IT WAS THE U.S. THAT SUGGESTED TO THE ISRAELIS THAT A U.S. SHIP IS ATTACKED IN ORDER TO GET AMERICA ON THE ISRAELIS SIDE IN 1967

In a revealing article in the New York Times magazine yesterday, Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman disclosed that in June 2007 he was given a top secret document by former director of Mossad, Meir Amit, that contained a transcript of a conversation between Amit and the then CIA Tel Aviv chief John Hadden.

According to Bergman, part of the transcript read thus:

Amit: “We are approaching a turning point that is more important for you than it is for us. After all, you people know everything. We are in a grave situation, and I believe we have reached it, because we have not acted yet. . . . Personally, I am sorry that we did not react immediately. It is possible that we may have broken some rules if we had, but the outcome would have been to your benefit. I was in favor of acting. We should have struck before the build-up.”

Hadden: “That would have brought Russia and the United States against you.”

Amit: “You are wrong. . . . We have now reached a new stage, after the expulsion of the U.N. inspectors. You should know that it’s your problem, not ours.”

Hadden: “Help us by giving us a good reason to come in on your side. Get them to fire at something, a ship, for example.”

Amit: “That is not the point.”

Hadden: “If you attack, the United States will land forces to help the attacked state protect itself.”

Amit: “I can’t believe what I am hearing.”

Hadden: “Do not surprise us.”

Amit: “Surprise is one of the secrets of success.”

Hadden: “I don’t know what the significance of American aid is for you.”

Amit: “It isn’t aid for us, it is for yourselves.”

While Hadden didn’t actually suggest that the Israelis themselves attack an American ship, it is clear that he did indicate that it should be Israel that manipulates affairs in such a way as to provide a casus belli for the US to enter the war on Israel’s side.

Bergman’s story is revealing for two reasons; firstly, it provides even more credibility to the story of the USS Liberty affair in which the Israel Air Force deliberately attacked a US warship in order to attract the US into their war against the Egyptians by making it look like the attack was carried out by the Egyptians.

Secondly, it is revealing inasmuch that a senior and well respected Israeli journalist should expose the details of the conversation held back in 1967 as Israel was planning to attack Egypt at a time when today Israel is considering its options with regards to attacking Iran and when the US has a considerable armada of warships close to the Iranian shore in the Persian Gulf and Straights of Hamuz. It begs the question: Is Bergman warning the world that what happened forty-five years ago could happen again today?

Time, as usual, will tell.

NEOCONSERVATIVES IN COMPLETE DISARRAY OVER FINDING A REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE

The only thing certain within the neoconservative ranks at the moment is the fact that they don’t seem to think any of the current crop of candidates are really suitable for their particular needs.

The editors of neocon blog National Review Online reckon ‘Mitt is lacklustre, but Newt is risky’.

Jennifer Rubin, herself a neoconservative, writing in the Washington Post is just plain confused and is not sure which way to turn. The only reason I can think of for her feeling the need to write this particular piece was that she is frustrated. Why else would you write something that showed little more than how confused one can be? But Jennifer at the end of her piece resorts to fatalism; ‘whoever wins, wins’.

Indiana State Governor Mitch Daniels has all the charisma of a patch of neatly mown lawn while at the same time having absolutely no idea about Middle Eastern foreign policy. Yet, for some reason, top neocon commentator William Kristol is almost pleading for Daniels to throw his hat into the Republican Presidential race.

But, if Daniels is so lack-lustre in everything neocons are usually looking for in a Republican president, why is Kristol is so intent on getting Daniels in to the race?

Short of Kristol knowing something about Daniels that no other commentator knows about – except, perhaps, the full knowledge that Daniels entering the race just isn’t likely to happen – I can only think that Kristol hopes that some other candidate, the one he and fellow neocon Artur Davis, would really like to see run, Jeb Bush, put his hand up and hop into the race instead.

For all the neocons bluster about domestic politics, one needs to remember that the neoconservatives primary concerns are for the well-being of Israel and their cause of creating a Greater Israel. Their interest in American politics exists primarily and ultimately to serve Israeli interests and the well-being of the state of Israel.

Not unsurprisingly, Gingrich, who has sensed over the last few days that neocon support has been slipping away, has realised this and, desperate for the neocons support, has opted to voice just the hawkish kind of rhetoric the neocons like to hear with regards to Iran but this is unlikely now to be enough to appease the neocons.

As for Ron Paul; the neocons barely venture to mention his name such is their fear of his popularity in both Democrat and Republican ranks.

The coming and passing of the Florida race may well reveal all.

Or not!

It’s easy for commentators – left and right alike – to say there are interesting times ahead as events unfold, but we should all bear in mind what terrible consequences there will be if the wrong choices are made.

NEOCONS GET DESPERATE: DID NEOCON FABRICATE DOCUMENT TO GET MITCH DANIELS TO RUN FOR REPUBLICAN NOMINATION?

Yesterday I wrote of William Kristol’s ‘exclusive’ article in The Weekly Standard claiming that his office had ‘mysteriously’ received a document that claimed to be a part of the text of the forthcoming Republican response to Obama’s State of the Union Address to be delivered next Tuesday. Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels is down to deliver the Republican response. In the mysterious document it is claimed that Daniels will announce his intention to enter the Republican race if enough Republicans asked him.

It now seems that this whole story was just a desperate attempt by Kristol to lure Daniels into the fray. While Daniels himself is yet to deny that the document is genuine, his office, according to Indychannel.com, has said that “Kristol's piece does not reflect the speech the governor intends to give Tuesday night”.

In other words, it’s a fabrication – regardless of how nicely Daniels’ office phrases it.

Apart from what is fast being exposed as a deliberate deceit from one of neoconservatism’s most senior and influential commentators, the affair highlights how desperate the neoconservatives have become about the current crop of frontrunners for the Republican candidacy both in terms of their right-wing credentials as well as their moral attributes, and also over the influence that Ron Paul is having on the race.

The deceit is one thing but, importantly, the desperation that has caused such a senior neocon to resort to such deceit indicates at the very least that their hopes for a reliably neocon- friendly Republican president at the next election are fading rapidly.

NEOCONS GET THEIR HOPES UP WITH POSSIBLE LATE ENTRY OF MITCH DANIELS AS REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE

According to William Kristol at The Weekly Standard, Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels may consider putting his hat in the ring for Republican presidential nomination if he can muster enough support.

Back in the beginning of December last year I wrote that it was clear that the neoconservatives were unhappy with the current crop of candidates. Kristol gave a list of other potential runners that he would prefer to see run and Mitch Daniels figured well on the list but, as I wrote then: “Mitch Daniels? In May, Kristol was wondering if Daniels might run, but by October his hopes were dashed and they are unlikely to be re-awakened”. Now, it seems, Daniel’s might just be reconsidering his options if what Kristol is telling us is true about a ‘leaked’ document that was mysteriously delivered to Kristol’s offices.

Certainly, the current crop of runners have little going for them from the Republicans point of view. Many have already fallen by the wayside and those that remain are either blighted with something unacceptable in their past or, as in the case of Ron Paul, are completely unacceptable to mainstream Republicans yet popular with many on both sides of the political divide who are fed up with America’s endless wars and threats of war and the outrageous amounts of money that have been wasted on them.

Ron Paul, at first dismissed as being just a radical isolationist and libertarian, has become a real threat to the neocons and their agenda for war against Iran, a war that they hope will bring Israel a little closer to their dream of creating a Greater Israel. The neocons might see Mitch Daniels as a possible alternative to bring the running back to their side of table.

Time will tell.

ISRAEL RESORTS TO MURDER IN ATTEMPT TO CONVINCE WORLD OF IRAN’S SO-CALLED ‘NUCLEAR WEAPONS PROGRAM’

Israel is so desperate to convince the world that any attack it launches against Iran will be because of its ‘nuclear weapons program’ that it has resorted to a program of murdering Iran’s nuclear scientists in order to bring world public opinion on side to support such an attack.

Yesterday, another of Iran’s top nuclear scientists was murdered by Israel’s Mossad via the use of a magnetic bomb attached to the door of the car the scientist, 32 year old Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, was travelling in. Roshan is the fifth Iranian scientist since 2007 to be murdered by Israeli terrorists.

Prior to this latest series of murders, (Israel had murdered Egyptian nuclear scientists in the past when Egypt was beginning to develop a nuclear program), Israel and her allies in the West were relying on intense propaganda to convince the West to support an attack against Iran. However, over the last few years, particularly since the US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) of 2007 assessed that Iran had abandoned it’s nuclear weapons program in 2003, the people of the world aren’t quite so convinced that Iran has any ‘nuclear weapons program’. Subsequent reports from both the US’s NIE’s and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), while stating that Iran is likely to have a ‘nuclear weapons program’, have not been able to produce any actual hard evidence of such a program. All of the NIE’s and IAEA reports since 2007 to date have been based purely on supposition and reports from dissidents and defectors and highly suspect circumstantial evidence.

Israel’s hope is that it will be able to convince the West to attack Iran because of its ‘nuclear weapons program’. Israel knows full well, however, that simply attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities is only likely to delay Iran’s nuclear program – weapon or otherwise – and that the real motive behind such an attack is not so much to destroy Iran’s ‘nuclear weapons program’ but to bring about regime change by destroying Iran’s defence forces and government institutions to the point where the Iranian government is forced to capitulate to Western demands for regime change.

