September, the domino effect could very well begin.........Jesus is coming!
.......................................benny

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Jun 11, 2008 12:01 | Updated Jun 11, 2008 18:43
Bush: All options on the table with Iran
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US President George W. Bush said Wednesday that his first choice is to solve a nuclear standoff with Iran by using diplomacy, but "all options are on the table."




Bush: All options are on the table with Iran

The president reinforced the possibility of a military strike against Iran, even as a last resort, during a news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Bush warned that a nuclear-armed Iran would be a danger to world peace, and he is rallying European allies to back sanctions.

Bush said, "I told the chancellor my first choice, of course, is to solve this diplomatically." He quickly added, "all options are on the table."

The president is pushing Iran to halt its uranium enrichment in a verifiable way. Iran insists it is enriching only for peaceful purposes.

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Merkel said if Iran does not agree to suspend its enrichment program, additional sanctions would be needed.

"The offer has been put on the table to Iran, but ... if Iran does not meet its commitments, then further sanctions will simply have to follow," she said. "We again said we want to give room for diplomatic solutions, we want to give diplomacy a chance, but we also have to stay on that particular issue."

She said the global community is unified, and that UN sanctions have been effective, and that its important that all of the existing sanctions are implemented.

Earlier on Wednesday, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday that Bush's era "has come to an end" and he has failed in his goals to attack Iran and stop its nuclear program.

Ahmadinejad, addressing thousands of people in a central Iranian city, also described the US president as "wicked."

"This wicked man desires to harm the Iranian nation. (Bush) made plans, moved into Afghanistan and then Iraq, and announced that Iran was the third target," he said.

"I tell him (Bush) ... your era has come to an end. With the grace of God, you won't be able to harm even one centimeter of the sacred land of Iran," he said.

Ahmadinejad said pressures and sanctions won't succeed in forcing Iran to halt its uranium enrichment program.

"In the past two-three years, they employed all their might, resorted to propaganda ... and sanctions. If the enemy thinks they can break the Iranian nation with pressure, they are wrong ... With God's help, today we have achieved victory and the enemies cannot do a damned thing," he said.

Meanwhile, in an interview with the London Times which was published on Wednesday, Bush said that Teheran could "either face isolation, or they can have better relations with all of us."

During the interview, Bush expressed concern that Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama would deviate from the current hard-line policy against the Islamic regime. He voiced confidence, however, that once the next president took office and assessed the situation, he would understand "what will work or what won't work in dealing with Iran", and would adopt the same tough stance.

Responding directly to comments made last week by Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz that an attack against Iran was "unavoidable," the president said that "we ought to work together, keep focused. His comments really should be viewed as the need to continue to keep pressuring Iran."

...........................................benny

http://www.military.com/news/article...an-attack.html




Ex-official Says DoD Nixed Iran Attack
June 10, 2008
Inter Press Service
WASHINGTON - Pentagon officials firmly opposed Vice President Dick Cheney's proposal to strike Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps bases last summer by insisting that the administration make clear decisions about how far the United States would go in escalating the conflict with Iran, according to a former Bush administration official.

J. Scott Carpenter, who was then deputy assistant secretary of state in the State Department's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, recalled in an interview that senior Defense Department officials and the Joint Chiefs used the escalation issue as the main argument against the Cheney proposal.

McClatchy newspapers reported last August that Cheney had proposed several weeks earlier "launching airstrikes at suspected training camps in Iran," citing two officials involved in Iran policy.

According to Carpenter, who is now at the Washington Institute on Near East Policy, a strongly pro-Israel think tank, Pentagon officials argued that no decision should be made about the limited airstrike on Iran without a thorough discussion of the sequence of events that would follow an Iranian retaliation against such an attack. Carpenter said the Defense Department officials insisted that the Bush administration had to make "a policy decision about how far the administration would go -- what would happen after the Iranians would go after our folks."

The question of escalation posed by Defense Department officials involved not only the potential of the Mahdi Army in Iraq to attack, Carpenter said, but also possible responses across the Middle East by Hezbollah and by Iran.

Carpenter suggested that Defense Department officials were shifting the debate on a limited strike from the Iraq-based rationale, which they were not contesting, to the much bigger issue of the threat of escalation to full-scale war with Iran, knowing that it would be politically easier to thwart the proposal on that basis.

The former State Department official said the Defense Department "knew that it would be difficult to get interagency consensus on that question."

The Joint Chiefs were fully supportive of the position taken by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates on the Cheney proposal, according to Carpenter. "It's clear that the military leadership was being very conservative on this issue," he said.

At least some Defense Department and military officials suggested that Iran had more and better options for hitting back at the United States than the United States had for hitting Iran, according to one former Bush administration insider.

Former Bush speechwriter and senior policy adviser Michael Gerson, who had left the administration in 2006, wrote a column in the Washington Post on July 20, 2007, in which he gave no hint of Cheney's proposal but referred to "options" for striking Iranian targets based on the Cheney line that Iran "smuggles in the advanced explosive devices that kill and maim American soldiers."

Gerson cited two possibilities: "Engaging in hot pursuit against weapon supply lines over the Iranian border or striking explosives factories and staging areas within Iran." But the Pentagon and the military leadership were opposing such options, he reported, because of the fear that Iran has "escalation dominance" in its conflict with the United States.

That meant, according to Gerson, that "in a broadened conflict, the Iranians could complicate our lives in Iraq and the region more than we complicate theirs."

Carpenter's account of the Pentagon's position on the Cheney proposal suggests, however, that civilian and military opponents were saying that Iran's ability to escalate posed the question of whether the United States was going to go to a full-scale air war against Iran.

Pentagon civilian and military opposition to such a strategic attack on Iran had become well-known during 2007. But this is the first evidence from an insider that Cheney's proposal was perceived as a ploy to provoke Iranian retaliation that could used to justify a strategic attack on Iran.

The option of attacking nuclear sites had been raised by President Bush with the Joint Chiefs at a meeting in "the tank" at the Pentagon on Dec. 13, 2006, and had been opposed by the Joint Chiefs, according a report by Time magazine's Joe Klein last June. After he become head of the Central Command in March 2007, Adm. William Fallon also made his opposition to such a massive attack on Iran known to the White House, according to Middle East specialist Hillary Mann, who had developed close working relationships with Pentagon officials when she worked on the National Security Council staff.

It appeared in early 2007, therefore, that a strike against Iran's nuclear program and military power had been blocked by opposition from the Pentagon. Cheney's proposal for an attack on Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps bases in June 2007, tied to the alleged Iranian role in providing both weapons -- especially the highly lethal explosively formed projectiles -- and training to Shiite militias appears to have been a strategy for getting around the firm resistance of military leaders to such an unprovoked attack.

Although the Pentagon bottled up the Cheney proposal in inter-agency discussions, Cheney had a strategic asset that he could use to try to overcome that obstacle: his alliance with Gen. David Petraeus.

And Cheney had already used Gen. David Petraeus' takeover as the top commander of U.S. forces in Iraq in early February 2007 to do an end run about the Washington national security bureaucracy to establish the propaganda line that Iran was manufacturing explosively formed projectiles and shipping them to the Mahdi Army militiamen.

Petraeus was also a supporter of Cheney's proposal for striking Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps targets in Iran, going so far as to hint in an interview with Fox News last September that he had passed on to the White House his desire to do something about alleged Iranian assistance to Shiites that would require U.S. forces beyond his control.

At that point, Adm. Fallon was in a position to deter any effort to go around Defense Department and military opposition to such a strike because he controlled all military access to the region as a whole. But Fallon's forced resignation in March and the subsequent promotion of Petraeus to become CENTCOM chief later this year gives Cheney a possible option to ignore the position of his opponents in Washington once more in the final months of the administration.

...............................................benny

Iran warns of "painful" response if Israel attacks
June 10....(Reuters) - Iran's defense minister was quoted on Tuesday as warning Israel of a "very painful" response if it launched a military strike over the Islamic Republic's disputed nuclear program. On Friday, Israeli Transport Minister Shaul Mofaz told an Israeli newspaper an attack on Iran looked "unavoidable" given the apparent failure of United Nations sanctions to deny Tehran technology with bomb-making potential. "Our armed forces are at the height of their readiness and if anyone should want to undertake such a foolish job the response would be very painful," the state Iran daily quoted Iranian Defence Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar as saying. Israel, widely believed to have the Middle East's only atomic arsenal, has described Iran's nuclear program as a threat to its existence. Olmert last week said it must be stopped by "all possible means." Iran does not recognize Israel and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is regularly predicting its demise.

................................................benny

The Iran Challenge
Jun 10, 2008
Matthew Continetti

Iranian.ws




The Iranian regime supports violent extremists and challenges us across the region. It pursues a nuclear capability that could spark a dangerous arms race, and raise the prospect of a transfer of nuclear know-how to terrorists. Its president denies the Holocaust and threatens to wipe Israel off the map. The danger from Iran is grave, it is real, and my goal will be to eliminate this threat.--Barack Obama, June 4, 2008

So begins the great transformation, whereby a dovish primary candidate mutates into a (moderately) hawkish nominee.

It's a tall order in Obam a's case. He must prove that a 46-year-old senator, a talented Chicago pol with a thin résumé and without national security or executive experience, is a plausible commander in chief. He must downplay the kumbaya rhetoric and irresponsible national security votes, and talk tough while inventing shifty rationalizations for prior weakness.

Exhibit A: Obama's June 4 address, quoted above, to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Read it alongside John McCain's speech to AIPAC, and you'll be struck by the similarities. Both candidates pledged to prevent a second Holocaust. Both said Iran is a major strategic threat. And both promised to deal with this threat through U.N. and non-U.N. sanctions, divestment, and--if necessary--force. But don't be fooled. There are major differences.

McCain told AIPAC, correctly, that for decades negotiations with Iran have failed to win concessions from the regime. This failure has been bipartisan and transatlantic. President Clinton pledged major inducements for Iran to liberalize. He got nothing. President Bush has offered more bounty to Iran in exchange for a suspension of uranium enrichment. Still nothing. The Europeans have been talking to the Iranians for years. They have zilch to show for it. McCain wants to increase pressure until the Iranians understand that their interest lies in reaching a diplomatic solution.

...............................................benny

Different Cheney
Jun 10, 2008


Iranian.ws




Analysts maintain Liz Cheney's views reflect her father's perspective.
A former State Department official and daughter of Dick Cheney says Iran 'will face military action' if it does not halt its nuclear work.

