The Grand Ayatollah of Nuclear Menace

As we all know only too well, the United States and Israel would hate to see Iran possessing nuclear weapons. Being “the only nuclear power in the Middle East” is a great card for Israel to have in its hand. But — in the real, non-propaganda world — is USrael actually fearful of an attack from a nuclear-armed Iran? In case you’ve forgotten…

In 2007, in a closed discussion, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said that in her opinion “Iranian nuclear weapons do not pose an existential threat to Israel.” She “also criticized the exaggerated use that [Israeli] Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is making of the issue of the Iranian bomb, claiming that he is attempting to rally the public around him by playing on its most basic fears.” ¹

2009: “A senior Israeli official in Washington” asserted that “Iran would be unlikely to use its missiles in an attack [against Israel] because of the certainty of retaliation.” ²

In 2010 the Sunday Times of London (January 10) reported that Brigadier-General Uzi Eilam, war hero, pillar of the Israeli defense establishment, and former director-general of Israel’s Atomic Energy Commission, “believes it will probably take Iran seven years to make nuclear weapons.”

Early last month, US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta told a television audience: “Are they [Iran] trying to develop a nuclear weapon? No, but we know that they’re trying to develop a nuclear capability.” ³

A week later we could read in the New York Times (January 15) that “three leading Israeli security experts — the Mossad chief, Tamir Pardo, a former Mossad chief, Efraim Halevy, and a former military chief of staff, Dan Halutz — all recently declared that a nuclear Iran would not pose an existential threat to Israel.”

Then, a few days afterward, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, in an interview with Israeli Army Radio (January 18), had this exchange:

Question: Is it Israel’s judgment that Iran has not yet decided to turn its nuclear potential into weapons of mass destruction?

Barak: People ask whether Iran is determined to break out from the control [inspection] regime right now … in an attempt to obtain nuclear weapons or an operable installation as quickly as possible. Apparently that is not the case.

Lastly, we have the US Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, in a report to Congress: “We do not know, however, if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons. … There are “certain things [the Iranians] have not done” that would be necessary to build a warhead. ⁴

Admissions like the above — and there are others — are never put into headlines by the American mass media; indeed, only very lightly reported at all; and sometimes distorted — On the Public Broadcasting System (PBS News Hour, January 9), the non-commercial network much beloved by American liberals, the Panetta quote above was reported as: “But we know that they’re trying to develop a nuclear capability, and that’s what concerns us.” Flagrantly omitted were the preceding words: “Are they trying to develop a nuclear weapon? No …” ⁵

One of Israel’s leading military historians, Martin van Creveld, was interviewed by Playboy magazine in June 2007: Read more È

A Brilliant Statement from a Not-So-Brilliant Man

A few days ago presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich told the people of Florida about his plans for a permanent colony- base on the Moon, and promised to work toward turning the satellite into the 51st US state. I, and many others, including our leaders and representatives, thought we already had one- a 51^st State. Our current president, Barack Obama, has publicly and repeatedly recognized the 51^st State. So did our previous president, George W. Bush. The United States Congress has been treating ‘it’ as such. The ordinary but informed public has acknowledged ‘it’ for years. Thus, there was not anything new or groundbreaking about the notion of a 51^st state in Gingrich’s recently publicized statements and promises. That was not what quickly grabbed my attention. And certainly that was not what I consider a brilliant idea coming from a not so brilliant man. What I considered brilliant, both as an idea and a solution to a major problem, was sending the 51^st state up to the moon.

For years I have been thinking and pondering about possible solutions to our 51^st state, considered by many in the world as the greatest threat to global peace and security- far more dangerous than Iraq, Iran or North Korea. For a very long time I have been searching for a possible answer to stopping what world human rights organizations consider a major human rights violator. I know I am not among the minority when it comes to this 51^st state, which has been declared a “ Nightmare for Human Rightsâ€�, even inside the walls of the timid United Nations. As a life-long advocate for children, how could I not seek solutions to the 51^st state problem, known for its ongoing torture, abuse and imprisonment of children? I even thought about relocating the 51^st state from its current location, and considered various spots ruled by the 51^st state’s creators and backers. Read more È

Israel’s Shimon Peres Salutes Azerbaijan while the Story-Line Keeps Getting Murkier

Last week Boiling Frogs Post broke the newly brewing story-line in the war propaganda against Iran involving an alleged Iranian terror plot in Azerbaijan. Yesterday we had a follow up on the emerging ‘alleged’ details in the ‘alleged’ plot claiming Israeli diplomats and religious figures were the intended targets of the alleged Iranian assassination plot [All Emphasis Mine]: Read more È

