US lawmaker: Iranian missile threat exaggerated

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON
Democratic Rep. Ellen Tauscher is under consideration to be undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, a position that has involved shaping policy on US missile defense plans in Poland and the Czech Republic. As chair of a congressional military appropriations panel, she has been a critic of US long-range missile defense systems.

Her comments came as the Obama administration was reviewing the European missile defense plans, and has signaled to Russia that it is willing to reconsider them, should the threat from Iran recede. Russia has adamantly opposed the European plans, which it believes would undermine its nuclear deterrent and encroach on its interests.

On another defense matter involving Russia, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Carl Levin, told the same conference on missile defense the subject will be at the center of a new set of security talks between Washington and Moscow and could become "a positive political tool" rather than an impediment to better US-Russian relations.

Advocates of the US defense plans for Europe argue that missile defense systems should be deployed urgently to counter Iran, which the United States has estimated could have missiles capable of reaching Europe or America within a decade. Congresswoman Tauscher said the threat has been exaggerated.

She told a conference on missile defense that the United States and allies should first develop and field short-range missile defense systems that could protect forces deployed in combat operations. She said advocates of the European plans "have been running around with their hair on fire."

"The argument that the US would be naked against an Iranian threat unless we deploy the GMD system in Europe is simply not right," she said, referring to the long-range system.

Levin suggested that the United States and Russia should set aside their differences on missile defense and begin cooperating against Iran to make a decisive difference toward weakening Iran as a missile threat and start US-Russian cooperation on defenses against Iranian missiles.

Russia strongly opposes the plan crafted by the Bush administration and under review by the Obama administration to place US missile interceptors in Poland and an associated radar in the Czech Republic. European defense from a long-range Iranian missile attack is the stated purpose.

Levin did not suggest that the Obama administration bargain away the Bush-era plan, although there has been speculation that US President Barack Obama would offer to scrap that plan in return for Russian help in persuading Iran to end its alleged nuclear program.

"Even if we were simply to begin serious discussions on the subject [it] would send a powerful signal to Iran," Levin said. "Iran would face in a dramatic way a growing unity against her pursuit of dangerous nuclear technology."

Later he added, "The bottom line is simple: We have a new opportunity to seek a cooperative approach with Russia on missile defense, and we should seize it. The upside potential of such an effort is huge, a geopolitical game changer. The downside is minimal."

Levin cited two matters the United States and Russia could take up immediately: a previous Russian offer to share data from an early warning radar in Azerbaijan, on Iran's northern border, and a never-executed US-Russian agreement to open a facility in Moscow for sharing missile-related data.

Speaking at the same conference, Gen. James E. Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said those who develop US missile defenses must take into account that adversaries are increasingly likely to use means other than traditional ballistic missiles in any attack on US interests.

"Ballistic missiles are about as passe as e-mail," Cartwright said. "Nobody does it anymore." Instead the emerging threat is missiles that can be maneuvered in flight and missiles that remain inside Earth's atmosphere, he said. Thus missile defenses must be flexible and adaptable enough to be useful against a range of threats, he added.

Iran's Air Force to test new armaments in large-scale war games

TEHRAN, July 20 (RIA Novosti) - Iran will test new armaments in a major air exercise to be held soon, Iranian Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najar said on Sunday.

"The Air Force exercises, Protectors of Velayat Air, which will be held soon, will test the newest armaments developed by specialists of the country's defense ministry," Najar said.

The Iranian defense minister said that Iranian specialists were developing combat hardware taking into account modern threats.

Iran successfully launched last week an upgraded Shahab-3 ballistic missile as part of the Great Prophet III military exercise in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, drawing a new wave of international criticism.

The Iranian missile tests came after the Israeli Air Force conducted military exercises involving over 100 fighters in early June. The exercises were widely seen as a 'dress rehearsal' for an attack on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Iran has reacted to rumors of an imminent attack by promising to deliver a "powerful blow" to any aggressor.

http://en.rian.ru/world/20080720/114469021.html

Hezbollah fighters could target Britain

By Jason Groves
IRAN is poised to launch terror attacks in Britain if the West presses ahead with military strikes against its nuclear facilities, intelligence experts warned last night.

As tensions in the Middle East continued to grow, they warned that the Iranian-backed terrorist group Hezbollah had already established sleeper cells in Britain and mainland Europe tasked with carrying out bloody reprisals.

Likely UK targets include nuclear power stations, military bases, Government buildings and high-profile politicians and members of the Jewish community.

Richard Kemp, former adviser on terrorism to Tony Blair, said the difficulty of attacking Western and Israeli military targets directly meant Iran was likely to use its terror network to retaliate. Hezbollah, formed in Lebanon in the 1980s, has grown to become a major force in the Middle East.

He said: “In my view Iran’s only realistic method of retaliation is through Hezbollah.

“Hezbollah undoubtedly have the capability to carry out attacks against Western targets outside the region. They have people here in the UK and they would aim to carry out attacks if they saw us as being in any way supportive of an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.”

Claude Moniquet, director of the European Strategic Intelligence and Security Centre, said: “Intelli-gence services across Europe believe Hezbollah pose a serious threat. They have already put in place a network of operatives and there is some evidence that reconnaisance has been carried out on potential targets.

“They are in wait-and-see mode at the moment and no-one knows exactly what they will do, but there is little doubt they will retaliate if Iran is attacked.”

The warnings come amid mounting speculation that either Israel or the United States may attack Iran’s nuclear facilities from the air. And tension mounted last week when, in a show of strength, Iran test-fired nine long-range ballistic missiles capable of hitting targets in Israel and coalition bases in Iraq.

In America Republican hawks suggest there is a “window of opportunity” for an attack after the US elections in November, before a new President is sworn in on 20 January next year.

But Sir Richard Dalton, British ambassador to Iran until 2006, insists there are still huge political, legal and military barriers to any attack.

Sir Richard, now an adviser to the think tank Chatham House, said the prospects had not changed, despite Iran’s missile launches and despite the major Israeli exercise last month which was widely seen as a rehearsal for air strikes on Iran.

Tomorrow the Government will ask MPs to approve adding Hezbollah – which attacked Israel with rockets in 2006 provoking an Israeli invasion of Lebanon – to a list of terrorist groups banned in the UK.

Yesterday Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said he viewed the impending ban as a “badge of honour”.

He added: “I consider it a natural decision to be issued by a founding bloc of the Zionist entity.”

Iran's Revolutionary Guards hold war games

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards began military maneuvers on Monday, news agencies said, the same day the U.S. Navy said it was carrying out an exercise in the Gulf.

The war games were conducted by missile units of the Guards' naval and air forces, the Fars and Mehr news agencies said. They said the exercises, which began a few hours ago, were aimed at improving combat readiness and capability.

The reports did not give details of where the exercise was taking place. The Guards often conduct maneuvers in the Gulf.

Speculation about a possible attack on Iran because of its disputed nuclear program has risen since the New York Times newspaper reported last month that Israel's armed forces had practiced such a strike.

Fear of an escalation in the standoff between the West and Iran, the world's fourth largest oil producer, has helped propel oil prices over $140 a barrel.

The head of the Revolutionary Guards said in remarks published in late June that Tehran would impose controls on shipping in the Gulf and the strategic Strait of Hormuz if it was attacked.

The U.S. Navy last week vowed Iran would not be allowed to block the Gulf waterway, which carries crude from the world's largest oil exporting region.

The U.S. Navy said on Monday that two U.S. vessels were taking part in its exercise alongside a British warship and one from Bahrain, a Gulf Arab ally which hosts the Fifth Fleet.

"The aim of Exercise Stake Net is to practice the tactics and procedures of protecting maritime infrastructure such as gas and oil installations," Commodore Peter Hudson said in a U.S. Fifth Fleet statement.

Western powers say they fear Iran is seeking to develop nuclear weapons under cover of a civilian nuclear program. Tehran says the work aims to generate electricity.