Speaking to appease Jews at the American Israel Political Affairs Committee convention, Elizabeth Cheney said the time for diplomacy on Iran is 'rapidly coming to an end'.

Former deputy assistant secretary for Near Eastern affairs deplored the Bush administration over key elements of its Middle East policies, suggesting that the administration needed to adopt a tougher stance in the region.

"In my view, this administration has gotten it right when we have been bold, when we have been decisive, when we have been focused, when we have used our military force when necessary," she said.

Cheney added that Washington must clearly declare that if Iranians "don't give up diplomatically [to United Nations demands that Iran freeze its nuclear program], they will face military action".

Iran has repeatedly asserted that as a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), it is entitled to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes and that has no intention to give up its inalienable rights.

The UN nuclear watchdog, in its latest report, certified the non-diversion of declared nuclear material in the country's nuclear activities. However, Washington with a blatant disregard for international reports continues to accuse Iran of pursuing a nuclear weapons program in a bid to justify the drumbeat for a war against the country.


© Iranian.ws

................................................benny

Bush Issues Iran Warning on Farewell Europe Tour

Wednesday, June 11, 2008 8:37 AM

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President George W. Bush threatened Iran on Wednesday with more sanctions if it failed to stop enriching uranium and said all options were on the table to thwart Tehran's nuclear ambitions.


Bush, who met German Chancellor Angela Merkel north of Berlin as part of his week-long tour of Europe, is pressing allies to agree new punitive measures against Iran.


While Europeans have voiced support for new sanctions, they are also looking past Bush, whose presidency ends in January.


"Both the chancellor and my first choice, of course, is to solve this diplomatically," Bush told a joint news conference with Merkel.


But he added: "All options are on the table," a reference to the threat of military action to stop Iran's nuclear program, which the West fears is aimed at making atomic bombs.


"The message to the Iranian government is very clear," said Bush, visiting Europe for the last time before the end of his eight years in office.


Merkel was more cautious, saying she could "not exclude" a further round of sanctions if Iran failed to cooperate and suspend enrichment work, which Tehran argues is for peaceful power generation.


With his approval ratings at home at the lows of his presidency and his domestic agenda largely blocked by an opposition-led Congress, Bush is trying to reassert his relevance on the world stage and forge a foreign policy legacy defined by more than the unpopular war in Iraq.


He has focused increasingly on Iran and says he wants to leave his successor a framework of international diplomacy for tackling the Iranian nuclear threat.


Despite three rounds of sanctions by the U.N. Security Council, Iran has refused to stop enrichment. Within a week, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana plans to present a revised package of political and economic incentives for Iran to give up enrichment, similar to an offer made in 2006 that was rejected.


In a televised speech in western Iran on Wednesday, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said the Bush "era" had ended and promised that Iran's foes would not be able to "harm even a centimeter" of its territory.


LAST EUROPE TRIP


Bush met Merkel at an isolated government residence north of the German capital where high-level meetings can take place out of the media glare.


He then headed to Rome and will also travel to Paris, London, and Belfast in Northern Ireland later in the week.


The U.S. president went biking through the rolling hills and lush woods of the Meseberg compound on Wednesday morning. At a relaxed news conference, he thanked Merkel for inviting him to a "modest cottage by the lake" and said he had enjoyed a "fabulous" meal of asparagus, a seasonal German delicacy.


Bush remains unpopular in western Europe more than five years after he clashed with Germany, France, Russia and others over the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.


He told reporters in Meseberg he had no regrets about going to war in Iraq but admitted he could have been smarter in making the case for the U.S.-led invasion.


"I could have used better rhetoric to indicate that one, we tried to exhaust diplomacy in Iraq, and two, that I don't like war," Bush said. "But, no, the decision to remove Saddam Hussein was the right decision."


Bush said he expected to seal a security pact with the Baghdad government but called media reports that Washington is planning permanent bases in Iraq "erroneous." U.S. Democrats worry Bush could use agreements sealed before he leaves office to tie the next president into current Iraq war policies.


Merkel, a conservative who grew up in East Germany, has worked hard to repair ties between the Cold War allies and has forged a close relationship with Bush. But she acknowledged this week that a "new era" was looming when Bush is replaced.


Democratic candidate Barack Obama is especially popular in Germany, where he is likened to President John F. Kennedy, who won over the country in 1963 with his celebrated "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech.


Obama says he is ready to talk directly to Iran over its nuclear program, a move the Bush administration has rejected.



............................................benny

EU and U.S. Seek to Turn Up Pressure on Iran

Tuesday, June 10, 2008 11:07 PM

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BRDO, Slovenia - The United States and the European Union told Iran on Tuesday they were ready to impose more sanctions over its nuclear enrichment program.


But President George W. Bush acknowledged the limits of U.S. influence over Tehran and, in the twilight of his presidency, appeared resigned to leaving the standoff to his successor.


"I leave behind a multilateral framework to work on this issue," Bush said after a U.S.-EU summit at a Slovenian castle.


"A group of countries can send a clear message to the Iranians, and that is: We're going to continue to isolate you ... we'll find new sanctions if need be, if you continue to deny the just demands of the free world, which is to give up your enrichment program," he said.


He stopped short of repeating the U.S. position that all options, including military action, remain open. "Now is the time for there to be strong diplomacy," Bush said.


A joint communique after his final summit with the 27-nation EU said both sides were ready to take additional measures on top of three rounds of United Nations sanctions -- an implicit recognition that tougher Security Council action might be difficult due to Russian and Chinese resistance.


Bush met Slovenian leaders, who hold the EU's rotating presidency, as well as European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, who has led efforts to get Iran to scrap its enrichment program.


The president later arrived in Germany where he will hold talks with Chancellor Angela Merkel on Iran, climate change and oil prices at Meseberg, north of Berlin, before heading to Rome, France and Britain as part of a week-long European tour.


INCENTIVES


Solana is due to travel to Iran at the weekend to present a new offer by major powers of incentives for it to suspend the program but he has played down prospects of a breakthrough.


"Iran with a nuclear weapon would be incredibly dangerous for world peace," Bush said.


All agree Iran should not be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons. Tehran insists its program is for civilian purposes.


But it remained unclear how far the Europeans, who rarely echo Bush's harsh rhetoric against Iran and have sometimes been reluctant to get tougher, would be willing to go.


Washington has pressed the EU to deny some Iranian banks access to the world financial system. European External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said further EU steps could entail a freeze on Iranian bank assets.


An Iranian newspaper said Tehran was withdrawing assets from European banks and converting some foreign exchange holdings into gold and equities to neutralize the impact of sanctions.


MORE COOPERATIVE


Bush was accused by critics of "cowboy diplomacy" early in his presidency, but the rancor has eased somewhat after he took a more cooperative approach in his second term.


After clashing with former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder over the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, he has forged a close relationship with Merkel, a pro-American conservative who grew up in communist East Germany.


Merkel has not shied away from criticizing Bush over issues like the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay but, like other European leaders, she is looking increasingly past Bush to his successor who will be chosen in the November election.


Bush acknowledges he is unpopular in Europe, as well as at home. "A lot of people like America. They may not sometimes necessarily like the president," he told Slovenia's Pop TV.


On climate change, EU policymakers say they have given up trying to get Washington to join with the bloc in signing up now to binding cuts of greenhouse gas emissions.


Bush repeated on Tuesday that the United States would not agree to cuts until big developing nations such as China and India made commitments too, but he said a global climate deal could still be reached during his presidency.


He also reaffirmed his strong dollar policy, even as the U.S. currency traded close to a historic low against the euro.


"We believe in a strong dollar and that the relative value of economies will end up setting the valuation of the dollar," Bush told a joint news conference in Slovenia.


.............................................benny

It’s not Mofaz’s fault


Minister Mofaz’s statement regarding Iran strike not real reason for rising oil prices

Amos Carmel Published: 06.11.08, 17:15 / Israel Opinion




There’s an old story about a scientist who trained a grasshopper to jump when he told it “jump.” One day, after removing the grasshopper’s legs, and seeing the grasshopper failing to respond to the “jump” command, the scientist wrote: When a grasshopper’s legs are removed, it loses its hearing.



Using baseless thinking, the scientist actually reached the right conclusion. A grasshopper’s hearing organs are indeed found in its legs. On the other hand, the contribution of Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz to skyrocketing oil prices seems dubious. I recalled this story in the wake of the attacks on Mofaz, who seemingly made oil prices jump by 10% because of a newspaper interview.



Indeed, the Yedioth Ahronoth headline on Friday quoted Mofaz as saying that Israel needs to attack Iran (and we could certainly make do without this incisive declaration.) Indeed, the price of oil rose after that by $10.75 a barrel (which, of course, proceeded to shake up economies across the global village.) Yet the simplistic linkage between these two developments seems puzzling – even when we keep in mind that psychologist Daniel Kahneman won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2002 for the seemingly sensational discovery that not everything is rational when it comes to business and negotiations.



First, the same day that Mofaz’ quote appeared, another Israeli newspaper quoted “security sources” who said that “Israel will be forced to act against Iran on its own.” Therefore, how can we attribute the skyrocketing oil prices to Mofaz alone? And how come that all the reprimands directed at Mofaz two days ago, not only by commentators but also by senior officials who did not hesitate to speak up, only lowered the price of oil slightly?



After all, these reprimands clearly attested to the fact that Israel will not be attacking Iran anytime soon (as was clear to any reasonable person even before that.)



What about weakening dollar?

Secondly, wise people have been telling us for a while now that the rises in oil prices will not end until the price reaches $200 per barrel, and only this will prompt the so-called enlightened world to do something – doesn’t this imply complex processes that exaggerated declarations by Israeli politicians would barely affect?




And if the dollar is weakening and the latest employment figures in the United States are disappointing, and both presidential candidates do no present any reasonable plan for saving on fuel, wouldn’t that be enough to see the unprecedented rise in the prices of oil continue? Was Mofaz’s needless declaration the only thing that prompted the rising prices?



And who, actually, decided that it was all because of Mofaz, aside from analysts that were caught off guard and were surprised by the latest developments, which were oh-so-expected?



This entire mini-storm did not deserve attention in and of itself. It will be soon forgotten like previous storms. Yet for the time being, it attests to the weakness of our approach to the overall energy problem, both here and abroad.



