Maariv: Obama Accomplice in Haj Imad Mughniyeh Assassination

In a week, the new American president Donald Trump will assume his presidential duties succeeding Barack Obama.

The prime minister of the enemy's government Benjamin Netanyahu believes that this will open a new era of relations with Washington. Meanwhile, the "Israeli" leadership hopes "that there will be improvement in the political relations, as it was productive on the security and intelligence levels during Obama's term," according to Netanyahu's claims.

The security commentator in the "Maariv" newspaper Yossi Melman said "that according to investigations published in ‘The Washington Post' and ‘Newsweek' newspapers, in February 2008 which was a month after Barack Obama entered the White House, the latter agreed that there should be communication between the CIA and the Mossad in a joint operation to assassinate a senior Hizbullah official Imad Mughniyeh," pointing out that "these two [intelligence] apparatuses share many years of cooperation agreements that include joint operations of information exchange and investigations, particularly with regard to combating terrorism." Melman pointed out that "this operation was the first joint CIA-Mossad assassination operation."

Melman added that "during Obama's term, joint operations between these two intelligence apparatuses increased, aimed at foiling and hitting the Iranian nuclear program." He noted that "during Obama's tenure the relationship between the occupation army and the US military also improved through the establishment of joint drills and maneuvers between the air force, the special units, areal defense systems and others."

According to Melman, Obama's two terms in office witnessed a series of errors. The most prominent of these was the manner in which he handled the Syrian war, which was described by a military analyst as "disgraceful".

As for the new US administration and how the Zionist government will deal with it, Melman believes "that Netanyahu and the right wing government hope that Trump performs three diplomatic and dramatic steps: the first is halting US support for the formation of a Palestinian state, the second is the transfer of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to al-Quds, and the third is to increase the pressure on Iran, and even scrapping the nuclear deal and re-imposing sanctions."

According to the Zionist commentator, these hopes are based on three reasons. "The first are Trump's statements during his election campaign; the second are the new appointments he ratified, including the appointment of his Jewish relative Jared Kushner as his special adviser as well as his lawyer David Friedman who was president of the Friends of "Beit El" Settlement Institution and the candidate for the post of US ambassador to the entity; and the third reason - which is the most important to Melman- is the Jew's wealth, as he is considered one of the wealthiest in the world, previously funding the ‘"Israel" Hayom' which backs Netanyahu."

Source: Maariv, Translated and Edited by website team