WarSclerotic

Meir Dagan’s Iran legacy.

Looking back at Meir Dagan’s eight-year leadership of the Mossad, one is struck by how starkly it differed, at least in the public perception and the ramifications, from that of his predecessor, the English-born Efraim Halevy.

The debonair Halevy, a nephew of Cambridge philosopher Isaiah Berlin, had focused, among other areas, on improving international relations in friendly countries and quiet intelligence gathering. Whatever daring missions he approved made few headlines.

In contrast, Dagan’s rough-and-tumble stint was chock full of controversial operations that restored the Mossad’s public reputation for ruthless, bold actions.

This approach sometimes strained diplomatic relations – see, for instance, the fallout from the Mahmoud al- Mabhouh assassination in Dubai last January. It also evidently meant the Mossad had a wealth of attractive intelligence to bring to the table in its dealings with the CIA, MI6 and other friendly parallel organizations. It is no wonder that Dagan has been prominently mentioned in numerous WikiLeaks documents released so far, as a sought-after source of information.

Dagan’s strong Jewish identity seems to have been a major motivating force. The post-Holocaust “never again” mantra was central to his worldview.

He was born in 1945, reportedly in a train somewhere between Poland and Russia, to two survivors. On his first day as director, it is said, he hung a photo on the wall of his office at Mossad headquarters north of Tel Aviv of an elderly bearded Jew draped in a prayer shawl kneeling down in front of two Nazi soldiers with fists in the air.

“Look at this picture,” Dagan would often urge visitors, according to an interview that appeared this past Holocaust Remembrance Day in Yediot Aharonot. “This man, kneeling down before the Nazis, was my grandfather just before he was murdered. I look at this picture every day and promise that the Holocaust will never happen again.”

Ariel Sharon appointed Dagan in October 2002, telling him, the story goes, that he wanted “a Mossad with a knife between its teeth.”

The two men had been close for decades. In 1970 Sharon, as head of the IDF’s Southern Command, had selected Dagan to command the Rimon counterterrorism unit that operated in the Gaza Strip. Rimon members disguised themselves as Palestinian taxi drivers, farmers and even women to carry out assassinations of Fatah terrorists.

In the years preceding Dagan’s ascendancy – and preceding Halevy’s too, for that matter – the Mossad had experienced several embarrassing failures. There was the failed attempt to assassinate Hamas’s Khaled Mashaal in Jordan in 1996, which sparked a crisis that Halevy played a central role in resolving. And there were the arrests of four Mossad agents caught attempting to tap the phone of Hizbullah operative Abdallah el-Zein in Switzerland in early 1998.

DAGAN’S MOSSAD has focused principally on Iran – its nuclear weapons drive and its jihadist proxies Hamas and Hizbullah. Since he took office, along with the killing of Hamas arms dealer Mabhouh in Dubai a year ago, Hizbullah’s terror chief Imad Mughniyeh was assassinated in early 2008 when the headrest of his car seat exploded, and Syria’s liaison to North Korea’s nuclear program Gen. Mohammed Suleiman was shot through the head a few months later while relaxing in the back garden of his villa on the Mediterranean shore.

Israel, it should be stressed, has never acknowledged involvement in any of these incidents.

The Mossad may or may not be connected to a string of “setbacks” to Iran’s nuclear program: scientist Shahram Amiri temporarily disappeared last year while another scientist, Majid Shahriari, was shot dead in November; two planes carrying cargo relating to the project crashed; two nuclear labs burst into flames; equipment sent to Iran for the program arrived broken; and the Stuxnet worm wreaked havoc in Iranian nuclear facilities’ computer control systems.

If not for these “developments” and others, it is very possible that Iran would by now have achieved the level of uranium enrichment needed for a bomb.

If it ultimately turns out that the Mossad was linked to some of these “setbacks,” and they proved significant in the struggle to thwart Teheran, this would be Dagan’s biggest legacy. Making sure those are not the last such “setbacks” could be incoming Mossad head Tamir Pardo’s biggest challenge.