Advertisement



We see prestigious prizes given to prophets of apocalypse, glamorous conventions used to lament the situation, and scathing attacks on outspoken politicians. On the other hand, massive shift to public transportation or meaningful investment in non-perishable energy sources are not at the top of either the local or global agenda. Yet this apparently has something to do with Transportation Minister Mofaz.
........................................benny

Iran News
Page One > Iran News


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Iran FM: Bush not to be taken seriously
Jun 11, 2008


Iranian.ws




Regime's Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki says US President George W. Bush's Iran war rhetoric should not be taken seriously.

In a Wednesday press conference, Mottaki said Bush's recent threats of military action against Iran are part of a propaganda campaign that should not be taken seriously.

He explained that a number of unresolved issues between Washington and Tehran were impeding the prospect of future Iran-US meetings on issues such as Iraq.

"We believe Washington is in a difficult situation in the twilight days of Bush's presidency and is still undecided about matters of utmost importance such as Iraq," said the Iranian foreign minister.

Mottaki, who is in Paris to take part in the International Support Conference for Afghanistan, expressed deep regret about reports that poppy cultivation has reached an all-time record since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.


"US forces have failed to stabilize Afghanistan and must be held responsible for the country's flourishing poppy cultivation," Mottaki said.

"The Islamic Republic, however, has stepped up cross-border controls and has taken drastic measures to combat drug trafficking," he added.

The Iranian foreign minister confirmed reports that EU Foreign Policy Chief Javier is slated to visit Tehran soon to discuss a new Western incentives package.

....................................................benny

Analysis: Bush is reconciled to a nuclear-armed Iran
June 11, 2008, 10:12 PM (GMT+02:00)

In an interview with the London Times , June 11, US president George W. Bush said his aim now was to leave his successor a legacy of international diplomacy for tackling Iran. Regarding the Israeli minister Shaul Mofaz’s recent assertion that a military strike on Iran’s nuclear installations was “unavoidable”, the US president commented that this “really should be viewed as the need to keep pressuring” Iran. On a farewell trip to Europe, Bush added: “We ought to work together, keep focused” regarding Iran’s nuclear program.

DEBKAfile’s informed sources report that President Bush was also clearly bidding farewell to the option of an American strike against Iran’s nuclear program. With six months left of his presidency, his message to the Iranians was: They can either face isolation or they can have better relations with us all.” No third option, of a punishing military strike, was mentioned.

Iran’s president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad shot back by saying: “I tell him… your era has come to an end. With the grace of God, you won’t be able to harm even one centimeter of the sacred land of Iran.”

DEBKAfile’s Iranian sources report that Tehran is driving hard to attain a weapons capability by September or October this year, before Bush leaves the White House.

Nonetheless, the US president has shown no sign of departing from the current course of diplomacy and international sanctions against Iran, although it has in no way inhibited Iran’s race for enriched uranium which advances unchecked. This was implied by his reference to a possible successor: Bush voiced concern that the Democratic nominee Barack Obama might “open cracks in the West’s united front towards Tehran’s nuclear ambitions.” But, he hoped that after is successor assesses “what will work or what won’t work in dealing with Iran,” he would stick with the current policy.”

.............................................benny P.S...Is president Bush putting the Iranians asleep for a sneak attack?

Tuesday, June 10, 2008
WAR, PEACE & POLITICS: Transcript from my interview on CNN Headline News



The following is the conversation I had last night on CNN Headline News with the guest host of the "Glenn Beck Show" as we discussed the growing threat of war with Iran and the U.S. presidential campaign. Note: Just to be clear, I was speaking last night as a private citizen, not as the head of The Joshua Fund, which is a non-profit humanitarian relief organization and does not get involved in partisan politics.
---------------------------------------------------------
TRANSCRIPT OF "THE GLENN BECK SHOW"
CNN Headline News
June 9, 2008


Topic: Possible war with Iran and the U.S. presidential campaign


PAGLIARULO: Hello, America. I'm Joe Pagliarulo -- Joe Pags -- sitting in for Glenn Beck while he`s touring the country for his summer stage show....With world leaders looking to the oil czars of OPEC for help from, or at least an explanation to, the historically high prices kicking us in the back pocket and in the gas tank, today they may just have their answer. Iran. OPEC`s second largest supplier has blamed the double-digit jump in the price of a barrel of oil on, yes, the weakening dollar. But also on a comment made by a senior Israeli official just this past Friday. Quote, "If Iran continues with its program for developing nuclear weapons, we will attack it," end quote.So, rising Middle East tensions affect the price of oil? Who knew? Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert did distance himself from those comments yesterday, but he did not explicitly -- explicitly reject them. So distance, yes, rejection, no. What`s the difference? I don`t know. Last week`s Iran`s president said that Israel would, quote, "soon disappear" -- that`s nothing new -- and has repeatedly called for that country`s extinction. His most recent rhetorical aggression is another reminder that the Middle East will undoubtedly be a central focus of not only this campaign but also the next administration`s first 100 days. So who`s the guy best equipped for this dogfight? Joining me now is Joel Rosenberg, author of "Dead Heat," the founder of The Joshua Fund. The average American, I would bet you, if we walked out on the street -- maybe not here in Manhattan, but I think middle America -- would not say Iran first if you asked them why the price of oil is so high.


JOEL ROSENBERG, AUTHOR, "DEAD HEAT": Iran, and their feverish attempt to steal, buy or make nuclear weapons, is the No. 1 threat in the Middle East. And now Israel`s deputy prime minister is now saying it looks as though war with Iran may be unavoidable. That`s the comment that seems to have driven up the price of oil. And understandably so. I think a confrontation very well may be coming. Whether it`s this year or next, it means the stakes are very high for who we select as the next commander in chief.


PAGLIARULO: OK. So we`ve got two people now. The presumptive nominees are McCain and Obama, both senators. Both have Washington addresses. They both claim they`re going to bring change, which is not true. How they deal with -- individually, how do they deal with Iran? I know that Barack Obama has said he`ll sit down with Ahmadinejad. I know that McCain says he`s not going to play that game and at one point saying, "Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran." What do you make of these two guys? Are they going to help or hurt?


ROSENBERG: Well, it`s a very serious question. And the question, I think, needs to be framed this way. If war is really coming with Iran, if it`s unavoidable -- and I hope that it`s not unavoidable. But if it is, who`s the most qualified and experienced person to be the next commander in chief? Now Senator Obama, he`s got a big problem. First of all, he`s got no military experience. He`s got very little Washington experience. He doesn`t know the world leaders, doesn`t know our military leaders. So that`s a challenge. But more importantly even that than that, his first foreign policy move, Senator Obama`s, upon entering the Oval Office next January if he`s elected, he said he will surrender in Iraq. He will pull U.S. forces out of the Middle East as rapidly as possible. This is not exactly going to send a message to make Iran fear us, much less stop building or buying or stealing nuclear weapons. That`s the big danger on his part.


PAGLIARULO: And conversely, what does John McCain do? Again, he`s more of a hard liner, more like President Bush when it comes to the Middle East, certainly. What does he do to keep the pressure on Iran? Guess what? We`ve had sanctions there for almost 30 years. It`s not working.


ROSENBERG: Yes. The sanctions aren`t working. Unfortunately, diplomacy is not working. There`s two tracks that have to be done simultaneously. First, don`t surrender in Iraq. And that`s what, of course, is Senator McCain`s position.


PAGLIARULO: Right.


ROSENBERG: Is that keep the pressure on in Iraq. But the next question is how are we actually going to stop Iran from getting these weapons? We`re getting to the point where it looks as though, if sanctions and diplomacy aren`t working, we may, in fact, have to resort to a massive air attack on Iranian nuclear facilities and air defenses.


PAGLIARULO: Well, I don`t want to be the predictor of something so horrible happening.


ROSENBERG: Nor do I.


PAGLIARULO: Let me ask you this. If, in fact, something like that would have to happen, wouldn`t the Israelis do it first, and then what would we do in support of that? Would we verbally support them? Would we get in the planes and go in and do the same thing? How would that go down, in about 30 seconds?


ROSENBERG: Look, I don`t think that the Israelis -- I wouldn`t tell you this, but I don`t think the Israelis have the capacity to neutralize Iran`s nuclear threat.


PAGLIARULO: OK.


ROSENBERG: They don`t have enough in the air force or long-range missiles. The United States does. We have forces in Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey, and the Persian Gulf. We could do it if we have to. The question is who will make that call? And how much time do we have to make that decision?


PAGLIARULO: So if we had to, we could. If Obama became the president, it probably wouldn`t happen, because he`d start pulling people out.


ROSENBERG: Well, exactly right. It`s not clear that McCain would take that action.


PAGLIARULO: Right, right, right.


ROSENBERG: But it`s clear that McCain -- that Obama would not.


PAGLIARULO: All right, Joel, thank you very much. We appreciate the expertise.

posted by Joel C. Rosenberg @ 10:22 AM

Monday, June 09, 2008
IS WAR WITH IRAN "UNAVOIDABLE"?



Just a quick heads up that I have been invited to appear on the "Glenn Beck Show" tonight on CNN Headline News. We will discuss Iran's latest threats against the U.S. and Israel and the comment made last week by an Israeli deputy prime minister that war with Iran may now be "unavoidable." Is that really true? How much time do we have to let diplomacy and sanctions work, before it's too late? What can and should the Bush administration do about the Iranian nuclear threat? And who might be the better Commander-in-Chief next year -- Senator John McCain or Senator Barack Obama -- if war with Iran actually comes to pass. The program will air at 7pm, 9pm and midnight eastern. Please check local listings for exact times and stations in your area, and please join us if you can.


* Thanks so much to those of you who were praying about my trip to Iraq. I was supposed to leave last Thursday night and be there all this week. However, the trip had to be postponed. I will let you know when it is rescheduled.


* Thanks to all of you who are inquiring about my speaking and travel schedule. After a very intense first five months of the year, it will -- thank the Lord -- be a quiet summer. I am resting up, spending time with my family, and writing a new book, INSIDE THE REVOLUTION, which is due to my publisher in early September. We will have a few public events this fall to announce soon. Please check the calendar on the homepage for updates from time to time.


