EDITOR: Preparation for war against Iran continue!
As Israeli propaganda for the war against Iran continues, and the forces are quietly collecting in the Gulf states and in Israel, the war of words also continues to flare up. Obama, as was the case since the start of his tenure, does both: he warmongers through Israel, and pretends to be worried about Israeli intentions. Who is fooling by this strange behaviour? Only the American population, of course, who can always be sold more wars under the guise of peacekeeping. He did not get his Nobel prize for nothing, you know… he has to start another war, now that he is out of Iraq, that peaceful country after a decade of the US/UK special peacekeeping.
The west is earning its demise with every mad and criminal action it advances.
Robert Fisk: An attack on Tehran would be madness. So don’t rule it out: Independent
After invading Iraq over weapons of mass destruction, we plan to clap as Israel bombs Iran
ROBERT FISK SATURDAY 04 FEBRUARY 2012
If Israel really attacks Iran this year, it – and the Americans – will be more dotty than their enemies think. True, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a crackpot, but then so is Avigdor Lieberman, who is apparently the Israeli Foreign Minister. Maybe the two want to do each other a favour. But why on earth would the Israelis want to bomb Iran and thus bring down on their heads the fury of both the Lebanese Hezbollah and Hamas at the very same moment? Along with Syria, no doubt. Not to mention sucking the West – Europe and the US – into the same shooting match.
Maybe it’s because I’ve been in the Middle East for 36 years, but I sniff some old herrings in the air. Leon Panetta, the US Defence Secretary no less, warns us that Israel may strike. So does CNN – an older herring it would be difficult to find – and even old David Ignatius, who hasn’t been a Middle East correspondent for a decade or two, is telling us the same, taken in, as usual, by his Israeli “sources”.
I expected this sort of bumph when I perused last week’s The New York Times Magazine – not an advertisement, this, for I would not want The Independent readers to burn their energy on such tosh – and read a warning from an Israeli “analyst” (I am still trying to discover what an “analyst” is), Ronen Bergman of Israel’s Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper.
And here is his “kicker” (as we call it in the trade), which is as near as you can get to playing the propaganda ragtime. “After speaking with many [sic] senior Israeli leaders and chiefs [sic yet again] of the military and intelligence, I have come to believe that Israel will indeed strike Iran in 2012. Perhaps in the small and ever diminishing window that is left, the US will choose to intervene after all, but from the Israelis’ perspective, there is not much hope for that. Instead, there is that peculiar Israeli mixture of fear… and tenacity, the fierce conviction, right or wrong, that only the Israelis can ultimately defend themselves.”
Now, first of all, any journalist who predicts an Israeli strike on Iran is putting his head on the chopping block. But surely any journalist worth his salt – and there are plenty of good journos in Israel – would ask himself a question: Who am I working for? My newspaper? Or my government?
Panetta, pictured below, who lied to US forces in Iraq by claiming to them they were there because of 9/11, should know better than to play this game. CNN ditto. I shall forget Ignatius. But what is all this? Nine years after invading Iraq – an enormously successful adventure, we are still told – because Saddam Hussein had “weapons of mass destruction”, we plan to clap our hands as Israel bombs Iran because of more unprovable “weapons of mass destruction”. Now I don’t doubt that within seconds of hearing the news, Barack Obama’s grotesque speech-writers will be grovelling to find the right words to support such an Israeli attack. If Obama can abandon Palestinian freedom and statehood for his own re-election, he can certainly support Israeli aggression in the hope that this will get him back in the White House.
If Iranian missiles start smashing into US warships in the Gulf, however – not to mention US bases in Afghanistan – then the speechwriters may have much more work to do. So just don’t let the Brits or the Frenchies get involved.
Iran military manoeuvres heighten Middle East tensions: Guardian
Revolutionary Guards exercises follow threats by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei against US and Israel
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaks to worshippers at a Tehran mosque.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards are carrying out military exercises amid rising tensions over the country’s nuclear programme and rumours of a possible strike by Israel or the US.
