US, Lockheed reach deal on Israeli F-35s

Deal facilitates program aiming to install Israeli-unique systems on US fighter jets and enhance electronic warfare equipment

           

The Pentagon has reached an agreement with Lockheed Martin Corp on a $450 million program to enhance electronic warfare equipment on the F-35 fighter jet, and integrate Israeli-unique systems beginning in 2016, according to sources familiar with the negotiations.

The deal, to be finalized in coming weeks, marks a big step forward for Israel's $2.75 billion agreement to buy 19 F-35 jets, which was signed in October 2010 and includes options for up to 75 of the radar-evading fighters.

The Pentagon said the Israeli foreign arms sale could be worth up to $15.2 billion if all options are exercised, when it first approved the sale in September 2008.

"This agreement kicks off the Israeli program," said one of the sources, who was not authorized to speak on the record. "Now all of the agreements are in place."

The F-35 will allow for even greater collaboration in the coming years with Israel, a critical strategic ally for the United States at a time when much of the Middle East is in turmoil.

Panetta to visit Israel

The deal comes as Defense Secretary Leon Panetta prepares to visit Israel next week where he will discuss heightened tensions with Iran, which on Thursday underscored its support for Syria despite its brutal crackdown on a 16-month uprising.

It also provides a vote of confidence in the embattled F-35 program, whose cost and technology challenges have overshadowed a year of progress in flight testing.

The deal will allow increased participation in the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program by Israeli companies, including Elbit Systems Ltd and state-owned Israel Aerospace Industries, which will start building wings for the radar-evading warplane.

IAI already builds wings for the F-16 fighter jet, the world's most widely used fighter, also built by Lockheed. Elbit, in a joint venture with Rockwell Collins, makes the advanced helmet used by pilots on the single-seat F-35.

Agreement on development of the new Israeli version of the F-35 will allow Israel to install its own radio and datalink systems, as well as other equipment, on the jets it is buying.

Electronic warfare enhancement

But the deal also covers enhancements to the airplane's electronic warfare capabilities that will benefit the United States, Israel and the other nine countries that either have already ordered fighter planes, or plan to in coming years

The radar-evading, multirole F-35 is the Pentagon's costliest arms purchase, expected to top $396 billion for 2,443 aircraft in three models through the mid-2030s.

Lockheed and its subcontractors are building the stealthy warplane for the US Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps along with Britain and seven other co-development partners – Italy, Turkey, Canada, Australia, Denmark, Norway and the Netherlands.

In addition to Israel, Japan also has a signed agreement to buy the F-35, which was designed to replace a range of fighter, strike and ground-attack aircraft, including the F-16.

The Defense Department this year postponed production of 179 F-35s until after 2017, stretching development and testing in an effort to curb costly retrofits and save money. The latest restructuring, the third such major revamp, added 33 months and $7.9 billion to the development plan.

Lockheed Martin, the Pentagon's No. 1 supplier by sales, is developing the F-35 with Northrop Grumman Corp and Britain's BAE Systems PLC. Britain initially invested $2 billion in the F-35's development, the most of any of the eight partner nations.

Work on the electronic warfare enhancements will be done largely by BAE Systems, the sources said.

Pentagon: Bulgaria terror attack bears hallmarks of Hezbollah

U.S. Defense Department says it has yet to conclude who is behind Burgas bombing on Israelis, which killed seven and wounded 37; Netanyahu says Iran-backed Hezbollah responsible for attack.

 A truck carrying the bus that was damaged in Wednesday’s terrorist attack on July 19, 2012.

A suicide bombing that killed Israeli tourists in Bulgaria this week bore hallmarks of Iranian-backed Hezbollah militants but the U.S. Defense Department has not yet concluded who was behind it, a Pentagon spokesman said on Friday.

The attack on a bus carrying Israelis at a Bulgarian airport, "does bear the hallmarks of Hezbollah," George Little, the Pentagon press secretary, told reporters.

Bulgaria's interior minister, Tsvetan Tsvetanov, said earlier in the day that the attacker, who killed himself and six others, was a foreign national. Sofia was investigating with the help of foreign intelligence services, he said.

Little turned aside a request to characterize the signs of an Hezbollah attack or how it could be distinguished from one by, for instance, al-Qaida, which is not linked to Iran.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has accused Hezbollah militants of carrying out the bombing Wednesday at Burgas airport, a popular gateway for tourists visiting Bulgaria's Black Sea coast. Iran has denied any involvement.

State demands prison sentences for officers who left Palestinian to die by side of road

Demand comes a month after Baruch Peretz and Assaf Yakutiel were charged for negligent homicide after they threw Omar Abu Jariban out of a police vehicle, leaving him to die of dehydration.

Assaf Yakutieli, one of the two officers suspected of negligent homicide of a Palestinian man, in a Jerusalem court.

The state demanded two policemen serve active prison sentences after they were convicted of negligent homicide after they dumped an injured Palestinian man on the side of the road, leaving him to die.

The decision comes a month after Judge Haim Liran rejected the testimony by Inspector Baruch Peretz, who was the officer on duty at the Rehovot police station on June 12, 2008, when he ordered a low-ranking policeman, Assaf Yakutieli, to throw Omar Abu Jariban out of a police vehicle, on the side of the road. Abu Jariban died of dehydration some time later.