Any attack against Iran will be accompanied by an Israeli attack against Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon – and this, of course, is the real motivation for war against Iran.

Israel will go to any lengths to eventually see the fulfillment of their dream of a Greater Israel, a dream that can only be realised without Hezbollah and Hamas to resist them. And to rid themselves of Hamas and Hezbollah, Israel must eliminate Iran’s support of the two Arab organisations.

NEOCON DEMANDS U.S. ENCOURAGE ISRAEL TO ANNEX WHOLE OF ‘BIBLICAL ISRAEL’ TO CREATE GREATER ISRAEL

In a recent article in National Review Online, Barbara Lerner, an Islamophobic American Zionist and neoconservative writer, has laid it out on the line what the neoconservative goal really is as far as what they want for Israel – and that is nothing less than the annexation by Israel of all of the so-called ‘Biblical Lands’ in order to create a Greater Israel. She writes:

We must end the mindless repetition of enemy propaganda about “occupied land,” and encourage our Israeli allies to annex the whole of Biblical Israel…

Clearly, there are no longer any pretensions about ‘negotiations’ aimed at establishing a ‘Palestinian State’; the Zionists do not want a Palestinian state of any kind. They never have. Endless talk about talks has been aimed at playing for more time while the Zionists and the Israeli right-wing wait for an appropriate moment to find an excuse to launch a war against their enemies Hamas in the Gaza and the West Bank and Hezbollah in south Lebanon; a war so devastating that it will provide Israel with the casus belli to invade and then ultimately annex the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and even south Lebanon up to the Litani River.

Since such a devastating war can only be achieved off the back of a war with Iran who supports both Hamas and Hezbollah, one can now clearly see why the neoconservatives and the Israeli Zionists are so anxious to launch an attack against Iran.

Barbara Lerner has now made it abundantly clear what she and her neoconservative colleagues want – a Greater Israel that exists at the expense of the Palestinian people and their aspirations for a Palestinian State.

SELECTIVE ‘DEMOCRACY’: NEOCONS WANT TO DICTATE TO ARAB NATIONS WHICH TYPE OF ‘DEMOCRACY’ THEY CAN AND CAN’T HAVE

A recent article in Commentary by Jonathan Tobin summed up how arrogant neoconservatives can be when it comes to sticking their noses into the business of other sovereign nations – and, of course, especially Arab nations that are problematic to Israel.

The neoconservative’s greatest fear is that the series of revolutions that last year rolled across North Africa and into the Middle East will bring to power Islamist governments that will not be able to be contained by the US. Never mind that the vast majority of the people of these nations are Muslims and ignoring the fact that elections in Egypt have overwhelmingly favoured theocratic parties and, in particular, the Muslim Brotherhood, the neoconservatives are insisting that the Obama government do not support the interim government that allows the Muslim Brotherhood the opportunity to become a government.

Tobin says that the Obama administration in trying to establish a working relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood is a mistake “not just because it is based on a misperception of the Islamists’ goals regarding democracy and willingness to keep the peace with Israel. It is also a slap in the face of the country’s military government that remains the only obstacle between the Brotherhood and the creation of another Islamic republic”.

For all the neocons talk of ‘democracy’ being allowed to prevail, it seems that a military dictatorship in this case is more preferable – and, indeed, should be supported by the US – if it seems the people are likely to elect a government that is unacceptable to the neoconservatives.

This is not the first time this has happened; as we saw in the 26 January 2006 Palestinian Legislative Council elections when Hamas won government by a handsome majority, the US and Israel, together with their Western allies, simply refused to recognise the elected government. Since they held the purse strings, the Hamas government was unable to function.

Egypt, however, is a different matter. If the Muslim Brotherhood ultimately win government fair and square in the current election series, then the US and their Western allies are going to have a tough time explaining why they can’t support a government that has been democratically elected.

The same is likely to happen in Syria once Assad is gone. The Muslim Brotherhood there is an also very strong and any democratic election held in Syria post-Assad is likely to see an Islamist government formed. And it’s not likely to be any friendlier toward Israel than the current one is. They’ll still be demanding the return of the Golan Heights.

Hypocrisy and arrogance are the values that ‘they’ hate about ‘us’.

Who can blame them?

It’s a good job that the neocons have the likes of Jonathan Tobin on their books to show us how transparent their policies actually are and in which nation their real interests really lay.

RICK SANTORUM GETS THE NOD AS THE NEOCONS’ MAN

No sooner had Rupert Murdoch anointed Rick Santorum last night as the man he will support for the presidency then William Kristol quickly posted a last minute tid-bit at The Weekly Standard website before heading off to bed saying what a ‘good omen’ it was for him to bump into Santorum in the lobby of the hotel that they both just happen to be staying at.

Neocons don’t do ‘omens’. They carefully plan stuff.

They’ve been hanging out in the wings for weeks waiting and watching how each of the candidates are performing, paying particular attention to their foreign policy attributes. It’s odd, however, that Kristol barely even mentioned Santorum as a possibility when he was rummaging around in an article that clearly demonstrated that they were very disappointed with the then field. As I said in my article at the time, Kristol’s list of possibilities then was Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, Paul Ryan, Chris Christie, Mitch Daniels, Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, but I doubt – apart from Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio – that he took any of them seriously.

But now the man with the most influence has come down on the side of Santorum, all we can do now is sit back and watch how all the neocons follow their master’s words.

ANDREW BOLT BECOMES A FULLY-FLEDGED NEOCON – WITH A TRIP TO ISRAEL

After his recent visit to Israel, Andrew Bolt, one of Australia’s most notorious Islamophobic racists, has taken the final step required to become a fully-fledged neoconservative. As Bolt himself says, Israel “makes you seem so neoconservative”. And there’s nothing like a trip to Israel to affirm ones aspiration.

The question now, however, is; who paid for it?

Most neocon journos – particularly those in the pay of Murdoch – usually get their trips bought and paid for by some right-wing Zionist lobby organisation or another; its how they keep control of what’s being said in the media about Israel.

It’ll be interesting to see what Bolt will be up to over the coming month as a result of his ‘elevation’ to the ranks of the fully-fledged neocon. Will he still be working for Murdoch? More than likely – despite last month’s wishful thinking on my part. Will he carry on with his column at the Herald-Sun? It’s hard to tell looking at it just at the moment. He’s clearly taken on a column at the UK Spectator but whether or not it’s going to be a regular column isn’t clear. The Spectator is a British neocon monthly owned by the Barclay brothers who also own the UK Daily Telegraph group of publications.

The Spectator audience is a little more upmarket than the redneck knuckle-dragging morons that usually infest his blog at the Herald-Sun, so who know who he’ll be writing for next year. Whoever it is, though, it’ll be interesting to read how he and his mob are going to justify the up-coming war against Iran.

IS CATACLYSMIC WAR AGAINST IRAN ONLY A DISTRACTION TO COVER ISRAEL’S ULTIMATE WAR AIMS?

Any strike on Iran by either the US or Israel or both is likely to be cataclysmic in scale yet for the Zionists of Israel such a war will serve only to distract the people of the West from the real aims of instigating such a horrific war which is to provide both the opportunity and the cover for Israel to realise its ultimate regional endgame of creating a Greater Israel. The Zionist’s dream of a Greater Israel includes occupying, and eventually annexing, south Lebanon up to at least the Litani River and possibly beyond, and also the full occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip with the eventual deportation of the Palestinians living in these places to the Sinai and Jordan.

Iran is a geographically large country with a well educated and cultured population that has, since the revolution in 1979 that threw out the US-supported Shah, mainly supported its theocratic hierarchy. It does have its own internal problems that are largely over domestic issues. The Iranian people clearly would like to have their government pay more attention to their welfare needs. Unemployment is high; inflation is high; wages could be better; the health system needs improvement; infrastructure needs upgrading, especially with regard to the processing of its own natural resources. For sure there is a demand for a more liberalised legislation that relies less on Sharia law and more on natural justice. But, for all of Iran’s internal short-comings, the Iranian people are essentially united when it comes to supporting its government’s nuclear power ambitions and also the defence of their country against US and Israeli aggression, threatened or otherwise.

The moment that the West thought it might be able to influence and exploit Iran’s internal divisions in order to create an environment that might bring about revolution leading to regime change has now long passed. The disputed elections of June 2009 created violence in the streets which clearly were aggravated by agents provocateurs supported and financed by Israel and the US. However, the rather feeble attempts to create conditions that might lead to some sort of ‘regime change’ favourable to the US and Israel failed miserably.

As a result of these failures, the West, particularly the US and Israel, have returned to the rhetoric and propaganda of ‘Iran has a nuclear weapons program’ that is designed to induce Western public opinion to support a military strike against Iran ostensibly to eliminate the so-called Iranian ‘nuclear threat’. In order to overcome the total lack of any evidence to support the ‘Iran has a nuclear weapons program’ meme, the US and Israel have adopted a ‘pull out all the stops’ propaganda strategy to the point now that they have said it so often, so loudly and so relentlessly that many now take it as read that Iran really does have a nuclear weapons program despite there still being no actual evidence to support the assertion.