There have been repeated incidents in the Gulf in which U.S. ships have come close to skirmishing with approaching boats in the busy waterway.

The Revolutionary Guards is an ideological wing of the Islamic Republic's armed forces and has a separate command structure to the regular military.

The Guards were reported by state media to have held two days of war games in the Gulf and Sea of Oman in February 2007.

(Reporting by Hossein Jaseb and Hashem Kalantari; Writing by Fredrik Dahl; Editing by Catherine Evans)

Obama vows to stop Iran from having nuclear arms

WASHINGTON, June 4 (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said on Wednesday Iran posed a serious threat in the Middle East and vowed to stop it from acquiring a nuclear weapon.

"The danger from Iran is grave, it is real, and my goal will be to eliminate this threat," Obama said in a speech to a conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a pro-Israel lobby group.

"I will do everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon - everything," he said to a standing ovation.

Obama also vowed to vigorously support Israel's right to defend itself and pledged an active effort to pursue a Middle East peace agreement in a broad speech on the region he delivered a day after clinching the Democratic presidential nomination.

"I will always stand up for Israel's right to defend itself in the United Nations and around the world," Obama said.

Some of Obama's critics have sought to undercut his support with Jewish voters by suggesting that he would be more inclined than the Bush administration and Republican presidential candidate John McCain to put pressure on Israel to make concessions in any peace negotiations.

Obama has been seeking to dispel that notion in campaign events that include the AIPAC speech and a forum with Jewish voters in Florida last month.

McCain has criticized Obama's call for talks with Iran, a state Israeli leaders consider a threat to Israel's security.

(Reporting by Caren Bohan, editing by David Alexander)

Senators say report of planned US strikes on Iran untrue

An anonymously sourced report that emerged Wednesday claims President Bush plans to launch an attack against Iran before summer's end, but aides to two Senators who were supposedly told of the plan tell RAW STORY that the report is absolutely untrue.

Asia Times correspondent Muhammad Cohen, reporting from New York, writes that an "informed source" has clued him in to plans from the Bush administration "to launch an air strike against Iran within the next two months."

Cohen's source told him that Sens. Diane Feinstein (D-CA), who is on the Senate Intelligence Committee, and Richard Lugar (R-IN), the ranking member of the Foreign Relations Committee, were secretly briefed on the administration's plans and were prepared to write a New York Times op-ed condemning Bush. Aides to the two senators were quick to deny the report.

"That story was inaccurate. Senator Feinstein has not received any briefing – classified or unclassified – from the Administration involving any plans to strike Iran," Philip J. Lavelle, the California Democrat's press secretary, wrote in an e-mail to RAW STORY Wednesday. "In addition, she has not submitted an op-ed to the NYT, or any other paper, on this subject in recent days. She has been a strong advocate for diplomacy with Iran, and will continue to be one."

Lugar spokesman Andy Fisher was more succinct: "No briefing. No oped. No conversations. No story."

Speculation that the US might launch an attack on Iran has fluctuated over the last year or so, as the Bush administration and its allies on Capitol Hill have accused the regime of seeking to build a nuclear weapons arsenal and aiding insurgents in Iraq. Back in September, onetime Democrat Sen. Joe Lieberman asked US Gen. David Petraeus whether Iran should be invaded as part of an extension of the Iraq war.

Cohen said his source for the latest report was a "retired US career diplomat and former assistant secretary of state still active in the foreign affairs community" who was an ambassador under President Bush's father, George H.W. Bush. Few precise details about the supposed strike were offered in the Asia Times report.

Lawmakers, including Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE), have said that an unauthorized strike on Iran would be grounds for impeachment.

The Bush administration has not said explicitly that an Iran attack is completely out of the question, but White House officials have emphasized that they prefer to work through diplomatic channels to counteract Iran's nuclear ambitions.

The White House flatly denied a similar report last week that an Iran attack was imminent before he leaves office in January.

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Senators_say_report_of_planned_US_0528.html

Bolton: U.S. should hit Iran training camps

The United States should launch air strikes on Iranian-based camps that are training insurgents for war in Iraq, said the ex-U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

John Bolton said striking Iran would represent a major step toward victory in Iraq, the Telegraph of London reported.

He acknowledged the risk of a hostile Iranian response harming Americans’ overseas interests existed but said the damage inflicted by Tehran would be “far higher” if Washington took no action, the newspaper reported.

“This is a case where the use of military force against a training camp to show the Iranians we’re not going to tolerate this is really the most prudent thing to do,” he said in The Telegraph. “Then the ball would be in Iran’s court to draw the appropriate lesson to stop harming our troops.”

Bolton, an influential former member of President Bush’s inner circle, dismissed as “dead wrong” British intelligence conclusions that the U.S. military had overstated the support that Iran was providing to Iraqi fighters.

A U.S. military spokesman revealed last week that the elite Quds Force of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards had drafted personnel from Lebanon’s Hezbollah to train fighters from Iraq’s Shia militias.

Col. Donald Bacon, a spokesman for the coalition in Baghdad, said captured fighters had told interrogators that thousands of Iraqi fighters were undergoing training in the Islamic Republic.
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/international/middle_east/view.bg?articleid=1092312

Ahmad Khatami vows crushing response if Iran attacked

A top cleric on Friday vowed that Iran would deal a knock-out blow to what he called maniacs in the United States and Israel if they ever attacked the Islamic republic reported by AFP.

"If maniacs in Washington or Tel Aviv seek to take action, the Iranian nation will slap them so hard they will not get off the floor," hardline cleric Ahmad Khatami said in a Friday prayer sermon carried live on state radio.

The Pentagon on Wednesday denied reports of new plans for military options against Iran, which is accused by the United States of seeking nuclear weapons, sponsoring terrorism and meddling in Iraq.

Iran vehemently denies all the charges.

However, Washington has never ruled out a military option in a bid to thwart Iran's nuclear drive, which Tehran insists is solely aimed at peaceful energy production.

The cleric said the fact that the United States had not yet attacked Iran was because it "has not been possible, not that it did not want to."

"Death be upon" Israel for "celebrating the killing of innocent people" in the Gaza Strip, Khatami also said. Iran does not recognise Israel, and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called for the annihilation of the Jewish State.

"Israel should know that these pressures will pave the way for another Intifada which will turn the Israelis' day into night," Khatami said.

Israel, the Middle East's sole if undeclared nuclear power, accuses Iran of seeking atomic weapons and has urged tougher punitive measures against Tehran, which is already under three sets of UN Security Council sanctions for its refusal to halt
uranium enrichment.

Khatami also took a swipe at US Democrat presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton for her threat to "totally obliterate" Iran if it launched a nuclear attack on Israel.

"Shame on you that your presidents should be weak-willed servants of Israel," he said.
http://www.iranmania.com/News/ArticleView/Default.asp?NewsCode=59548&NewsKind=Current%20Affairs

Is War With Iran Imminent?

by Justin Raimondo
The shooting has already started in the Persian Gulf – and chances are we'll be at war with Iran before President Bush's term is up. An American ship under contract with the U.S. Navy – the Western Venture – claims it was in international waters when Iranian speedboats approached and failed to answer radio calls. Shots were fired on the American side. Iran denies the whole thing. Yet you'll recall that in the last incident, involving the capture of British sailors, the story about being in international waters was the same – except, it turns out, they weren't in international waters, but in disputed waters, just as we speculated in this space. There's no reason to expect anything different this time. Clearly, the U.S. and Britain are trying to trigger a new conflict with the most brazen provocations, and they don't really care how it happens – only that it does.

