WarSclerotic

US accusations turn up heat in simmering G… JPost – Middle East.

    Many analysts in the Middle East remain skeptical about US charges that Iran plotted to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington, but in Riyadh officials are taking the accusations seriously and have already begun to employ them in a diplomatic assault against Tehran.

On Sunday, Riyadh’s permanent mission to the United Nations formally requested that the secretary-general notify the Security Council of the “heinous conspiracy” against it, Saudi-owned newspapers reported on Sunday. The move that could be used to impose fresh sanctions on Iran.

“Tension is already high and is going to skyrocket in the days and weeks to come,” Abdelkhaleq Abdalla, professor of political science at Emirates University in Dubai, told The Media Line. “How far will the Saudis go? Maybe as far as recalling their ambassador from Tehran. I think this is the limit.”

A long-standing rivalry between the two countries has grown more acrimonious as the turmoil of the Arab Spring topples governments and threatens others. The unrest has raised deep fears in Saudi Arabia that it or its Gulf neighbors could be next. In Iran, the initial euphoria of seeing old adversaries like Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak fall has given away to concerns that allies like Syria’s Bashar Assad are also at jeopardy.

The US charges, leveled last week, involve a plot to assassinate Saudi Ambassador Adel Al-Jubeir in a conspiracy involving a secret Iranian military unit, the Quds force, and an Iranian living in the US Critics have termed the charges implausible because the operation as described by the US government appears so ham-fisted and without any obvious benefit to the Iranian regime.

Tehran has vehemently denied the charges, but in Saudi Arabia, officials have expressed deep anger.

“Somebody in Iran will have to pay the price,” Saudi Prince Turki Al-Faisal, often seen as an unofficial foreign policy voice for the royal family, said in London on Wednesday. “The burden of proof and the amount of evidence in the case is overwhelming and clearly shows official Iranian responsibility for it.”

Iran’s Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi on Saturday urged Riyadh to exercise caution in moving against Iran, asserting that “the [US] enemy always seeks to sow discord” in the region even while conceding that Tehran has differences with Riyadh. “We have no problem with Saudi Arabia, but there are some differences of opinion as to regional developments,” he said in an interview with a local radio station and reported in the Tehran Times.

Abdalla said Tehran may retaliate by recalling its ambassador to Riyadh, but is likely to be careful not to ratchet up the situation anymore than it has. Other Saudi actions could include limiting Iranian visas for the Haj pilgrimage to Mecca, which begins later this month.

The two countries are divided by religion and politics, with Saudi Arabia seeing itself as the standard bearer of Sunni Islam and the defender of the Muslim world’s status quo while Shiite Iran’s leadership views itself as the vanguard of Islamic revolution. The two sides have bumped heads in places as far afield as Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, but the stakes have grown this year amid the chaos enveloping the Middle East.

Protests in February by the Shiite majority against a Sunni monarchy in Bahrain, an island emirate just off the Gulf coast from Saudi Arabia, were seen in Riyadh as evidence of Iranian meddling and prompted it to send it forces to quash the rebellion. Earlier this month, the Saudi Interior Ministry accused an unnamed foreign power – a codeword for Iran – of instigating riots by Shiites in the country’s eastern province.

Many analysts and governments have expressed doubt about the US allegations, which point at an Iranian-American used car salesman as they key figure in the case. Abdalla said he was withholding judgment until details are clarified. However, he also noted that US credibility had suffered from what ultimately proved to be false charges that Iraq under Saddam Hussein was developing weapons of mass destruction. Those charges were used as a justification for launching the war against Iraq in 2003.

But Michael Singh, an analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, termed the Iranian assassination plot “entirely plausible.” He cited the disbursed command structure of the Quds force, a unit of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). That gives more room for lower-level commanders to make key – and perhaps amateurish – decisions, he said.

The humiliation Iran felt at not being able to counter Saudi moves in Bahrain would give Iran ample reason to strike out at the Saudi embassy, echoing tactics it employed in the 1990s when the IRGC allegedly attacked Israeli embassy in Argentina in 1994.

Saudi Arabia won’t be alone in its drive against Iran. US President Barack Obama said last week he would press for “the toughest possible sanctions” against Iran over the alleged plot and vowed not to take any options off the table, a phrase used to indicate the possibility of using force. Singh said the US could not rely solely on sanctions.

“Responding only with sanctions would be a mistake,” he wrote on Foreignpolicy.com last week. “By downplaying the US military option against Iran and ceasing military signaling activities in the Gulf, the Obama administration has allowed American deterrence of Iran to deteriorate. Reestablishing that deterrence is vital to discouraging IRGC activities such as this plot.”