* Finally, welcome to those of you who have signed up for these email updates and are reading the weblog from around the world. Last month, we had traffic to the site from 98 countries and territories. These include the U.K., Australia, Russia, China, Brazil, India, Germany, Israel, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, and Pakistan, to name just a few.
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posted by Joel C. Rosenberg @ 1:24 PM
................................................benny

How Iran Has Bush Over a Barrel
Wednesday, Jun. 11, 2008 By ROBERT BAER An aircraft of Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards flying over an oil tanker in the Persian Gulf.
AFP / GettyArticle ToolsPrintEmailReprintsSphereAddThisRSSYahoo! Buzz If wasn't clear before it should be now: the Bush Administration can't afford to attack Iran. With gas already at $4 a gallon and rising almost every day, Iran figuratively and literally has the United States over a barrel. As much as the Administration is tempted, it is not about to test Iran's promise to "explode" the Middle East if it is attacked.

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The Iranians haven't been shy about making clear what's at stake. If the U.S. or Israel so much as drops a bomb on one of its reactors or its military training camps, Iran will shut down Gulf oil exports by launching a barrage of Chinese Silkworm missiles on tankers in the Strait of Hormuz and Arab oil facilities. In the worst case scenario, seventeen million barrels of oil would come off world markets.

One oil speculator told me that oil would hit $200 a barrel within minutes. But Iran's official news agency, Fars, puts it at $300 a barrel. I asked him if Iran is right, what does that mean?

"Four-dollar-a-gallon of gasoline only reflects $100 oil because the refiners' margins are squeezed," he said. "At $300, you have $12 a gallon of gasoline and riots in Newark, Los Angeles, Harlem, Oakland, Cleveland, Detroit, Dallas."

In either case, whether at $200 or $300, Bush does not want to be the President who leaves the White House on a mule-drawn cart. But Iran's blackmail is not just about oil. The Iranians truly believe they have us hostage in Iraq — our supply lines, the acquiescence of the Shi'a in the occupation. It would all change in an instant, though, especially if we were to borrow Iraq to attack Iran. The way Fars put it: "In Iraq, fighters would rise up in solidarity with each other and begin ... making the Tet Offensive in 1968 Vietnam."

If this all sounds very alarming, Iran meant it to, and it seems to be working. On Tuesday Bush was talking about the prospect of new sanctions rather than attacking.

Which leaves Israel. Are the Israelis, who have a lot more on their minds than the price of gas in the United States, going to launch a pre-emptive attack? One hard and fast rule in the Middle East is never rule out Israel's readiness to turn the table over. But an Israeli hawk on Iran, with close ties to Israel's Ministry of Defense, told me to forget about it. "There's not a chance Israel will do anything. Maybe there's a window after the American elections and the new President but even that's doubtful. Washington does not have the stomach for another war."

Israel cannot attack or contain Iran on its own; it needs the full military might of the United States behind it. So in the meantime Israel can only huff and puff, hoping new sanctions on Iran will do the trick.

...........................................benny

Jun 14, 2008 15:54 | Updated Jun 14, 2008 16:21
Syrian official: Peace isn't the only way to get the Golan
By JPOST.COM STAFF
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Several weeks after Jerusalem announced the renewal of indirect peace talks between Israel and Syria, frustration about the pace of the negotiations seems to be settling in among some Syrian officials, with one senior member of the foreign ministry suggesting that if Israel did not willingly give up the Golan, then Syria would take it by force.


Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad.
Photo: AP

Slideshow: Pictures of the week During a press conference to Jordanian reporters on Saturday, Syrian deputy Foreign Minister Faysal Mekdad said that Syria has "other options" to "liberate" the Golan, adding that should hostilities erupt, his country would be able to "protect its land within minutes."

Speaking directly to Israeli residents of the Golan - whom he labeled "settlers" - the foreign minister warned that they should not "raise their sons in the Golan, for this is not their place."

He addressed Israel with a question: Would it be better to return the heights to Syria "peacefully and without blood," or would a war be necessary?

Mekdad's message to the Golan's residents implied that in case of war, the civilian population there would be a Syrian target.

Also during the press conference the foreign minister offered a glimpse into the status of the indirect talks, saying that they were based on "Rabin's pledge." According to the Syrians, after negotiations between the two countries began in the early 1990s, former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin promised then-Syrian president Hafeez Assad that any agreement would include the transfer of territory to Syria.

Israeli media reported recently that the said "pledge" had been relayed to Assad without Rabin's explicit consent.
............................................benny

COMMENT
War on Iran: Law the first casualty
By Kaveh L Afrasiabi

"So foul a sky shall not clear without a storm," wrote William Shakespeare in the play King John and, indeed, the deafening saber-rattling against Iran by the United States and Israel increasingly reveals a coming storm that will likely dwarf the magnitude of the Iraq war, in light of Iran's military prowess and ability to strike back throughout the Middle East.

The US's and Israel's decision to escalate the threat levels against Iran, reflected in President George W Bush's statement in Europe this week that all options remain on the table, has been matched by an equally resolute defiance by Iran. As a result, the growing anxiety over a summer war with Iran threatens to send



already rocketing oil prices to unimaginable levels.

This is not "new realism" in US foreign policy, as US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice self-congratulatingly narrates in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs [1], but rather a new level of American "dumb power" that harms its own self-interest by the pursuit of warmongering policies.

The official Washington discourse is presently overwhelmed with platitude about America's "new Wilsonian" commitment to spread freedom and democracy in the Middle East. But, for example, the mere thought that "Iraq's freedom" may also mean freedom from foreign hegemonic domination is simply foreign to the discourse and understanding of US officials such as Rice. She is, nonetheless, on the mark when writing, in the article cited above, that "our policy in the Middle East is, in reality, an extension of traditional tenets".

But, looking at Iraq, where the US is desperately trying to shove down the throat of Iraqi political leaders an imperialistic "security pact" that would allow upwards of 50 or 60 US military bases in Iraq, together with the judicial immunity of US personnel, the picture reminds of another tradition - the US's gun-boat diplomacy of the 19th century. In 1854, for instance, Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry forced open Japan, prompting Japan to sign the shameful "Ansei Treaties" that provided a system of "extraterritoriality" for foreign residents in that country, aptly detailed in Michael Auslin's Negotiating With Imperialism.

Instead of charting a post-hegemonic, new liberal course of action for US foreign policy, Rice's "new realism" is in many ways the old realism of empire realpolitik, using liberal semantics to give a nice cover to the US's hegemonic motives and intentions.

Paradoxically, precisely when the US has put full steam behind its efforts to finalize the controversial security agreement with Iraq, that would put US bases near Iranian borders, the US and its allies in the "Iran Six" group are now poised to dispatch the European Union's foreign policy chief Javier Solana to Iran to present an "incentive package" to Iran that supposedly contains references to "security". (The "Iran Six" includes the United Nations Security Council's permanent five members - the US, France, China, Russia and Britain - and Germany.)

Washington is oblivious to the linkage between the two issues, that is, that the US cannot expect Iran's compliance with nuclear demands made on it when the US is exacerbating Iran's national security worries through its military projections in Iraq. US policymakers and various US pundits have simply preoccupied themselves with a villain image of Iran, out to "subvert Persian Gulf states", to paraphrase Rice, without an iota of concern about separating fact from fiction. Rice writes about a "new political realignment" in the Middle East, yet glosses over the perceived role and image of US imperialism on the part of many people in the Middle East who regard this as the empire's "divide and conquer" tactic.

The benign American hegemon has, in a word, become self-imprisoned in make-believe altruism and Jeffersonian idealism, unwilling or unable to come to terms with the underlying reasons for "why we are losing the war on terror". This invokes the title of a recent book by Paul Rogers, who deconstructs the post-September 11, 2001, security discourses of the US, tracing them to the pre-September 11 prescriptions of the neo-conservative agenda known as the Project for the New American Century.

Any wonder then that international law does not warrant any mention in Rice's prominent article, and mention is equally missing in the hawkish "attack Iran" narratives of known pro-Israel pundits such as Daniel Pipes and Thomas Friedman. The answer is that it is hardly surprising and, in fact, makes a lot of sense, given that Iran has not breached its nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty obligations, just as former Russian president (now premier)Vladimir Putin told the European press recently.

Consequently, another unjustified, illegal war in the Middle East is being plotted openly before our eyes, with the warmongering voices enjoying a great deal of media latitude, basking in the glory of vilifying Iran and rationalizing their incendiary viewpoints while, simultaneously, branding Iran as being "completely outside the norms of the international community".

But, what norm of international community condones an unprovoked war that will claim many innocent lives no doubt, not to mention collateral damage on the world economy? The answer is that a legal frame of reference is simply missing and hawkish warmongers in the US and Israel simply operate in a vacuum of legal foundation in their increasingly unabashed recommendations for immediate war on Iran.

Note 1. See Rethinking the National Interest. American Realism for a New World by Condoleezza Rice, Foreign Affairs, July/August 2008.

Kaveh L Afrasiabi, PhD, is the author of After Khomeini: New Directions in Iran's Foreign Policy (Westview Press) and co-author of "Negotiating Iran's Nuclear Populism", Brown Journal of World Affairs, Volume XII, Issue 2, Summer 2005, with Mustafa Kibaroglu. He also wrote "Keeping Iran's nuclear potential latent", Harvard International Review, and is author of Iran's Nuclear Program: Debating Facts Versus Fiction.

....................................................benny

International diplomats visit Tehran to deliver nuclear ultimatum
Saturday, 14 June 2008
The Guardian

Iran to be given a month to curb programme
Refusal could mean EU sanctions by end of July
Julian Borger, diplomatic editor

Iran will today be given a month to accept a package of incentives in return for curbing its nuclear programme or face new sanctions, in an ultimatum to be presented in person by a team of international diplomats.

The team arriving in Tehran this morning under the leadership of the EU foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, will include the political director of Britain's Foreign Office, Mark Lyall Grant, and his counterparts from Russia, China, France and Germany.

The US, the sixth member of the group negotiating with Iran over its nuclear ambitions, will not be represented. The Bush administration has said it will not enter into direct negotiations with Iran on the issue until Tehran complies with UN security council demands to suspend uranium enrichment.

However, the US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, has jointly signed a letter with the foreign ministers of the five other nations to be handed to the Iranian government along with the negotiating package.

A senior British official said: "If they are serious about convincing the international community it is only interested in a peaceful programme, then it will suspend enrichment and reprocessing."