The indications of an imminent attack – the latest incident, the steady stream of accusations coming from the U.S. regarding Iranian influence in Iraq, the nuclear charade, etc. – have suddenly taken a more ominous turn with the recent statement of America's top military officer that the U.S. is weighing military action against Iran. The Washington Post reports:

"The nation's top military officer said yesterday that the Pentagon is planning for 'potential military courses of action' as one of several options against Iran, criticizing what he called the Tehran government's 'increasingly lethal and malign influence' in Iraq. Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said a conflict with Iran would be 'extremely stressing' but not impossible for U.S. forces, pointing to reserve capabilities in the Navy and Air Force."

Speaking of malign influences: since when does an American military officer make foreign policy pronouncements, as if he were the president? It's an indication of the advances militarism has made in what used to be a republic that no one has so much as blinked at the brazenness of such blatant Caesarism.

The reasons for the uptick in the rhetorical and physical assault on Iran by the Americans are entirely due to domestic politics, not anything occurring on the ground in the region.

Hillary Clinton's demagogic threat to "obliterate" Iran, uttered on national television just before the Pennsylvania primary, was meant to buttress her newfound image as a shot-swilling macho up against the effete, Adlai Stevenson-esque Barack "Arugula" Obama. It's the Old Politics, trying to revive the red state-blue state dichotomy, and it's driving us down the road to war with Tehran. McCain, too, is helped by the ratcheting up of tensions in the Persian Gulf: think what the outbreak of war with Iran would do for his underdog candidacy.

Standing behind this developing pro-war Popular Front, the central factor in turning the U.S. toward a policy of confrontation rather than constructive engagement with Iran has been the Israel lobby. Since 1993, the Lobby has been demanding that the U.S. take a more aggressive approach to the mullahs of Tehran, and, with few exceptions, has been largely successful.

The policy of "dual containment," conceived by the Clinton administration during the early 1990s, meant that the U.S. was committed to hostile relations with both Iraq and Iran. The policy, as John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt point out, "was essentially a copy of an Israeli proposal." It meant stationing troops in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to offset an alleged threat to American interests. Yet there was no reason to assume Tehran had hostile intentions toward the U.S. At the time, Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani was eager to establish friendly relations with the U.S. As pressure built to abandon "dual containment" and initiate a more workable policy that would give the U.S. more flexibility, the Lobby went on the offensive with a relentless campaign to impose economic sanctions on Iran.

The Iranians, determined to signal their willingness to be reasonable, chose an American oil company, Conoco, to develop the Sirri oil fields. As Trita Parsi points out in Treacherous Alliance: The Secret Dealings of Israel, Iran, and the United States:

"For AIPAC, the Conoco deal 'was a coincidence and a convenient target.' The organization went into high gear to use the Iranian offer not only to scuttle the Conoco deal, but also to put an end to all U.S.-Iran trade. In a report that it released on April 2, 1995, titled 'Comprehensive U.S. Sanctions Against Iran: A Plan for Action,' AIPAC argued that Iran must be punished for its actions against Israel. 'Iran's leaders reject the existence of Israel. Moreover, Iran views the peace process as an American attempt to legalize Israel's occupation of Palestinian, Muslim lands,' it said. Pressured by Congress, AIPAC, and the Israelis, President Clinton swiftly scrapped the deal by issuing two executive orders that effectively prohibited all trade with Iran. The decision was announced on April 30 by Clinton in a speech before the World Jewish Congress."

This wasn't enough for the Lobby, which brought pressure on Sen. Alphonse D'Amato to introduce a bill that imposed sanctions on any countries doing business with either Libya or Iran. The Iran-Libya Sanctions Act passed the House with not a single dissenting vote, and the same scenario went down in the Senate. The Lobby made sure the Iranian peace offering was rudely rebuffed – and the president reminded of just who was in charge of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. The White House meekly went along with the Lobby's wishes: after all, the presidential election was but three months away.

The Conoco affair should dispel any myths about the supposedly supreme power of the "oil lobby" as the decisive factor in shaping U.S. policy in the region: the Israel lobby beat them hands down. As James Schlesinger put it, "It is scarcely possible to overstate the influence of Israel's supporters on our politics in the Middle East." The harder the Iranians tried to approach the Americans, the more rudely they were repulsed.

The election of the even more pro-American Mohammad Khatami as Iran's president in 1997 did not break the back of "dual containment" – dubbed "a nutty idea" by Brent Scowcroft, albeit one with plenty of domestic political traction. The U.S. had every reason to pursue a policy of engagement, while that was possible, giving Iranian moderates the political breathing space they needed to ensure the growth of pro-American forces in the country. The benefits of opening up Iran to American investment are similarly obvious, yet our leaders chose to do otherwise due solely to the power of the Lobby. As Ephraim Sneh, a prominent figure on the Israeli Right, acknowledged: "We were against it … because the interest of the U.S. did not coincide with ours."

In short: Washington policymakers weighed the interests of both the U.S. and Israel, and made their decision accordingly…

From dual containment to regional transformation and "regime change" was not a long road to travel. After 9/11, Washington embarked on a campaign to topple the governments of both Iraq and Iran, as well as Syria, and rid Lebanon of Hezbollah while they were at it. As soon as "mission accomplished" was declared in Iraq, the Israelis and their American amen corner began demanding action against Iran.

In an interview with the Times of London, Ariel Sharon declared that Washington had better start threatening to march on Tehran "the day after" Baghdad was secured. By late April 2003, the Israeli ambassador to Washington was complaining that the demise of Saddam's regime was "not enough." Those indolent Americans must be made to "follow through" by taking action against "great threats of that magnitude coming from Syria, coming from Iran."

Shimon Peres rallied the faithful with an op-ed in the War Street Journal titled "We Must Unite to Prevent an Ayatollah Nuke." The neoconservatives convened a special all-day conference devoted to inciting war hysteria aimed at Tehran, with all the usual suspects – Michael Ledeen, Bernard Lewis, Reuel Marc Gerecht – in attendance. The cry went up: "Regime change!" The only question was which exile faction we were going to support: the royalists, or the cult-like neo-Marxist Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MEK) and its numerous well-connected front groups in the U.S. and Europe.

The leaders of the latter have energetically vied for the role of the Iranian Chalabi, coming up with reams of "intelligence" detailing Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program. Their "revelations," however, have been definitively debunked by the latest national intelligence estimate, which says Tehran abandoned its nuclear program some time ago. All those diagrams and documents coming from MEK by the truckload were evidence of a nuclear program that no longer existed.

If any of this sounds familiar, then it should.

The efforts of the Lobby aren't limited to war propaganda. The AIPAC spy trial – in which two top officials of the powerful pro-Israel lobbying organization have been indicted for passing top-secret classified information to Israeli embassy officials – is all about Israel's attempt to penetrate U.S. governmental discussions about what stance to take regarding Iran, with the goal of exerting maximum influence on American policymaking circles.


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Israel considers a nuclear-armed Iran an "existential threat" to the Jewish state, a contention that amounts to little more than absolute nonsense. Their argument goes something like this: Iran is not a normal state, it is run by ideologues who are profoundly invested in apocalyptic religious visions that can only end in war. Deterrence means nothing to them. They want to be incinerated in a nuclear exchange involving Israel, themselves, and quite possibly the U.S., because it fulfills the ancient prophecies and means the return of the Mahdi, or something along those lines.

This makes no more sense than the inverse version of the religion-determines-all theory, which would have the "born again" George W. Bush intent on provoking a nuclear war in the Middle East in order to bring about the Second Coming and the Kingdom of God on Earth – as the Christian dispensationalists who make up so much of the GOP's base fervently believe is entirely possible and certainly desirable.

These latter, of course, are the foot-soldiers of the Israel Lobby in America, a group that GOP presidential candidate John McCain has actively courted in the person of the Rev. John Hagee. Rev. Hagee is a vicious Catholic-hater and all-around nut-job who looks forward to a nuclear war in the Middle East as the fulfillment of Biblical prophecy. Hagee has lately taken up with AIPAC, appearing at their last national confab in a starring role.