The manoeuvres in southern Iran involve ground forces and follow threats by the Islamic regime to close the strategic Strait of Hormuz in retaliation to western sanctions.
The show of military strength also follows a warning by Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, that any military strike by the US or Israel would only make Iran stronger. Khamenei also pledged that Iran will help any nation or group that confronts the “cancer” Israel,
He affirmed that Iran had assisted militant groups like Hezbollah and Hamas – a well-known policy, but one that Iranian leaders rarely acknowledge explicitly.
“We have intervened in anti-Israel matters, and it brought victory in the 33-day war by Hezbollah against Israel in 2006, and in the 22-day war” between Hamas and Israel in the Gaza Strip, he said.
Israel’s large-scale military incursion against Hamas in 2008-09 in Gaza ended in a ceasefire, with Israel claiming to have inflicted heavy damage on the militant organisation. The war in Lebanon ended with a UN-brokered truce that sent thousands of Lebanese troops and international peacekeepers into southern Lebanon to prevent another outbreak.
“From now on, in any place, if any nation or any group confronts the Zionist regime, we will endorse and we will help. We have no fear expressing this,” said Khamenei. He said Israel was a “cancerous tumour that should be cut and will be cut”.
His speech followed suggestions by Israel that military strikes are an increasing possibility if sanctions fail to halt the Islamic Republic’s nuclear programme.
An Israeli foreign ministry spokesman said he wasn’t surprised by Khamenei’s remarks. “It’s the same kind of hate speech that we’ve been seeing from Iran for many years now,” Yigal Palmor said.
Khamenei said the US would suffer defeat and lose standing in the region if Washington decided to use military force.
“Iran will not withdraw. Then what happens?” asked Khamenei. “In conclusion, the west’s hegemony and threats will be discredited” in the Middle East. “The hegemony of Iran will be promoted. In fact, this will be in our service.”
Western forces have recently bolstered their naval presence in the Gulf led by the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln.
Last month, Iran’s navy carried out 10 days of exercises in the Gulf. The manoeuvres by the Revolutionary Guard, under the direct control of Khamenei, were announced by Iranian state media.
Iran: Oil ban will not halt nuclear program: Haaretz
Iranian oil minister says his country will cut its oil exports to some European countries due to the sanctions imposed last month.
Iran’s oil minister said his country would not retreat from its nuclear program even if its crude oil exports grind to a halt, the official IRNA news agency reported on Saturday.
But he also called on the European Union, which accounted for a quarter of Iranian crude oil sales in the third quarter of 2011, to review its decision last week to bank Iranian oil imports from July 1.
“We will not abandon our just nuclear course, even if we cannot sell one drop of oil,” Rostam Qasemi told reporters, according to IRNA.
Tension with the West rose last month when the United States and the European Union imposed the toughest sanctions yet on Iran in a bid to force it to provide more information on its nuclear program. The measures are aimed at shutting off the second-biggest OPEC oil exporters’ sales of crude.
Qasemi said Iran would cut oil exports to some nations in Europe – he did not specify which – in retaliation for the 27-state EU’s decision to stop importing Iranian crude.
“Our oil exports will certainly be cut to some European countries … We will decide about other European countries later,” Qasemi told a news conference, IRNA reported.
He urged Europe to reconsider its ban, and said the oil market is in balance now but would be thrown into turmoil without Iranian crude supplies.
“Unfortunately the EU has succumbed to America’s pressure. I hope they would review their decision on sanctioning Iran’s oil exports,” Qasemi said.
“The international crude market will experience turmoil in the absence of Iranian oil with unforeseen consequences on oil prices,” he said.
However, analysts say the global oil market would not be greatly affected if Iran were to turn off the oil tap to Europe.
The EU’s ban on Iranian oil came after U.S. President Barack Obama signed new sanctions into law on New Year’s Eve that would block any institution dealing with Iran’s central bank from the U.S. financial system.
If fully implemented, these measures will make it impossible for countries to buy Iranian oil.