On Sunday, The New York Times reported that Obama is pressing UN nuclear inspectors to release classified intelligence showing that Iran is designing and experimenting with nuclear weapons technology. Over the longer term, several senior Obama administration officials said in interviews, that they are mulling a ban on financial transactions with Iran’s central bank and an expansion of the ban on the purchase of petroleum products sold by IRGC-affiliated companies.

First Video of capturing Gaddafi in Sirte When He was wounded and Alive. – YouTube.

(Before being butchered by his captors and his body dragged through the streets of Misrata.  As you can hear in the video, “ALLAH HU ACHBAR !” – JW)

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

( This is the kind of culture Israel and the West are facing.  Make no mistake. – JW)

DEBKAfile Special Report October 20, 2011, 4:44 PM (GMT+02:00)

Muammar Qaddafi is dead

Questions swirl around the death outside Sirte Thursday, Oct. 20, of Muammar Qaddafi, who ruled Libya for 42 years until his overthrow in August 2011:
One theory holds that after his convoy was attacked by NATO warplanes outside Sirte, he was seriously wounded in both legs, released that the game was up, crawled into a nearby pipe and shot himself dead to escape capture.
In the eyes of his loyalists, and there are still many left in Libya, he is admired for dying the death of a hero.
This theory is borne out by the discovery by rebels of a gold-plated pistol near his body.
If the bullet or shell that hit his convoy and killed him is identified as belonging to NATO, he will be acclaimed by his own people and the Muslim world as a martyr like Osama bin Laden before him. This would be the pretext for the outbreak of bloody guerrilla warfare between the dead ruler’s following and his opponents.

The third theory is that rebel forces found him dying from an attack on the convoy carrying him and his party and made sure of his death by shooting him in the head.

debkafile: Qaddafi’s death may end NATO’s military campaign in Libya, but it is far from ending the Libyan war. The barbaric treatment of his body in Misrata is a shocking omen of the bloody conflict to come.

debkafile reported earlier Thursday:

Western sources confirm the NTC report that Muammar Qaddafi was captured Thursday, Oct. 20 in or near Sirte. There were initially conflicting reports of his condition. He was said wounded in two legs, according to an NTC official. He now appears to have died of wounds sustained in a NATO air strike against his convoy outside Sirte, one of his last strongholds.

Rebel troops are celebrating the end of the 42-year Libyan ruler.
Earlier Thursday, the NTC claimed to have achieved complete control of the city after long months of siege against fierce resistance.

As long as Qaddafi was at liberty, the interim government was prevented from establishing its legitimacy and a stable administration.

For the rebel forces, Qaddafi’s capture or death is a major psychological and political triumph. However, Libya remains bitterly polarized between pro- and anti-Qaddafi factions with scores of rival militias and hundreds of tribes at each other’s throats. Qaddafi’s demise rather than promoting unity and ending the conflict could trigger wider civil bloodshed.

Muammar Gaddafi killed in air strike tryin… JPost – Middle East.

    Former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi died of wounds suffered in his capture near his hometown of Sirte on Thursday, a senior NTC military official said.

National Transitional Council official Abdel Majid Mlegta told Reuters earlier that Gaddafi was captured and wounded in both legs at dawn on Thursday as he tried to flee in a convoy which NATO warplanes attack

“He was also hit in his head,” the official said. “There was a lot of firing against his group and he died.”

There was no independent confirmation of his remarks.

Reports of Gaddafi’s capture and death came after a Libyan transitional forces commander said Moussa Ibrahim, former spokesman for Muammar Gaddafi’s fallen government, was captured near the city of Sirte on Thursday.

Abdul Hakim Al Jalil, commander of the 11th brigade, also said he had seen the body of the chief of Gaddafi’s armed forces, Abu Bakr Younus Jabr.

“I’ve seen him with my own eyes,” he said and showed Reuters a picture of Jabr’s body. “Moussa Ibrahim was also captured and both of them were transferred to (our) operations room.”

Western sources confirm Qaddafi was captured in Sirte and died of wounds

( Assad…  The line forms to the left. – JW )

Breaking news one

Western sources confirm the NTC report that Muammar Qaddafi was captured Thursday, Oct. 20 in or near Sirte. There are conflicting reports of his condition. He was said wounded in two legs, according to an NTC official. According to Arab sources, he has died of his wounds possibly in a NATO air strike of his convoy as he was in flight from Sirte, one of his last strongholds. The State Department has not been able to confirm the report of Qaddafi’s capture or death. Rebel troops are celebrating the end of the 42-year Libyan ruler although there is no independent confirmation of Qaddafi’s capture or death.
.Earlier Thursday, the NTC claimed to have achieved complete control of the city after long months of siege against fierce resistance. For weeks, he was believed be hiding in Libya’s southern desert.