If Tehran refuses, the security council will begin talks on a fourth wave of sanctions, but more immediately the EU will impose its own measures. "I don't think we'd wait to begin the summer break. If there is not a response within a month, we'd look at our response," the British official said. "There will be further EU sanctions by the end of July."

Also hanging over today's talks is uncertainty over whether military action might be taken against Iran if it proceeds with its current nuclear programme. The British official, talking to journalists before the Tehran trip, said that all six members of the group, including the US, were committed to a diplomatic solution, but he added that if Iran continued to defy the security council "clearly there can be temptations to go the other way".

This week, George Bush once more refused to rule out the use of force, but he was mocked by Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who said: "Bush's time is up, and he was not able to harm even one centimetre of our land."

British officials remain confident that the Bush administration will not take military action before leaving office but warn Israel "may draw a different conclusion".

Israel's transport minister and former army chief of staff, Shaul Mofaz, has said publicly a strike on Iran may be "unavoidable".

Today's incentive package, offering help to establish Iran's nuclear programme and supply nuclear fuel, along with general economic benefits, differs little from one offered two years ago, which Iran turned down. Tehran insists it has a sovereign right to pursue a comprehensive nuclear programme, which it says is for purely peaceful purposes.

Western European and US officials have little confidence the offer will be accepted this time, but are hopeful that it will stir a debate among Iran's dominant conservatives over the rising economic costs of the nuclear programme.

They say the former chief negotiator, Ali Larijani, showed himself to be more pragmatic than his successor, Saeed Jalili. Since the March elections, in which he stood as an economic critic of Ahmadinejad, Larijani has emerged as parliamentary speaker, a powerful position. The delegation is due to meet Larijani, as well as Jalili and the foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki.

Unlike 2006, this time the incentives package, along with the accompanying letter, will be made public, in an attempt to appeal directly to Iranian public opinion. They are due to be published tomorrow.

British diplomats say both China and Russia insisted the offer to Iran be "refreshed" and presented once more before they agreed to intensified UN sanctions. However, there is no agreement among the security council's five permanent members over what further measures could be taken.

Iran is likely to take the threat of EU sanctions more seriously. Last week, EU member states agreed in principle to go further than existing UN sanctions on Iran, if today's offer is rejected. In particular, Italy dropped its objection to a freeze on the assets of Iran's biggest bank, Bank Melli.


............................................benny

Jun 16, 2008 17:37 | Updated Jun 16, 2008 19:04
'Fearing sanctions, Teheran pulls $75 billion from EU banks'
By JPOST.COM STAFF AND AP
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Iran has withdrawn around $75 billion from European banks to prevent the assets from being blocked under threatened new sanctions over Teheran's disputed nuclear ambitions, Reuters reported Monday, quoting an Iranian weekly.




Iran remains defiant against pressure to halt nuclear enrichment

The report in Shahrvand-e Emrouz stated that "About $75 billion of Iran's foreign assets which were under threat of being blocked were wired back to Iran based on Ahmadinejad's order."

"Part of Iran's assets in European banks have been converted to gold and shares and another part has been transferred to Asian banks," Mohsen Talaie, Deputy Foreign Minister in charge of economic affairs, was quoted as saying.

The UK's Daily Telegraph reported last week that Iranian assets held in Europe were being funneled back to Teheran using financial intermediaries in Dubai.

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Meanwhile, Prime Minister Gordon Brown said Monday that Britain will freeze the assets of Iran's largest bank.

It was not clear how this may have affected the reported Iranian withdrawal.


The UK branch of Bank Melli in London

Brown, speaking at a news conference with US President George W. Bush, said Britain will work to convince Europe to follow suit.

The British leader said it would freeze the assets of Iran's Bank Melli, a bank the United States accused last year of providing services to Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile programs

Brown said he will press fellow leaders attending a European Union summit in Brussels, Belgium, later this week to agree on a tougher package of EU sanctions against Iran, including freezing Bank Melli's assets.

The EU imposes its own set of measures against Iran, in addition to UN- backed sanctions, which include a total arms embargo and travel bans against a number of named individuals and organizations.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner previously has called on the EU to target more companies - particularly in the banking sector - and other individuals who do not now face visa bans under current EU penalties.

"Britain will urge Europe, and Europe will agree, to take sanctions against Iran," Brown said.

"Action will start today in new phase of sanctions on oil and gas. We will take any necessary action so that Iran is aware of the choice it needs to make," he said.

Brown said his government wants to do all it can to maintain a dialogue with Teheran.

"But we are also clear that if Iran continues to ignore [UN] resolutions, to ignore our offers of partnership, we have no choice but to intensify sanctions," the prime minister said.

"I will repeat that we will take any necessary action so that Iran is aware of the choice it has to make: To start to play its part as a full and respected member of the international community, or face further isolation."

Bush told the news conference that Iran's declared ambition for a civilian nuclear power program was "justifiable," and urged Teheran to accept a new package of incentives.

"When the Iranians say we have a sovereign right to have one, the answer is 'You bet you have a sovereign right, absolutely,"' Bush said, referring to a civilian nuclear program.

"But you don't have the trust of those of us who have watched you carefully when it comes to enriching uranium, because you have declared that you want to destroy democracies in the neighborhood."

Bush said Teheran should accept a Russian proposal to enrich uranium on Iran's behalf.
.............................................benny

Report on Sept. 6 strike to show Saddam transferred WMDs to Syria

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satelli...cle%2FShowFull


'Report on Sept. 6 strike to show Saddam transferred WMDs to Syria'

An upcoming joint US-Israel report on the September 6 IAF strike on a Syrian facility will claim that former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein transferred weapons of mass destruction to the country, Channel 2 stated Monday.

Furthermore, according to a report leaked to the TV channel, Syria has arrested 10 intelligence officials following the assassination of Hizbullah terror chief Imad Mughniyeh
......................................benny

Before the next war starts


The IDF is capable of taking over and flattening Gaza; but then what?

Eitan Haber Published: 06.15.08, 10:04 / Israel Opinion





Please go ahead and write down the names of the politicians, public figures, and journalists who are prompting the government and the IDF to enter Gaza. These people, the very same ones, will be asked the following questions after the next war (yes, it will be a war): Why did we go in? Who needed it? These same people will of course ask for the heads of Olmert, Barak, and Ashkenazi to roll, because “we need personal accountability.”




Indeed, there is no arguing that the situation in Sderot and the Gaza region is intolerable, impossible, and cannot continue. It is also true that there isn’t, never was, and never will be another country in the world that would allow for even one day its sovereignty and its people to be targeted like that. It is also true that the IDF is capable of wiping Gaza off the face of this earth (and there are some amongst us who even promise to wipe out Iran and its tens of millions of citizens.)



This is all true, but one needs not be a military commentator or retired general in order to realize that a wide-scale military operation, a euphemism for war, will bring maybe several months of quiet in its wake, but after that we’ll again face the storm.



We are talking about 1.5 million people who have nothing to lose. They are armed to the teeth; even following the occupation, or liberation, of the Six-Day War they possessed many weapons.



We can occupy and flatten Gaza, and then what? There’s nobody like our Arab neighbors when it comes to restoration. Anyone who served in the territories can tell you about how quickly razed homes are rebuilt. Sometimes within two to three days. Hundreds and maybe thousands of Palestinians will be killed, and then what?



They’re not short on manpower

Currently there are about 10,000 terrorists in Israeli detention facilities; most of whom, please note, were not even born when the first Intifada broke out in 1987. This is already the 3rd or 4th round following those stone-throwing kids. Some say that almost 500,000 Palestinians have been through our detention and interrogation rooms, yet they are still firing Qassam rockets at Sderot and Gaza-region communities. They’re not short on manpower.




At this time some good Jews must be sitting out there and saying: Why is he talking nonsense? Our IDF will already find the timing, way, and method; just issue the right orders. Do you remember Entebbe? Do you remember Ehud Barak in his commando days dressed as a woman in Beirut’s alleyways? Just give the IDF the order, and its troops will emerge out of the chimneys, appear out of sewage pits, go directly into the strongholds of terror and kick their butt. Just give them the order already!

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Yet these days are gone. Today, the IDF is realistic, it knows the limits of power, and also knows that the politicians will issue the order if, heaven forbid, the number of casualties as a result of an attack from Gaza will be intolerable (usually that means double digits.) The IDF already knows, for example, that the Second Lebanon War happened and everything, or almost everything, is back to the way it used to be, with the exception of 166 Israelis who didn’t make it back home.



Zionism is premised, among other things, on breaks between fighting, patience, wars of no choice, and building, building, and more building of a nation that has almost no equal in the world. Between the wars and terror attacks that have been persisting since the end of the 19th Century, the Jewish people bit its lips and built a glorious home; the State of Israel.



This is no comfort to the civilians living in Sderot and demanding a solution, but this is the truth; apparently the politician who would utter it has not yet been born.
............................................benny

'If you want to help Iran, don't attack'
Jun 15, 2008
guardian.co.uk

Iranian.ws




The Iranian human rights lawyer Shirin Ebadi is not a woman easily stopped in her tracks - she has been held in jail and faced repeated death threats, but continues to speak out against the abuses of the theocratic regime. On the doorstep of the BBC's Bush House in central London, though, an American tourist waves the Nobel peace laureate and her entourage aside, complaining loudly: "Do you mind? We're trying to take a picture!"

It serves, perhaps, as a reminder for Ebadi - who has spent the day being treated like a VIP by the BBC World Service - of the challenge she faces in attracting western interest to her cause.

With the international community fixated on Iran's nuclear ambitions, Ebadi says there is dwindling scrutiny of human rights in her homeland, and the hardline president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has taken advantage of this to increase repression.

"Since the world started focusing on the nuclear programme, the human rights situation in Iran has worsened every day," says Ebadi, who won the Nobel prize in 2003.

Dozens of activists have been prosecuted and condemned to prison, the lash or both. Arrests, detention and judicial harassment are increasing, with journalists, lawyers, students and trade unionists particularly targeted.

"The morality police interfere more in people's everyday lives," she says. "They recently announced they would carry out inspections in private homes and companies. In Tehran there was also a plan to target hooligans on the streets, but it led to a lot of innocent young people and women being arrested."

Ebadi, 60, has been relatively lucky. She was born in 1947 to a non-traditional Muslim family. She was treated as an equal with her brother and encouraged to go to college. In 1975, aged 23, she became Iran's first woman judge. She lost her position after the Islamic revolution in 1979 when conservative clerics insisted that Islam prohibits women from holding such an office. She was allowed to practice law again in 1992, and since then has turned her legal skills against the Islamic republic she once supported but now opposes due to its human rights abuses.