International economic sanctions, though they are starting to bite, have so far failed to persuade the regime in Teheran to abandon the program. A major military offense, while still “on the table,” is deemed by many to be unlikely, due in part to the prohibitively high risk of a major regional conflagration that could follow. For now, quiet but effective behind-the-scenes work may be the most important obstacle to a nuclear Iran.

Obviously, sabotage cannot delay the Iranians indefinitely. But it can buy time. Meir Dagan may have bought the free world a lot of that already.

Iran invites EU, Russian reps to visit nuclear sites.

VIENNA — Iran has invited Russia, China, the European Union and its allies among the Arab and developing world to tour its nuclear sites, in an apparent move to gain support ahead of a new round of talks with six world powers.

In a letter made available Monday to The Associated Press, senior Iranian envoy Ali Asghar Soltanieh suggested the weekend of Jan. 15 and 16 and said that meetings “with high ranking officials” are envisaged.

While no reason was given for the timing of the offer, it comes just weeks before Iran and the six powers follow up on recent talks that ended with agreement on little else but to meet again.

The new round between Teheran, and the permanent UN Security Council members — the US Russia, China, Britain, France — plus Germany, is tentatively set for Istanbul, Turkey in late January.

It is meant to explore whether there is common ground for more substantive talks on Iran’s nuclear program, viewed by the US, and its allies as a cover for secret plans to make nuclear arms — something Teheran denies.

Instead, the Islamic Republic insists its uranium enrichment and other programs are meant only to generate fuel for a future network of nuclear reactors.

Diplomats from delegations at the table with Iran during the December talks in Geneva said Teheran made no commitments to talking about UN Security Council demands that it freezes uranium enrichment — which can turn out both fuel and fissile warhead material. And Iranian negotiators flatly ruled out discussing such demands at the Istanbul meeting.

The offer of a visit comes more than three years after six diplomats from developing nations accredited to the IAEA visited Iran’s uranium ore conversion site at Isfahan, which turns raw uranium into the feedstock gas that is then enriched. Participants then told reporters they could not make an assessment of Iran’s nuclear aims based on that visit to that facility in central Iran.

But the new offer appeared more wide ranging, both as far as nations or groups invited and sites to be visited.

Dated Dec. 27, the four paragraph letter obtained Monday by the AP offered no details beyond offering an all-expenses paid “visit to Iran’s nuclear sites.”

But a diplomat familiar with its contents said it was mailed to Russia, China, Egypt, the group of nonaligned nations at the IAEA, Cuba, Arab League members at the IAEA and Hungary, as the president of the rotating EU presidency.

The US was not among those invited. China, and to a lesser degree Russia, have acted to dilute originally harsh sanctions measures proposed by the US and its Western Security Council allies, Britain and France, leading to compromise penalties enacted by the council that are milder than the West had originally hoped for.

The diplomat, who is accredited to the International Atomic Energy Agency, also told the AP that Bushehr and Natanz were the venues to be toured and that meetings were planned with acting Foreign Minister Ali Salehi, the head of Iran’s atomic agency and Saeed Jalili, Teheran’s chief nuclear negotiator. He asked for anonymity because his information is privileged.

Iran: ‘Harry Potter a Zionist Plot to Promote Devil Worship’ » Matzav.com – The Online Voice of Torah Jewry.

If you thought the Harry Potter series was an innocent children’s fantasy story, you’re wrong, an Iranian movie producer says: In reality, the Harry Potter books and movies are part of a “Zionist plot” to “spread their poison.” With its emphasis on witches, warlocks, and wonders, he says, the Harry Potter series “serves to spread the dark and evil essence of Zionism and its goals.”