This administration, which has been in thrall to the Israel lobby more than any other, has been increasing the volume in its war of words with Tehran since January of this year, and, as Bush's reign comes to an inglorious end, there apparently remains one last act of perfidy the neocons will leave as their legacy. Bush's going away gift to the American people looks more than likely to be another war – one that truly does make the Iraq war seem like a "cakewalk" in comparison. It took a few years for the impact of the war in Iraq to be felt by the American people, and its full impact has yet to hit. Not so with the next war. The firing of a few shots at those speedboats sent the price of oil up three bucks. Think of what a full-scale all-out war would do to the price of nearly everything. And for what?

Iran, a signatory to the Nonproliferation Treaty, says it is not seeking to build nuclear weapons, and that the production of nuclear energy for peaceful uses is the one and only goal of its activities on this front. This is more than Israel can say, far more. Everyone knows the Israelis have nukes – the technology for which they probably stole from us – and they are one of the few civilized countries who haven't signed the NPT and refuse to even discuss doing so.

If ever there was a nuclear rogue nation, then surely it is Israel. As Henry Kissinger said of them in a 1969 memo to Richard Nixon: "The Israelis, who are one of the few peoples whose survival is genuinely threatened, are probably more likely than almost any other country to actually use their nuclear weapons." Although the Iranians claim their nuclear program is geared exclusively toward peaceful purposes, that they have the option to act otherwise, should the need arise, is a challenge to Israel's nuclear hegemony. The Iranians, by American and Israeli lights, have no right to a deterrent.

In a world where "benevolent global hegemony" is the goal of U.S. foreign policy, there is no right to self-defense; that, along with national sovereignty, has been abolished. Defiance is met with an implacable campaign for regime-change in the offending nation. By all indications, Iran is the next victim to be made an example of, sometime in mid-summer, or so the rumor goes.

We know where the presidential candidates stand on this issue. Hillary looks forward to the "obliteration" of Iran and takes up Charles Krauthammer's demand that we extend our nuclear shield over Tel Aviv just as we would do the same for, say, Toledo. Indeed, there are not a few who would argue that we would be fully justified in sacrificing the latter in order to save the former, and not all of them are to be found among Rev. Hagee's deluded flock. In any case, we know what the McCain-Hagee position is without even having to ask.

We also know where Obama stands on all or most of this: he advocates a policy of engagement with the Iranians, just as he has endorsed talking with South American caudillo Hugo Chavez, and for the same very sound reasons: because it's talk or fight. He clearly realizes waging perpetual war is hardly in our interests, even if we had the financial and military capacity to carry out such a crazed policy. Yet, if he's speaking out about this, at this crucial moment – when the chairman of the Joint Chiefs is practically declaring war on the Iranians – then I just can't hear him: he must not be speaking very loudly, or perhaps this gets lost amid all the soaring rhetoric about Change and Hope and A Better Tomorrow.

Hillary voted for the Kyl-Lieberman resolution, which designated the Iranian Revolutionary Guards – an official part of the Iranian armed forces – as a "terrorist organization," and now Gen. Petraeus is telling us Tehran is funding, arming, and succoring those who are killing American soldiers and bombing the Green Zone. The main threat against us in Iraq is no longer the Sunni "dead-enders," as Don Rumsfeld liked to call them, it's the Mahdi Army – Iraqi Shi'ites – and the Iranians, who have very close ties to the government our troops are dying to defend. If Bush seeks to obliterate Iranian hopes for regional preeminence by launching an attack before he leaves office, one can hardly see how the Clintons could possibly object: perhaps they'll declare that, this time, we have to send enough troops to "do the job." This, you'll recall, was Hillary's McCain-like critique of the Iraq invasion long before being antiwar was required of all Democratic presidential aspirants. No doubt she'll revert to that when the time comes, but what about Obama?

He could skewer Hillary the hawk with one well-placed arrow, aimed straight at her vulnerability on the Iran issue. With the first shots of a new war already fired, apparently, and rumors of an imminent American strike at Iran flying thick and fast, Obama could denounce her as a warmonger, a McCain in drag, whose short-term political opportunism is helping to embroil us in a quagmire far worse than the one in Iraq, where she played a similar role in 2003. Yet I hear nothing like this coming from Obama's camp. Maureen Dowd nails it, with her typically acerbic take:

"Despite all his incandescent gifts, Obama has missed several opportunities to smash the ball over the net and end the game. Again and again, he has seemed stuck at deuce. He complains about the politics of scoring points, but to win, you've got to score points."

The American people oppose war with Iran, perhaps more than they want out of Iraq: the economic consequences alone will infuriate them far more than any other foreign policy decision of this administration. What the War Party is hoping is that their fury will be directed overseas, at our alleged "enemies" in Tehran, and not at home, in the direction of Washington, where proper blame belongs.

Americans await the advent of a real leader, the sort who could and would focus that anger on the right target. Whether Obama has the gumption – and the strategic sense – to make this fight about policy, not personalities, race, and gender, remains to be seen. He's promised us a new politics, but that doesn't have to mean blandness and an inability to fight. It can and must mean sharp attacks on wrong ideas – and one looks in vain for an idea as wrongheaded as war with Iran.

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=12755

Joint Chiefs chair: US prepping military options against Iran

Mike Sheehan
Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that the Pentagon is planning "potential" military actions against Iran, reports The Washington Post.

Mullen criticized Iran's "'increasingly lethal and malign influence' in Iraq," writes Ann Scott Tyson for the Post.

Addressing concerns about the US military's capability of dealing with yet another conflict at a time when forces are purportedly stretched thin, Mullen said war with Iran "would be 'extremely stressing' but not impossible for U.S. forces, pointing specifically to reserve capabilities in the Navy and Air Force," Tyson notes.

"It would be a mistake to think that we are out of combat capability," she quotes the U.S.'s top military leader at a Pentagon news conference.

Mullen's assertion comes a day after American forces reportedly fired warning shots at Iranian speedboats in the Persian Gulf, a confrontation that Iran denies took place.

A prior incident involving U.S. forces in the Strait of Hormuz and Iranian speedboats in January of this year--which Republican White House candidates used (with the notable exception of Ron Paul) as a saber-rattling opportunity during a nationally-televised debate--was later discredited as a virtual fabrication.

Excerpts from the Post article, available in full here, follow...

1.

...Mullen made clear that he prefers a diplomatic solution to the tensions with Iran and does not foresee any imminent military action. "I have no expectations that we're going to get into a conflict with Iran in the immediate future," he said.

Mullen's statements and others by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates recently signal a new rhetorical onslaught by the Bush administration against Iran, amid what officials say is increased Iranian provision of weapons, training and financing to Iraqi groups that are attacking and killing Americans.

In a speech Monday at West Point, Gates said Iran "is hell-bent on acquiring nuclear weapons." He said a war with Iran would be "disastrous on a number of levels. But the military option must be kept on the table given the destabilizing policies of the regime and the risks inherent in a future Iranian nuclear threat."

Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, who was nominated this week to head all U.S. forces in the Middle East, is preparing a briefing soon to lay out detailed evidence of increased Iranian involvement in Iraq, Mullen said. The briefing will detail, for example, the discovery in Iraq of weapons that were very recently manufactured in Iran, he said.

Israel Would Destroy Iran if Attacked:Israeli Minister

An Israeli government minister warned on Monday that Israel would respond to any "Iranian attack by destroying that country", public radio reported. "An Iranian attack against Israel would trigger a tough reaction that would lead to the destruction of the Iranian nation," National Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer said.

"Iranians are aware of our strength but continue to provoke us by arming their Syrian allies and Hezbollah," he claimed during a meeting at his ministry. Ben-Eliezer, a member of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's security cabinet, stressed however that the "Iranians were unlikely to attack as they understand the meaning of such an act."

Last month, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak told visiting US Vice President Dick Cheney that "no option would be ruled out in Israel's bid to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons".