Ebadi recently took her campaign to the mid-west United States, where she found sympathy among ordinary Americans upset by bellicose rhetoric about Iran. She is perturbed at how contestants in the US presidential race have cited their preparedness to attack Iran. In April, Hillary Clinton said she would "obliterate" the country if it attacked Israel.

"It is very concerning," she says. "Undoubtedly a military attack on Iran would worsen human rights in the country. Look at Iraq - now the fundamentalists have a pretext for their extremism. No one talks about freedom of speech or human rights. People just want a safe shelter.

"Do you think that since the US troops arrived in Iraq that the Iraqi people have become prosperous? As a human rights activist I tell the people of the world that if you want to help people in Iran the solution is not to launch an attack."

There is little sign that western leaders are listening. This week, George Bush once again raised the possibility of military action, warning that "all options are on the table". A US-EU summit in Slovenia threatened new sanctions against Iran if it fails to end uranium enrichment.

Ebadi says the nuclear standoff has made the Iranian regime attractive to disaffected young people elsewhere in the Middle East whose governments are unelected.

"Disenchanted young people have turned to Iran for inspiration, a country that takes every opportunity to burn the American flag. But can the Iranian government represent a good system of government? No."

The world needs to know that every day the lives of Iranians are "getting poorer and more impoverished" due to the regime's internal oppression and confrontational foreign policy, she says.

"There are close to 10 million people under the poverty line. That's one out of every seven. And that is according to official government figures, so let's imagine the reality.

"The consequences of Iranian policies domestically should be revealed around the world, so [young people in the Middle East] understand that just opposing the US isn't going to solve the problems they face. We've been saying 'death to America' for years but our people have been getting hungrier."

Ebadi says that to tackle the surge in support for Iran among the young in the region, the US must stop supporting its undemocratic regimes. "What is interesting is almost all the undemocratic regimes in the Middle East – Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates – is they're all friends of the United States," she says.

"If the US were to stop supporting their governments they would fall immediately. So the people of those countries don't feel good about American foreign policy and view it suspiciously."

Ebadi was always unconvinced by the Bush administration's view that regime change in Iraq would create a domino effect bringing democracy across the Middle East. "It was a flawed argument from the start. If a country genuinely believes in democratic reform it's not going to wait for another country to reform before taking action."

Her hopes hinge on obliging the regime to adhere to the international human rights conventions it has ratified. She is in London to promote a new book on the rights of refugees in Iran that sets out how international and Islamic law can be used to protect them.

Iran signed the United Nations declaration of human rights in 1975. Activists say the government is in violation of the treaty. But last year the much-criticised UN human rights council removed Iran from a list of countries that were being closely monitored.

There have been six visits to Iran by investigators since the council was established in 2006, but their recommendations have not been implemented. Ebadi says abuses have gone unchecked, and she is calling on the council to reappoint a special rapporteur to bring the regime to account.

At a conference in Geneva this week, Ebadi called on the international community to strengthen the council, as it remains a last resort for many victims.

"Unfortunately the Iranian government has not followed the recommendations of the UN rights agencies," she says. "But the fact the recommendations are recognised by the government shows that the Iranian people do have rights and have the confidence to demand that they are respected. So though the UN reports may not have practically led to results, psychologically it has been a great boost to the morale of the Iranian people."

Ebadi remains optimistic that reform is achievable. Her hope lies in Iran's youthful population – almost 70% aged under 30 – which is hungry for change and prepared to fight for its freedom.

She cites the example of one of her clients, 32-year-old Maryam Hossienkhah, a journalist and member of the One Million Signatures Campaign for equal rights for Iranian women.

Hossienkhah was arrested in November for writing articles demanding respect for women's rights under the Islamic constitution. Her bail was set at the equivalent of £75,000.

Ebadi says: "She told the judge, 'I refuse to do that. I'm innocent but I'll go to jail.' As soon as she arrived in the jail, she started giving advice to the women about how to defend their cases.

"She sent a message out to her friends and colleagues that the prison library didn't have a good book collection. So other members of the campaign brought in books and in less than 20 days the prison had a full library. Finally the judge said to the prosecutor, 'You'll have to get this woman out otherwise she will cause chaos!'"

Hossienkhah was released in January after her bail was reduced to just over £3,500. There are many similar cases before the courts, says Ebadi. "I'm glad to say that the more harsh women's lives become, the more determined they are to overcome them. The will of these women is very powerful and that poses a challenge for the government."

.......................................................benny

Make-up of Iran’s new foreign affairs committee
Monday, 16 June 2008
Iran Focus: Tehran, Iran, Jun. 16 – The new members of the Iranian Majlis (Parliament) Foreign Policy and National Security Committee were appointed on Monday. The following are members of the committee:


EU's Solana says no decision on Iran sanctions
Monday, 16 June 2008
Reuters: The European Union did not take decisions on Monday to launch a new round of sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programme, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said.
Iran's Melli Bank: the target of sanctions
Monday, 16 June 2008
AFP: Iran's Bank Melli, the newest target for European sanctions against Tehran over its nuclear defiance, is the oldest bank in the country and has already been hit by punitive measures from the West.

Egypt sees Iran "on a surge" in Arab world
Monday, 16 June 2008
Reuters: Egypt sees Iran "on a surge" in the Arab world, playing many political and diplomatic cards regardless of Arab interests, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said in an interview.


...........................................benny

Iran Has Technology for a Nuclear Warhead to Fit Shehab-3 Missile – www.debka.com

Some Western military and intelligence were shocked to learn that Iran had the blueprints for making a nuclear warhead that could fit onto its Shehab-3 missiles. The discovery was released by the former UN weapons inspector, David Albright, Sunday, June 16, ahead of the report on his investigation of the nuclear smuggling ring run by the father of the Pakistan nuclear bomb Abdul Qadeer Khan. He alleged that the nuclear blueprints passed to Libya, Iran and North Korea included “previously undisclosed designs for a compact warhead that could fit on Iran’s medium-range ballistic missiles.”

On May 22, Swiss President Pascal Couchepin, disclosed that, last December, the destruction had been ordered of a batch of 30,000 documents detailing construction plans for nuclear weapons, gas ultra-centrifuges to enrich weapons-grade uranium and guided missile delivery systems , evidence in a criminal case of a Swiss family of three engineers involved in the Khan ring.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s exclusive sources disclosed on May 30 that these nuclear blueprints were sold in underhand deals to those countries - and possibly also to al Qaeda - in the second half of the 1990s. Tehran has therefore had those designs for between 10 and 13 years.

This discovery makes nonsense of the supposedly definitive judgment in Western and Israel intelligence that Iran lacks the technology for building a nuclear missile delivery system. Because of these estimates, Western governments have been able to keep their sanctions-***-diplomatic track with Iran rolling as though tomorrow would never come.

It is now evident that not only North Korea and Iran have known for some time how to build and deliver a nuclear warhead, but unknown recipients of A.Q. Khan’s merchandise, including terrorist organizations, may also command hazardous nuclear knowledge.

The three Swiss engineers, members of the Tinner family, are the father, Friedrich, whose ties with Khan went back decades, and his sons, Urs and Marco.

The Khan ring set up marketing headquarters in Dubai and Malaysia. The brothers have awaited trial for four years in a Swiss jail. Their father is out on bail and confined to Switzerland. The evidence against Urs Tinner, the hard disk he stole containing the incriminating nuclear documents, has now been destroyed by the Swiss authorities under the supervision of the UN nuclear watchdog.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s military experts reported on May 30: If Urs Tinner, a small cog in the Khan network, was able to steal a hard drive containing a mass of the network’s nuclear secrets, three conclusions are inescapable:

1. That Khan did not retain an efficient security system for the data he was selling. Therefore, his system was full of holes and his confederates and agents, whether employed on the technical or marketing side of the business, were able to help themselves to documents, diagrams and other illicit nuclear materials that were put on sale and, perhaps, go into business on their own.

2. It is an open secret among the American and Western intelligence services involved in uncovering the Khan ring that large sections are still going strong out in Pakistan, the Far East and the Middle East through channels still unexposed. They are bound to assume that the documents destroyed by the Swiss government may exist in copies still in circulation.

3. Some of their holders may have hung onto them for the last four or five years and then destroyed them when the Khan ring was exposed, for fear of being linked to the trafficker. On the other hand, it is possible that some of A. Q. Khan’s agents and accomplices sold his nuclear plans and secrets to terrorists linked to al Qaeda.
__________________
Got Jesus? It's hell without Him.
..................................................benny

Militant Islamic terrorists have the nukes

Just a matter of distribution and timimg before they use them

Their targets will not be prepared

This is the real and present danger

Ex-Official: Russia Moved Saddam's WMD

Kenneth R. Timmerman
Sunday, Feb. 19, 2006
http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/...023.shtml?s=lh

A top Pentagon official who was responsible for tracking Saddam Hussein's weapons programs before and after the 2003 liberation of Iraq, has provided the first-ever account of how Saddam Hussein "cleaned up" his weapons of mass destruction stockpiles to prevent the United States from discovering them.

"The short answer to the question of where the WMD Saddam bought from the Russians went was that they went to Syria and Lebanon," former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense John A. Shaw told an audience Saturday at a privately sponsored "Intelligence Summit" in Alexandria, Va. www.intelligencesummit.org

"They were moved by Russian Spetsnaz (special forces) units out of uniform, that were specifically sent to Iraq to move the weaponry and eradicate any evidence of its existence," he said.

Shaw has dealt with weapons-related issues and export controls as a U.S. government official for 30 years, and was serving as deputy undersecretary of defense for international technology security when the events he described today occurred.

He called the evacuation of Saddam's WMD stockpiles "a well-orchestrated campaign using two neighboring client states with which the Russian leadership had a long time security relationship."

Story Continues Below



Shaw was initially tapped to make an inventory of Saddam's conventional weapons stockpiles, based on intelligence estimates of arms deals he had concluded with the former Soviet Union, China and France.

He estimated that Saddam had amassed 100 million tons of munitions - roughly 60 percent of the entire U.S. arsenal. "The origins of these weapons were Russian, Chinese and French in declining order of magnitude, with the Russians holding the lion's share and the Chinese just edging out the French for second place."