In a series of accusations that sound ridiculous to those raised in the West, Iran’s Irinn TV channel produced a documentary that purports to show how the various elements of the Potter story – the use of magic, the struggle against the Dark Lord, and other themes – essentially reflect the tenets and goals of Zionism (read: Judaism), and encourage innocent people around the world to support those goals.

“Propaganda for purity of blood and race, one of the principles of global Zionism, is openly portrayed and emphasized in the second Harry Potter film,” the film’s narrator says, referring to the obsession of the film’s villain, Voldemort, with pure bloodlines – symbolic of the Jews’ parochial attitude to non-Jewish nations. “If we add this [film] to the other pieces of the puzzle – the beliefs depicted in the other propaganda and political products of the Ziono-Hollywoodists, the Satanic features of this inhumane movement will become more evident.”

In addition to the blood theme, the series alludes to the Jewish desire to rule the world, says a prominent Iranian film critic quoted in the movie. “[The Zionists] support Harry Potter because he is the promised Messiah,” Sa’id Mostaghasi says. “As you can see, he has the same traits and wants to defeat a dark force, which in this film is depicted as Voldemort. In the sixth episode, there is even mention of the War of Armageddon.”

Perhaps worst of all, the documentary says, is the series’ attempts to influence innocent Christians and Muslims to worship the devil, as the Jews do. “The creation of new stories, based on mythical themes leading to witchcraft and devil worship, has always been a tool used by contemporary Zionists, and is once again being used by them… targeting innocent children and youth” to join them in their Satanic ways.”

The Iranians are apparently the first to make the three-way connection between Harry Potter, the Devil, and Jews, although they did not invent the two strands that make up that connection; Christian Europe has for nearly a millenium portrayed the Jews as the representative of the Devil on earth, while modern-day Christian evangelicals preachers have railed against Harry Potter because of its magic and fantasy related themes – although there have been a number of commentators across the spectrum of Christianity, including evangelicals and Catholics, who have rallied to the series’ defense. Thus, while the Focus on the Family group has said that the Potter books contain some positive messages, “they are packaged in a medium – witchcraft – that is directly denounced in Scripture,” evangelical author Connie Neal has written.

That the Iranians would connect the devil theme to the Jews is not surprising at all, given that Christians have been doing this for much of their own history. In his seminal work on the subject, “The Devil and the Jews,” author Joshua Trachteberg laid out a sordid history of European anti-Semitism, which showed that much of Christian anti-Semitism over the past 1,000 years stems from a fear – and suspicion – that the Jews were working with the Devil to destroy Christianity.

“How is it that the Jews can be hated for being Communists and capitalists – at the same time,” asks Trachtenberg, as he explores some of the most ridiculous beliefs that Christians have had about Jews: that they poison wells, desecrate the “host” (the wafer representing Jesus in Catholic ritual), and destroy morality, among many other sins. In his work, published in 1943, Trachtenberg builds a persuasive case that Christians have seen Jews as allies of the Devil, working against them, and that those vestigial beliefs are still around today – for example, in the accusation that Hollywood (which everyone knows is “controlled by the Jews”) spreads moral perversion and unpatriotic attics.

Thus, it didn’t take much for Iran to pick up on these themes in its battle against Israel and the Jews, says history researcher Morris Cohen. “Those themes were out there for the taking, so it makes sense that they would use them against Israel.” The Islamic world, he said, is much more vehement in its condemnation of Harry Potter than the Christian world: In 2002, the books were banned in schools across the United Arab Emirates (UAE), on the grounds that its themes were contrary to Islamic values; in 2007, police in Karachi, Pakistan discovered and defused a car bomb located outside a shopping center where the final Harry Potter novel was scheduled to go on sale that day; and of course, Iran has harped on the Jewish connection to the sorcery themes in the books, saying that “Zionists had spent billions of dollars” on it in order to encourage devil worship, as described above.

Iran says Bushehr plant nearly ready to join power grid.

Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant is scheduled to be connected to the national electricity network in February 2011, one month later than previously stated.

