WarSclerotic

Sa’ad Hariri: Issuing of indictments a ‘hi… JPost – Middle East.

  Former Lebanese prime minister on Thursday welcomed indictments issued in his father’s 2005 assassination, calling the move a “historic moment.”

The comments came after Lebanese State Prosecutor Saeed Mirza announced that he had received indictments over former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri’s assassination, and four arrest warrants.

The four suspects are Mustafa Badreddine, Salim al-Ayyash, Hasan Aineysseh and Asad Sabra, The Daily Star reported, quoting a judicial source. Badreddine is cousin and a brother-in-law of slain Hezbollah terrorist Imad Mughniyeh, who was assassinated in Damascus in 2008.

Earlier Thursday, officials from the UN-backed tribunal investigating the assassination met Lebanon’s state prosecutor. Lebanese media reported that the four arrest warrants presented were for Hezbollah members.

Neither Mirza nor the delegation from the Special Tribunal for Lebanon commented immediately after the talks.

On Monday, London-based Asharq Alawsat had reported that five high ranking Hezbollah officials were expected to be indicted by the special tribunal. The report added that once the indictments are released, the identities of the accused will be kept secret for a short period in order to allow the Lebanese government to investigate and arrest them.

Also Thursday, Lebanon’s interior minister was quoted as saying that the indictments are  “a big deal.”

“Why the big deal? It’s just an indictment and not a final verdict. So why all this hubbub?” Lebanese Interior Minister Marwan Charbel asked during a Voice of Lebanon interview, according to The Daily Star.

Charbel said that he hoped the Special Tribunal for Lebanon decision would “satisfy” the Lebanese people.

Syrian troops kill 11 dissidents, as US mounts pressure on Assad.

Al Arabiya

Thursday, 30 June 2011

A woman takes part in a sit-in for the people killed during recent protests, in Damascus. (File Photo)

US to resume Muslim Brotherhood ties – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Analysts say growing clout of Islamist party, which doesn’t recognize Israel, leaves US little choice

Reuters

The United States has decided to resume formal contacts with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, a senior US official said on Wednesday, in a step that reflects the Islamist group’s growing political weight but that is almost certain to upset Israel and its US backers.

“The political landscape in Egypt has changed, and is changing,” said the senior official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “It is in our interests to engage with all of the parties that are competing for parliament or the presidency.”

The official sought to portray the shift as a subtle evolution rather than a dramatic change in Washington’s stance toward the Brotherhood, a group founded in 1928 that seeks to promote its conservative vision of Islam in society.

Under the previous policy, US diplomats were allowed to deal with Brotherhood members of parliament who had won seats as independents – a diplomatic fiction that allowed them to keep lines of communication open.

Where US diplomats previously dealt only with group members in their role as parliamentarians, a policy the official said had been in place since 2006, they will now deal directly with low-level Brotherhood party officials.

There is no US legal prohibition against dealing with the Muslim Brotherhood itself, which long ago renounced violence as a means to achieve political change in Egypt and which is not regarded by Washington as a foreign terrorist organization.

But other sympathetic groups, such as Hamas, which identifies the Brotherhood as its spiritual guide, have not disavowed violence against the state of Israel.

The result has been a dilemma for the Obama administration. Former officials and analysts said it has little choice but to engage the Brotherhood directly, given its political prominence after the Feb. 11 downfall of former President Hosni Mubarak.

Stirring up demons

US President Barack Obama will surely face criticism for engaging with the Brotherhood, even tentatively.

Howard Kohr, executive director of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, made clear the pro-Israel group’s deep skepticism about the group in a speech last month.

“While we all hope that Egypt emerges from its current political transition with a functioning, Western-oriented democracy, the fact is the best-organized political force in Egypt today is the Muslim Brotherhood – which does not recognize Israel,” Kohr said.

Former US diplomats said the United States had to engage with the Brotherhood given its influence in Egypt.

“We cannot have a free and fair election and democracy unless we are going to be willing to talk to all the people that are a part of that democracy,” said Edward Walker, a former US ambassador to Egypt and Israel who now teaches at Hamilton College.