Alternative crude buyers
Brent crude prices rose to near three-month peaks on Friday, partly thanks to oil investors covering short positions ahead of the weekend due to the standoff between the West and Iran over its nuclear program.
The United States wants buyers in Asia, Iran’s biggest oil market, to cut imports to put further pressure on Iran, which is scrambling to find new buyers and persuade existing customers to keep doing business with it.
But Iran remains a key supplier for many countries, and some of its major customers are seeking waivers from the U.S. from the sanctions while they look for alternative sources of oil.
Saudi Arabia, Iran’s regional rival, has promised to make up any shortfall in supply.
Iranian officials have said sanctions have had no impact on it, while the country’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei threatened on Friday to retaliate against the West for
sanctions.
Qasemi also played down the importance of Europe as a market for its exports.
“We have no problem to find other crude buyers to replace the European countries,” he was quoted as saying.
The United States and its allies say Iran is trying to develop weapons under cover of a civilian nuclear program. But energy-rich Iran denies this, saying it needs nuclear technology to generate electricity.
The U.S. and Israel have not ruled out military action if diplomacy fails to resolve the standoff. Iran has warned of firm retaliation if attacked, including targeting Israel and U.S.
bases in the Gulf and closing off the vital oil shipping route through the Strait of Hormuz.
But Qasemi played down the possibility of Iran blocking the crucial waterway.
“Iran is not after tension, and closure of the Strait is a politically motivated issue,” he said.
Isolated Iran is also facing problems over the price it charges neighbor Turkey for its natural gas exports. Turkey said on Jan. 31 that it was taking Iran to international
arbitration over the matter.
Qasemi rejected Turkey’s complaint that the price was too high. “Iran surely cannot decrease its natural gas price (for Turkey) without legal authorization,” he said.
Iran exports 10 billion cubic metres of gas each year to Turkey, making it Turkey’s second-biggest supplier after Russia.
Drums of war beat louder as Iran and Israel step up rhetoric: Independent
Evidence is mounting that Washington believes an Israeli attack on Iran is now only a matter of time.
DONALD MACINTYRE SATURDAY 04 FEBRUARY 2012
Iran’s supreme leader threatened to attack Israel yesterday in retaliation for Western sanctions against the Islamic Republic, warning that “threatening Iran and attacking Iran will harm America”. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s declaration came as apprehension of possible conflict was intensified by a report suggesting that the US Defense Secretary, Leon Panetta, believes Israel could strike nuclear targets in Iran before the summer after concluding that military action might be needed before it was “too late” to stop Tehran’s nuclear programme.
The Ayatollah used a televised sermon to warn that threats of war – which would be “ten times against the interests of the US itself” – would not deter Iran from its “nuclear course”. And he declared the Tehran regime’s backing for “any nation or group” that wants “to confront and fight” against Israel. He also said that Tehran was seeking to “extract a price” from Israel for the assassination of four nuclear scientists since November 2010.
The threat from Iran is apparently being taken seriously in Israel. Yoram Cohen, the head of the domestic intelligence agency Shin Bet, was reported as having told a closed meeting in Tel Aviv this week that Iran was seeking to strike Israeli targets around the world in an attempt to stem the assassinations of scientists.
Mr Cohen was quoted by the liberal newspaper Haaretz as having cited “three serious attacks” since last summer that had been thwarted as they were “on the verge of being carried out,” against the Israeli consul general in Istanbul, in Baku, Azerbaijan, and two weeks ago in Thailand.
The Shin Bet head said that Iran believed Israel was behind the attacks on its scientists and added: “It doesn’t matter if it’s true or not that Israel took out the nuclear scientists. A major, serious country like Iran cannot let this go on. They want to deter Israel and extract a price so that decision makers in Israel think twice before they order an attack on an Iranian scientist.”