The ‘Iran has a nuclear weapons program’ meme originated as public rhetoric by Israeli Zionists and their neoconservative supporters in the United States soon after the Shah was deposed and the Islamic Revolutionary government took control. It has reached a crescendo today after years of continuous and increasingly relentless propaganda from Israeli Zionists and neoconservatives. The propaganda existed long before Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became Iran’s president, but once becoming president, Ahmadinejad’s own rhetoric about Israel has served only to reinforce the twisted propaganda from the Zionists and neoconservatives about Iran being an existential threat to Israel based on Iran’s continued so-called ‘nuclear weapons program’.

Recently, the Israelis and their neoconservative supporters have changed gear in their propaganda about Iran’s ‘nuclear weapons program’. The call at first was supposedly about finding a diplomatic solution to the perceived problem of a nuclear Iran. Sanctions, as part of finding a ‘diplomatic solution’, are an absolutely necessary step in the path to war against Iran; world public opinion would not support a direct attack against Iran without going via the sanctions route first. UN endorsed sanctions are now in place and, just as the Israelis and the neoconservatives had hoped, they are not having any effect on Iran’s nuclear ambitions. As a result, the Israelis and neoconservatives have shifted up a gear and are now demanding quite openly and in unison that the US attack Iran.

Some commentators have suggested that President Obama is hesitant about attacking Iran and that because of this Israel may take it upon themselves to attack unilaterally. The well publicised recent article by Jeffery Goldberg in Atlantic magazine suggests that there is a ‘50/50 chance’ that Israel will do just that. Well known neoconservative and former CIA officer, Reuel Marc Gerecht writing in The Weekly Standard also recently suggested that Israel may launch a unilateral strike against Iran. George Will, writing in the Washington Post has said, after lamenting the lack of action against Iran by the US; “If Israel strikes Iran, the world will not be able to say it was not warned”. Other far-right neoconservatives on the other hand, like Michael Barone writing in National Review Online, are saying that Obama just might instigate an attack against Iran. Meanwhile, another neoconservative, Jonathan S. Tobin, writing in the neoconservative flagship intellectual magazine Commentary this month, goes as far as calling upon and encouraging Obama to “emulate Truman’s example of decisive leadership”, eluding to Truman’s use of nuclear weapons on Japan in an effort to end a war that was as good as already over anyway.

The rhetoric of Israel launching a unilateral strike against Iran is designed not so much to garner public opinion against Iran, but more to promote sympathy for Israel from a US Congress that may be otherwise hesitant to support a US strike against Iran. The idea is to get Congress to push Obama to support an Israel that feels so desperate about their situation that they may take it upon themselves to go it alone despite the risks involved. In the process, the rhetoric also attempts to garner public opinion that supports the notion that Israel is a ‘small embattled nation’ struggling to survive in a hostile region.

Pushing the ‘we might need to strike unilaterally’ propaganda as portrayed by the Israeli Zionists and the neoconservatives, however, does not stand up to close scrutiny and even the most cursory analysis reveals that it is, indeed, nothing more than propaganda.

The reality is; Israel is so reliant on the US that it would be utterly impossible for Israel to strike Iran ’unilaterally’. Israel will need the full support of the US to launch any attack against Iran even if the initial attack is carried out solely using current Israeli air force aircraft and personnel in order for such an attack to appear unilateral. The logistics of obtaining the fuel and ordnance alone that would be required for such a strike will necessitate the full connivance of the US; and the follow-up support of an America apparently coming to Israel’s aid to prevent retaliatory attacks by Iran would require meticulous advance planning and is not something that can be spontaneously set in motion at a moments notice.

The notion that Israel could act ‘unilaterally’ against Iran is one designed purely for propaganda purposes only.

Neither Israel nor the US will be attacking Iran for the exclusive purpose of eliminating Iran’s nuclear facilities in order to destroy its so-called ‘nuclear weapons program’; the US and the neoconservatives have made it quite clear that their aim is to bring about regime change in Iran and nothing less. The idea that either or both will attack in order to destroy Iran’s ‘nuclear weapons program’ will merely be the stated casus belli to justify such an attack.And there are other realities that also need to be considered. Despite the now almost deafening rhetoric of Iran’s so-called ‘nuclear weapons program’, there is still the not unimportant matter of evidence proving that Iran actually has a ‘nuclear weapons program’. To date not a single skerrick of any hard evidence has been produced to support any of the US or Israeli claims. The UN’s nuclear watchdog organisation, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), has not been able to find any evidence and the US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) of 2007 stated quite categorically that Iran had discarded its nuclear weapon program in 2003. While the 2010 NIE (which this year is entitled ‘The Annual Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community’) has suggested that Iran “is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons in part by developing various nuclear capabilities that bring it closer to being able to produce such weapons, should it choose to do so”, no actual hard evidence was offered to support the idea that Iran actually had a ‘nuclear weapons program’. The 2010 NIE also noted tellingly that: “We do not know, however, if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons”. Surely, if Iran hasn’t yet decided to build nuclear weapons how would it have a nuclear weapons program? And if they ‘do not know’ then what evidence can they possibly have to even assume that Iran has a ‘nuclear weapons program’?

As the threat of UN sanctions against Iran loomed yet again in mid-May, 2010, Turkey, Brazil and Iran came up with a plan that they thought would allay the West’s apprehensions about Iran’s so-called ‘nuclear weapons program’. The plan was actually in response to the West’s demands that Iran send its Low Enriched (LE) uranium to a third country for enrichment to Medium Enriched level (ME) for use in producing isotopes for cancer treatment. The product returned to Iran for use would not then be able to be further enriched to the High Enriched level (HE) required to produce a nuclear weapon. Iran arranged through Turkey and Brazil to send half of its 2400kgs of LE uranium off to France and/or Russia for conversion to ME uranium suitable for producing isotopes.

Not entirely unexpectedly, the US rejected the plan saying that this would still leave Iran with 1200kgs of uranium – enough, once enriched, to build one bomb – which was not acceptable to the US. The irony, of course, is that Iran is now left with enough uranium which, once enriched, is enough to build not just one bomb but two; a point seemingly lost on the US and their allies – or was it?

In rejecting the plan, (which conveniently left Iran with nearly two and a half tonnes of uranium) the way was immediately left open for the US to continue its pursuit of sanctions against Iran through the UN. It was by now quite clear where the US, Israel and their Western allies were heading with this strategy. If Russia and China vetoed further sanctions, the way would then be clear for the US and Israel to claim that Iran’s ‘pursuit of nuclear weapons’ could not now be stopped which would provide a pretext for either or both to then attack Iran. In order to avoid, or at least delay, war against Iran, Russia and China reluctantly agreed on 9 June 2010 to expand the already existing UN sanctions but not before the US agreed to water the new proposals down. Later, the US in partnership with the European Union, adopted further much stronger sanctions against Iran outside of UN oversight.

These latest sanctions, however, are doing nothing to deter Iran from continuing what it is actually legally entitled to do under international law with regards to uranium enrichment within the terms of the Non-Nuclear Proliferation Treaty of which Iran is a signatory. It is this lack of deterrence which has now brought on the upsurge in threats from Israel and the neoconservatives. The Israelis and the neoconservatives, continuing to ignore entirely the total lack of any evidence, believe that they have now provided Iran every opportunity to give up their quest for ‘nuclear weapons’ and the only option now is to take military action.

By ignoring the fact that there is no evidence to suggest Iran has a nuclear weapons program and continuing to insist that Iran gives up its lawful peaceful quest for nuclear generated electrical power and to be able to produce isotopes to treat cancer, Israel and the neoconservative have demonstrated that, regardless of anything else Iran might do to allay the West’s fears, the Israelis and the neoconservatives want nothing less than war against Iran.

And now we get down to the reason why war, and only war, is so necessary for the Zionists of Israel and their neoconservative supporters.

Israel knows full well that Iran has no nuclear weapons program. They also know that, even if Iran did manage to obtain a nuclear weapon or two, it would still be utterly impotent. To be sure, two nuclear devices, or even one, detonated in Israel would likely destroy Israel, but if Iran were to commit such a horrendous crime, Iran knows it in turn would be destroyed in retaliation by Israel’s comparatively massive arsenal of nuclear weapons that are undoubtedly dispersed throughout Israel and on board Israel’s submarine fleet.

Despite this, however, the Zionists and neoconservatives, like George Will for example, argue that Iran has some kind of death wish whereby it is willing to ‘martyr’ itself in the cause of destroying Israel. To actually believe that Iran would be willing to sacrifice itself just to get at Israel in this way demonstrates only Zionism’s sense of monumental self-importance – or, more realistically, their desire to portray themselves as the perennial victim where Islam is out to get them no matter the cost.

All of this serves the Zionist purpose. Without war with Iran there would be nothing to distract the world’s attention away from an Israeli attack against Hezbollah in Lebanon or Hamas in the Gaza Strip. However, the benefit of war with Iran provides a multitude of perceived advantages.

Both the US and Israel have gone to great lengths over the years to emphasise Hezbollah’s and Hamas’ links to Iran portraying them as Iran’s ‘proxies’ on Israel’s doorstep. Building these connections to Iran has been essential to the Zionist’s strategy. From the propaganda point of view, the Zionists use of the word ‘proxy’ in describing Hezbollah and Hamas has been important; for the Zionists and neoconservatives to say that Hezbollah and Hamas are Iran’s ‘proxies’ is to imply that Iran is the main enemy and that Iran had developed Hezbollah and Hamas specifically to provide a means of getting closer to Israel. Presented as proof of this is the supply of arms and finance that flows from Iran.