Ben-Eliezer also stressed that an ongoing "five-day home front defense exercise was not meant to threaten Israel's neighbors, but the scenarios considered in the exercise could be reality tomorrow." "Israel could one day find itself in a situation in which hundreds of rockets rain down on Jerusalem and Tel Aviv", he said.
http://www.almanar.com.lb/NewsSite/NewsDetails.aspx?id=39922

War with Iran May Have Begun with Offensive in Iraq

by William H. White
March 28, 2008

First Offensive Underway
The United States military offensive against Iran may have begun with a swiftly escalating series of operations directed against the Mahdi Army, a Shiite militia led by cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, which had been observing a six month old cease-fire.

Overall circumstances in support of this conclusion:
If attacks against Iran are to commence soon, then it makes sense to weaken those forces considered likely to irrupt in response to such an attack: Better to attack those forces first and separately, throwing them off balance and subjecting them to prolonged siege, thereby depleting their assets and revealing their larger weapon capabilities and stores, prior to an attack on Iran itself;

If attacks against Iran are to commence soon, then it makes sense to force an end to the Mahdi Army six month cease-fire and to establish general conditions of conflict, during which accusations and operations against Iran would appear less unprovoked;

The recent Bush and Cheney "peace" trips occurred within the planning and operating context of not only the current offensive, but also part of an event platform for operations whose scale and duration certainly extend beyond the forces deployed in the port of Basra during the last week in March, leaving the distinct impression US actions are plan rather than event driven.

Iraqi circumstantial elements:

Operations against the Mahdi Army are large scale, coordinated attacks: Starting with raids and arrests in the Shiite neighborhoods in Baghdad and following-up immediately by a claimed 30,000 man police and Iraqi army offensive in Basra, which required months of planning and logistical preparation, even if largely imagined;

The operations were timed to occur immediately after the Bush-Cheney Middle-East trips and before the administration's presentation of its force level plans to Congress;

The operations were directed against what US and Iraqi governments say are Iranian assets in Iraq: US and Iraqi government officials have repeatedly charged that the elements attacked were those supported by Iran;

The local police and army units in Basra were bypassed: long considered unreliable, the Basra police and army units, which were expected to melt away in any general insurrection, have been largely replaced (and possibly contained/detained) by units sent from the north in the Iraqi government's single largest military operation;

Sadr's call for civil peace demonstrations in Baghdad to protest US attacks were met with an unprecedented three day, 24 hour curfew;

Throughout all of this, US forces have been held almost entirely in reserve, with their likely use to occur as each Mahdi Army element is fixed in defensive positions by the Iraqi army, depending on circumstances, such as hitting Mahdi Army strong points, supporting weakening Iraqi government operations, and killing/capturing Sadr.

General Petraeus claimed in a BBC interview about the Green Zone attacks, "Tehran had trained, equipped and funded insurgents who fired the barrage of mortars and rockets."

General Petraeus in a videoconference with the president on Monday, during the briefings reported by officials, recommended taking "up to two months" to evaluate security in Iraq before considering additional withdrawals.

US circumstantial elements:

According to a New York Times report on March 28, 2008, Bush attended "three days of briefings with senior advisers and military commanders on the situation in Iraq and the options for reducing the number of American troops there beyond the withdrawals already announced." Given Bush's limited attention span, his attending three days of briefings to discuss planned withdrawals is unbelievable, with plans to attack Iran the far more likely three day topic.

As soon as the Iraqi operations began in Basra, Bush immediately and personally praised the Iraqi government for its actions, appearing to be part of planned propaganda offensive;

In the same report, Bush described the operation in Basra as an "offensive" that "builds on the security gains of the surge";

Finally, the same New York Times report says, "Mr. Bush also accused Iran of arming, training and financing the militias fighting against the Iraqi forces";

Admiral Fallon's removal takes effect March 31, 2008;

US Treasury Department undermines Iranian international banking operations.

What are the likely next steps toward an attack on Iran?

Continuing the current tactical thrust of preemptive strikes against those likely to respond in an attack on Iran, major US military operations on the Iraq-Iran and Iraq-Syria border areas are very likely;

Various Iranian assets within Iraq will likely be targeted by US and Iraqi government operations;

Israel may attack Hamas in Gaza as well as Hezbollah in Lebanon and Syria;

The likelihood of a US-Iran naval incident continues.

Overall, US and Iraqi government forces are expected to continue a general offensive against the Mahdi Army in violation of the six month cease-fire, while claiming Iran is responsible for attacks on US forces. Finally, if a bit of tea reading can be forgiven, Bush's confidence and high spirits this week appear to be of the "I have decided" sort. The relief seen just prior to the Iraq invasion: When Bush decided to go to war, so the hard part for him was over, as he reported he sleep like a baby, having just made what is arguably the worst strategic blunder in American history.

Iran 'behind Green Zone attack' - Petraeus

The most senior US general in Iraq has said he has evidence that Iran was behind Sunday's bombardment of Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone.
Gen David Petraeus told the BBC he thought Tehran had trained, equipped and funded insurgents who fired the barrage of mortars and rockets.

He said Iran was adding what he described as "lethal accelerants" to a very combustible mix.

There has as yet been no response from Iran to the accusations.

In response to the news that 4,000 US military personnel have now been killed in Iraq, he said it showed how much the mission had cost but added that Americans were realistic about it.

He also said a great deal of progress had been made because of the "flipping" of communities - the decision by Sunni tribes to turn against al-Qaeda militants.

The extent of this had surprised even the US military, he said.

'Promises violated'

In an interview with BBC world affairs editor John Simpson, Gen Petraeus said violence in Iraq was being perpetuated by Iran's Quds Force, a branch of the Revolutionary Guards.

"The rockets that were launched at the Green Zone yesterday, for example... were Iranian-provided, Iranian-made rockets," he said, adding that the groups that fired them were funded and trained by the Quds Force.

"All of this in complete violation of promises made by President Ahmadinejad and the other most senior Iranian leaders to their Iraqi counterparts."

The barrage hit the Green Zone on Sunday morning. Some rockets missed their targets killing 15 Iraqi civilians.

Later in the day four US soldiers died when their patrol vehicle was blown up by a bomb in southern Baghdad, putting the total number of US fatalities above 4,000.

This and other bloodshed on Sunday came despite an overall reduction in violence since last June, when the US deployed an extra 30,000 troops for the surge.

Days earlier, Mr Bush marked the fifth anniversary of the invasion, saying that it had made the world a better place.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7311565.stm

6 Signs the U.S. May Be Headed for War in Iran

The resignation of the top U.S. military commander for the Middle East is setting off alarms that the Bush administration is intent on using military force to stop Iran's moves toward gaining nuclear weapons. In announcing his sudden resignation today following a report on his views in Esquire, Adm. William Fallon didn't directly deny that he differs with President Bush over at least some aspects of the president's policy on Iran. For his part, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said it is "ridiculous" to think that the departure of Fallon — whose Central Command has been working on contingency plans for strikes on Iran as well as overseeing Iraq — signals that the United States is planning to go to war with Iran.

Fallon's resignation, ending a 41-year Navy career, has reignited the buzz of speculation over what the Bush administration intends to do given that its troubled, sluggish diplomatic effort has failed to slow Iran's nuclear advances. Those activities include the advancing process of uranium enrichment, a key step to producing the material necessary to fuel a bomb, though the Iranians assert the work is to produce nuclear fuel for civilian power reactors, not weapons.

Here are six developments that may have Iran as a common thread. And, if it comes to war, they may be seen as clues as to what was planned. None of them is conclusive, and each has a credible non-Iran related explanation:

1. Fallon's resignation: With the Army fully engaged in Iraq, much of the contingency planning for possible military action has fallen to the Navy, which has looked at the use of carrier-based warplanes and sea-launched missiles as the weapons to destroy Iran's air defenses and nuclear infrastructure. Centcom commands the U.S. naval forces in and near the Persian Gulf. In the aftermath of the problems with the Iraq war, there has been much discussion within the military that senior military officers should have resigned at the time when they disagreed with the White House.