The main media focus in Israel, however, were the fears attributed to Leon Panetta in a report in The Washington Post – which Mr Panetta has not denied – that Israel might launch a strike on Iran’s nuclear plants in April, May or June before Iran enters what his Israeli counterpart, Ehud Barak, this week called the “immunity” zone.
Mr Barak has coined the term to describe the point from which Iran will have developed sufficient knowledge and material so successfully that an external attack would be unable derail any ambition it may have to attain a nuclear weapon.
The administration in Tehran have denied that its nuclear programme is for anything other than peaceful energy purposes. Speaking in Germany yesterday Mr Panetta said that “all options” remained on the table. But he said “the most important thing” was to maintain unified global support for tough economic sanctions.
The public statements followed a week of intense discussion about Iran’s perceived nuclear threat at the annual conference of Israel’s security establishment at the Inter-Disciplinary Centre in Herzilya. Despite unanimity among prominent intelligence, military and political leaders about the need to halt the threat, there were also strong signs of what Mr Barak in his keynote address openly acknowledged were “disagreements among us” about how to do it.
One of the emerging areas of disagreement appears to be the vulnerability of Iranian sites to bunker-buster bombing raids. The Vice Prime Minister, Moshe Yaalon, while saying that “one way or the other” the “messianic-apocalyptic” Iranian regime’s “nuclear project” had to be stopped, went out of his way to reject claims that Iran’s underground facilities might be invulnerable to “bunker-buster” bombs.
In remarks that appeared to run counter to Mr Barak’s warning that it might soon become “too late” to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities, Mr Yaalon added: “Any facility that is protected by humans can be penetrated by humans. Every military facility in Iran can be hit, and I say this from my experience as [military] chief of staff.”
Equally, the current military chief of staff, Benny Gantz, did not refer to the “immunity zone”, pointing instead to the strategy of “continuing to disrupt Iran’s attempts to attain nuclear weapons” and adding that it was important “to continue to build strong, reliable, impressive military capabilities, and to be prepared to use them if and when the need arises”.
Robert Fisk: We’ve been here before – and it suits Israel that we never forget ‘Nuclear Iran’: Independent
The Ayatollah ordered the entire nuclear project to be closed down because it was the work of the devil
ROBERT FISK WEDNESDAY 25 JANUARY 2012
Turning round a story is one of the most difficult tasks in journalism – and rarely more so than in the case of Iran. Iran, the dark revolutionary Islamist menace. Shia Iran, protector and manipulator of World Terror, of Syria and Lebanon and Hamas and Hezbollah. Ahmadinejad, the Mad Caliph. And, of course, Nuclear Iran, preparing to destroy Israel in a mushroom cloud of anti-Semitic hatred, ready to close the Strait of Hormuz – the moment the West’s (or Israel’s) forces attack.
Given the nature of the theocratic regime, the repulsive suppression of its post-election opponents in 2009, not to mention its massive pools of oil, every attempt to inject common sense into the story also has to carry a medical health warning: no, of course Iran is not a nice place. But …
Let’s take the Israeli version which, despite constant proof that Israel’s intelligence services are about as efficient as Syria’s, goes on being trumpeted by its friends in the West, none more subservient than Western journalists. The Israeli President warns us now that Iran is on the cusp of producing a nuclear weapon. Heaven preserve us. Yet we reporters do not mention that Shimon Peres, as Israeli Prime Minister, said exactly the same thing in 1996. That was 16 years ago. And we do not recall that the current Israeli PM, Benjamin Netanyahu, said in 1992 that Iran would have a nuclear bomb by 1999. That would be 13 years ago. Same old story.
In fact, we don’t know that Iran really is building a nuclear weapon. And after Iraq, it’s amazing that the old weapons of mass destruction details are popping with the same frequency as all the poppycock about Saddam’s titanic arsenal. Not to mention the date problem. When did all this start? The Shah. The old boy wanted nuclear power. He even said he wanted a bomb because “the US and the Soviet Union had nuclear bombs” and no one objected. Europeans rushed to supply the dictator’s wish. Siemens – not Russia – built the Bushehr nuclear facility.