The reality is somewhat different. Both Hezbollah and Hamas are organisations that resist Israel’s expansionist ambitions and, despite being of two different sects of Islam (Hezbollah is Shiite, as is Iran; while Hamas is Sunni) the two organisations have very common interests inasmuch as both are enemies of expansionist Zionism.

The Zionist dream of a Greater Israel is well known and its history and ideology are well documented. The original idea of a Greater Israel that stretched “from the Nile to the Euphrates” is now truly just a dream. But the Zionists haven’t given up entirely on their dream of a Greater Israel. The Zionists of today firmly believe that the dream of creating a Greater Israel that includes the Golan Heights, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and south Lebanon up to the Litani River or even beyond, can be become a feasible reality.

Israel’s past attempts at occupying the Gaza Strip and south Lebanon have failed miserably due to resistance from the Palestinians and the Arabs respectively. Israel’s attempts to spread itself into the West Bank via ever-growing ‘settlements’ have had some success since the 1967 invasion and military occupation but nowhere near as successful as Israel’s invasion, occupation and eventual colonisation of the Golan Heights that occurred at the same time.

Recent attempts by Israel to eliminate Hezbollah and Hamas have failed. The 2006 attacks and invasion of south Lebanon ended in defeat for Israel despite the horrendous loss of lives inflicted on the civilian population by the Israelis. Likewise, the 2008/09 attacks on Hamas in the Gaza which slaughtered over 1300 innocent civilians and all but destroyed Gaza’s infrastructure was also to no avail. Both wars failed to draw in the US and Iran directly and succeeded only in gaining for Israel the condemnation of the world for what many saw as deliberate war crimes committed against civilian populations.

The Zionist leaders of Israel have learnt their lesson; in the future they will not attempt to get what they want while the eyes of the world are upon them. Before attacking Hezbollah and Hamas again the Zionists of Israel need to ensure that the eyes of world are looking elsewhere. They will also need to ensure that their casus belli for attacking Hezbollah and Hamas and invading Lebanon and the Gaza Strip is credible – and what more credible or plausible an excuse could the Israelis have for attacking Hezbollah and Hamas than pre-empting strikes by them in retaliation for Israel having attacked Iran in order to eliminate an ‘existential and imminent nuclear threat’.

While the eyes of the world are watching the turmoil and carnage being wrought on Iran, initiated possibly by Israel and then followed up with the full force of the US, the Israelis will feel free to smash all resistance to them as they attack and then invade Lebanon, the Gaza Strip and launch a full take-over of the West Bank on the grounds that the Palestinians there will launch a full-on third Intafada against the Israelis and the Zionist settlers.

For the war against Iran, the aim will be to bring the government to its knees by use of massive and overwhelming air power against Iran’s governmental and military institutions forcing the Iranians to capitulate and sue for peace at the UN. There is unlikely to be any kind of occupation; only the threat of more force if the government of Iran does not concede to US demands. The major demand will be for a change in government to one that is friendly to the US, Israel and the West; in other words; regime change.

Meanwhile, the Israelis will consolidate their positions in the areas they occupy by ruthlessly liquidating Hezbollah and Hamas during the fighting. The occupation of south Lebanon, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank eventually will give way to annexation, even in the face of opposition from most of the world, and the peoples of those places will be forced out and relocated. The Palestinian people will be forced in to the Sinai or Jordan while the Arabs of south Lebanon will be forced north of the Litani River.

Overall, once the war begins, the US and Israel will be relying on their overwhelming military might, especially their air-power, in order to prevail. The US are far too overstretched in Iraq and Afghanistan to be able to invade and occupy such a vast country as Iran and would rely on its air-power to maintain its domination. In Lebanon and the Gaza Strip Israel would rely initially on its air-power and then ground mechanised and infantry forces to launch an invasion and maintain an occupation. The same would apply in the West Bank.

There will be nothing spontaneous or ‘unilateral’ about the coming confrontation; it has been in the planning for decades by the Zionists and their neoconservative supporters. Regime change in Iran will be the war aim for the US while the defeat of Hezbollah and Hamas and the subsequent occupation of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and south Lebanon with a view to eventual annexation will be Israel’s war aims while creating a Greater Israel will be their ultimate goal. In all theatres the war will devastate the civilian populations leading to massive upheavals and deaths.

The war against Iran is likely to be cataclysmic in scale but for the Israelis such a war will serve only to be the catalyst for the creation of the Zionists dream; Greater Israel. The ultimate costs of the final confrontation, however, in the end may very well be more than any side can bear.


This article was first posted on 21 August 2010.
It's as appropriate today as it was then - maybe even more so!

THE SYRIAN BOMBINGS HAS THE TOUCH OF THE MOSSAD ABOUT IT

Friday’s bombings in Damascus have all the hallmarks of a Mossad false flag bombing operation about it. Here’s why.

According to a New York Times report, the bombing was a suicide car bomb. Meanwhile, the UK’s Daily Telegraph is reporting that the Syrian government has blamed al Qaeda elements among Syria’s anti-Assad rebels for the attacks, while a dissident claiming inside knowledge is blaming the Assad government itself for the bombings saying that the bodies were of dissidents murdered by the security forces then planted prior to the explosions to make it seem as though they were victims of the bombing (a scenario that some will find has a familiar ring to it).

The first problem with the story is that it is reported as being a suicide bombing. Suicide bombings are usually confined to either Islamic fighters wanting to kill people of other ethnic/religious groups as has been seen in Iraq, or Islamic fighters wanting to kill foreign troops on their lands as has been seen with Palestinian suicide attacks against Israelis and Islamic fighters in Iraq wanting to kill American and Western troops. Whilst suicide bombings have been used in violence between secular groupings, as in revolution and civic upheaval, such bombings are very rare and have usually been by individual’s intent on revenge killing and are usually of a more personal nature as in, say, revenge for the killing of a relative. With two huge bombs going off simultaneously, as in Syria on Friday, these are well organised and designed for maximum impact.

As for the notion that the Syrian government would bomb its own security headquarters buildings – a small regional or district office, maybe – just to gain a few Brownie points from the Arab League is ludicrous. And since the opposition has denied being responsible on account of it only operating on a defensive basis, this only leaves one other option – Israel’s Mossad – and it’s not as though Israel hasn’t used car bombs before in Damascus.

Next, one needs to ask why Mossad would do such a thing; what’s in for them? How do they gain?

Mossad have always worked in devious ways and, while it is often difficult to figure out why they have done any specific deed, one can count on it having some kind of desired effect, even if sometimes obscure, for the Israeli government who would have given the authority which initiated the action.

In the case of the Syria bombing, the ultimate aim would be to initiate further violence that might cause escalation to a point that Iran and/or its proxy Hezbollah is drawn in to the fray. This would then trigger the confrontation that Israel for years has been searching for.

NEOCON LUNATICS WANT WAR WITH NORTH KOREA RIGHT NOW!

The editors of the neoconservative National Review Online are today demanding that the US:

…should conduct military exercises around the peninsula, we should fly over their nuclear sites with stealth aircraft, and we should demonstrate that we can reach out and touch the regime anytime and anywhere. We should freeze the assets of the Kim family wherever they may be. We should shut down Kim’s criminal enterprises by stepping up our patrols of ships that leave the peninsula. We should give our allies in South Korea all the military capability necessary to defend themselves and strike back at the North should they once again be hit.

The editors naively go on to say:

We should do all this before Beijing and Pyongyang have time to hatch a plan that solidifies the status quo. The status quo is dangerous, far more so than patiently and relentlessly working to bring down the Kim regime. For once, instead of waiting to see if a new dictator is “someone we can work with,” we should show the dictator what it will take to work with us. It should be clear that unless the Kim family gets rid of its nuclear weapons and its organs of repression and crime, we will work to remove it from power.

The world is fortunate that Obama is still President of the US and very unlikely to heed the neocons lunatic advice demanding that world war three start right now before Beijing and Pyongyang have time to ‘hatch a plan that solidifies the status quo’.

Do the warmongering lunatics at neocon headquarters really believe that the Chinese and the North Koreans hadn’t thought about what will happen in the event of Kim Jong-Il’s death?

I have little time for any totalitarian government but I have even less for the lunacy of the neoconservatives who believe they are able to project military power without there being horrific consequences. Have they learnt nothing from their wars against the Vietnamese, Afghan and Iraqi people? The neocons misguided belief that the US is now the world’s only superpower is going to get more Americans and their South Korean allies killed when they realise that they are up against the world’s largest standing fanatical army in North Korea and a Chinese military force that is able to match the US.

America is nowhere near as strong as the neocons like to think they are. War after war since the end of the Second World War seems to have taught them nothing.

THE NEOCONS ARE BEGINNING TO WORRY ABOUT RON PAUL

Until now the neoconservatives had all but ignored Ron Paul as a contender for the Republican nomination. They had focussed their attention instead on those potential candidates that were in the mainstream of Republican politics hoping to find one that goes along with neoconservative ideology, particularly with regard to foreign policy relating to Israel and the Middle East.