2. Vice President Cheney's peace trip: Cheney, who is seen as a leading hawk on Iran, is going on what is described as a Mideast trip to try to give a boost to stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. But he has also scheduled two other stops: One, Oman, is a key military ally and logistics hub for military operations in the Persian Gulf. It also faces Iran across the narrow, vital Strait of Hormuz, the vulnerable oil transit chokepoint into and out of the Persian Gulf that Iran has threatened to blockade in the event of war. Cheney is also going to Saudi Arabia, whose support would be sought before any military action given its ability to increase oil supplies if Iran's oil is cut off. Back in March 2002, Cheney made a high-profile Mideast trip to Saudi Arabia and other nations that officials said at the time was about diplomacy toward Iraq and not war, which began a year later.

3. Israeli airstrike on Syria: Israel's airstrike deep in Syria last October was reported to have targeted a nuclear-related facility, but details have remained sketchy and some experts have been skeptical that Syria had a covert nuclear program. An alternative scenario floating in Israel and Lebanon is that the real purpose of the strike was to force Syria to switch on the targeting electronics for newly received Russian anti-aircraft defenses. The location of the strike is seen as on a likely flight path to Iran (also crossing the friendly Kurdish-controlled Northern Iraq), and knowing the electronic signatures of the defensive systems is necessary to reduce the risks for warplanes heading to targets in Iran.

4. Warships off Lebanon: Two U.S. warships took up positions off Lebanon earlier this month, replacing the USS Cole. The deployment was said to signal U.S. concern over the political stalemate in Lebanon and the influence of Syria in that country. But the United States also would want its warships in the eastern Mediterranean in the event of military action against Iran to keep Iranian ally Syria in check and to help provide air cover to Israel against Iranian missile reprisals. One of the newly deployed ships, the USS Ross, is an Aegis guided missile destroyer, a top system for defense against air attacks.

5. Israeli comments: Israeli President Shimon Peres said earlier this month that Israel will not consider unilateral action to stop Iran from getting a nuclear bomb. In the past, though, Israeli officials have quite consistently said they were prepared to act alone — if that becomes necessary — to ensure that Iran does not cross a nuclear weapons threshold. Was Peres speaking for himself, or has President Bush given the Israelis an assurance that they won't have to act alone?

6.Israel's war with Hezbollah: While this seems a bit old, Israel's July 2006 war in Lebanon against Iranian-backed Hezbollah forces was seen at the time as a step that Israel would want to take if it anticipated a clash with Iran. The radical Shiite group is seen not only as a threat on it own but also as a possible Iranian surrogate force in the event of war with Iran. So it was important for Israel to push Hezbollah forces back from their positions on Lebanon's border with Israel and to do enough damage to Hezbollah's Iranian-supplied arsenals to reduce its capabilities. Since then, Hezbollah has been able to rearm, though a United Nations force polices a border area buffer zone in southern Lebanon.

Defense Secretary Gates said that Fallon, 63, asked for permission to retire. Gates said that the decision, effective March 31, was entirely Fallon's and that Gates believed it was "the right thing to do." In Esquire, an article on Fallon portrayed him as opposed to President Bush's Iran policy and said he was a lone voice against taking military action to stop the Iranian nuclear program. In his statement, Fallon said he agreed with the president's "policy objectives" but was silent on whether he opposed aspects of the president's plans. "Recent press reports suggesting a disconnect between my views and the president's policy objectives have become a distraction at a critical time and hamper efforts in the Centcom region," Fallon, said in the statement issued by Centcom headquarters in Tampa, Fla. "And although I don't believe there have ever been any differences about the objectives of our policy in the Central Command area of responsibility, the simple perception that there is makes it difficult for me to effectively serve America's interests there," he said. Gates announced that Fallon's top deputy, Army Lt. Gen. Martin Dempsey, will take over temporarily when Fallon leaves. A permanent successor, requiring nomination by the president and confirmation by the Senate, might not be designated in the near term.

http://www.usnews.com/blogs/news-desk/2008/03/11/6-signs-the-us-may-be-headed-for-war-in-iran.html

Al-Sadr In Tehran

By: Kenneth R. Timmerman
Firebrand Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr is being treated by foreign doctors in a Tehran clinic for a potentially life-threatening illness, sources in Baghdad told Newsmax on Friday.

The Iraqi cleric, who ordered his Iranian-backed “Mahdi Army” last August to refrain from terrorist attacks against U.S. or coalition forces for six months, has angered hard-line supporters who want to resume terrorist attacks, the sources said.

Muqtada al-Sadr is the last remaining scion of a much-revered family of Iraqi Shiite clerics, and is a distant relative of former Iranian president, Mohammad Khatami.
His Mahdi Army has received significant military and financial support from Iran and became a driving force in the early “resistance” to the international coalition that liberated Iraq from Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Sadr’s Iranian backers pushed him to declare a ceasefire last August, as part of an Iranian strategy to lull the United States into believing that the “surge” of U.S. troops was having a permanent impact on the Iraqi domestic political scene.

But Sadr’s hard-line supporters, who maintain separate lines of support to the Quds force of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, were angry with the ceasefire, and have continued to use Iranian-supplied IEDs in terrorist attacks against U.S. and coalition forces.

U.S. military officials have fingered the Iranian Revolutionary Guards for supplying Explosively-formed penetrators – a particularly deadly form of IED – to splinter groups of the Sadrist militia.

Admiral William Fallon, commander in chief of the U.S. Central Command, criticized the Iranian regime for its ongoing support of “lawless militia groups” in testimony on Tuesday before the Senate Armed Services committee.

“From the East, Iran pursues a destabilizing political and ideological agenda and is a key source of finance, weapons and training support to lawless militia groups,” Fallon said.

“The Iranian regime provides Shia militia groups in Iraq with training, funding and weapons including lethal Explosively Formed Penetrators (EFPs), a particularly deadly form of Improvised Explosive Device (IED),” he added.

Newsmax sources in Baghdad who are close to Sadr said that the split within his organization has become lethal in recent months, as hard-liners close to the Revolutionary Guards Qods Force have sought to break the ceasefire and continue attacks against U.S. and coalition forces.

“Muqtada’s ceasefire offer outraged his own people,” the sources told Newsmax on Friday. “So they penetrated his inner sanctum, in an effort to stop him. They are willing to kill him to get him to walk back the ceasefire.”

Former Sadr spokesman, Baha al-Araji, has become a key leader of the break-away splinter groups, sources in Baghdad said. Mr. al-Araji is also a member of the Iraqi parliament.

Al-Araji has consistently argued that Sadr’s Mahdi army should not lay down its arms.

“The people underneath Muqtada al-Sadr, in Parliament and in his movement, make Muqtada look like a candy salesman,” a knowledgeable Western source in Baghdad told Newsmax.

“When you look into the eyes of someone like Baha al-Araji, you are looking into the eyes of the Devil, He is one scarcy s.o.b,” the source said.

The Iranian regime is supporting al-Sadr and his relatively conciliatory approach at the same time they are supporting al-Araji, sources in Baghdad told Newsmax.

“Sadr is the clerical figurehead, while al-Araji represents the Quds force influence,” the sources said.

As a member of parliament, Al-Araji has been awarded three large villas in the Green Zone in Baghdad, and has rented out two of them to British defense contractors for substantial cash payments.

“It’s no exaggeration to say that these contractors – whether knowingly, or unknowingly – are directly providing financial support to a terrorist organization,” a knowledgeable Western source in Baghdad told Newsmax.

The Kuwaiti daily al-Siyassa reported earlier this week that Muqtada al-Sadr had been “secretly transferred” a few days ago to a Tehran hospital in a comatose condition, following a bout of food poisoning.
Sources in Baghdad close to Sadr confirmed to Newsmax on Friday that the Iraqi Shiite cleric was indeed in a Tehran hospital and was being treated by “foreign” specialists, presumably Russians.