But as Shaw's office increasingly got involved in ongoing intelligence to identify Iraqi weapons programs before the war, he also got "a flow of information from British contacts on the ground at the Syrian border and from London" via non-U.S. government contacts.

"The intelligence included multiple sightings of truck convoys, convoys going north to the Syrian border and returning empty," he said.

Shaw worked closely with Julian Walker, a former British ambassador who had decades of experience in Iraq, and an unnamed Ukranian-American who was directly plugged in to the head of Ukraine's intelligence service.

The Ukrainians were eager to provide the United States with documents from their own archives on Soviet arms transfers to Iraq and on ongoing Russian assistance to Saddam, to thank America for its help in securing Ukraine's independence from the Soviet Union, Shaw said.

In addition to the convoys heading to Syria, Shaw said his contacts "provided information about steel drums with painted warnings that had been moved to a cellar of a hospital in Beirut."

But when Shaw passed on his information to the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and others within the U.S. intelligence community, he was stunned by their response.

"My report on the convoys was brushed off as ‘Israeli disinformation,'" he said.

One month later, Shaw learned that the DIA general counsel complained to his own superiors that Shaw had eaten from the DIA "rice bowl." It was a Washington euphemism that meant he had commited the unpardonable sin of violating another agency's turf.

The CIA responded in even more diabolical fashion. "They trashed one of my Brits and tried to declare him persona non grata to the intelligence community," Shaw said. "We got constant indicators that Langley was aggressively trying to discredit both my Ukranian-American and me in Kiev," in addition to his other sources.

But Shaw's information had not originated from a casual contact. His Ukranian-American aid was a personal friend of David Nicholas, a Western ambassador in Kiev, and of Igor Smesko, head of Ukrainian intelligence.

Smesko had been a military attaché in Washington in the early 1990s when Ukraine first became independent and Dick Cheney was secretary of defense. "Smesko had told Cheney that when Ukraine became free of Russia he wanted to show his friendship for the United States."

Helping out on Iraq provided him with that occasion.

"Smesko had gotten to know Gen. James Clapper, now director of the Geospacial Intelligence Agency, but then head of DIA," Shaw said.

But it was Shaw's own friendship to the head of Britain's MI6 that brought it all together during a two-day meeting in London that included Smeshko's people, the MI6 contingent, and Clapper, who had been deputized by George Tenet to help work the issue of what happened to Iraq's WMD stockpiles.

In the end, here is what Shaw learned:

# In December 2002, former Russian intelligence chief Yevgeni Primakov, a KGB general with long-standing ties to Saddam, came to Iraq and stayed until just before the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.

# Primakov supervised the execution of long-standing secret agreements, signed between Iraqi intelligence and the Russian GRU (military intelligence), that provided for clean-up operations to be conducted by Russian and Iraqi military personnel to remove WMDs, production materials and technical documentation from Iraq, so the regime could announce that Iraq was "WMD free."

# Shaw said that this type GRU operation, known as "Sarandar," or "emergency exit," has long been familiar to U.S. intelligence officials from Soviet-bloc defectors as standard GRU practice.

# In addition to the truck convoys, which carried Iraqi WMD to Syria and Lebanon in February and March 2003 "two Russian ships set sail from the (Iraqi) port of Umm Qasr headed for the Indian Ocean," where Shaw believes they "deep-sixed" additional stockpiles of Iraqi WMD from flooded bunkers in southern Iraq that were later discovered by U.S. military intelligence personnel.

# The Russian "clean-up" operation was entrusted to a combination of GRU and Spetsnaz troops and Russian military and civilian personnel in Iraq "under the command of two experienced ex-Soviet generals, Colonel-General Vladislav Achatov and Colonel-General Igor Maltsev, both retired and posing as civilian commercial consultants."

# Washington Times reporter Bill Gertz reported on Oct. 30, 2004, that Achatov and Maltsev had been photographed receiving medals from Iraqi Defense Minister Sultan Hashim Ahmed in a Baghdad building bombed by U.S. cruise missiles during the first U.S. air raids in early March 2003.

# Shaw says he leaked the information about the two Russian generals and the clean-up operation to Gertz in October 2004 in an effort to "push back" against claims by Democrats that were orchestrated with CBS News to embarrass President Bush just one week before the November 2004 presidential election. The press sprang bogus claims that 377 tons of high explosives of use to Iraq's nuclear weapons program had "gone missing" after the U.S.-led liberation of Iraq, while ignoring intelligence of the Russian-orchestrated evacuation of Iraqi WMDs.

# The two Russian generals "had visited Baghdad no fewer than 20 times in the preceding five to six years," Shaw revealed. U.S. intelligence knew "the identity and strength of the various Spetsnaz units, their dates of entry and exit in Iraq, and the fact that the effort (to clean up Iraq's WMD stockpiles) with a planning conference in Baku from which they flew to Baghdad."

# The Baku conference, chaired by Russian Minister of Emergency Situations Sergei Shoigu, "laid out the plans for the Sarandar clean-up effort so that Shoigu could leave after the keynote speech for Baghdad to orchestrate the planning for the disposal of the WMD."

# Subsequent intelligence reports showed that Russian Spetsnaz operatives "were now changing to civilian clothes from military/GRU garb," Shaw said. "The Russian denial of my revelations in late October 2004 included the statement that "only Russian civilians remained in Baghdad." That was the "only true statement" the Russians made, Shaw ironized.

The evacuation of Saddam's WMD to Syria and Lebanon "was an entirely controlled Russian GRU operation," Shaw said. "It was the brainchild of General Yevgenuy Primakov."

The goal of the clean-up was "to erase all trace of Russian involvement" in Saddam's WMD programs, and "was a masterpiece of military camouflage and deception."

Just as astonishing as the Russian clean-up operation were efforts by Bush administration appointees, including Defense Department spokesman Laurence DiRita, to smear Shaw and to cover up the intelligence information he brought to light.

"Larry DiRita made sure that this story would never grow legs," Shaw said. "He whispered sotto voce [quietly] to journalists that there was no substance to my information and that it was the product of an unbalanced mind."

Shaw suggested that the answer of why the Bush administration had systematically "ignored Russia's involvement" in evacuating Saddam's WMD stockpiles "could be much bigger than anyone has thought," but declined to speculate what exactly was involved.

Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney was less reticent. He thought the reason was Iran.

"With Iran moving faster than anyone thought in its nuclear programs," he told NewsMax, "the administration needed the Russians, the Chinese and the French, and was not interested in information that would make them look bad."

McInerney agreed that there was "clear evidence" that Saddam had WMD. "Jack Shaw showed when it left Iraq, and how."

Former Undersecretary of Defense Richard Perle, a strong supporter of the war against Saddam, blasted the CIA for orchestrating a smear campaign against the Bush White House and the war in Iraq.

"The CIA has been at war with the Bush administration almost from the beginning," he said in a keynote speech at the Intelligence Summit on Saturday.

He singled out recent comments by Paul Pillar, a former top CIA Middle East analyst, alleging that the Bush White House "cherry-picked" intelligence to make the case for war in Iraq.

"Mr. Pillar was in a very senior position and was able to make his views known, if that is indeed what he believed," Perle said.

"He (Pillar) briefed senior policy officials before the start of the Iraq war in 2003. If he had had reservations about the war, he could have voiced them at that time." But according to officials briefed by Pillar, Perle said, he never did.

Even more inexplicable, Perle said, were the millions of documents "that remain untranslated" among those seized from Saddam Hussein's intelligence services.

"I think the intelligence community does not want them to be exploited," he said.

Among those documents, presented Saturday at the conference by former FBI translator Bill Tierney, were transcripts of Saddam's palace conversations with top aides in which he discussed ongoing nuclear weapons plans in 2000, well after the U.N. arms inspectors believed he had ceased all nuclear weapons work.

"What was most disturbing in those tapes," Tierney said, "was the fact that the individuals briefing Saddam were totally unknown to the U.N. Special Commission."

In addition, Tierney said, the plasma uranium programs Saddam discussed with his aids as ongoing operations in 2000 had been dismissed as "old programs" disbanded years earlier, according to the final CIA report on Iraq's weapons programs, presented in 2004 by the Iraq Survey Group.

"When I first heard those tapes" about the uranium plasma program, "it completely floored me," Tierney said.
__________________
...........................................benny P.S....Last summer,Syria tried to mount a chemical warhead onto a scud missile, and it exploded killing the engineers......two days later,Israel sends Syria a message stating..."If you try using one of those on us, we will wipe Damascus off the face of the earth!.............Isaiah 17;1

06/16/2008 Digg Stumble Upon Reddit Facebook Del.icio.us Fark Yahoo Newsvine Google Font:
'MISSION DOABLE'
Israeli Ministers Mull Plans for Military Strike against Iran
By Ralf Beste, Cordula Meyer and Christoph Schult

The Israeli government no longer believes that sanctions can prevent Iran from building nuclear weapons. A broad consensus in favor of a military strike against Tehran's nuclear facilities -- without the Americans, if necessary -- is beginning to take shape.

Dani Yatom, a member of the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, was invited to attend a NATO conference in Brussels last year. While reviewing the agenda, Yatom, a retired major general, was surprised to see that the meeting was titled "The Iranian Challenge" and not "The Iranian Threat."

When a speaker with a French accent mentioned that a US military strike against Iranian nuclear facilities would be the most dangerous scenario of all, Yatom said, politely but firmly: "Sir, you are wrong. The worst scenario would be if Iran acquired an atom bomb."


PHOTO GALLERY: ISRAEL'S PLAN OF ATTACK
Click on a picture to launch the image gallery (8 Photos)



Yatom, 63, has spent most of his life in the military. He was a military adviser to former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and, in the mid-1990s, was named head of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency. Nevertheless, Yatom, a member of the Labor Party, is not some reckless hawk. Unlike most Knesset members, he flatly rejects, for example, a major Israeli offensive against the Islamist Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

But Yatom's willingness to strike a compromise ends when he is asked what he considers to be the best response to the Iranian nuclear program. "We no longer believe in the effectiveness of sanctions," says Yatom. "A military operation is needed if the world wants to stop Iran."


