US President Barack Obama Tuesday, Feb. 28, vetoed plans submitted to him last week for Western-Arab military intervention in the Syrian crisis, debkafile reports. He is weighing an alternative plan for setting up “humanitarian corridors” in the most embattled areas. That too would be contingent on Russian endorsement, because Obama believes Moscow holds the key to Assad’s consent - or at least abstention from sending his army to attack the aid routes.  No Russian response as yet to feelers from Washington.

Military preparations for intervention in the horrendous Syrian crisis are quietly afoot in Washington, Paris, Rome, London and Ankara. President Barack Obama is poised for a final decision after the Pentagon submits operational plans for protecting Syrian rebels and beleaguered populations, debkafile reports. The deaths of two notable journalists helped galvanize the West into action. They died after Syrian artillery located their secret press center in Homs with the help of Russian spy satellites or Iranian electronic measures - and gutted it. 

The unattributed killing of Iranian nuclear scientist Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan last Wednesday, Jan. 11, was the subject of an angry phone call from US President Barack Obama to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the next day, debkafile reports.  Washington is concerned, the Wall Street Journal reported Saturday, that Israel may strike Iran's nuclear sites and has bolstered the defenses of US facilities in the region. In Jerusalem, Washington's strong and unusual slamming of the attack was deeply resented.

The US and Israel, while bound tightly by military bonds, are at loggerheads over Iran. The Obama administration wants to cut Israel out of military action against Iran's nuclear sites and prevent it hitting back for an Iranian reprisal. Israel is withholding a commitment to abstain from striking Iran ...

Saudi Arabia demands a precise, unequivocal US declaration of intent to prevent a nuclear Iran by a military strike if necessary. Riyadh doesn't trust sanctions to do the job – or Barak Obama to stick to the course of a military strike on Iran's nuclear sites without wavering.