Damascus.
Original Source