And when Ayatollah Khomeini, Scourge of the West, Apostle of Shia Revolution, etc, took over Iran in 1979, he ordered the entire nuclear project to be closed down because it was “the work of the Devil”. Only when Saddam invaded Iran – with our Western encouragement – and started using poison gas against the Iranians (chemical components arriving from the West, of course) was Khomeini persuaded to reopen it.
All this has been deleted from the historical record; it was the black-turbaned mullahs who started the nuclear project, along with the crackpot Ahmadinejad. And Israel might have to destroy this terror-weapon to secure its own survival, to ensure the West’s survival, for democracy, etc, etc.
For Palestinians in the West Bank, Israel is the brutal, colonising, occupying power. But the moment Iran is mentioned, this colonial power turns into a tiny, vulnerable, peaceful state under imminent threat of extinction. Ahmadinejad – here again, I quote Netanyahu – is more dangerous than Hitler. Israel’s own nuclear warheads – all too real and now numbering almost 300 – disappear from the story. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards are helping the Syrian regime destroy its opponents; they might like to – but there is no proof of this.
The trouble is that Iran has won almost all its recent wars without firing a shot. George W and Tony destroyed Iran’s nemesis in Iraq. They killed thousands of the Sunni army whom Iran itself always referred to as “the black Taliban”. And the Gulf Arabs, our “moderate” friends, shiver in their golden mosques as we in the West outline their fate in the event of an Iranian Shia revolution.
No wonder Cameron goes on selling weapons to these preposterous people whose armies, in many cases, could scarcely operate soup kitchens, let alone the billions of dollars of sophisticated kit we flog them under the fearful shadow of Tehran.
Bring on the sanctions. Send in the clowns.
Israeli theatre company expects Globe Shakespeare disruption: Jewish Chronicle
February 2, 2012
A senior Habimah Theatre producer has admitted that actors expect anti-Israel activists will succeed in disrupting their performance at a major international festival at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre in May.
Israel’s leading theatre company will perform The Merchant Of Venice in Hebrew as part of a six-week event at the Globe to coincide with the Cultural Olympiad.
The executive, who does not want to be identified, said the Israelis feared their performance being halted. She said: “I’ve been worried for a long time because of what happened with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall. It will be a great shame if they protest, but I am sure it will not be peaceful.
“The Globe is aware of the threat and we hope they will do everything possible. They have to think really hard about how to prevent the protesters getting in. It’s a real challenge.
“It is very difficult; there is no way to stop them. The boycotters could flood the crowd with activists. But do they think stopping us will bring peace quicker?”
The producer said Habimah had been devising ways to work around any disruption, and might even have a “surprise” for potential protesters. She added: “We are very much against all boycotts. Our artists often do things for the Palestinians and privately they go to demonstrations [to lend support].”
A Globe spokeswoman said “all sensible precautions” would be taken but would not disclose how it planned to stop demonstrators.
The theatre has already rejected opposition to its invitation to Habimah. Boycott From Within, formed by Israelis who back the boycott movement, wrote to Globe directors last month, highlighting performances by Habimah in the West Bank settlements of Ariel and Kiryat Arba.
BFW complained: “By inviting Habimah to perform in London, you are siding with its administrators in the debate on settlement performances, and you are taking a step against the conscientious Israeli actors and playwrights who have refused to perform in the settlements.” But the Globe hit back, publishing an open letter stating that festival directors had “deliberated long and hard” before deciding that “active exclusion was a profoundly problematic stance to take”.
The Globe concluded: “Habimah is the most well-known and respected Hebrew-language theatre company in the world, and are a natural choice to any programmer wishing to host a dramatic production in Hebrew.
“They are committed, publicly, to providing an ongoing arena for sensible dialogue between Jews and Arabs, Israelis and Palestinians. ”
The Globe, which said it had reached the right decision about Habimah, added that the Ramallah-based Ashtar Theatre would be performing an Arabic version of Shakespeare’s Richard II at the festival.