As yet, the neoconservatives, as I noted over a week ago, don’t seem to have actually settled on anyone that they are entirely happy to give their full support to. All had flaws that the neoconservatives felt did not quite reflect full neoconservative values and the hint was that others better qualified, at least as far as the neocons were concerned, might yet enter the race even at this late stage. Since then, nobody else has stepped forward and the one potential candidate the neoconservatives would definitely not support, Ron Paul, has consistently been up there in the polling as the various debates unfolded and it seems the grass-root rank and file Republicans are increasingly giving Ron Paul the thumbs up. To what extent this will translate into actual votes that count for the nomination still remains to be seen but certainly the support he is getting now is beginning to worry the neoconservatives who today found it necessary to write a lengthy hit piece against Ron Paul portraying him as a maverick libertarian extremist and an outrageous conspiracy theorist. Up until now, the neocons had barely given him a mention believing him to be a rank outsider with no chance of getting up.

Ron Paul’s popularity comes not so much from his extremist libertarian ideology of no government interference in anything – though this has a certain appeal among the middle classes that have managed to hang on to some of their wealth – but, rather, from his anti-war isolationist views. For the neoconservatives, this translates to ‘anti-Israel’ since Ron Paul’s policies include no more US aid – not just to Israel, but to any nation – and also no more wars especially against Middle East nations that are Israel’s enemies.

Since Obama came to be President on the back of a promise to end the wars – which he then promptly reneged on – those that voted for him are reluctant to give him another go. On the other hand, it is only Ron Paul among the Republican contenders that is anti-war; all of the others seem to have been bought off by the Israel lobby who are champing at the bit for war against Iran in order to save Israel from being ‘wiped off the map’. Ron Paul, therefore, has won the hearts of those disillusioned with Obama’s promises, and also of those who like Ron Paul’s libertarian stance.

It’s going to be an interesting New Year which is very likely to disappoint the neocons if it’s going to be left to the current crop of candidates to look after the neoconservative’s interests. While all of them – except Ron Paul – have taken on neoconservative advisors to help out with their campaigns, none of them can really be considered die-hard neoconservatives who will push along the neocon’s agenda.
Ron Paul’s ‘every man for himself’ stance will leave many unenthralled but his anti-war rhetoric is finding a lot of appeal among conservatives fed up with ten years of non-stop wars with more in the offing.

HAS AUSTRALIAN SUPER RACIST, ANDREW BOLT, BEEN SACKED?

The Murdoch ‘journalist’ [sic], Andrew Bolt, a columnist at Melbourne’s Herald-Sun newspaper, left a perplexing post at his column yesterday prior to taking leave. He wrote:

It’s customary to thank your readers at the end of each year. Never have I had more cause to do so than this year. Your support ... well, you can imagine how much and why. I’m extremely grateful.

I am off on holidays with my family. Some thinking will also need to be done about what I’ll do next year. In the meantime, have a wonderful Christmas and new year.

‘Some thinking will also need to be done about what I’ll do next year’?

At worst this simply means he’s going to be spending his holidays dreaming up new ways of peddling his extreme racist fearmongering views. At best, however, it may mean that Murdoch’s new chief lackey in Australia, Kim Williams, who recently took over from retiring News Ltd. Australia CEO John Hartigan, has had enough of forking out hundreds of thousands of dollars to cover Bolt’s legal fees after being found guilty of racial discrimination. This, coupled with Murdoch trying to pull back from the image of right-wing extremist journalism after the News of the World fiasco, which ended in Murdoch closing the newspaper down, may well be the reason why Bolt needs to think about what he’ll be doing next year.

Bolt undoubtedly would have had a contract with News Ltd. And it may well be that Bolt has decided to take an offer that’s too good to refuse, hence him going without a fuss – if, indeed, he is going.

Reading through the comments to his post, some of his adoring rednecked fans and supporters are also wondering if he’ll be back. After all, among the extreme right-wing in Australia, Bolt was a hero. But after the court case and what with Murdoch struggling to convince the government that controls on the press aren’t needed, it may well be that Murdoch and Williams have decided that Bolt is too much of a liability and that he should go gracefully without a fuss and with a handsome golden handshake and a well formulated explanation for his departure. Perhaps he could write books for the Murdoch-owned HarperCollins company to publish.

So, the question is: has Bolt gone from the Herald-Sun for good? Let’s hope so. Time will tell. We can but dream.

SO WHO IS THE NEOCON’S MAN FOR THE NOMINATION?

Over the past few months the neocons haven’t really shown a great deal of enthusiasm for any of the candidates running so far for the Republican ticket for the 2012 Presidential election. Michelle Bachmann simply faded away; Mitt Romney turned out to be wishy-washy on climate change; as for Herman Cain, well let’s face it, his race was over the moment someone mumbled something about ‘sex’. Rick Perry’s race was over when he mumbled ‘Oops’; and, while Newt Gingrich is now top of the charts, he just doesn’t have the support of the neocons who regard him increasingly as a ‘flip-flop’ man who is happy to nod and shake his head in any way any given audience wants him to at the time. And Ron Paul, of course, is loathed by the neocons for his isolationist stance.

William Kristol, one of neoconservatisms most influential pundits, penned a piece in the Weekly Standard earlier this week which, reading between the lines, seemed to despair at the motley crew who are currently vying for the top job. He offers up a list of other vaguely possible contenders who haven’t put their hands up – yet. His list includes Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, Paul Ryan, Chris Christie, Mitch Daniels, Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush – in that order.

Mike Huckabee? But why? He didn’t get to the top of the pile in 2008, so why would Kristol think he might get up this time? The answer is; Kristol doesn’t. Huckabee’s name’s there just to make up the numbers.

Same with Sarah Palin. Even if she did step in at this late stage, one wonders if she’d get any serious support from the neocons after her last bungling blustering efforts last time.

Paul Ryan? Ryan is one potential candidate that the neocons would support – if he were to put himself up. This, though, is unlikely and Kristol knows it. Back in January of this year Kristol was promoting a Ryan for President push with Marco Rubio as vice-President runner. But by August Ryan was suggesting Kristol should find someone else to fantasise about.

Chris Christie? A month later Kristol was pleading for Christie to step up. One couldn’t blame Christie if he felt a bit miffed about being asked by Kristol only after Ryan had declined Kristol’s advances. No one likes being second fiddle.

Mitch Daniels? In May, Kristol was wondering if Daniels might run, but by October his hopes were dashed and they are unlikely to be re-awakened.

Marco Rubio? As already mentioned, Kristol had Rubio behind Ryan on a president/vice-president ticket so why would Rubio now be enthralled by Kristol’s suggestion?

Jeb Bush? When one reads out a list there is a psychological advantage of being the last name on the list; you’re invariably the first one to be remembered and therefore shoved into prominence. Was that Kristol’s intention?

So soon after the detested George W. Bush, Jeb, his brother, would be a hard one to sell to the American people. Fortunately for the American people, however, Jeb Bush ruled himself out of the 2012 race much earlier on but if it seems that those that are currently in the race aren’t going to do the trick for the neocons, then just maybe Jeb Bush might reconsider even at this late date. Certainly, there are a lot on the right in the republican movement who are hoping just that.

Jeb Bush is a far more articulate and more sophisticated person than his brother George will ever be and would superficially have far more appeal. But that doesn’t mean to say that Jeb would be a better President; it just means that he’d be able to pull the wool over the eyes of the American people more successfully than his brother George did - or not. Jeb Bush became a neoconservative long before his older brother became one and was a signatory to the June 1997 Project for the New American Century Statement of Principles.

If ever Jeb Bush did become president the world could look forward to a very dark future as it feeds on the ideas and ideology of neoconservatives eager to finish what they started when Jeb’s brother was President.

Let's hope Kristol doesn't get his wish. The world will not be a better place.

ON THE MIS-USE OF THE ‘ANTI-SEMITISM’ LABEL BY ZIONISTS AND THEIR SUPPORTERS

There was a time, back in the last century and before, when the phrase ‘anti-Semitism’ simply meant a hatred of Jewish peoples for no reason other than they were Jews. This unfounded hatred built up over centuries and culminated in the tragedy that occurred during the Second World War when Nazis, their sympathisers and fellow travellers, together with other Jew-haters throughout Europe, jumped on Hitler’s bandwagon of anti-Semitism in an attempt to wipe out European Jewry.

At the end of the war when the full extent of the attempted extermination of European Jewry became known, the world was horrified. But, despite the defeat of Nazism, the punishment of many of those responsible, and the universal condemnation of what had happened, a latent anti-Semitism lingered on into the post-war period not just among the peoples of the nations that carried out and assisted in the atrocities, but even among some peoples that were part of the nations that were Allies who eventually defeated Nazism and brought an end to the war and the atrocities that went with it. White-supremacist neo-Nazi groups flourished during the post-war years and the ‘anti-Semite’ label became synonymous with both those who had hated Jews and those that continued to do so.

To this day, there are still anti-Semites, mostly white-supremacists and neo-Nazis, who continue to hate Jews for no reason other than they are Jews.

However, there has evolved from this an opportunity for some to abuse the anti-Semitic label for nefarious propaganda purposes other than to identify true anti-Semites. It’s rather unfortunate that those that are now misusing the term are themselves Jewish.

Zionists, intent on creating a Greater Israel at the expense of the Arab people by building and farming on their lands, are now attempting to use the ‘anti-Semite’ label against anyone who condemns Israeli Zionists and their supporters for their actions against the Palestinian people as the Zionists attempt to create their Greater Israel. Zionists and their supporters, particularly neoconservatives, are especially adept at mis-using the term as part of their propaganda to demonise their critics and enemies.