The country’s Atomic Energy Organization chief Ali-Akbar Salehi had previously said that the Russian-built 1,000-megawatt reactor would be up and running by January 2011.

On Sunday, however, Salehi told official Iranian television station IRIB, “As we have repeatedly announced, work in the Bushehr power plant is progressing well by God’s grace,” PressTV reported.

He added that Iran began injecting fuel into the reactor’s core in late October and said he hoped tests necessary for further progress would be completed by mid January.

The Islamic Republic has given many conflicting reports regarding their nuclear progress. In early December, Salehi said that all relevant tests had been completed.

The startup of the Bushehr power plant, a project completed with Russian help but beset by years of delays, will deliver Iran the central stated goal of its atomic work — the generation of nuclear power.

The United States and some of its allies, however, believe the Bushehr plant is part of a civil energy program that Iran is using as cover for a secret aim to develop a nuclear weapons capability. Iran denies the accusation.

The Bushehr plant itself is not among the West’s concerns because safeguards are in place to ensure that the spent fuel will be returned to Russia and cannot be diverted to weapons making.

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

DEBKAfile Exclusive Analysis January 3, 2011, 8:49 AM (GMT+02:00)

Meir Dagan ends a remarkable career as Mossad chief

The cabinet in Jerusalem quietly took leave Sunday, Jan. 2, of Meir Dagan, marking the end of his eight remarkable years as head of the Mossad, Israel’s external intelligence, espionage and covert warfare service. His retirement – after several extensions – also won a backhanded mention in Tehran.

Amir Ali Hajizadeh, commander of the Revolutionary Guards aerial arm, told the Fars news agency: “Many spy planes and ultra-modern aircraft of our enemies have been shot down. We have also shot down two Western reconnaissance drones in the Persian Gulf.” He did not say when this happened, only: “It is the first time we are announcing it.”
The Iranian official, say debkafile‘s intelligence sources, was aiming a dig at Meir Dagan by hinting at Tehran too may have had successes against “our enemies.” That was the best – or worst – Tehran could do after the French Le Canard Enchaine’s glowing account of Israel’s secret war against Iran’s nuclear program. Thursday, Dec. 30, the journal, known for its good connections with French intelligence, reported that Israel had won the help of the American CIA and British MI6 for its covert operations after promising to hold back from a direct military attack on Iran’s nuclear installations.

The publication describes the Mossad as responsible for the liquidation of five senior Iranian nuclear scientists and planting the Stuxnet cyber worm in the program’s computer systems. Also attributed to Israeli intelligence is the explosion in Iran’s most important Shihab-3 ballistic missile arsenal at the Imam Ali mountain base near Khorramabad on Oct. 12 last year. Le Canard reported that 18 Iranian nuclear technicians died in that attack and many of the missiles were destroyed.
Judging from the French intelligence description, Meir Dagan led this successful secret war on Iran not just for Israel but for the West at large.

Even if Le Canard embellished those feats somewhat, they are still pretty impressive. The measure of their success was conveyed in a laconic comment by Moshe Yaalon, Deputy Prime Minister in charge of Strategic Affairs in a radio interview on Dec. 29. He said: “Iran does not currently have the ability to make a nuclear bomb on its own” – throwing out all previous forecasts of Iran’s close approach to this capability as no longer valid.

Was this delay due to Stuxnet? Yaalon did not say. But he referred to Western pressure (sanctions) when he predicted that this pressure would force a decision in Tehran between stopping the nuclear program or stopping to exist.

“I don’t know whether this will happen in 2011 or 2012,” he said, “but we are talking in terms of the next three years” – i.e. 2014 will be the critical year,” said the minister. By then, either Iran will have a bomb or the Revolutionary Islamic regime will be gone.
Yaalon’s timeline, the clearest heard thus far from any Israeli official, means that Meir Dagan is ending his tour of duty at the high point of the undercover war he managed, having successfully tipped the scales against Iran’s nuclear progress.

