Russia, China Express Alarm After Israel Hits Syria

[Purveyor]

Source: REUTERS

* After air strikes, Israel seeks to ease tension with Syria

* China urges restraint during Israeli PM's visit

* Russia says chance of foreign intervention growing

* Oil price rises on concern of regional tension

By Dan Williams and Khaled Yacoub Oweis

JERUSALEM/AMMAN, May 6 (Reuters) - Russia and China expressed alarm on Monday over the regional repercussions of two Israeli air raids on Syria, while Israel played down strikes which its officials said targeted Iranian missiles bound for Lebanese Hezbollah militants.

Oil prices spiked above $105 a barrel, their highest in nearly a month, on Monday morning as the air strikes on Friday and Sunday prompted fears of a wider spillover of Syria's two-year-old civil war that could affect Middle East oil exports.

Israel, whose prime minister visited China on Monday in a sign of business-as-usual, sought to persuade Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Monday that the air strikes did not aim to weaken him and dismissed the prospects of an escalation.

"There are no winds of war," Yair Golan, the general commanding Israeli forces on the Syrian and Lebanese fronts, told reporters while out jogging with troops.

Read more: http://www.trust.org/item/20130506150459-hpfda

[AtheistCrusader]

1. Well, there's a dangerous path to tread.

Things like that have a way of escalating whether you meant them to or not.