But they could not confirm the seriousness of his condition or reports that he was near death.

http://www.newsmax.com/international/Muqtada_al_Sadr_very_ill/2008/03/07/78720.html

Obama lays out plan for confronting Iran

WASHINGTON - When he launched his US presidential campaign, only few people knew that Democratic candidate Barack Obama's middle name is Hussein. His political rivals, however, made sure to reveal this fact and attempted to paint him as a pro-Arab Muslim.
Over the past few weeks, his rivals have spread rumors that Obama attended a madrasa (Islamic religious school) in Indonesia, which served as a terrorist training camp.
On Tuesday Obama provided written answers to questions presented by the Yedioth Ahronoth daily newspaper. In this exclusive interview, he presents his views on Israel, the Palestinians and Iran.
Senator Obama, Two years ago you visited Israel for the first time. What were your impressions of this visit and did you learn something about our country that you did not know?
My travels in Israel in 2006 left a lasting impression on me. I have long understood Israel's great dilemma, its need for security in a difficult neighborhood and its quest for peace with its neighbors. But there is no substitute for meeting the people of Israel, seeing the terrain, experiencing the powerful contrast of a beautiful, holy land that faces the constant threat of deadly violence. The people of Israel show their courage and commitment to democracy every day that they board a bus, or kiss their children goodbye, or argue about politics in a local cafe.
For many years, Israel has considered the occupant of the White House a very good friend. Will this friendship continue if you become president?
Absolutely yes. I will carry with me to the White House and unshakeable commitment to the security of Israel and the friendship between the United States and Israel. The US-Israel relationship is rooted in shared interests, shared values, shared history, and in deep friendship among our people. It is supported by a strong bipartisan consensus that I am proud to be a part of, and I will work tirelessly as president to uphold and enhance the friendship between the two countries.
During your campaign, you have said you would start new aggressive efforts to make peace between Israel and the Palestinians. What is your plan and why do you believe you could succeed when so many American presidents have failed?
I know how much Israelis crave peace. I know that Prime Minister Olmert was elected with a mandate to pursue it. I pledge to make every effort to help Israel achieve that peace, although I will not try to dictate its terms.
The principles that will guide me are 1) that Israel's security must be guaranteed; 2) that the status quo is unsustainable over time, and the best long-term guarantee of Israel's security is a negotiated two-state solution with the Palestinians, if it can be achieved; and 3) that Israel has to remain a Jewish state and the Palestinian state must be viable.
But success is not guaranteed. Israel must have confidence that the Palestinian leadership is both committed to peace and is able to follow through on its commitments. So the approach we have to take with respect to negotiations is that you sit down and talk, but you have to suspend trust until you can see that the Palestinian side can follow through. That is a position I have consistently taken and will take with me to the White House.
You have said you would be ready to talk to "enemy leaders." Some Israelis are skeptical that just by speaking with the leaders of Iran, you could prevent them from producing a nuclear weapon. If diplomacy fails, would you support using force against Iran, as Israel did against Iraq in 1981?
I don't believe that diplomacy alone will stop the Iranians from pursuing nuclear weapons. I believe it will require all facets of our national power to achieve this important goal. The gravest threat to Israel today comes from Iran, where a radical regime continues to pursue the ability to build a nuclear weapon, and continues its support for terrorism across the region. (Iranian) President (Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad continues his offensive denials of the Holocaust, and his disturbing denunciations of Israel; recently he referred to Israel as a "deadly microbe" and a "savage animal." Threats of Israel's destruction cannot be dismissed as rhetoric.
The threat from Iran is real, and my goal as President will be to eliminate it. Ending the war in Iraq will be an important step toward achieving this goal, because it will increase our flexibility and our credibility when we deal with Iran. Make no mistake; Iran has been the biggest strategic beneficiary of the war in Iraq, and I intend to change that.
My approach to Iran will be based upon aggressive diplomacy. I will not take the military option off the table. But I also believe that under this administration, we have seen the threat grow worse, and I intend to change that course.
The time has come to talk directly to the Iranians, and to lay out our clear terms: an end to their pursuit of nuclear weapons; an end to their support of terrorism; and an end to their threats against Israel and other countries in the region. To achieve this goal, I believe that we must be prepared to offer incentives: like the prospect of better relations and integration in the international community; as well as disincentives: like the prospect of increased sanctions.
I would seek these sanctions through the United Nations, and encourage our friends in Europe and the Gulf to use their economic leverage against Iran outside of the UN. I believe we will be in a stronger position to achieve these tough international sanctions if the United States shows that we are willing to come to the table. And I would continue the work that I have started in the Senate by enacting my legislation to make it easier for states to divest their pension funds from Iran.
Some people in Israel and some Jewish American leaders have expressed concern that you would be more sympathetic to the Arab side because of your Muslim background. How do you respond to this argument?
First it is important to establish the facts. Here are the facts: I am not a Muslim and I never have been. I never attended a madrasa. I did not take my oath of office on a Koran. I am a committed Christian. I lived in Indonesia for four years as a child, where I attended secular schools. I took my oath of office on our family Bible.
People who know the facts are not worried about my commitment to Israel's security and the U.S.-Israel relationship. I have overwhelming support among the Jewish community that knows me best, which is the Jewish community in Chicago. It may be that my family roots in Africa and my childhood experience in Indonesia give me some insights that allow me to practice effective diplomacy in the Muslim world. I certainly hope so. And that ability can be used to benefit American interests and Israel's security, and, I hope, help build a better relationship between both our countries and the Muslim world.
Senator Obama, there are some in Israel who are leaking stories that Israel would have reason to be concerned if you are elected president. How would you respond to this anxiety among some critics that your election might not be good for Israel?
I understand that I am not as well-known as some other candidates, so people might have questions about my positions on many issues. What I have found is that when Israelis, and Jewish Americans, and others who care about Israel learn about my view, my record, and my proposals, they are extremely supportive. I have a strong record of supporting Israel in every office I have ever held, and nothing will change about that when I am president.

http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3512872,00.html

Iran predicts ‘destruction’ of Israel by Hezbollah

TEHRAN, Feb 18: Iran’s Revolutionary Guards on Monday predicted that Israel would be destroyed by the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah in the “near future”, the Fars news agency reported.

“In the near future, we will witness the destruction of Israel, the aggressor, this cancerous microbe Israel, at the able hands of the soldiers of the community of Hezbollah,” said the head of the Revolutionary Guards, Mohammad Ali Jafari.

The comments by the head of Iran’s elite ideological force came in a condolence message to Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah after the murder last week in Damascus of a top commander of the group, Imad Mughnieh, the news agency said.

“With the martyrdom of this true Muslim, the intentions of all revolutionary and combatant Muslims, especially the comrades of this dear martyr, will without doubt become firmer against the Zionist regime,” Jafari said.

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has already hailed Mughnieh as a “great” man and predicted his death will serve to increase resistance against Israel.

In a sign of Iran’s respect for Mughnieh, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki attended his funeral in the Shiite suburbs of Beirut on Thursday and gave an oration.

The Islamic republic has a longstanding policy of non-recognition of Israel but its rhetoric against the Jewish state has sharpened during the presidency of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Iran insists its position is in no way anti-Semitic but anti-Zionist, pointing to the continued existence in the country of the largest Jewish community in the Middle East after Israel.

Mughnieh, who was killed in a car bombing in Damascus on Tuesday, was suspected of masterminding the abduction of western hostages in Lebanon in the 1980s and the 1992 bombing of the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires that killed 29 people.

The United States accuses Iran, along with its regional ally Syria, of arming and financing Hezbollah, as well as working to destabilise Lebanon in its current political crisis.—AFP
http://www.dawn.com/2008/02/19/int6.htm

IAEA Chief: Iran is not the real threat

The IAEA chief says the greatest global danger would be posed by nuclear-armed extremist groups and not newly emerging nuclear states.