The minister said cautiously in the same interview: “We cannot talk about a point of no return” – meaning that the greater part of the contest still lies ahead – until the moment comes for the Iranian regime to abandon its drive for a nuclear bomb if it wants to survive.

While the Western media by and large has high praise for Dagan’s accomplishments, the consciousness of the inevitable failures on his record colored his parting address to the Israeli cabinet Sunday. He used it to pay tribute to Mossad and its agents: “Our people,” he said, “have only two weapons:  their cover stories and their sharp wits. Otherwise, they are on their own with no chance of rescue.”

So where was the Israeli Defense Forces in the fateful secret war with Iran? The answer, say debkafile‘s military sources, is nowhere.

In the four years since the 2006 war with Hizballah, the IDF’s role has been progressively sidelined in most proactive efforts to safeguard Israel’s national security and enhance its strategic standing. History may one day determine whether this decline was the outcome was dictated by circumstances or a function of the personalities of the last two chiefs of staff, Dan Halutz and Gaby Ashkenazi who too is about to retire.

Both began building their political careers and platforms before taking off their uniforms. During their watch, not only did the IDF not face up to the Iranian threat, but it avoided grappling with Iran’s junior allies, Hizballah and Hamas, taking no action to prevent them tightening a noose strung with missiles and rockets around Israel’s borders.  In more ways than one, Meir Dagan stood in for the chief of staff – and the Mossad for the IDF – in bearing the brunt of cutting down Israel’s foremost enemies.

WikiLeaks: Iran can attack Israel within 10-12 minutes.

IDF Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi said that Iran has over 300 missiles that could reach Israel within 10-12 minutes, according to cables released by WikiLeaks on Sunday.

During a November 15, 2009 meeting with a US Congress delegation led by Ike Skelton (D-MO), Ashkenazi added that that Israel was prepared for a major war against Hamas.

“I’m preparing the Israeli army in a major war, since it is easier to scale down to a smaller operation than to do the opposite,” he said.

Ashkenazi told the delegation that “rocket threat against Israel is more serious than ever. Therefore, Israel has a strong emphasis on missile defense.”

He added that although the Iranian threat is serious, the threat from Hamas and Hizbullah, which are funded by Iran, is most acute. Their rockets are more accurate than Iran’s, due to their proximity to Israel.

“We therefore believe,” Ashkenazi said, “that the next war will take place in the same areas where the previous wars occurred,” Lebanon and Gaza.

According to the cables, Ashkenazi said that Hizbullah has over 40,000 rockets, most of which can reach any point within Israel, and Hamas has the ability to strike Tel Aviv.

Disruption of daily life in Tel Aviv is a major goal of Hizbullah and Hamas, and their weapons stockpiles indicated to the IDF that they are aiming for a lengthy conflict with Israel in which they plan to send a “massive number” of rockets into Israel daily.

The chief of staff explained that anti-missile defense systems can not cover the whole country; therefore the IDF sends out drones over Lebanon to “identify potential targets,” he said. “So far, the drones have been a success.”

Ashkenazi said that during Operation Cast Lead the IDF made mistakes, but never deliberately attacked civilians. He added that in the next war, Israel can not be restricted in urban battles.

In a related cable, from September 2009, Maj.- Gen. Yoav Galant told Senator Kirsten Gilibrand (D-NY) that had the IDF enterted main urban areas in Gaza, Operation Cast Lead would have lasted three days, not three weeks.

Iran: We shot down 2 ‘Western spy’ drones – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Revolutionary Guards’ air force commander boasts that all ‘enemy’ bases in Gulf are within range of Iranian missiles

AFP

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have shot down two “Western spy” drones in the Gulf, the Fars news agency quoted a top commander of the elite military force as saying on Sunday. 

“Westerners have a series of capabilities which cannot be ignored, especially satellites, or for example they have spy planes which can take pictures in some places,” Amir Ali Hajizadeh, head of the air force wing of the Guards said.