On Tuesday, State Representative Batia Kolitz told the Jerusalem Magistrate Court the court that the officers “were so dense that they did not see the human that stood in front of them.”

“There is no room in Israeli society for an attitude that says ‘it will be okay, he’ll find a ride by standing on the side of the rode.’ The officers harmed the image of the police and of the uniform,” Kolitz said.

Kolitz wrapped up her statements by saying that a fitting punishment should include prison sentences.

Peretz asked the judge not to sentence him to prison, saying that since the incident his life “has been in ruins.”

“I feel hurt and betrayed,” Peretz said. “There have been times in the past when I have admitted I was wrong or I failed. In this case I did neither. I believed that justice would prove that.”

Yakutieli expressed regret over the incident. “I honestly was trying to fix a situation which was out of our hands. The result was tragic, and I am sorry. This is something I think about every day, and I am ashamed of what happened.”

Prior to the incident, Jariban was seriously injured in a car accident on May 28, 2008, while driving a stolen car on Route 6, near the Soreq interchange. He had been in Israel illegally. He was hospitalized at the Sheba Medical Center, Tel Hashomer where he remained for two weeks before he was released into the custody of Rehovot police officers. He still required medical care and rehabilitation, and was apparently in a state of confusion.

Police, who did not know the identity of the patient-suspect, ultimately decided to admit him to the Israel Prison Service's medical facility. But it turned out there was no room for him there. So officers from the Rehovot station, which had assumed responsibility for investigating the accident and the car theft, drove Jariban to the West Bank. They eventually left him, late at night, at the side of road 45 near the Ofer military base. His body was discovered two days later.

World powers maintained united front during nuclear talks with Iran in Moscow

Iranian stalling tactics, veiled threats by the six powers and odd PowerPoint presentations, but nary a word about Israel in the third round of nuclear talks with Iran.

Iranian stalling tactics, veiled threats from the six powers, an odd PowerPoint presentation about religious rulings by Iranian spiritual leader Ali Khamenei, and nary a word about Israel: That is some of what happened behind closed doors at Moscow's Golden Ring Hotel, where a third round of nuclear talks with Iran took place this week.

The intensive talks held in Moscow on Monday and Tuesday between Iran and the six powers - the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany - ended in failure. The six powers were unable to bridge their major gaps with Iran.

A Western diplomat who asked to remain anonymous in light of the sensitivity of the talks said that one major obstacle revealed by the Moscow talks relates to the underground facility for uranium enrichment in Fordo, near the city of Qum.

According to the diplomat, the Iranians responded only in a broad, vague fashion to demands that it limit its enrichment of uranium to a level of 20 percent and move such uranium outside the country, and they refused to discuss the Fordo plant at all. The Iranians claimed that Fordo is not a military facility, so it should not be included in the talks.

"We learned that Fordo is a taboo subject for the Iranians, and that it is the flagship of their nuclear project," the diplomat said.

After ending the second round of talks in Baghdad with the feeling that the six powers were desperate to forge an agreement, the Iranian delegates arrived in Moscow feeling confident. But Western diplomats, who realized that expectations had been raised too high in Baghdad, came to Moscow skeptical and cautious. The message they broadcast was that the powers want an agreement, but not at any price.

The Western diplomat said that several times during the Moscow talks, Western representatives conveyed veiled threats and warnings to the Iranian delegation. The message was that "we are not under pressure, and we prefer no deal to a bad deal."

Western delegates, he added, told the Iranians that "packing our bags and going home won't be a problem. That won't cause anything bad to happen to us. But if you are the ones to pack your bags and leave, you'll have a lot to lose."

The six powers presented tough terms to the Iranians, and they rejected Iran's request to conduct a fourth round of talks with higher-level representatives. "Another round of talks like this one will not lead to results, so we told the Iranians that there's no point in holding them," the Western diplomat said.

They did agree to arrange a meeting of jurists and nuclear experts to conduct a detailed review of the positions presented by both sides during the Moscow discussions. But the powers made it clear to the Iranians that they "want concrete actions, not just talks."

The Iranians were surprised that delegates from the six powers managed to maintain a united front throughout the discussions. The Iranians had hoped to bring the Chinese and Russian delegates into their corner. But during separate meetings with the Russian and Chinese diplomats, the Iranians heard the same message that was relayed consistently in the meetings with representatives from all six countries.

Throughout the Moscow negotiations, Saeed Jalili, head of the Iranian delegation, tried to carry out delaying tactics and evasive maneuvers. One odd moment occurred on the second day of the discussions, when the Iranians announced that they were willing to discuss an initiative broached by Russia's President Vladimir Putin regarding the nuclear dispute.

Delegates from the six powers began passing notes among themselves in an effort to ascertain what Putin's initiative actually said. Some of the diplomats in the conference room sent text messages to colleagues outside, asking that they conduct Google searches to see whether Putin had sponsored an initiative they didn't know about.