As long as Qaddafi was at liberty, the interim government was prevented from establishing its legitimacy and a stable administration. His capture completes the rebel victory. The interim regime must decide whether to try the deposed ruler before a local court or hand him over to the international court.

For the rebel forces, Qaddafi’s capture or death would be a major psychological and political triumph. However, Libya remains bitterly polarized between pro- and anti-Qaddafi factions with scores of rival militias and hundreds of tribes at each other’s throats. Qaddafi’s demise rather than promoting unity and ending the conflict could trigger wider civil bloodshed.

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

Israel’s eye in the sky [Jerusalem Post (Israel)].

It was the middle of January 2009, and IDF ground forces were pushing deep into the Gaza Strip as Operation Cast Lead – aimed at weakening Hamas – was nearing its end.

Concrete intelligence reportedly obtained by the Mossad several days earlier indicated that a ship carrying a number of containers packed with advanced Iranian weaponry had docked in Port Sudan, on the Red Sea. The containers, the Mossad’s sources said, were being loaded onto the backs of trucks for the long drive north to the tunnels underneath the Egypt-Gaza border.

Different options were considered for how to deal with the convoy, which the Mossad had been tipped off was carrying 120 tons of weaponry including Iranian Fajr-5 artillery rockets, capable of striking Tel Aviv, a capability Hamas did not have at the time. Some in the defense establishment proposed an airstrike against the convoy to prevent the rockets from reaching the Gaza Strip.

Others warned that with Israel already under major international criticism for the rising death toll and extensive devastation in Gaza, news of an Israeli strike in another country would not help and could even damage Israeli efforts on the diplomatic front.

The final decision was likely brought before prime minister Ehud Olmert and defense minister Ehud Barak who, after a short debate, gave the green light to attack the convoy of 17 trucks. The timing was crucial since once the trucks crossed into Egypt everyone knew that Israel would not be able to attack. It had to be done while the trucks were still inside Sudan.

The question now was how to carry out the strike. Sending fighter jets to Sudan was risky. What would happen if there was a malfunction in one of the planes or one was detected by the Egyptian or Saudi air forces, which also operate over the Red Sea, the likely flight route? The entire mission would be jeopardized.

Another concern was what would happen if the fighter jets showed up too early. They wouldn’t be able to stay in Sudanese airspace forever and would be limited by the amount of fuel they could carry.

The decision ultimately taken by Israel Air Force (IAF) commander Maj.-Gen. Ido Nehushtan was to use unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), also referred to as drones, due to their ability to hover for extended periods of time over an area of operations like the vast Sudanese desert, where they could just sit and wait for the convoy to show up.

“When you attack a fixed target, especially a big one, you are better off using jet aircraft. But with a moving target with no definite time for the move, UAVs are best, as they can hover extremely high and remain unseen until the target is on the move,” an Israeli security source was quoted by one British paper after the attack.

The UAVs chosen for the operation were the Heron TP – Israel’s largest drone – to provide surveillance of the area of operations and the Hermes 450, Israel’s main attack drone.

The night of the bombing, there were some clouds but for the most part the skies were clear, like most mid-January nights in Sudan.

As the smugglers, some Sudanese and some Palestinian, made their way through the vast desert, the last thing on their minds was that Israeli drones were already tracking them. As the missiles streaked to their targets it was already too late. Fifty smugglers were reportedly killed and all of the trucks were destroyed.

This is the alleged story – based on foreign press reports – of one of Israel’s more monumental airstrikes in recent years.

But like other covert operations attributed to Israel, here too, the country has never claimed responsibility. It does however shed some light on the growing role UAVs – ranging in size and shape – are playing in Israel’s wars and operations, raising questions not only about the future of the technology but also of the morality behind its use on the battlefield.

Israel’s first experience with unmanned aircraft was in 1969 during the War of Attrition. At the time, Israel desperately needed intelligence on Egyptian military movements on the other side of the Suez Canal. A team from Military Intelligence came up with an idea. It purchased a number of remote-control planes, used masking tape to attach an automatic stills camera and sent it over the canal to snap some photos.