"We need to be aware this is the number one security threat we are facing," Mohammed ElBaradei told a group of high-profile diplomats at a key security conference in the southern German city of Munich.

"Any country, even if they have nuclear weapons will know that if they use nuclear weapons they will be pulverized." But extremist groups, ElBaradei warned, "If they have it, they will use it."

The IAEA chief urged western nations to directly negotiate with Iran, instead of using sanctions and military threats, to resolve the crisis.

"Confidence building can only be attained by direct negotiations," ElBaradei said.

He went on to say that good progress had been made to resolve the outstanding issues concerning Iran's nuclear program.

ElBaradei is expected to deliver a report on Iran's nuclear activities by late February.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=42393&sectionid=351020104

Turkey rejects US bank request on Iran

A Turkish official has refused a US request to scrutinize and then suspend the activities of the Turkey-based Iran's Bank Mellat.
“What binds Turkey are the resolutions of the UN and not US presidential decrees or Congressional decisions,” a Turkish diplomat told the Turkish Daily News.

US officials have told bankers around the world that Iran is funding terrorists and seeking nuclear technology. Banks such as UBS AG and Deutsche Bank AG have responded by ending - or severely reducing - their business with Iran.

However, in Ankara US requests have not been responded to in a similar way, according to officials.

Stating that foreign banks operate according to the regulations set by the current Banking Law and are inspected periodically, the official underlined that the conditions of suspending one bank's operations are clear.

“Obviously we cannot move upon a third party's requests,” he said.

Although some banks in Europe and Japan have bowed to US pressure, a host of analysts and diplomats believe that the move has proved futile.

They opine that the Bush administration's controversial policy of slapping sanctions on Iranian banks is facing a critical challenge, as financial institutions in Russia, China, and much of the Middle East have declined to cut ties with Iranian banks.

AO/JG/PA

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=41099&sectionid=351020101

US fails to isolate Iran from Arabs

George Bush, the US president, has urged Arab states to think of Iran as the greatest threat to their security, but his warnings are likely to fall on deaf ears in the Middle East.

During a stop in the United Arab Emirates on his Middle East tour on Sunday, Bush called Tehran a "sponsor of terror" and urged Arab allies to confront Iranian "extremism".

But Middle East analysts say the US president is too late as key American allies in the Arab world have thrown their weight behind a growing rapprochement with Iran.

Seyed Mohammad Marandi, a political analyst and professor of political science at Tehran University, said American fumbling in the Middle East has pushed Arabs to adopt dialogue with the Islamic Republic.

He said: "America's wrong policies in the Middle East have ironically helped Iran's voice be heard more clearly, as well as Iran's political prudence that has kept it away from the conflicts in the area.

"At this moment in time, the United States' popularity is at its lowest level among the people all over the Arab world, and Iran's popularity has grown immensely as the only regional power standing against the United States in the same region."

Unprecedented moves

For most of 2007, the US tried to push through a UN resolution to impose economic sanctions on Iran if it did not halt its alleged nuclear weapons programme.

But Washington failed in its bid to isolate Iran in the Middle East.

Not only did its Arab allies reject a punitive US military strike against Iran, but they were also keen on bolstering their own ties with the country.

The members of the Gulf Co-operation Council countries invited Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's president, to attend their annual meeting held in Doha, Qatar last December while Egypt engaged in shuttle diplomacy of its own with Tehran.

Often contentious issues between Iran and its neighbours, such as a string of disputed islands bordering the United Arab Emirates, were shelved for later "dialogue" in favour of building trust and rapprochement.

Weeks later, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia invited Ahmadinejad to perform the Hajj in Mecca.

Even Egypt has been keen on extending a friendly hand towards Iran. For the first time in 27 years, the two countries are discussing the possibility of renewing diplomatic relations and reopening Tehran's embassy in Cairo.

In 1980, Tehran cut off ties when Anwar Sadat, then Egyptian president, hosted Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, the deposed Shah of Iran.

Iran also blamed Egypt for supporting its enemy during the eight-year Iran-Iraq war.

But last week, Ahmadinejad told Iranian television that if Egypt decided to restore full diplomatic ties, he would "put the new Iranian ambassador on the next plane to Cairo".

Street name changed

Iran also caved in to Egyptian demands and recently changed the name of a Tehran street honouring Khaled el-Islamboli, the man who assassinated Sadat.

Fahmy Howeidy, an Egyptian scholar and expert on Iran, believes recent conflicts, including the Iraq war, have elevated Tehran's importance in the region.

"For one, no one can talk about the Iraqi file without mentioning Iran. Iran is also involved in the Lebanese and Afghani files and it has connections with the Syrians, the Palestinians. Thus, if anyone wants to reach a settlement in the region, he should approach Iran," he told Al Jazeera.

Mustafa Bakri, an Egyptian MP and opposition journalist, agrees.

He said: "In the coming period, Iran will play a significant role in the Gulf regional security, perhaps even with the undeclared consent of the international powers.

"At the same time, the Gulf countries would seek to assure Iran that their lands will not be a base from which any war against it will be launched."

Mohammad Ali Hosseini, Iran's foreign ministry spokesman, earlier said that existing relations between Iran and its Arab neighbours should be strengthened.

He said: "We believe the stronger the ties get, the more stability, peace and security the Persian Gulf region will enjoy and that is a crucial necessity needed by both Iran and its neighbours in the region."

Marandi believes that the normalisation of Arab ties with Iran also plays to domestic consumption.

"It's despite US pressure that Arab countries are extending a friendly hand towards Iran," he said.

"The reality is that a lot of the Arab regimes have always been very close to the United States and some of them have been dependent on the United States.

"It's for the benefits of these governments to strengthen ties with the Iranian government and be seen as independent."

Role in Iraq

In Iraq, Iranian influence - and involvement - is becoming pivotal to stabilising the country, five years after the US-led invasion that toppled the Saddam Hussein government.

In late January, US and Iranian representatives are expected to sit for a fourth round of discussions over Iraq's security.

Ahead of the talks, US generals who once accused Iran of arming and training Shia death squads, conceded that Iran has a constructive role to play in Iraq by curbing arms and fighters from crossing the border.

Hussein Hafez, a political science professor at Baghdad University, said the US has tried to isolate Iraqi Shias from Iran since 2003.

He said: "Iraq's Shia society is an integral element in the architecture of America's tie-up with Iran and vice versa. Iran is a major and influential state in the region. It is not possible any more for the American think-tanks and decision-makers to deal so naively and simply with a state like Iran."

Hafez says Tehran's ongoing support for Shia militias, which he believes undermine US efforts in Iraq, make US-Iran negotiations "inevitable".

"The Iranian-US dialogue in so many ways reminds me of the US foreign policy shift before its complete defeat in Vietnam; back then,the American strategy experts had noted that the US administration had changed its policies towards the countries of south-east Asia."

However, Iraq is unlikely to benefit from US-Iran talks, he said.

"Unfortunately, the US does not care about the interests of any of Iraq's factions. It is its own interests that it serves."

Cautious steps

While the threat of war between the US and Iran has significantly subsided since a National Intelligence Estimate report said Tehran halted its nuclear weapons programme in 2003, tensions remain high.

Bush's Iran terror warning earlier this week was preceded by a showdown between Iranian gunboats and US warships in the Gulf.

Iranians say such brinkmanship and speeches means that Tehran still distrusts Washington's intentions and is waiting for the US elections for any signs of a shift in strategy.

"Iran is wary of the US policy change," says Marandi in Tehran.

"I don't think that the Iranians really believe that this US administration has shifted its policy towards Iran and I think that they are waiting to see what the next administration will do."

With additional reporting by Doha Al Zohairy in Cairo and Alireza Ronaghi, Al Jazeera's Iran correspondent.