After a few minutes of searches, it became clear that the initiative in question was actually an article published by Putin four months ago, during his presidential campaign. Putin stated in the article that Iran should be allowed to enrich uranium under certain restrictions, to be monitored and enforced by the International Atomic Energy Agency. The agitated Russian delegation hastily explained that this article was not a formal diplomatic initiative and bore no relevance to the diplomatic negotiations then underway.

Mubarak declared clinically dead, Egypt sources say

Security sources conflict reports, saying Mubarak is unconscious and on a respirator but not clinically dead; reports follow announcement that ex-Egyptian president suffered stroke and was moved to military hospital.

Hosni Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for three decades until overthrown by the Egypt uprising last year, was declared clinically dead by his doctors on Tuesday, the state news agency MENA said in a report confirmed by a hospital source.

Mubarak was 84 and had been sentenced to life in prison earlier this month.

"Former president Hosni Mubarak has clinically died following his arrival at Maadi military hospital on Tuesday evening," MENA said, quoting medical sources.

"Mubarak's heart stopped beating and was subjected to a defibrillator several times but did not respond."

In conflicting reports, two security sources said Mubarak is unconscious and on a respirator but is not clinically dead. "He is completely unconscious. He is using artificial respiration," one military source told Reuters, after the state news agency reported he was clinically dead after being taken from a prison medical facility to a military hospital.

Another separate security source gave the same account and dismissed the report issued by the state news agency saying: "It is still early to say that he is clinically dead."

The reports come just as a potentially explosive fight opened over who will succeed him as president, with both candidates claiming to have won last weekend's presidential election.

The developments add further layers to what is threatening to become a new chapter of unrest and political power struggles in Egypt, 16 months after Mubarak was ousted by a popular uprising demanding democracy.

The campaign of Mubarak's former prime minister, Ahmed Shafiq, said Tuesday he has won Egypt's presidential election, countering the Muslim Brotherhood's claim of victory for its candidate, Mohammed Morsi.

The election commission is to announce the official final results on Thursday and no matter who it names as victor, his rival is likely to reject the result as a fraud. If Shafiq is declared winner in particular, it could spark an explosive backlash from the Brotherhood.

Supported by Russia !!! - Bashar Assad's forces launch aerial assault on Syrian opposition strongholds

Birds fly over a destroyed minaret of a mosque at the northern town of Ariha, on the outskirts of Idlib,

Syria

Syrian troops attacked a rebel-held town in the center of the country with helicopter gunships on Monday and shelled other restive areas across the country, activists said.

The aerial assault targeted the strategic river-crossing town of Rastan that has resisted repeated government offensives for months, they said.

Meanwhile, newly elected head of the Syrian opposition Abdel Basset Sayda responded on Monday to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s offer of aid to the Syrian people, saying “we are not counting on Israeli assistance and we don’t need it,” adding that there are enough countries that can offer aid.

The attack is part of an escalation of violence in recent weeks, despite an internationally-brokered cease-fire that was supposed to go into effect on April 12 but never took hold.

"The regime is now using helicopters more after its ground troops suffered major losses," said Rami Abdul-Rahman of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. "Dozens of vehicles have been destroyed or damaged" since the end of May, he added.

A Syrian Foreign Ministry spokesman, Jihad Makdissi, recently said that rebels are now using sophisticated anti-tank missiles. Videos posted by activists over the past week have shown many destroyed tanks and armored personnel carriers.

The Observatory and the Local Coordination Committees also reported government shelling in the central provinces of Homs and Hama, the southern region of Daraa, the northern province of Aleppo, and suburbs of the capital Damascus and Deir el-Zour in the east.

The Observatory reported the deaths of four civilians and an army defector in shelling in the area of Ashara in Deir el-Zour, and said another eight unidentified bodies had been discovered nearby. It reported three dead in the Hama shelling.

According to reports in Russia, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will visit Iran on Wednesday. Russia and Iran are Syrian President Bashar Assad's strongest allies. Moscow and Beijing have vetoed two Security Council resolutions that threatened possible sanctions against Syria.

The ministry said in a statement that Russia is not playing the role of advocate for certain Middle East regimes. "We are speaking for the strict observance of the norms and principles of international law in the interest of supporting regional stability and security in the Near and Middle East and North Africa," it said.

Syrian activists say the violence has claimed the lives of more than 13,000 people. On Sunday, activists said government shelling killed at least 38 people in the rebellious Homs district in the country's center. It was impossible to independently confirm the death toll.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said Sunday that he could not rule out military intervention in Syria, saying the situation there is beginning to resemble the violence that gripped Bosnia in the 1990s.

Hague told Sky News television that time was "clearly running short" to implement international envoy Kofi Annan's cease-fire plan. It was supposed to take effect on April 12 but never took hold.

Hague said Syria was "on the edge of collapse or of a sectarian civil war so I don't think we can rule anything out."

On Sunday, Netanyahu said that the Syrian regime is carrying out a massacre of civilians. "We see horrid pictures of children and the elderly," Netanyahu said during the weekly cabinet meeting.

Netanyahu said that the massacre is not only carried out by the Syrian government, but is also aided by Iran and Hezbollah, and that "the world must see this axis of evil so everyone would understand in what world we live in."