“We had to use binoculars to track the small planes, and once in a while we would lose sight of them,” recalled Haim Eshed, former head of the Defense Ministry’s Space Division and a member of the team that flew the remote-control planes in the Sinai. “When they landed, we took the camera, sent the film to be developed and then studied the pictures.” Not everyone believed in the UAVs and Eshed – who served at the time as head of MI’s Research and Development Division – succeeded in moving the project over to the Defense Ministry. There it was taken over by MAFAT, the ministry’s R&D directorate.

In 1971, the IAF established a UAV squadron following the arrival of the Firebee, an American-made UAV, which was put to use mostly along the Suez Canal to track Egyptian surface-to-air missile SAM systems. It was launched like a missile and landed with a parachute.

Israel’s dramatic leap in the field of UAVs came in 1979 with the arrival of the Scout, the first drone developed by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), which was used extensively during the First Lebanon War in 1982.

One memorable operation was when a Scout operator spotted an SA- 8 SAM system hidden under a tree in Syria. The operator got through to a nearby Phantom pilot and directed him to the target, which was immediately bombed and destroyed. In 1992, the Scout participated in the airstrike which killed Sheikh Abbas al-Musawi, Hezbollah’s leader at the time, in southern Lebanon. The UAV was used to locate the vehicle and to report the results of the strike back to Israel.

“This was the big breakthrough,” a top official in the Defense Ministry’s UAV directorate said. “The IAF operated a single squadron at the time but everyone in the IDF benefited from its operations and people began to understand the untapped potential.” IN THE years since, the IAF has used and retired a number of additional UAV systems, but unlike its larger manned platforms – fighter jets, attack helicopters and transport aircraft – the UAVs are strictly blue-and-white, developed and manufactured by Israeli companies such as IAI, Elbit Systems and Aeronautics.

A demonstration of Israel’s superior technological capabilities was evident in 2010 when Israeli companies sold $1 billion worth of UAVs and associated equipment around the world and five countries – Germany, Australia, Spain, France and Canada – were flying Israeli- made drones in Afghanistan.

Further proof was provided in August when France selected IAI’s Heron TP – Israel’s largest UAV with a wingspan of 26 meters, like a Boeing 737 – over America’s Predator B.

But what is the secret to Israel’s success? “There are three explanations for Israel’s success in becoming a world leader in development and production of UAVs,” explained a top official from MAFAT. “We have unbelievable people and innovation, combat experience that helps us understand what we need and immediate operational use since we are always in a conflict which allows us to perfect our systems.” Amit Wolff, a young engineer at IAI’s Malat Division which develops and manufactures UAVs, encapsulates these three elements.

Wolff enlisted in the IDF in the early 1990s and served in the elite Maglan Unit for a number of years, attaining the rank of captain. After his discharge, he studied engineering and was then hired by IAI. A number of years ago, Wolff became a development team leader.

One day, Wolff and his team met at a coffee shop near IAI headquarters – located next to Ben- Gurion International Airport – for one of their regular brainstorming sessions. As the former commander in Maglan, Wolff knew what he would have liked to have when leading his troops on operations inside densely populated Palestinian and Lebanese cities and villages.

“We started discussing the possibility of creating a lightweight UAV which can be taken into the field, be quickly unpacked and be capable of taking off and landing vertically without the need for a runway,” he recalls.

The idea was quickly sketched on some scrap paper at the coffee shop, and a few days later Wolff approached Arnold Nathan, director of IAI’s R&D engineering division, who listened to the proposal and decided to allocate $30,000 for its continued development.

The investment paid off and about two years later, in October 2010, the government-owned company unveiled the Panther, its first tilt-rotor UAV, which can hover over targets and vertically take off and land in the battlefield.

Weighing about 65 kg., the Panther is fitted with three small electric motors and can stay airborne at 10,000 feet for six hours. A smaller version, called the Mini Panther, weighs a mere 12 kg. and can stay airborne for approximately two hours.

“In general, our ideas come from a number of sources,” Wolff explains. “We closely follow different inventions on the Internet to see if they are applicable, we are in close contact with the defense establishment to understand the IDF’s needs, and we also draw on our own experience as soldiers and active reservists.” ALONGSIDE THE UAV squadron, the IDF and IAF have a number of additional squadrons and units that operate UAVs. The UAV squadron uses the Heron 1 UAV, while another IAF squadron uses the Hermes 450, Israel’s primary attack drone according to foreign reports and similar to the Predator, which is used extensively by the US in targeted killings in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The IAF is now planning the establishment of an additional UAV squadron by the end of 2012 which will incorporate the Heron 1 and the Hermes 900, a larger version of the Hermes 450 with the ability to carry larger payloads.