The method they use is simple: Instead of identifying specific criticism against Zionism and addressing that criticism, Zionists and their neoconservative supporters simply condemn the criticism – any criticism – as being anti-Semitic, and those that are doing the criticising as being anti-Semitic ‘jew-haters’. In some cases, even other Jews that criticise Zionism are being labelled ‘anti-Semites’ though more often the term ‘self-hating Jew’ is used.

The objective of such mis-labelling by Zionists and their supporters is transparent; it is to paint those that criticise Zionism as the same kind of evil anti-Semites that attempted to destroy European Jewry during the last century. Fortunately, such propaganda devices are indeed transparent and, for the most part, such mis-use of the label has been exposed and dismissed simply as abusive propaganda by right-wing Zionist extremists and their neoconservative supporters.

But while it is easy for most to dismiss the mis-use of the ‘anti-Semite’ label as outrageous propaganda by extremists, it does have an extremely unfortunate side-effect inasmuch that its mis-use devalues the true meaning and use of the label. If the ‘anti-Semite’ label is bandied around inappropriately too often in the way it has been then there will come a time when its true and proper use will become ignored – until, once again, it is too late.
The ‘anti-Semite’ label was once a powerful tool that could be used against those that attempted to resurrect the age-old hatreds that were, and still are, levelled against Jews just because they are Jews. However, Zionists and neocons that abuse the ‘anti-Semite’ label for purely political and propaganda purposes diminish the memory of those that perished at the hands of those that really were anti-Semites.

NEOCONS WELCOME NEW U.S. EMPHASIS ON INFLUENCE IN S.E. ASIA TO COUNTER CHINA GROWTH BUT FEAR NEGLECT OF MIDDLE EAST

President Barack Obama’s visit to Australia and Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s embrace of Obama’s plan to bring US influence and military hegemony to the South East Asian region should not have come as a surprise to observers. It’s been in the offing for some time.

The move is exactly in line with America’s AirSea Battle Concept, a plan that was developed in 2010 by the US think-tank Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA). The opening lines of their document titled AirSea Battle: A Point-of-Departure Operational Concept goes straight to the point:

The US military today faces an emerging major operational challenge, particularly in the Western Pacific Theater of Operations (WPTO). The Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) ongoing efforts to field robust anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) capabilities are threatening to make US power projection increasingly risky and, in some cases and contexts, prohibitively costly. If this occurs, the United States will find itself effectively locked out of a region that has been declared a vital security interest by every administration in the last sixty years. It will also leave longstanding US allies and partners vulnerable to aggression or, more likely, subtle forms of coercion. Consequently, the United States confronts a strategic choice: either accept this ongoing negative shift in the military balance, or explore options for offsetting it.

This is welcome news for the neoconservatives who have been advocating ever since the demise of the Soviet Union that Chinese power needed to be confronted over the long term.

However, the Middle East, and Israel in particular, have never been far from neoconservative thinking – even when the Cold War between the West and the Soviet Union was at its height. Then came 9/11 and the ‘War on Terror’ which provided the neoconservatives with an opportunity to deal a blow against Israel’s enemies while China simmered very quietly on the back-burner.

Unfortunately for the neoconservatives, their plans for the Middle East didn’t quite work out as they had hoped. A quick decisive victory in Iraq became a protracted insurgency that virtually ended up being a civil war. Relying on the quick decisive victory where jubilant Iraqis were expected to welcome the US forces as liberators was to trigger a domino effect where other Arab nations would rise up and demand to be ‘liberated’ just like Iraq. That way all of Israel’s enemies would be dealt a mortal blow leaving Israel with no resistance to contend with as they created their Greater Israel surrounded by Israeli and US-friendly Arab states. They had eight years to do it in while they had a sympathetic president but their plans were spoilt by the Iraqi’s intransigence and the neocons simply ran out of time with the Bush presidency.

They had hoped a McCain Republican presidency may have followed through after Bush but this too was thwarted when Obama swept in on promises to end the wars. While the wars didn’t end, Obama did run them down, and with the end almost in sight in Iraq as the troops get withdrawn at the end of the year and the US looking for a way out of Afghanistan, Obama seems to think that now is a good time for the US to start looking a new ways to affirm American supremacy in the world. And what better way than easing into a confrontation with China.

However, for the neoconservatives, there is still the unfinished business of the Middle East and an Israel that still has enemies that are inhibiting their dreams of a Greater Israel. Israel and their neoconservative supporters still want to confront Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon but they know they can only do this by taking on Iran in order to isolate Hamas and Hezbollah who are supported by Iran. They had hoped at one point that Obama may oblige but, while he came out with the rhetoric regarding Iran’s supposed ‘nuclear weapons program’, Obama was not quite politically ready to take on Iran over allegations of a nuclear weapons program – especially after the Iraq fiasco when similar claims were made.

Senior neocon warmonger Max Boot writing in Commentary outlines the neocons concerns:

The prosaic reality is that America must commit to both the Middle East and Far East. That means maintaining a healthy level of defense spending and avoiding further cuts on top of the $450 billion that has already been lopped off this year. We must build up the Navy and Air Force without cutting much if any force structure from the Army and Marine Corps. Such a commitment may appear to be costly at a time of skyrocketing federal debt, but the costs of ignoring either region–and letting our enemies have their way–will be higher than we can bear.

Boot also highlights the neoconservative's ability to display their arrogance and also their propensity to see enemies where none exist; since when, for example, has China been an enemy? And the US has let them ‘have their way’?

The new US-China paradigm highlights the stark difference between the two powers. Whereas the US overtly flexes its military muscles coupled with bribes to leaders to ensure its needs are met, China simply writes out a cheque to ensure that its needs are met – and most nations are willing to oblige China by accepting their cheque and shipping whatever China needs directly to them. Why can’t the US do the same? Why the need for confrontation?
The answer is… Well, that’s another essay.

THE I.A.E.A. REPORT ON IRAN: ANOTHER FIZZER – AND NO SMOKING GUN!

Well, the latest and much anticipated International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report has finally been released and, despite all the fanfare about Iran’s so-called nuclear weapons intentions, not one skerrick of solid ‘smoking gun’ evidence is contained therein.

Alex Spillius at the UK’s Telegraph wrote of the report, “Never before had it joined the dots of Iran's nuclear research to create the inescapable impression that the regime was on the threshold of nuclear weapons capability”.

The problem with ‘dots’ – and the IAEA had created plenty of them – is that, if there are enough of them, one can create any kind of ‘impression’ you like to suit your propaganda and rhetoric. But, try as hard as they did to suggest otherwise, at the end of the day there is still no hard irrefutable bona fide evidence that says Iran has a nuclear weapons program.

What the IAEA seem to have done is drawn the wrong conclusions about the presence of a ‘container’ that they suspect is being used for experiments testing nuclear bomb trigger devices via complex explosive techniques. In reality the ‘container’ is indeed for use in creating complex explosions, but not for triggering a nuclear explosion but, rather, creating nanodiamonds which are used for chemotherapy purposes treating cancer patients – a pervasive health issue in Iran and one of the reasons why they need to enrich their uranium to 20% which can then be used for the creation of isotopes used also in cancer treatment. (Readers can find abundant material relating to nanodiamonds and cancer therapies in Iran utilising Google Scholar.) The reason the device is kept at a military facility is simply because that’s where the explosives can be safely kept.

As far as the other ‘evidence’ the IAEA report refers to, i.e., the massive amounts of paperwork and computer modelling relating to nuclear technology at universities; that’s what universities are for – research and learning. There isn’t a scientific university on the planet that wouldn’t have a similar amount of paper material or computer modelling data relating to nuclear technology at their university. Nigh on every nuclear physics student and postgrad from universities all over the world would be familiar with this stuff. There’s absolutely nothing new her at all – unless you happen to be a layman who is impressed by the techno jargon and gullible enough to believe politicians that know even less than you do!

It’s time the people got out on the streets once again and demand an end to this nonsense ‘cause if the West and Israel go head to head against Iran it will make the Iraq and Afghanistan thing look like a fun-filled paintball skirmish.

I hate to think where it will end.

THE U.S. AND ISRAEL’S ‘OBSESSION’ WITH IRAN - THE REAL REASONS

Actually, it’s not so much that the U.S. and Israel are seemingly ‘obsessed’ with Iran, but more that the neoconservative’s of the U.S. and Israel’s right-wing Zionists are. However, this apparent obsession is only a deliberately created illusion. Israel’s real obsession is the creation of a Greater Israel and the destruction of those that prevent Israel’s expansionist dreams; Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon, both of who are supported by Iran.

The stated casus belli for any Israeli/US attack on Iran will be that Iran is building a nuclear weapon with which it intends to ‘wipe Israel off the map’. The ‘Iran has a nuclear weapons program’ and the ‘wipe Israel off the map’ are two memes that have gone hand in hand in the propaganda and rhetoric of Israel’s Zionists and their neoconservative allies in the US and, indeed, around the world for years.

There are, however, a range of problems with these allegations. Firstly, there is, despite the constant barrage of assertions to the contrary, no actual physical evidence whatsoever that Iran actually has a ‘nuclear weapons program’. Time and time again, Israel and their allies have made the accusations but have never been able to support their allegations with any hard irrefutable evidence. All of the ‘evidence’ so far has been either vaguely circumstantial, hearsay based on statements from dissidents and defectors, straight out lies or simply conclusions based on wishful thinking and vivid imaginations.

