The Burden of Damascus - Isaiah Chapter 17
(Isa 17:1) An oracle concerning Damascus. Behold, Damascus will cease to be a city and will become a heap of ruins.
(Isa 17:2) The cities of Aroer are deserted; they will be for flocks, which will lie down, and none will make them afraid.
(Isa 17:3) The fortress will disappear from Ephraim, and the kingdom from Damascus; and the remnant of Syria will be like the glory of the children of Israel, declares the LORD of hosts.
(Isa 17:4) And in that day the glory of Jacob will be brought low, and the fat of his flesh will grow lean.
(Isa 17:5) And it shall be as when the reaper gathers standing grain and his arm harvests the ears, and as when one gleans the ears of grain in the Valley of Rephaim.
(Isa 17:6) Gleanings will be left in it, as when an olive tree is beaten— two or three berries in the top of the highest bough, four or five on the branches of a fruit tree, declares the LORD God of Israel.
(Isa 17:7) In that day man will look to his Maker, and his eyes will look on the Holy One of Israel.
(Isa 17:8) He will not look to the altars, the work of his hands, and he will not look on what his own fingers have made, either the Asherim or the altars of incense.
(Isa 17:9) In that day their strong cities will be like the deserted places of the wooded heights and the hilltops, which they deserted because of the children of Israel, and there will be desolation.
(Isa 17:10) For you have forgotten the God of your salvation and have not remembered the Rock of your refuge; therefore, though you plant pleasant plants and sow the vine-branch of a stranger,
(Isa 17:11) though you make them grow on the day that you plant them, and make them blossom in the morning that you sow, yet the harvest will flee away in a day of grief and incurable pain.
(Isa 17:12) Ah, the thunder of many peoples; they thunder like the thundering of the sea! Ah, the roar of nations; they roar like the roaring of mighty waters!
(Isa 17:13) The nations roar like the roaring of many waters, but he will rebuke them, and they will flee far away, chased like chaff on the mountains before the wind and whirling dust before the storm.
(Isa 17:14) At evening time, behold, terror! Before morning, they are no more! This is the portion of those who loot us, and the lot of those who plunder us.
Dempsey in Israel, Jordan, to tie last ends before Obama decides finally on US military action in Syria
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report August 13, 2013, 8:44 AM (IDT)
US and Jordanian special forces
Chairman of the US Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin Dempsey arrived in Israel Monday, Aug. 12 for critical talks with Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Defense minister Moshe Ya’alon and Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, followed by parallel talks in Jordan. debkafile reports he has come to lay the ground ahead of President Barack Obama’s final decision to embark on limited US military intervention in the Syria civil war.
The Obama plan, if it goes forward, would involve Saudi Arabia, Emirates, Israel, Jordan and possibly Turkey. debkafile’s Washington and military sources reveal its 11 high points - most of which were first reported exclusively in DEBKA Weekly 598 on Aug. 1:
1. US, British, French, Saudi and United Arab Emirates will establish a no-fly zone over central and southern Syria, stretching from the Jordanian-Israeli borders up to and including Damascus.
2. The Israeli Air Force will provide these forces with air cover from Syrian air space.
3. A 40-kilometer deep military buffer zone will be drawn from the Jordanian-Israeli borders up to the southern and western outskirts of Damascus. The military units controlling this zone will hold the entire area of the capital within artillery range.
4. The southern Syrian town of Deraa, where the Syrian uprising sprang up, will be declared capital of Liberated Syria.
5. President Obama has determined that there will no American troops in the buffer zone or anywhere else on Syrian soil, only special Syrian rebel forces.
6. Those forces will consist of 3,000 fighters trained in Jordan by US military instructors. They will be headed by Jordanian special forces and operate under US officers based in Jordan.
7. To host them, the US Army has just finished building in the Hashemite Kingdom a huge training camp and logistical system, debkafile’s military sources report. All the weapons and equipment required to train and arm the rebel force are already stacked there.
8. The American operational command center for the Syrian operation is already in place in Amman led by US Brig. Gen. John Wright, who at 57 is a veteran of the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya.
9. The US air force units for imposing the no-fly zone over Syria are already in position at Middle East locations and ready to go at 36 hours’ notice.
10. A Druze unit trained by US military instructors will be a key component of the special rebel force. It was put up by the million-strong community which populates 120 villages and towns in the Jabal al-Druze area of southern Syria. They are situated in a commanding position overlooking the Syrian-Jordanian-Iraqi border triangle.
11. US forces deployed in the Middle East, especially in Jordan and Israel, will stand ready for possible reprisals against American, Israeli, Jordanian or Turkish targets, if ordered by Syrian President Bashar Assad in retaliation for the no-fly and buffer zones.