In the ground forces, drones are used under the Sky Rider Program, which saw the delivery of Elbit’s Skylark 1 to IDF battalions in 2010 as part of an effort to provide commanders with quick over-the-hill intelligence without being dependent on the IAF. The Defense Ministry is now evaluating the Skylark II as a drone for brigade commanders.

At the top level, called HALE (high altitude long endurance), the IAF has purchased a number of Heron TP UAVs from IAI which have the ability to stay airborne for days at a time and which for that reason have become known in Israel as “the drone that can reach Iran.” The squadron that is planned to operate the Heron TP is slated to become operational by the end of 2011.

“This UAV puts us at a new level when it comes to gathering intelligence,” a senior IAF officer explained. “Due to its size it can carry multiple payloads and conduct a wide variety of missions at the same time.” The Israeli genius is not just in the development of the drone itself but just as importantly in the payloads it carries and the systems that operate it. IAI and Elbit, for example, have made names for themselves for developing autonomous takeoff and landing systems. All it takes is four buttons to get the Heron TP, which is as wide as a Boeing 737, turned on and off the ground.

The missions a drone can carry out range from regular surveillance to airstrikes. In Gaza, for example, the Palestinians have given the drones the nickname Zanana, for the buzzing sounds they make as they fly over the Hamas-controlled territory.

“Drones are best for what are known as ‘3D’ missions – dull, dirty and dangerous,” the top IAF officer said. “Its operation costs are less than a manned aircraft, people are not put in danger and it can sometimes even do a better job.” One example is in the Navy, which currently uses helicopters to fly ahead of ships and help it build a picture of the sea out of range of what the ship-based radars can see. Each helicopter has a crew of at least three officers who can sometimes sit for hours going back and forth over an ocean.

“Why put a crew’s life in danger on missions that are dull and boring when the same mission can be done by a UAV,” a defense official said.

For that reason, the navy has been conducting a number of experiments with different long-range UAVs with the aim of finding one that can take off from a ship and land there as well.

THE FUTURE world of UAVs is inside the small caravans at the Palmahim Air Force Base where young male and female officers in jumpsuits sit in front of consoles lined with large TV screens watching the surveillance footage stream in from the drone they are moving with the nearby joystick.

These small and mobile command caravans put the UAV operator at a safe distance from the mission, wherever it might be – over the Gaza Strip or in Lebanon, tracking Hamas and Hezbollah arms transfers.

The numbers are already overwhelming, with the IAF recording a dramatic increase of in-flight hours in the past decade. Today, UAVs make up around a third of the IAF’s overall annual flight hours. It also produces a couple hundred hours of visual intelligence (VISINT) on a daily basis which then have to be processed and catalogued.

In the IAF there is no question that while UAVs have made a tremendous leap in the past 20 years, it is just the beginning. At the force’s recent “2030 Workshop,” IAF commander Nehushtan spoke of a future when the air force’s fleet will consist just of the stealth F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) and UAVs.

“No one would have thought 20 years ago that we would be where we are today, and it is difficult to accurately predict where we will be in another 20 years,” a senior defense official from MAFAT said, adding with a smile: “Ultimately, the sky is the limit.” (BOX) Above the scene They may sit inside air-conditioned mobile command posts but for the operators of the UAV squadron, almost every decision they make is one of life or death.

The squadron flies the double-tailed Heron UAV from its headquarters in Palmahim Air Force Base and is operational 24 hours seven days a week all year long, collecting intelligence, directing ground troops to their targets and identifying terrorists for targeted killings.

Before bombings in Gaza in retaliation to rocket attacks, UAVs are there to survey the target; as helicopters and fighter jets move in to bomb a car carrying a Katyusha rocket cell, the UAVs are there to ensure that children don’t move into the kill zone; and when IDF ground troops surround a compound in Jabalya where Hamas terrorists are holed up, the UAVs are there to provide real-time air support in guiding the soldiers safely inside.

Take Maj. Gil’s story as an example. During Operation Cast Lead in the Gaza Strip in 2009, Gil, deputy commander of the UAV squadron, was flying a Heron UAV over northern Gaza when he spotted what looked like an IDF soldier walking by himself down a narrow alleyway. The man was wearing a green uniform and had an M16 slung over his shoulder.

“We followed him as he continued walking and wondered what a soldier would be doing all by himself,” Gil, 30, recalled in a recent interview. “Finally after he walked into a residential building we were able to conclude that he was a terrorist disguised as a soldier even though he came out a few minutes later wearing completely different clothes.” The use of UAVs has grown significantly in recent years as has the responsibility of the drone operators who might sit sometimes hundreds of kilometers from their targets but are charged with fateful decisions that could save lives or sentence others.