Secondly, the ‘wipe Israel of the map’ meme is a deliberate mistranslation of a statement by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who said nothing of the sort. It was the neoconservative organisation MEMRI that was responsible for the deliberate mistranslation of the ‘wipe Israel of the map’ line which has been used extensively by neoconservatives and Israelis ever since to invoke hatred of Iran and to infer an existential threat against Israel from Iran. Still, though, Israel and the US insist that Iran is intent on producing a nuclear weapon that it plans to use against Israel and possibly even against America.

Which brings us to the third problem with the allegations ranged against Iran and that is; why would Iran, even if it did have a nuclear weapon, risk utter and swift destruction by the US and Israeli retaliatory nuclear strikes if it were to ever attack Israel with a nuclear weapon? The answer, of course is; it wouldn’t – and the Israelis and the US are well aware of it. They are also well aware that in reality Iran has no nuclear weapons program.

So why then all the fuss? The hope is that with the aid of a compliant Western mainstream media, the propaganda memes of ‘Iran has a nuclear weapons program’ and wants to ‘wipe Israel off the map’ repeated over and over endlessly will eventually so influence public opinion that it will support an attack against Iran.

The ‘Iranian problem’ is presented to the world via the mainstream media in its most simplistic form. It runs thus: ‘Iran has a nuclear weapons program with which it wishes to wipe Israel off the map so the answer is to destroy its weapons making capabilities using military action’.

That’s the rhetoric and the propaganda.

The reality is this: Israel and the US have no real interest in Iran’s nuclear program; their real aim as far as Iran is concerned is to destroy the Islamic regime and replace it with one that is US and Israel friendly.

Attacking Iran and affecting regime change kills a number of birds with one stone. It puts an end to what Israel and the US regard as Iran’s influence in the region, but, most important as far as the Israelis and their supporters are concerned, is that an attack against Iran provides, so they hope the world will believe, a legitimate pretext for attacking Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon on the basis that the Israelis are pre-empting a strike by Hamas and Hezbollah against Israel in retaliation of Israel’s attack against Iran.

Since the only way the US and Israel will be able to affect ‘regime change’ in Iran without the use of an invasion and occupation – unthinkable considering that Iran is more than three and a half times the size of Iraq and has about two and a half times the population – is by bombing it into capitulation and surrender, one can expect a campaign that will be far more than a load of bunker-buster bombs aimed at Iran’s nuclear facilities. Much more likely is a campaign of significant attacks against Iran’s defence and governmental institutions as well as its nuclear facilities; attacks that will deliberately inflict significant ‘co-lateral damage’ on civilians as the Iranian authorities get accused of using their civilians as ‘human shields’. The hope always with this strategy is that the civilian population will then press their government to end the war by capitulating to their enemies demands.

The only problem with this strategy is that it rarely ever works. Usually when such all-out bombing campaigns are carried out with the view to getting the enemy to sue for peace, rather than suing for peace, a phenomenon known as ‘Kriegssozialismus’ sets in whereby people from all walks of civilian life spontaneously ignore their ordinary class affiliations and come together to help each other out in circumstances where all are suffering equally due to war, and, importantly, collectively stiffen their resolve to resist the enemies actions rather than cave into them. Short of using nuclear weapons to defeat Iran, the US and Israel stand no hope of defeating the people of Iran.

There is also a problem of logistics in attacking Iran. Over the years that the threat of attack has prevailed, there have been reports that have suggested that Israel will ‘go it alone’ if they feel threatened enough by Iran’s ‘nuclear weapon program’. One report recently even suggested that the US is “concerned that Israel will not warn them before taking action against Iran’s nuclear facilities”. This is all rhetorical nonsense dished up for public consumption. The reality is that it would be absolutely impossible for Israel to launch an entirely unilateral attack against Iran without US connivance.

In any attack they mount, Israel will use American aircraft which constantly require spare parts mostly from the US. They will also require ordnance which also mostly comes from the US; they will require vast quantities of military jet fuel, and, if Israel plans to attack Hamas and Hezbollah at the same time, it will also require massive amounts of diesel fuel to power up its ground forces. All of this comes from the US and, as was recorded in August 2010, Israel has already ordered that fuel which would by now have been delivered and stockpiled.

The other major logistic hurdle Israel needs to overcome is the one of getting to and from its target. Israel is separated from Iran by at least two other countries; Syria and Iraq or Jordan and Iraq. Either way, this amounts to a round rip of around 3000kms to bomb Bushehr and/or Qom, Iran’s two main nuclear facilities. The most likely route would be via Syria who would be unlikely to offer any resistance to Israeli overflights – especially if it came under attack itself. Then there is the question of overflying Iraq. The Iraqi government on its own is unlikely to allow Israeli aircraft to overfly their territory. Israel would need to be in cohorts with the US if it wished to get the US to convince the Iraqi government to allow Israeli aircraft into its airspace. And not only would Israel need to have Iraqi permission to pass through its airspace, it would also need to use Iraqi airspace for in-flight refuelling operations which the Israelis would need to utilise since their strike aircraft do not have the range to do the job in one round trip without refuelling.

The question then is; what exactly is Israel’s intended endgame in the event of an attack against Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah?

Such a massive attack against all of its enemies at once is a huge commitment on Israeli resources and one of very high risk. It will, therefore, need to be decisive in terms of meeting all of its war aims.

Israel will have learnt the lessons of its past failures. After years of attacks against Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, Israel has not been able to destroy Hezbollah or Hamas despite its efforts against Hezbollah in 2006 and against Hamas in 2008/2009. In the event of an attack against Iran, Israel is likely to simultaneously mount hitherto unprecedented attacks against both Hamas and Hezbollah. Such a strike will likely be opened up with a massive aerial and artillery barrage and then, since Israel does not have to commit ground forces to attacking Iran, it will be able to invade and occupy the Gaza Strip and south Lebanon up to the Latani River. At the same time, Israel is likely to fully occupy all of the West Bank in order to prevent any uprising by Palestinian resistance there and remilitarise the Golan Heights to prevent any backlash there.

In short, for Israel an attack against Iran and Israel’s other enemies on the pretext of pre-empting an immediate threat to its own existence will be the do or die action it will take in order to realise Zionism’s ultimate endgame; the creation of a Greater Israel.

The coming confrontation is not about Iran being a threat; it is about Israel ridding itself of all of its enemies in the places that it would like to annex as part of its realisation of creating a permanent Greater Israel nation abundant with fertile lands, its own water resources, and living space. War is its pretext.

IS THE ‘FINAL CONFRONTATION’ NOW IMMINENT?

This post is a modified version of a post that I wrote back in June of 2008. What I wrote then is just as valid today as it was then.

Those pushing for war against Iran argue, despite the total lack of any evidence to support their claims, that Iran has a nuclear weapons program and that they will use their nuclear weapons, once they have them, against Israel. Their allegations are reinforced by what they say, quite falsely, are President Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric about ‘wiping Israel off the map’.

All of this is merely propaganda and neither Israel nor the US or even the International Atomic Energy Authority, the UNs nuclear watchdog, can produce any evidence whatsoever to support Israeli and US claims about Iran’s so-called nuclear weapons program. [Update: An imminent report due next week from the IAEA will still not provide any hard actual evidence of Iran having a nuclear weapons program. The ‘evidence’ the IAEA will produce will only be statements fro various dissidents and defectors who claim to have knowledge of a nuclear weapons program, and some vague references to Iran supposedly researching trigger devices for nuclear warheads.]

The reality is this: Israel and their supporters have been carrying on about Iran’s nuclear ambitions for years and threats to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities were being made long before Ahmadinejad became President of Iran in August, 2005. Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric has merely been a reaction to Israel’s bellicose stance towards Iran and, with a little careful massaging of translations of his speeches by the neoconservative think tank, MEMRI, has provided much fodder for the Israel/neocon propaganda machine. However, the real reason Israel wants to attack Iran is not because of Iran’s ‘nuclear weapons program’ – it simply doesn’t have one – nor is it because Ahmadinejad has said he wants to ‘wipe Israel off the map’ – he never said any such thing – it is because Iran supports both Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Palestinian territories and Syria who are seeking to have the Golan Heights returned to them. What Israel and the US and their neoconservative allies really want is ‘regime change’ in Iran. They want an Iran that has an Israel and US friendly government so that Israel can continue in its quest to create a Greater Israel without having to worry about Iran supporting those that are resisting Israeli expansionism.

In the event of Israel and the US attacking Iran, one can expect to see not just Iran’s nuclear facilities destroyed, indeed, that will be just a minor part of the operation, but there will also be major attacks against Iranian military targets including air bases, missile storage areas, barracks, etc. Iran’s communications systems and government buildings will also likely be targeted. In short, the Iranian government would be bombed into capitulation.

One can also expect Israel to launch an attack, probably simultaneously with the assault on Iran, against Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Israel may also attack Syria pre-emptively on the basis that Syria has a mutual assistance treaty with Iran and despite the current domestic problems Syria is experience. The resulting conflict could have a devastating effect both on the region and around the world. As well as bringing death and destruction to countless Iranians, Palestinians, Lebanese and Syrians, many Israelis may also die as Iran launches missiles in a counter attack against Israel, a move that could escalate rapidly if Israel decided to its use nuclear weapons against Iran in retaliation to an Iranian counter attack.

