U.S. warplanes left the Incerlik air force base in southern Turkey and attacked nearby Mosul in what analysts acknowledge was a completely ineffective and almost desperate act. Israeli warplanes headed for Syria in a show of force but did not reach their targets. But as soon as Saddam appeared to show his hand, he quickly withdrew. The electronic activity around the missile sites were halted. The troops and command cars disappeared.
Nobody knows for sure.
But the overriding assessments is that Saddam was testing the U.S. response to a missile attack on Israel. Analysts say Saddam has up to 50 missiles left over from the 1991 Gulf war that can strike Israel. They say these missiles can be tipped with chemical weapons warheads. President Assad was willing to meet Yasser Arafat is one of the most inauspicious occurrences since Arafat and Iraq's Saddam Hussein concluded to their strategic-military pact last April, five months before the outbreak of the Palestinian uprising. Under discussion now is whether Arafat will be invited to Damascus before the Amman Arab Summit on the 27th.