“It’s going to stir up demons,” he added. “You have got an awful lot of people who are not very happy with what the roots of the Brotherhood have spawned … There will be people who will not accept that the Brotherhood is of a new or different character today.”

Egypt’s parliamentary elections are scheduled for September and its military rulers have promised to hold a presidential vote by the end of the year.

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report June 30, 2011, 12:16 PM (GMT+02:00)

Putin imposes secrecy on nuclear Iran

Our Iranian and intelligence sources offer details on the British Foreign Secretary William Hague’s allegation Wednesday, June 29, that Iran has carried out secret tests of missiles capable of delivering a nuclear payload in breach of UN resolution 1929: Three of those tests, four in all, were carried out between October 2010 and February 2011and the fourth on Tuesday, June 28, in the course of the Prophet Mohammed war games currently in progress.
Iran is clearly continuing to upgrade and improve the accuracy of the missiles in its armory that are capable of delivering nuclear warheads.
It was the last test of the four that led Hague to break the Russian-imposed US-Israeli blackout on the critical tests, thereby leaving Iran free to push ahead at top speed with its program for attaining an operational nuclear weapon. Click here for debkafile‘s June 29 report of Hague disclosures.

debkafile‘s military and Moscow sources now report exclusively: In early October 2010, Russian intelligence learned that Iran was about to begin test launches of missiles for carrying nuclear warheads. They reported this to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

He then took three steps: He conveyed the information to US President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and bound them to secrecy.  With their pledges in hand, he used backdoor intelligence channels to persuade Tehran to refrain from bragging about its dramatic progress and keep the tests of the nuclear-capable missiles quiet in order to avert a world outcry against the violation of all their international commitments.  The Iranians bought the deal.

In this way, the Russian leader raised a wall of silence around Iran’s advances towards ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads and pre-empted condemnations, Security Council action, and other forms of American, European and Israeli action for keeping a nuclear bomb out of Iranian hands.

This was the last straw – at least for the British government. Hague in consultation with Prime Minister David Cameron went public about what Iran was really up to with a statement to parliament.

debkafile‘s military sources disclose that Iran has now tested two types of missile for carrying nuclear warheads: the Shahab-3 Kadar and the Sejjil – both powered with solid fuel and having a maximum range of 2,510 kilometers.
Two of the first three tests – one by Sejjil and one by Shahab-3 Kadar – were successful. A third apparently failed. Tuesday of this week the Iranians conducted another successful Shahab-3 test.

Saudi official: Riyadh will seek nukes if … JPost – Middle East

  Saudi Arabia would be forced to seek nuclear weapons if Iran became nuclear-armed, the Guardian quoted a senior Saudi official as saying on Wednesday.

“We cannot live in a situation where Iran has nuclear weapons and we don’t. It’s as simple as that,” the official said. “If Iran develops a nuclear weapon, that will be unacceptable to us and we will have to follow suit,” the official said, clarifying an earlier statement from Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal.

Faisal had told NATO officials that Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon “would compel Saudi Arabia … to pursue policies which could lead to untold and possibly dramatic consequences”.

US State Department cables uncovered by whistle-blower website WikiLeaks last year, revealed a Saudi leadership wary of Iran and its nuclear aspirations.

A cable from 2008 quoted former Saudi Ambassador to the US Adel al-Jubeir recalling Saudi King Abdullah’s  “frequent exhortations to the US to attack Iran and so put an end to its nuclear weapons program. ‘He told you to cut off the head of the snake,’ he recalled to the Charge, adding that working with the US to roll back Iranian influence in Iraq is a strategic priority for the King and his government.”

The document says that the Saudi foreign minister called for “severe US and international sanctions on Iran, including a travel ban and further restrictions on bank lending.” It added that, “the foreign minister also stated that the use of military pressure against Iran should not be ruled out.”

In its assessment, the US Embassy cable concluded that the Saudis, “are eager to work with the US to resist and reverse Iranian encroachment in Iraq.”

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