The economic consequences for the rest of the world could also be catastrophic. Oil prices, already at record levels due to the uncertainties prevailing in the region, would play havoc with economies world wide.

Then there are the unknowns. How, for example, will Russia, a supplier of nuclear equipment to Iran, and China, a customer of Iran’s resources, react to such an attack? How will the UN handle a pre-emptive assault against Iran? How will the governments of the other Arab states react? How will the peoples of the other Arab states react? What will happen in Iraq, already destroyed by over half a decade of fighting?

The world, somehow, is not reacting to the prospect of war in the same way as it did during the build-up to the invasion of Iraq. The reason for that is; the world knew the invasion of Iraq was coming, but this time around there is no overt preparations for war against Iran in the way that there was against Iraq. There is even a feeling that the US simply wouldn’t be stupid enough to do it again after the disaster of Iraq. The problem is, however, that the extreme right-wing of the US and Israel are convinced of their own self-righteousness and that all will go according to their plans.

It’s a frightening scenario. The Middle East could erupt into catastrophic war at any tick of the clock but the world doesn’t seem to think its going to happen.

Sooner or later it will. Israel’s ultimate endgame is for regime change in Iran which, in turn, will deny Hamas and Hezbollah of its ability to resist Israel’s quest for a Greater Israel. War against Iran is the only way Israel’s Zionists will be able to realise their dream.

The coming confrontation hasn’t got anything to do with Iran’s so-called nuclear weapons program; it has everything to do with Israel’s desire to create a Greater Israel and rid itself of its enemies once and for all.

IRAN: THE NEOCONS HAVE BECOME CONFUSED AS THEY PUSH FOR ACTION

Yesterday, Jonathan Tobin at Commentary wrote:

With the International Atomic Energy Agency set to release a new report next month detailing Iran’s efforts to create a nuclear weapon, Tehran’s main protector in the international community is making a last ditch effort to squelch the watchdog group’s efforts to blow the whistle on this threat.

Russia announced today it opposed the IAEA’s plans to publish a report about the military implications of Iran’s illegal push for nukes.

Tobin goes on to write:

Since the beginning of the last decade, Iran has played Western diplomats for fools with Russian assistance.

While Tobin conceded that “the Russians have as much reason to fear a nuclear Iran as anyone else”, Tobin claimed that Russian support for Iran was because Prime Minister Putin “believes anything that thwarts American foreign policy goals constitutes a win for his government”.

This didn’t seem to make any sense. On the one hand Tobin – as well as other neocons and their allies – is accusing Russia of helping Iran cover up what they think is Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, while at the same time saying that a nuclear-armed Iran would not be in Russia’s interest any more than anyone elses. Why would they help Iran cover up their so-called nuclear weapons program?

In order to clarify Tobin’s stance, I emailed him. I wrote:

What you are saying, Jonathan, is tantamount to suggesting that Russia is complicit in aiding Iran to become nuclear armed. I wonder, can you explain how a nuclear armed Iran would be in Russia's interest?And, even if it were in Russia's interest, would it not be easier for Russia to simply supply Iran with the nuclear arms you say it seeks?

His response was even more confusing than his article. He replied:

As I wrote, a nuclear Iran is not in Russia's interest. But its delight in thwarting American policy aims seems to trump common sense in this case. Russia has been Iran's chief enabler in international diplomacy as their effort to suppress the IAEA report shows. While Russia knows better than to give Iran nukes, a Middle East in which Iran displaces the U.S. as a power is one that they may think they can live with.

The response provided more questions than answers. I wrote back to him saying:

May I take this a little further since your reasoning seems to be contradictory. We can agree that a nuclear armed Iran is not in Russia's interest, but how can Iran 'displace the US as a power' without being nuclear armed? And, if it's not in Russia's interest, how is it that Russia could 'live with' that?

I’m still, not unsurprisingly, awaiting his reply.

IRAN: IS CONFRONTATION NEAR AT HAND?

In recent days America has accused Iran of plotting to commit an act of war on American soil by assassinating a Saudi Arabian diplomat. The first question one would need to ask is: why on earth would Iran commit such a deliberate act of war against the US and Saudi Arabia?

And the answer, of course is: they simply wouldn’t.

Yet, this is exactly the ludicrous scenario that the US administration is hoping the world of will accept. “We’re in the process of uniting world public opinion continuing to isolate and condemn their behavior. Nothing has been taken off the table,” vice–President Joe Biden told ABC News on the ‘Good Morning America’ show.

Robert Baer, an ex-CIA intelligence analyst specializing in Iranian affairs, however, has doubts about the veracity of the report about an Iranian plot to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador in Washington, DC, saying that the plot is “completely out of character” for the Iranians.

Apart from a load of wild accusations and an arrest of one of the so-called plotters, the US has not provided any evidence whatsoever of any plot. It seems to be yet another case of ‘we have said it has happened and, therefore, it has’. The world is then expected to believe it just on that basis despite having been gullible enough to have fallen for this nonsense so many times before.

Two questions remain unanswered. First, my original one: why would Iran do such a thing: and two, why would the US want to accuse Iran of plotting such an outrageous act knowing that it could lead to war?

As readers of my blog will be aware, I have warned for some time of a coming confrontation between Iran and Israel and its allies. For years, the Israelis and the US together with their other Western allies have accused Iran of having a nuclear weapons program. And for just as many years, not a skerrick of evidence has ever been produced to support the claims. Iran has consistently claimed that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only in order to produce electrical energy and for medical purposes. And, contrary to claims by the US, Iran has allowed the IAEA access to all of its facilities and no evidence has ever been found that supports the accusation that Iran has a ‘nuclear weapons program’.

While the US continues to claim that Iran does have a nuclear weapons program, it does so purely to maintain the propaganda rhetoric; it certainly doesn’t have any hard evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program that would justify it attacking Iran. It is for this reason that the US has resorted to making other accusations about Iran’s hostility toward the US – and in this case, has also attempted to wedge an already extremely fragile relationship between Saudi Arabia and Iran into the bargain.

The reality is that Iran is in no position to provoke a war against either Israel or the US. Both Israel and the US, however, would gain extensively from a war that resulted in regime change in Iran.

If the US attacked Iran, say, on the pretext that Iran threatened to commit an act of war against the US, then Israel would be provided with a pretext to attack Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip on the basis that they would be pre-empting a retaliatory strike by Hezbollah and Hamas who are Iran’s allies. And just for good measure, the Israelis would also launch a full scale invasion and full military occupation of the West Bank in order, so they would tell the world, to prevent hostile Palestinian elements taking up arms against Israel and the Israeli settlers in the West Bank. While the American attack against Iran would take the world’s centre stage, the Israeli reaction to an American attack against Iran – attacks against Hezbollah and Hamas – would be seemingly only of minor significance compared to the war against Iran whereas in fact the entire war is really is about Israel’s desire to rid itself of its enemies once and for all and thus go some way to realising their dream of creating a Greater Israel.

The fact is; Iran is not at all a threat to the US and never can be, but while Iran supports Hezbollah and Hamas, Iran will always be there to thwart Israel’s dreams of a Greater Israel.

Only a full on war against Hezbollah and Hamas and regime change in Iran will give the Zionists of Israel what they have yearned for since 1948. And that can only be achieved by America attacking Iran.

COULD TARGETED ASSASSINATIONS LEGITIMISE TIT-FOR-TAT KILLINGS OF THE LEADERS OF THE BELLIGERENTS?

I’ve spent much of the day reading a dozen or so newspaper articles, opinion pieces and commentaries on the pros and cons of the killing of American citizen and Jihadist, Anwar al Awlaki, who died in Yemen yesterday after being targeted by a Hellfire missile fired from an American operated drone aircraft.

The left and the civil and human rights folk together with folk from the libertarian right have condemned the killing as illegal and unconstitutional, while the right-wing, led noisily by the neoconservatives, have praised the killing as a victory and argued that in time of war such killings are quite justified.

What’s missing from all of these arguments from both sides is the fact that such extra-judicial killings can work two ways. No matter what the rights and wrongs of these kinds of killings are, it means that if it’s okay for the US and its allies to kill their enemies in this way, then its okay for the enemy to do likewise and kill American leaders and leaders of American allies; and since the President of the United States also happens to be the Commander in Chief of American forces, he now becomes a quite legitimate target by exactly the same virtues and logic that the President viewed al Awlaki to be a legitimate target.

Targeted assassinations, of course, are nothing new; the Israelis have quite famously and openly attempted to legitimise the extra-judicial killing of its non-combatant enemies for years. It could even be argued from an historical point of view that Israel’s long history of not very seriously challenged policy of targeted assassinations has paved the way for the Americans to do likewise. Whilst the practise has caused outrage in the past, that outrage hadn’t stopped the killings – killings which continue almost daily in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere against Islamic militants, both combatant and non-combatant. Today, people have become so war-weary they have become immune to more news about such killings. In the case of the latest killing, the uproar is because al Awlaki was an American citizen but this too will soon become just another killing that will usher in a new era of Americans killing Americans justified solely on the basis that they are a threat to security.

One wonders how long it will be before a militant will be targeted and killed in America itself simply because he represents ‘a threat to security’.

And one wonders how long it will be before American and Israeli leaders are themselves targeted by their enemies.