
 A new US-led contingency headquarters for joint US, IsraelU, Jordanian and  Turkish operations will go into action inside Syria if any or all these allies  should come under chemical or biological attack. Agreement to establish this  headquarters was finalized at the talks US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel held  with visiting Israeli defense Minister Ehud Barak at the Pentagon Tuesday, March  5. debkafile’s military sources  report that Hagel spoke of a chemical war in Syria in terms of an imminent and  realistic eventuality. Washington expected the Syrian rebels close to al Qaeda  to initiate this type of warfare and the Syria army to fight back in kind. Such  an exchange could quickly spill over the Syrian borders to its neighbors, it was  likewise predicted. Therefore, the parties involved in their release refute the optimistic  accounts of the blue-helmeted hostages’ early release issuing from Damascus, UN  headquarters in New York and Middle East capitals. By strengthening their holdings in eastern Syria, the Islamist militias  believe they would pave the way for the creation of an al Qaeda-dominated  territorial entity, the first of its kind, ranging from the eastern outskirts of  Damascus to the northern approaches to Baghdad. Jabhat al Nusra, al Qaeda’s most effective combat force in Syria and Iraq, is  determined to go through with this plan, even if it necessitates fighting with  the chemical or biological weapons they have managed to get hold of. The kidnappings of UN observers have attracted worldwide attention and put  the Islamist camp now dominating the Syrian rebel movement on the map as a force  to be reckoned with and respected – internally and internationally. The US defense secretary warned his Israeli visitor that the intelligence  data reaching him indicates that al Qaeda and its affiliates will prefer  multiple chemical attacks inside Syria and across its borders for greater  effect, rather than aiming for single targets. Each of the victimized countries  will then have to decide whether to react at once, or wait for the  member-governments under the new headquarters to get their act together for a  collective response. Our military sources add that the new headquarters places under one roof the  American, Israeli, Turkish and Jordanian counter-WMD commands operating  separately since last year in Tel Aviv, Ankara, Beirut, Amman and areas abutting  Syria. According to those sources, although US defense spending cuts have held up  the overhaul and refitting of the USS Harry S. Truman carrier and its strike  force and their departure for the Middle East, the ship and its air combat unit  are nonetheless on standby for deployment in the event of chemical warfare  raising its head in the Syrian conflict.
The abduction of 21 UNDOP Filipino UN observers  Wednesday, March 6, by the Islamist Martyrs of the Yarmouk, is now seen as tying  in closely with the next plans of the Islamist militias of the Syrian rebel  force, headed by Jabhat al-Nusra, which are to cement their grip on the Syrian  Golan, eastern Syria and the Upper Euphrates, where the important towns of Deir  Azor and Abu Kemal are situated.