FROM THE MAGAZINE
Find out how you can reprint this DER SPIEGEL article in your publication. When Israeli Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz, a former defense minister, expressed similar sentiments 10 days ago, they were viewed, especially in Europe, as the isolated opinions of a card-carrying hardliner seeking to score points with the electorate in a bid to succeed Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. In truth, however, there is now a consensus within the Israeli government that an air strike against the Iranian nuclear facilities has become unavoidable. "Most members of the Israeli cabinet no longer believe that sanctions will convince President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to change course," says Minister of Immigrant Absorption Yaakov Edri.

The one question over which Israel's various political groups disagree is the timing of an attack. The doves argue that diplomatic efforts by the United Nations should be allowed to continue until Iran is on the verge of completing the bomb. That way, Israel could at least argue convincingly that all non-military options had been exhausted.

The hawks, on the other hand, believe time is running out. They stress that there is now a "favorable window of opportunity" that will close with the US presidential election in November, and that Israel can only depend on American support for as long as current US President George W. Bush is still in charge in Washington. They are convinced that the country cannot truly depend on any of the candidates to succeed Bush in office. Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic candidate, has already said that he favors direct negotiations with Tehran. And even if Republican John McCain wins the race, politicians in Jerusalem do not expect him to be ordering an attack as his first official act -- despite his performance, at a campaign appearance last year, of the Beach Boys' song "Barbara Ann" with the lyrics: "Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran."


FORUM

Should the West Attack to Prevent Iran Obtaining Nukes?
Discuss the issue with other SPIEGEL ONLINE readers!

President Bush, however, has recently been sending out signals that are suspiciously reminiscent of the run-up to the Iraq war. Then, as today, he insisted that "all options are on the table." And then, as today, he sought to appease the Europeans by saying that all diplomatic channels would be exhausted first. But during his recent visit to Slovenia, Bush said: "There's a lot of urgencies when it comes to dealing with Iran, and the Israeli political folks ... if you go to Israel and listen carefully, you'll hear that urgency in their voice."

An Iranian nuclear bomb would overshadow all other threats that Israel has faced during the 60 years of its existence. As costly as its wars have been, and as horrific the suicide bombings of radical Islamists may be, they can never pose a serious threat to the existence of the Jewish state.

But a single nuclear strike would have devastating consequences for this small country, which is only about half the size of Switzerland. In fact, international strategists commonly refer to Israel as a "one-bomb country."

Jerusalem's military leaders claim that Tehran could curtail every Israeli military campaign -- in the Gaza Strip, for example -- with only the credible threat of a nuclear strike. Despite its military strength, they say, the country would be practically defenseless. Even worse, the mere existence of an Iranian nuclear bomb, the government in Jerusalem believes, would trigger an exodus of the educated elite that could spell disaster for the country, both economically and culturally. "Iran would be in a position to destroy the Zionist dream without even pressing a button," says Ephraim Sneh, a retired general and cabinet minister for many years.

All experts agree that the Iranian bomb doesn't yet exist. Nevertheless, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad continues to threaten the Jewish state with destruction at every opportunity. "If the enemy thinks they can break the Iranian nation with pressure, they are wrong," he said last week.

Even the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mohamed ElBaradei, voiced in a recent SPIEGEL interview (more...) his concern that Iran is sending out the message that it could "build the bomb in a relatively short period of time."

And no one knows better than the Israeli leadership just how much power lies in the mere belief that a country has nuclear weapons. After all, Israel itself has used this belief as a deterrent for the past 40 years. It is believed that an estimated 100 to 200 nuclear warheads have been produced at the Dimona reactor in the Negev Desert. Israeli historian Benny Morris, who is not normally considered a hardliner, recently suggested using the weapons: "If the issue is whether Israel or Iran should perish, then Iran should perish."

Jerusalem has already demonstrated that it is not only prepared for, but also technically capable of, frustrating the nuclear ambitions of a hostile country. In 1981, the Israelis bombed Iraq's Osirak reactor. Flying in tight formation to avoid being detected by enemy radar, eight F-16 fighter-bombers traveled 900 kilometers (560 miles) from Israel to Iraq, where they dropped 16 thousand-kilo bombs, destroying the reactor. Victor Ostrovsky, a former Mossad agent, revealed that the Israelis had paid a French technician working in the reactor to plant a transponder there.

The second time was on Sept. 6, 2007, when Israeli F-16 fighter-bombers entered northern Syrian airspace along the Turkish border and destroyed a suspected nuclear site in eastern Syria. Before the attack, a group of special forces soldiers were reportedly dropped off on the ground to mark the target for a laser beam. To this day, the government in Damascus claims that the site was not a nuclear facility. However, images the Mossad has obtained of the building's interior allegedly reveal similarities with the North Korean reactor in Yongbyon.

Iran could be next. In a recent letter to Austrian Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak wrote that Tehran is not far from the "point of no return" at which the Israelis believe it could no longer be prevented from developing a bomb. Israeli intelligence officials believe that Iranian weapons engineers could have enough enriched uranium to build a nuclear warhead by 2009.

In reaching this conclusion, the Israelis are expressly contradicting the assertion, put forward in a report by US intelligence issued last December, that Iran shut down its nuclear weapons program in 2003. "The Iranians resumed the program at full speed in 2005," says Yossi Kuperwasser, the director for intelligence analysis with Israeli military intelligence at the time.
While the Europeans continue to pin their hopes on diplomacy and are convinced that a negotiated solution that would allow Tehran to save face is still possible, the Israelis already view the UN sanctions regime as a failure. Russia and China, they say, sabotaged the boycott from the very beginning, and even the Europeans have only half-heartedly supported sanctions.


PHOTO GALLERY: ISRAEL'S PLAN OF ATTACK
Click on a picture to launch the image gallery (8 Photos)



According to the Israelis, companies from Austria and Switzerland have recently signed agreements for the delivery of natural gas with Tehran, and even the German government has only slightly limited trade with the mullah-run regime. "The Iranians don't even feel the sanctions," says Tzachi Hanegbi, chairman of the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. According to Hanegbi, the international community will have to unite if it hopes to achieve anything -- "and soon."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has been reticent on the issue. During a visit to the ranch of US President George W. Bush in Crawford, Texas last November, Merkel promised to "take another look at economic contacts between German companies and Iran" and push for additional restrictions.

But there was little left of that resolve when Bush met with Merkel last Wednesday at Schloss Meseberg, the German government guesthouse outside Berlin. Her only comment about another round of UN sanctions was that she would "not rule them out." As one of her fellow Christian Democrats admits pessimistically, "Merkel is no longer pursuing this issue with any great enthusiasm."


RELATED SPIEGEL ONLINE LINKS
Photo Gallery: Israel's Plan of Attack
Interview with IAEA Boss Mohamed ElBaradei: 'If We Fail, Humanity's Survival Will Be on the Line' (06/11/2008)
Syrian-Israeli Negotiations: Olmert's Deft Golan Deal (05/22/2008)
Daniel Barenboim: My Land, My Pain (05/15/2008)
Israel's 60th Anniversary: The Poisoned Congratulations of German Know-It-Alls (05/08/2008)
New Survey Undermines Official Policy: Most Germans Feel no Responsibility for Israel (05/05/2008)
SPIEGEL Interview with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak: 'Nobody Can Push Me' (04/08/2008)
SPIEGEL Interview with Avigdor Lieberman: "Israel May Have to Act Alone" (02/12/2007)
Israel Reaffirms Tough Stance on Iran: Olmert 'Certain' Tehran Seeking Nuclear Weapons (02/12/2008)
SPIEGEL 360: Our Full Middle East CoveragePoliticians in Berlin have noted with concern signs of the next war brewing in the Middle East. Former Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, who travels regularly to Jerusalem and Washington for political talks, warns that Israel could see the Bush presidency as its last chance to gain American support for a military strike. "Politically speaking, the window for action is now, in the last months of George W. Bush's term in office," Fischer wrote recently. "The Middle East is headed for another major confrontation."

Others share this sense of unease. Karl-Theodor Freiherr zu Guttenberg, a foreign policy expert and member of the conservative Christian Social Union (CSU), says that he has "the unsettling feeling that the contemplation of a military option against Iran is gaining a new dynamic in Israel." He wants to see Berlin use its close relations with Jerusalem to deter it from launching a military strike.

This political offensive would not be without risk. "By issuing this warning, we are taking even more responsibility for (guaranteeing that) our favored approach will yield results," says Ruprecht Polenz, the chairman of the German Bundestag's Committee on Foreign Affairs. In other words, if Iran continues to pursue its nuclear program, the West will have to close ranks with Jerusalem. "Under no circumstances can the impression be created that Israel would be left alone with the possibility of an Iranian atom bomb," says Polenz.

Israel's main ally, the United States, is still at odds over what constitutes the right strategy on Iran. The Bush administration is divided. Vice President Dick Cheney "would still want an attack," says Flynt Leverett, a former official in the US State Department and now a Middle East expert with the New America Foundation. However he believes the secretary of state favors a different approach: "Condi Rice is buying time to get the president through his term."

Bruce Riedel, a Middle East expert who spent many years working for the CIA, says it would be "very difficult for this administration to start a war with Iran. There would be public uproar and congressional uproar." But the situation is different from Israel's perspective, says Riedel. "There is some risk that Israel thinks it has limited time to act and it has a green light from American politicians."

Besides, the Israeli Air Force is known for its "inventive solutions to military problems," says Riedel, who has strong contacts to Israel, referring to the feasibility of such an attack. "Israeli military planners tell me it is mission doable."


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This is why Riedel sees an Israeli military strike, with the US government's consent, as the most likely attack scenario. But the consequences, according to Riedel, would not differ from those of an American attack. "An Israeli attack will be seen as a US attack. Iran will retaliate against both Israel and the US." The consequences, says Riedel, would be fatal. "We will see a Middle East in flames."

Nevertheless, in Israel it is no longer a matter of whether there will be a military strike, but when. It is clear that the attack would be exclusively an aerial strike. Jerusalem recently received approval from Washington for a purchase of F-22 stealth bombers. The centrifuges used to enrich uranium at the Natanz nuclear facility are apparently the main target. According to Israeli information, the centrifuges are kept above ground and are thus easier to destroy. The reactor in Bushehr is seen as another possible target.

And the Iranian air defenses? "We know that Iran's air defenses are not among the world's best," says former Mossad chief Yatom. "They can be overcome." Nevertheless, many Israelis still hope that the Americans will do the job for them. "It could still be the case," says Yatom, "that George W. Bush wants to guarantee himself a place in the history books with this last act."

.............................................benny