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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (162063)	5/15/2005 12:09:10 AM
From: bentway	Respond to of 281500

IRAN: ISRAEL PREPARES ITS ATTACK (Updated) This morning's Times of London carries the first confirmation from a major news source that--just as the Bush administration's neo-cons had expected and plotted for--Israel is secretly preparing an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities. You will recall that, on February 18, DIRELAND brought you reports from the European press of a Bush speech -- virtually ignored here in the U.S. -- in which The Twit gave his green light to an Israeli attack on Iran and said he'd support it. That attack is no longer theoretical but in an advanced stage of planning. "The inner cabinet of Ariel Sharon, the Israeli prime minister, gave 'initial authorisation' for an attack at a private meeting last month on his ranch in the Negev desert," the London Times reports today. " Israeli forces have used a mock-up of Iran’s Natanz uranium enrichment plant in the desert to practise destroying it. Their tactics include raids by Israel’s elite Shaldag (Kingfisher) commando unit and airstrikes by F-15 jets from 69 Squadron, using bunker-busting bombs to penetrate underground facilities. The plans have been discussed with American officials who are said to have indicated provisionally that they would not stand in Israel’s way if all international efforts to halt Iranian nuclear projects failed...." This news comes just one day after the Financial Times reported -- to the indifference of the U.S. media -- that Iran was "offering to halt development of most of its nuclear fuel cycle facilities while retaining the ability to enrich small amounts of uranium." This back-channel compromise offer from the Iranians went unreported in the Stateside press. The Iranians have known an attack on their nuke-development centers was in the works ever since last Fall, when the story about the AIPAC spy ring at the Pentagon broke: the principle task of the spies was securing --for Israel -- classified U.S. intelligence on Iran in furtherance of plans for an attack. Which is why neo-cons in the administration -- who have an ideological commitment to a military strike against Iran -- lent themselves to this espionage and provided the documents to Israel. The imminent threat of Israeli bombing is obviously what is driving the compromise offer reported by the F.T., which could jump-start a new round of diplomatic negotiations to avoid war -- but the respected financial daily also reported that the U.S. was unlikely to accept the offer of a near-total climbdown from Iran. Saturday's declarations from Tehran refusing to accept a U.S. offer to drop its opposition to Iranian membership in the WTO and other economic incentives in return for total elimination of Iran's nuke progrm are clearly for public consumption within Iran and an attempt to put a brave face on things even as the Islamic Republic makes confidential backchannel offers of compromise. The drive toward war-by-proxy with Iran is thus in high gear, with disastrous consequences not only for the Iranian people, but for the region and the world: a proliferating nuclear arms race motored by countries Washington doesn't like, who see a nuclear shield as the only protection against Bush's announced first-strike doctrine; and a new mega-motivation for those whom the Islamist mullahs are trying to recruit to respond to the call for more terrorist jihad. Not to mention the distinct possibility of radioactive clouds wafting contaminated desert sands throughout the region, empoisoning food, livestock, and innocent human beings, even among U.S. allies. If The Twit and his new Secretary of State -- a rather literal-minded woman not known in diplomatic circles as the brightest bulb in the chandelier either -- reject the chance to avoid war embodied in the compromise Iranian offer, the Times of London's report today strongly suggests the bombs may begin falling soon.... UPDATE at 10:00 AM -- On ABC's This Week this morning, George Stephanopolous did briefly ask Condi Rice about the London Sunday Times report--but Little Georgie blundered hugely, asking her if the U.S. had "authorized" an Israeli strike at Iran's nuke capacity. This allowed Condi to quickly bat away the question by saying, "Nobody's authorizing anything here." (Israel's government needs only its own "authorization" for such an attack.) The entire exchange with Condi on Iran lasted less than a minute. What Stephanopolous should have asked was whether the U.S. supported such an attack or thought it was a good idea, as well as asking her about Bush's little-noticed February 18 comments in the affirmative cited above. But Georgie is still really a tyro in the news biz, and infinitely less tough as a questioner than, say Tim Russert. So, after Condi wiggled away from the question with a non-denial denial of Washington's support for an Israeli attack on Iran, Stephanopolous went on to devote 15 minutes to an interview with Jose Canseco on steroid use by athletes--such are the priorities of interest at ABC's ratings-chasing news division....But Russert, too, had Condi on this morning--and never asked her about Iran at al. UPDATE on March 14, 7:00 AM -- Reuters today reports that the consequences of Washington's position has been to pusheIran to consider setting a deadline for a final resolution of its nuclear question if its compromise offer is not accepted as the basis for discussion. The compromise by Iran, according to Reuters, includes "intrusive U.N. inspections of its [Iran's] nuclear facilities which would verify that uranium is not enriched to bomb-grade levels." That, it seems to me, is a reasonable alternative to war...Meanwhile, the L.A. Times reports today that, as its headline puts it, "Data on Iran Scant, U.S. Official Says," quoting Bush's new National Security Adviser, Stephen Hadley. "Hadley was asked whether, given the intelligence failures in prewar Iraq, he was convinced that U.S. intelligence in Iran was good enough to declare that it was developing a nuclear bomb," the paper reports. Hadley's answer: "Intelligence in Iran is hard to come by." Deja vu? Posted by Doug Ireland at 07:36 AM

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (162063)	5/15/2005 2:39:38 AM
From: marcos	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Again you lie outright - nowhere will you find me saying that any particular group was 'the only rightful owners' ... you'll find the exact opposite, go back far enough and you'll find me pointing out to you that various non-muslim communities had been living in peace among the muslim majority in Palestine for centuries, and that they were strongly opposed to zionism, they understood clearly the consequences of a foreign group robbing and dominating natives, in the course of setting up the Excludostaat ... no doubt you'd lie about them too, if they were to post to SI ... it just shows your lack of any valid justification for your land-grab project, when all you can come up with is to distort the words of its critics