Gil has been operating UAVs for four years. The greatest challenge, he explains, is accurately analyzing and understanding a battlefield and identifying who is an ally and who is an enemy.

While the objectives change each mission, the one constant in Gil’s operational life is the need to minimize collateral damage and civilian – or “uninvolved” as they are called in the IDF – casualties.

This responsibility is enhanced as future IDF operations in urban centers – like the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon – loom on the horizon. The long hours in the command post, he explains, pale in comparison to the huge responsibility the operators shoulder in ensuring that Israeli airstrikes hit their designated targets and just them.

“By sitting far away, I have the ability to study a target for a long time, to ensure that it is the right target and to minimize collateral damage,” Gil explains. “At the same time, what keeps me up at night is the responsibility that rests on us to do our utmost to see the entire picture to minimize collateral damage. Also, if I tell a soldier that an area is clear and he is hit by a sniper, then I am responsible.” That is why the IDF gives the UAV operators – even ones who are in their early twenties – the authority to call off an operation even at the last second.

“There are a lot of moral dilemmas,” explains 23-year-old Lt. Dudi, an instructor at the IAF’s UAV training school. “There was one case when I was tracking a man who we had intelligence on as being a senior terror operative. We could have given permission to attack at any time, but didn’t, since he would always walk around with a group of children trailing behind him.”(c) Copyright Jerusalem Post. All rights reserved.

US fears more plots from Iran’s … JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

    WASHINGTON – The United States believes Iran’s shadowy Quds Force is becoming increasingly aggressive overseas and may be working on other international plots beyond the alleged plan to kill Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Washington, three US officials told Reuters.

US allegations last week of a foiled plot in Washington have escalated tensions between the United States and Iran. They have also renewed Washington’s focus on the Quds Force, the covert operations arm of Iran’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, which is believed to have sponsored attacks on US targets in the Middle East — but never before in the United States.

“They’re being more aggressive … not only in Iraq but worldwide,” one senior US official said in an interview. The official and others insisted on anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record and because of the sensitive nature of the matter.

US officials have long charged that the Quds Force — the Arabic word for Jerusalem — has used proxies to attack US troops in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.

The Quds Force, whose power within Iran is believed to be growing, is also active in Lebanon, the Gulf, Syria and elsewhere, officials said.

Many Iran specialists have reacted skeptically to the disclosure of an alleged Iranian plot within the United States itself. Tehran has dismissed the charges as a fabrication.

Some foreign nations briefed on the plot have raised questions. While US President Barack Obama has so far demanded tougher sanctions on Iran and not a military reprisal, representatives of those nations are nonetheless wary, given the flawed intelligence case President George W. Bush made for war in Iraq.

Even US officials now convinced of the plot’s authenticity acknowledged they were initially doubtful due to the case’s odd facts, including the bumbling nature of the Iranian-American now in custody, and his approach to a supposed Mexican drug cartel figure who happened to be a US federal informant.

US officials who spoke to Reuters declined to provide details of the evidence that the Quds Force may have other plots in the works. But two officials stressed they were based on more than just speculation or analysis.

“These are not merely aspirational plots dreamed up by the Quds Force. In fact, there is active planning around them,” a second senior US official told Reuters. Both senior officials played down concerns any attack was imminent.

A third US official said the recklessness of the alleged attempt to assassinate Saudi Ambassador Adel al-Jubeir in Washington suggested that Quds “may be involved in other actions.”

In the wake of the US government’s disclosure of the alleged plot, counter-terrorism investigators in Britain are examining the possibility that other plots hatched in Iran were under way, a European government source said.

But the source said he and his colleagues were unaware of any current Iranian plots similar to the one the Americans said they had uncovered and disrupted.

Iran’s “second most powerful man”

US officials said they believed Iran’s Quds Force had expanded its power in recent years, exerting more control over the country’s foreign policy.

Its commander, Qasem Suleimani, a brigadier general, has led the group’s efforts to broaden Iran’s influence in the Middle East, including by supporting Iraq factions that oppose the US presence.

“His prominence within the Quds Force cannot be overstated. He is directly responsible for everything the Quds Force does,” one US military official, who is an expert on Iran, told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

Karim Sadjadpour, an associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, described Suleimani as “arguably the second most powerful man in Iran after the supreme leader,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The United States has blamed Iran for an upswing in attacks against US forces in Iraq over the summer that made June the deadliest month for US personnel there since 2008. The United States also accuses Tehran of supplying weapons to Afghan militants, although on a far smaller scale than in Iraq.