He said that the drones were mainly being used in Iraq and Afghanistan but “some violations against our soil” have also occurred. “And we have so far downed many of their advanced spy planes. In the Persian Gulf we have downed two of their planes and this is the first time that we are saying it,” Hajizadeh said without specifying when exactly the drones were shot down. He also boasted that all “enemy” bases in the region were within range of Iranian missiles, referring to arch-foe the United States. He said that even the aircraft carriers deployed in the region were no longer a threat to Iran. “There was a time when an aircraft carrier was something to rely on and when they told a country that this warship was moving towards your shore, the government of that country would be toppled,” Hajizadeh said. “But now this has become a threat for them. We have full control of our enemies. We notice whatever changes taking place on our shores. When they go on alert in the warships or when they put on life jackets to launch boats in the sea, we are aware of that.”

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps was set up as a force to defend the 1979 Islamic revolution from internal and external threats.Its commanders have repeatedly boasted of its capabilities and delivered warnings to regional foe Israel, which has not ruled out a military strike to prevent Iran acquiring a nuclear weapons capability.

‘US secretly talking to Damascus about Israel-Syria peace’.

The US has been secretly communicating with Syrian officials in recent weeks in hopes of brokering a comprehensive peace agreement between Syria and Israel, Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Rai reported on Saturday.

Sources told Al-Rai that the US was contacted by Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem with the message that Syria was ready to renew dialogue with the Israelis and reach a peace deal.

The Obama administration believes peace between Israel and Syria would constitute a breakthrough that would help kick-start stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, according to the sources.

The Al-Rai report added that senior adviser to US President Barack Obama, Dennis Ross, said that the Syrians are prepared to distance themselves from Iran, Hizbullah and Hamas and cooperate with the US in the war on terrorism. The Israelis in return have expressed willingness to return the Golan Heights to Syria, reach an agreement on water rights and immediately normalize relations with Damascus.

Ross recently visited Israel, exerting pressure on the government to make concessions either on the Palestinian-Israel track or the Syrian-Israel track, according to the report.

The paper quotes US sources as saying Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has put Defense Minister Ehud Barak in charge of the negotiations. If there is a breakthrough in negotiations, Netanyahu will publicly announce them and if negotiations fail he can distance himself from the process and place the blame on Barak and the US, the sources said.

The sudden breakthrough in relations with Syria was responsible for US President Barack Obama’s Wednesday decision to bypass the Senate and appoint Robert Ford to be the first US ambassador to Damascus since 2005, according to the report.

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report January 1, 2011, 10:44 AM (GMT+02:00)

North Korea’s Punggye-ri nuclear testing site

A large group of Iranian nuclear scientists and technicians has been spotted in the last few days at North Korea’s nuclear center at Yongbyon, according to debkafile‘s intelligence sources. American and South Korean watchers assumed at first they were examining the new, extra-fast centrifuges for enriching uranium North Korea had showed off to America visitors in November. But they thought again when a small group broke away from the Iranian delegation for a secret side-trip to visit North Korea’s Punggye-ri testing site near the Chinese border and appeared to be receiving detailed briefing on the next nuclear test planned soon by Pyongyang.

US and South Korean intelligence experts now strongly suspect now that they were putting their heads together for making it a joint North Korea-Iranian test.
One South Korean intelligence source reported that the Iranian visitors brought with them a large sum of money, estimated at least at $150 million, in all likelihood to cover Pyongyang’s fee for staging a nuclear test on Tehran’s behalf. French intelligence subscribes to this assumption in view of the dramatically heightened interchanges between North Korea and Iran in the last two months.
On Dec. 2, debkafile disclosed that French President Nicolas Sarkozy had strongly urged US President Barak Obama to get tough militarily with North Korea – not just over the crisis in the peninsula but for fear Pyongyang would use the sound and fury to distract attention from its transfer to Iran of nuclear technology and advanced centrifuges for offsetting the malfunctions retarding its progress towards a weapon.
Sarkozy argued too that Tehran has decided to engage the world powers in talks on its nuclear program – the second round takes place in Istanbul this month – solely to play for time until North Korea’s assistance kicked in.