From Supposed Assassination Plot against Saudi Diplomat to Supposed Assassination Plot against Israeli Diplomat

Last week we broke the newly brewing story-line in the war propaganda against Iran here at Boiling Frogs Post. The new scenario was originated, disseminated and promoted by a known member of the loyal propaganda machine of our global imperial pursuits, Radio Free Europe. According to the new story-line, our soon-to-be-NATO member intimate ally regime in Central Asia, Azerbaijan, claims it has allegedly exposed an Iranian assassination plot and Iranian terror cell in its capital city-Baku [All Emphasis Mine]: Read more È

Turning the Magical Mega Dollar Wheels

When it comes to elections and political fundraising there are certain magic words, sentences and phrases. Of course I am not talking about ‘increasing employment’ or ‘creating jobs.’ Those lines are used later- after the competition is almost ended, and the deal becomes pretty much a slam dunk. No. I am talking about the real political ‘magic words.’ As you know, as soon as they utter those magic words and make those pledges the money magically starts flowing into their campaign sack. And by that I don’t mean peanuts. I don’t mean humble individual contributions by voting citizens. I am talking about ‘serious money;’ magically serious, that is. I am talking millions; not in Lira or Peso, but in US dollars. You get it; no?

Okay. Mitt Romney just started using some of those magic words- magical lines. Let me give you an example, sure to bring some of those mega magical dollars into his camp.

On his website Mitt Romney suggests that the victim of Russian aggression would be, improbably, Central Asia. A Romney administration’s policies, he writes, would:

Deter Russian ambitions to its south by enhancing diplomatic ties, increasing military training and assistance, and negotiating trade pacts and educational exchanges with Central Asian states.

Magical indeed. You don’t have to read in between the lines. Just read the lines and you’ll see the mega dollar signs in the eyes of … who? Okay, let’s play it dumb and slow in case there are some MSM readers are among us reading this post. We want them to get it to. Special treatment.

So, Romney says he will ‘increase military training and assistance’ for all these Central Asia nations. Meaning: Read more È

Organized Terror & Ethnic Cleansing in Palestine

The official Israeli government explanation for the ‘disappearance’ of 750,000 Palestinian Arabs from the land (roughly half the Arab population in Palestine in 1948) was that they left “voluntarily.� The “new history� of Israel emerged within the past couple decades due to declassified documents relating to the 1948 war and its origins, and with a number of Israeli historians recreating the history of Israel and challenging the official story. David Ben-Gurion, who would become Israel’s first Prime Minister, was a leading Zionist at the time. He and other Zionists “accepted� the UN partition plan, wrote Jerome Slater, “only as a necessary tactical step that would later be reversed.� In a 1937 letter to his son, Ben-Gurion wrote:

A partial Jewish state is not the end, but only the beginning. The establishment of such a Jewish state will serve as a means in our historical efforts to redeem the country in its entirety… We shall organize a modern defense force… and then I am certain that we will not be prevented from settling in other parts of the country, either by mutual agreement with our Arab neighbors or by some other means… We will expel the Arabs and take their places… with the forces at our disposal. [1]

In the same year, Ben-Gurion also wrote that, “The Arabs will have to go, but one needs an opportune moment for making it happen, such as a war.â€�[2] A year later, in 1938, Ben-Gurion told a Zionist meeting that, “I favor partition of the country because when we become a strong power after the establishment of the state, we will abolish partition and spread throughout all of Palestine.â€� Palestine, as defined by the Zionists, had included the West Bank, Golan Heights in Syria, Jerusalem, southern Lebanon, and a significant degree of Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.[3] Read more È

Israel: A Buffer against Arab Nationalism

Israel emerged in the post-War period due to a great many complex domestic and international political reasons: to provide a place to direct the Jewish survivors of the Holocaust, to allow the British to formally end the Mandate over Palestine which they held as their empire was crumbling, and to serve as a ‘buffer state’ for Western nations in the Middle East, a region of the world which was identified as a necessity to control in order to secure its vast oil resources and strategic position in relation to the East. America in the post-War period, however, was deeply divided in its strategic-imperial circles on whether or not to support the State of Israel, which did not become a stated and strong policy until the later 1950s. The State Department, in particular, full of individuals who were familiar with the politics and changes in the Middle East, were worried that support for Israel would threaten America’s interests in the region by antagonizing the Arab states and ruining America’s good reputation following the War. Others, however, won out in the end, largely by arguing that such a state in the Middle East would be a significant support to American interests, acting as a powerful ‘buffer’ against the spread of Arab nationalism and Pan-Arabism. In its first years, Israel walked a balance of receiving support from both the United States and the Soviet Union. With the rise of Nasser in Egypt, however, America saw its imperial interest in supporting Israel. Read more È