In recent years, Suleimani’s Quds Force has been “meddling in more places,” the first senior US official said.

“There are opportunities they think they can exploit in various places in the Middle East, that either they’ve got some foothold, and we’re on one side, and they’re on the other,” the official said.

Vali Nasr, a professor of international politics at Tufts University, said the alleged plot cited by US officials tracked with what appeared to be “far more aggressive Iranian behavior everywhere else.”

He also cited Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and Afghanistan.

“For some, it might be this news came in the context of a trendline that they were seeing with Iran,” Nasr said.

US officials have told Reuters they believe Suleimani is connected to the latest US plot.

“Whether he is doing this like other things on his own or whether this is the direction of Khamenei, we can’t say right now,” the first US official said. “It’s a problem no matter what.”

Nasr said he doubted the Quds Force would be doing something as risky as a plot on US soil without political clearance from above.

Some Iran watchers were stunned that Tehran would choose to carry out an attack on US soil, a potentially dangerous departure from past protocol. But US officials following Iran told Reuters the behavior was consistent with the activities by the Quds Force and Suleimani.

“It makes a huge difference to us that it’s on US soil. But Iran has been, with only the thinnest of veils, seeking to kill US troops and US government individuals for years,” the military official said.

Stuxnet Clone ‘Duqu’: The Hydrogen Bomb Of Cyberwarfare? | Fox News.

New virus may herald Stuxnet-style attack on Iran nuclear program, experts say – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Security software firm Symantec says new program called ‘Duqu’ may be a precursor for an attack similar to that which reportedly crippled Iran’s nuclear program.

By Reuters

First there was the Stuxnet computer virus that wreaked havoc on Iran’s nuclear program. Now comes “Duqu,” which researchers on Tuesday said appears to be quite similar.

Iranian officials have confirmed earlier this year that the Stuxnet virus hit staff computers at the Bushehr plant but said it had not affected major systems.

	Ahmadinejad at the Natanz nuclear enrichment facility in 2008.
	Photo by: AP

Reports have also surfaced that the computer worm was meant to sabotage the uranium enrichment facility at Natanz – where the centrifuge operational capacity has halved over the past year.

Security experts say the computer worm may have been a state-sponsored attack on Iran’s nuclear program and may have originated in the United States or Israel.

On Tuesday, security software firm Symantec said in a report that a new virus was alerted by a research lab with international connections to a malicious code that “appeared to be very similar to Stuxnet.” It was named Duqu because it creates files with “DQ” in the prefix.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said it was aware of the reports and was taking action.

“DHS’ Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team has issued a public alert and will continue working with the cybersecurity research community to gather and analyze data and disseminate further information to our critical infrastructure partners as it becomes available,” a DHS official said.

Symantec said samples recovered from computer systems in Europe and a detailed report from the unnamed research lab confirmed the new threat was similar to Stuxnet.

“Parts of Duqu are nearly identical to Stuxnet, but with a completely different purpose,” Symantec said. “Duqu is essentially the precursor to a future Stuxnet-like attack.”

Stuxnet is a malicious software that targets widely used industrial control systems built by German firm Siemens . It is believed to have crippled centrifuges Iran uses to enrich uranium for what the United States and some European nations have charged is a covert nuclear weapons program.

Cyber experts say its sophistication indicates that Stuxnet was produced possibly by the United States or Israel.

The new Duqu computer virus is designed to gather data from industrial control system manufacturers to make it easier to launch an attack in the future by capturing information including keystrokes.

“The attackers are looking for information such as design documents that could help them mount a future attack on an industrial control facility,” Symantec said.

“Duqu does not contain any code related to industrial control systems and is primarily a remote access Trojan (RAT),” Symantec said. “The threat does not self-replicate.”

Duqu shares “a great deal of code with Stuxnet” but instead of being designed to sabotage an industrial control system, the new virus is designed to gain remote access capabilities.

“The creators of Duqu had access to the source code of Stuxnet,” Symantec said.

Israeli politicians, political maneuvering and military gains – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

There are good historical reasons to suspect hidden motives behind the prime minister’s U-turn on the Shalit deal.

By Amir Oren

Benjamin Netanyahu is good at explaining, but has difficulty deciding. When he finally makes a problematic decision and attempts to explain why he did so – he only adds to the worry: In whose hands is the State of Israel, and where is he leading it?

