Russian-rebel ceasefire deals in Daraa are hazy
Although fighting and air strikes over Daraa paused on Sunday, July 8, the ceasefire deals the Russians negotiated with rebel leaders on July 6, are unclear – above all, for lack of a word of endorsement from Damascus. Even the Russians have been caught in non-compliance, DEBKAfile’s military sources report. It was agreed that the Russian military police would assume control of the key Nassib crossing on the Syrian-Jordanian border held for seven years by Syrian rebels. On Saturday, however, a mixed group of Russian and Syrian troops were depicted in control of Nassib.
After capturing several villages, the Syrian army has yet to reach large stretches of land in the province of Daraa and control the full length of the Jordanian border, which could take another 10 days or so. The ceasefire may not hold in some places if rebel groups holding out against the ceasefire resist Syrian forces. Neither are the Syrians yet in control of the city of Daraa, where rebel militias still rule most districts. According to the Russian-rebel accord, only Syrian civil servants may enter the city – not soldiers. But if that provision also falls by the wayside, the rebels may again resort to arms. And so the the agreed ceasefire is fragile at best.
R. Jose b. Kisma asked him, ‘When will the Messiah come?’ He answered, ‘I fear lest you demand a sign of me.’ They assured him, ‘We will demand no sign of you.’ So he answered them, ‘When this gate falls down, is rebuilt, falls again, and is again rebuilt, and then falls a third time, before it can be rebuilt the son of David will come.’
They said to him, ‘Master, give us a sign.’ He protested, ‘Did you not assure me that you would not demand a sign?’ They replied, ‘Even so.’ He said to them. ‘If so, let the waters of the grotto of Paneas turn into blood;’ and they turned into blood. When he lay dying he said to them, ‘Place my coffin deep for there is not one palm-tree in Babylon to which a Persian horse will not be tethered, nor one coffin in Palestine out of which a Median horse will not eat straw.’
This was a forecast of the future, technically saying “Babylon and Palestine would be overrun with Persians, Medes and Parthians and their horses would dig up the dead, whose coffins would serve as cribs.” It represents a desire and unique solution, seen as possible at that time, to have some external power (Persians, Medes and Parthians) taking off the extreme subjection in which Jews were kept by the Romans after the failure of the Bar Kokhba revolt.
But this event is consumed (already) by the take off of the Parthian empire and subsequent wars with Rome.
There is no connection between that invasion and the effort of today’s Persians to destroy Israel. They will never have another empire, that time is long gone.
er….wrong…Sanhedrin 98 is eschatological and, in its entirety speaks of Mashiach..
Now, come write it on a tablet with them, and on a book engrave it, and it shall be for the last day, forever to eternity.
For a rebellious people are they, lying children, children who would not hearken to the Lord’s instruction.
Who said to the seers, “You shall not see,” and to the prophets, “You shall not prophesy for us true things. Speak to us with smooth talk; prophesy mockery.
And death shall be preferable to life for all the residue that remain of this evil family, which remain in all the places whither I have cast them out, says the Lord of Hosts.
And you shall say to them; so says the Lord: Shall they fall and not rise, if he repents, will He not return?
Why has this people, Jerusalem, slid back a perpetual backsliding? They have held on to deceit, they refuse to repent.
How do you say, “We are wise, and the Law of the Lord is with us”? Verily, behold it is in vain, he made a false scribes’ pen.
Wise men were ashamed, they were broken and caught; behold they rejected the word of the Lord, now what wisdom have they