It is now believed in Paris that Tehran and Pyongyang have brought their plans forward. Instead of going through the process of shipping nuclear items and materials from North Korea to Iran and risking their interception by American forces in keeping with international sanctions, they have decided to go straight for a joint nuclear test to be carried out at the North Korean testing site. This step would defeat the enforcement of international sanctions.

This possibility was suggested in one of the remarks Gen (ret.) Moshe Yaalon, Deputy Prime Minister with portfolio for Strategic affairs, made on the subject on Dec. 29:  “Iran does not currently have the ability to make a nuclear bomb on its own,” he said. The “technical difficulties” he referred to (without specifying who or what had caused them) had disabled Iran’s independent nuclear weapons capability, he said, implying that they did not stand in the way of Tehran’s ability to call on outside help for attaining its objective.
debkafile: North Korea is the only outsider with the ability and will to help Iran.

Taken with other remarks, Yaalon’s words were interpreted as conveying the following message to Washington: We’ve dealt with Iran; it’s your turn to take care of North Korea and make sure they don’t outmaneuver us by using Pyongyang’s nuclear facilities to fill in the gaps for Iran.
That would include conducting a nuclear test on Iran’s behalf as its subcontractor or surrogate.

Iran accuses Israel of kidnapping former deputy defense minister – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Deputy foreign minister calls for international investigation, claiming Israel snatched Ali Reza Asghari, who disappeared in Istanbul in 2006.

By Yossi Melman

Iran is accusing Israel of kidnapping its former deputy defense minister Ali Reza Asghari. Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister in the Middle East and Commonwealth Affairs Mohammed Raouf Sheybani said that he was worried by reports that Asghari was taken by force to a “prison of the Zionist regime.”

According to Sheybani, Asghari was kidnapped by Israeli forces, with the help of the United States. Sheybani called upon the international community to take emergency action in order to discover Asghari’s current whereabouts.

	Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gestures prior to delivering his speech in the city of Qazvin about 140 kilometers west of Tehran, Nov. 10, 2010
	Photo by: AP

Asghari, who served as commander of the Al-Quds unit of the Revolutionary Guards and was later appointed Deputy Defense Minister, disappeared on December 9, 2006 during a visit to Turkey. After passing through Syria, he arrived at his hotel in Istanbul, when he went missing without a trace.

Since his disappearance, the media have speculated as to his whereabouts. Some have speculated that he has defected to a Western country, either the U.S., the U.K., Germany or Israel.

According to these theories, Asghari divulged to the CIA, Mossad, the British MI-6 and German intelligence a great deal of information that was in his possession due to the high-ranking positions that he occupied in the Iranian security apparatus.

Asghari’s wife and relatives and the Iranian government contend that he would not have defected of his own free will, but that he instead was kidnapped, and are demanding that the Turkish authorities investigate the incident.

The Iranian deputy foreign minister mentioned the disappearance of four Iranian diplomats in Lebanon in 1982 in his remarks. Iran holds Israel responsible for the disappearance of the four. During negotiations held to try to secure the release of captured Israeli airman Ron Arad, Hezbollah officials raised the Iranian demand for information on the fate of the four diplomats.

Through German mediators, Israel relayed its contention that the four were arrested at a roadblock set up by the Lebanese Christian Phalanghist militias at the height of the first Lebanon War. Israeli officials claimed then that after their arrest, the four were transferred to another location for interrogation, at the conclusion of which they either died as a result of torture or were summarily executed.

According to information from the same sources that related that version of events, the four Iranian diplomats were buried in an open field in Beirut, upon which a commercial center was later built.