WarSclerotic

KAHLILI: Luring Israel into war – Washington Times.

Are Iranian leaders seeking Arab war with Israel to protect Assad?

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, has ordered the Revolutionary Guards to draw Israel into another Middle East war through their Islamic Jihad, Hamas and Hezbollah proxies in an effort to save Bashar Assad’s brutal regime in Syria, sources report.

The ploy appears to be working, as Israeli opposition leaders are demanding the Netanyahu government launch a major military campaign against the terrorist-controlled Gaza Strip.

Just in the past few days, militants in the Hamas-ruled strip have bombarded southern Israel with more than 100 rockets and mortars. The instability in Cairo with the fall of the Mubarak regime has helped the Iranian-backed terrorists in the Sinai area attack Israel from within Egypt’s borders and has enabled Iran to smuggle in thousands of rockets to arm the militants. On Aug. 18, gunmen infiltrated Israel and killed six civilians and two soldiers. And at least one civilian was killed and 20 others were wounded in the rocket attacks.

The Iranian leader had previously sent a letter to President Obama warning him that unless he avoided interfering in Syria’s affairs, consequences would take place in Afghanistan and Iraq. As the White House continued its condemnation of the atrocities in Syria, attacks against U.S. forces picked up in both Iraq and Afghanistan, with several U.S. fatalities.

When Mr. Obama openly called for the ouster of Mr. Assad last week, Iran retaliated by handing out eight-year sentences to the two American hikers held since 2009 on charges of espionage.

The Iranian regime apparently is willing to start a similar Arab-Israeli war like the one in 2006 initiated by the terrorist group Hezbollah in Lebanon. At that time, the Iranian regime feared that President George W. Bush had decided to attack Iran, and therefore it created a diversion not only to flex its muscle in the region but also to keep America busy with yet another crisis. Now fearing the fall of Mr. Assad, who has been complicit in many of Iran’s terrorist plots in the region over the years, it sees the need for another war to divert attention from Syria’s suppression of its people.

Ever since the Islamic Revolution in Iran, the Syrian regime has provided the kind of gateway for the radicals ruling Iran to create Hezbollah, arm Hamas, sabotage any peace activity between the Palestinian authorities and Israel, and push for the destruction of Israel through its proxies.

Syria is the most important ally of the Iranian regime, and the fall of Mr. Assad would drastically decrease Iran’s influence in the region. It also would threaten the demise of Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Iran has done everything at its disposal to help suppress the months-long uprising in Syria. The Iranian supreme leader has called the Syrians involved in the unrest enemies of God and agents of Israel. Back in May, Ayatollah Khamenei held a covert meeting in Tehran with commanders of the Revolutionary Guards, representatives of the Syrian Embassy, members of Hezbollah and leaders of the Sadr movement in Iraq. There, he demanded that all operational and logistic forces be applied to stamp out the blaze of sedition in Syria and destroy those who were enemies of Allah in that country.

The guards also have warned Turkey and any other country that might interfere in Syrian affairs of consequences and that Iranian missiles would be used to retaliate against any interfering force.

Ayatollah Jafar Sobhani, a marja scholar in the city of Qom, announced on Sunday that Israel has had a direct hand in the unrest in Syria and issued a fatwa that any change in Syria will be against Islam.

The Iranian regime is determined to save Mr. Assad, and in doing so it will not hesitate to destabilize the region. Mr. Obama, who has rightly called for Mr. Assad to step down, must make clear that Iran will not be allowed to continue with its adventurous policy in the region and that any instigation of war will come back to haunt the Iranian leaders themselves.

The dual tracks of negotiations and sanctions have failed to stop the radicals ruling Iran in their nuclear-bomb ambitions. Just today, Iran announced it has moved some of its centrifuges to an underground uranium-enrichment site that offers better protection from possible airstrikes. It is critical to global security that we act in time to stop the jihadists in Tehran from checkmating the world.

Reza Kahlili is a pseudonym for an ex-CIA spy who is a fellow with EMPact America and the author of “A Time to Betray,” about his double life in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (Threshold Editions, Simon & Schuster, 2010).

Ahmadinejad: Iran is determined to eradicate Israel – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Iranian president says those who are for humanity should also be for eradicating Israel, since the ‘Zionist regime is a symbol of suppression and discrimination.’

By DPA

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that Iran was determined to eradicate Israel, ISNA news agency reported Thursday.

“Iran believes that whoever is for humanity should also be for eradicating the Zionist regime (Israel) as symbol of suppression and discrimination,” Ahmadinejad said in an interview with a Lebanese television network, carried by ISNA.

	Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on July 20, 2011.
	Photo by: AP

“Iran follows this issue (the eradication of Israel) with determination and decisiveness and will never ever withdraw from this standpoint and policy,” the Iranian president added in the interview with the Al-Manar network.

The remarks by Ahmadinejad came one day before the annual anti-Israeli rallies named Qods (Jerusalem) Day, which are held nationwide in Iran on the last Friday of the fasting month of Ramadan.

Ahmadinejad on Monday said that Iranians and Muslim nations worldwide should hold Qods rallies and show their willingness to dispose of this “infectious tumor and this regime full of rascality.”

The Iranian president provoked international condemnation in 2005 when he said that Israel should be eliminated from the map of the Middle East and transferred to Europe or North America.

Ahmadinejad to Syria: Killings ‘serves Zionist interests’ – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Iranian President calls Assad’s regime to engage in dialogue with Syrian people, stop violence, reach understanding so as to avoid western intervention in favor of ‘Zionist entity’

Roee Nahmias

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejadcalled the Damascus regime to engage in dialogue with the Syrian people in order to put a stop to the violence and reach an understanding regarding the political reforms in the country, Lebanese Al-Manar television reported on Thrusday.  “The people and government of Syria must come together to reach an understanding,” he told the station, which is run by the Iranian and Syrian-backed Hezbollahmovement.  The online website “Now Lebanon” quoted Ahmadinejad’s interview in Al-Manar, saying that the Iranian president claimed the violence in Syria only “serves Zionist interests.”   Syrians under fire (Photo: AFP)  “When there is a problem between the people and their leaders they must sit down together to reach a solution, away from violence,” he said. “One must not kill the other.”  Despite these declarations, Ahmadinejad conveyed a different messageback in 2009, when thousands of Iranians took to the streets to protest against his re-election. YouTube videos appeared online, showing the regime’s militia firing at the masses, killing dozens and injuring thousands.  Riots in Iran in 2009 (Photo: AP)  The Iranian president linked between NATO’s assistance to the Libyan upheaval and the Syrian situation. He claimed the West seeks to attack Syria just as they intervened in Libya, therefore concluding that the people of Syria and its government must come to an understanding soon.   Ahmadinejad added that the West was not interested in reforms, but only wishes to encourage a national conflict.   “We need freedom, justice and free elections,” Ahmadinejad declared, adding that the people of Syria have a right to demand these privilages while setting a clear timeline. He further inferred that all of the tragedies of “its people” result from Western intervention in favor of “the Zionist entity.”

IDF strikes Gaza after more than 20 rockets hit southern Israel – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Palestinians report two killed, some 20 wounded from IDF strikes; nine-month-old baby lightly wounded after rocket hits Ashkelon region on Wednesday night.

By Avi Issacharoff, Yanir Yagna and The Associated Press

A renewed barrage of rockets hit Israel’s south overnight Wednesday, prompting Israel Defense Forces planes to carry out strikes on the Gaza Strip on Thursday morning, killing two and wounding about 20, according to Palestinian reports.

 

	Palestinians inspect the damage to the Islamic Jihad club after an Israeli air strike in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza Strip, early Thursday, Aug. 25, 2011.
	Photo by: AP

Click here for full Haaretz coverage on the escalation on Israel’s southern border

Five grad rockets fell in open areas on Wednesday night, one near Ofakim, one south of Ashkelon and three in Be’er Sheva. Rockets also fell in the Eshkol Regional Council. A nine-month-old baby was lightly wounded after a rocket hit a private car in the Hof Ashkelon Regional Council.

Rocket fire continued late into Wednesday night, with two rockets also landing in Sderot.
In response to rocket attacks, Israel Air Force aircraft targeted a weapons storage facility in the northern Gaza Strip as well as a smuggling tunnel and weapons manufacturing site in the southern Gaza Strip overnight on Wednesday. The Israel Defense Forces said in a statement that “direct hits were confirmed.”

Earlier Wednesday, IAF aircraft targeted two militants in separate locations on Wednesday in northern Gaza, who had launched projectiles at Israel shortly before, the IDF said in a statement.

The military branch of Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the rocket attacks later on Wednesday night, saying that they were a response to the killing of an Islamic Jihad operative, Ismael al-Asmar, early on Wednesday morning, according to a report by Israel Radio.

Palestinian sources reported on Wednesday evening that a member of the Islamic Jihad was killed by an IDF strike in Sheikh Radwan neighborhood in the Gaza Strip. Shortly afterwards a Grad rocket was launched toward Be’er Sheva and was intercepted by the Iron Dome system.