When engaged in lengthy bargaining, one occasionally tends to become mired in the details and to fall in love with minutiae. True, the forest has burned down – what can you do? But a certain iconic ancient tree survived and became a symbol. On the one hand, hundreds of murderers will indeed be freed, but on the other, Israel’s adamant demand that they be transported to freedom by bus and not train was accepted.

	Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
	Photo by: Daniel Bar-On

In the historic balance, the Palestinian resistance movement and Muslim fanaticism scored a huge victory this week. They initiated a move, carried it out, held firm – and defeated Israel. They thereby proved that patience pays off, that Arab time beats Western time, and in the face of such patience, military and technological supremacy are meaningless. From an operational standpoint, this is a message that will spread across the Muslim world, from Hamas to Hezbollah and the assorted Jihad movements, from East Asia to South America, from China to Sinai, reaching every youth who has no need of a chain of command or weapons infrastructure to get up, kidnap a random Israeli, stash him in a readymade hideaway, and demand 1,000 prisoners for his release.

Netanyahu is remembered as the ambassador to the United Nations who opposed the Jibril deal in 1985 – to the point where he sabotaged a television interview that had been arranged for his political patron, Moshe Arens, to explain the rationale behind the deal. Netanyahu and Ehud Barak know that never before have two such arrogant veterans of the elite Sayeret Matkal unit capitulated like this to Ahmed (Ja’abari ) and Mohammed (Def ). This is a painful disillusionment, the motives for which can be interpreted only in a context that goes beyond that of the Gilad Shalit deal. The modus operandi of Netanyahu and Barak shows a willingness to absorb a small loss if they think it will help them attain a great success. The behavior of prime ministers and defense ministers in previous affairs provides telling indications that add up to a clear direction: toward some sort of a military adventure.

* What do you do when someone in the leadership is of a different opinion? The case of Sharett: In 1956, David Ben-Gurion decided to go to war against Egypt. To assure himself maximum control, he ousted from the government then-Foreign Minister Moshe Sharett, who opposed his belligerent line. When he coordinated the Sinai Campaign/Operation Kadesh with Britain and France, he made a point of not informing Sharett, who was humiliated for his ignorance while on a visit to India.

* What do you do when there’s an important matter, and an even more important matter? The case of Begin: In the spring of 1981, Syria moved surface-to-air missiles into Lebanon. Menachem Begin wanted to attack the missiles. Bad weather and U.S. intervention caused the operation to be canceled. Begin reconsidered and decided that attacking the Iraqi nuclear reactor was more important than hitting the Syrian missiles. Since Israel might pay a heavy political price for each of the two operations, the reactor should take precedence, he thought.

* What will the Americans say? The case of Sharon: Defense Minister Ariel Sharon, while visiting U.S. Secretary of States Alexander Haig in May 1982, imagined that he would secure from Haig an understanding for an operation in Lebanon in retaliation for a “mass provocation” whose essence remained unknown. That was the shaky premise for the assumption that the Reagan administration – in which Haig was not among the more powerful players – would show restraint over the invasion of Lebanon two weeks later. The allegory is fairly obvious: placing people where the decision makers see fit, subjugating secondary concerns to a single top priority, and assuming that the U.S. administration will react with indifference or even support, not active opposition.

The Netanyahu-Barak government began operating in March 2009. On one miserable matter, peace talks with the Palestinians, it purported to begin anew and remains stuck to this day. On two other matters – the danger of Iran’s nuclear program and a deal for Shalit’s release – a reshuffle of the defense leadership occured but was delayed.

Barak and Netanyahu regretted Gabi Ashkenazi’s fourth year as Israel Defense Forces chief of staff, Yuval Diskin’s sixth year as head of the Shin Bet security service, and Meir Dagan’s eighth year as head of the Mossad. They inherited the first from the preceding government, which was acting on the advice of then-Attorney General Menachem Mazuz. The additional years for Diskin and Dagan were granted by Netanyahu, with Barak’s approval (under a political agreement between them ).

Ashkenazi and Dagan made it hard for Netanyahu and Barak to take action against Iran. Diskin stopped them from capitulating to Hamas on a Shalit deal. In both these matters, the politicians were afraid to confront the incumbent professionals in government discussions, subsequently also in public, and ultimately – in the event that politicians ignore the professional warnings and the warnings are subsequently realized – even perhaps before a commission of inquiry as well.

Personnel solution

The solution this time, as in the case of Sharett, was a personnel change. Foreign Minister Golda Meir was more junior in the party hierarchy, personally loyal to Ben-Gurion, and a fan of belligerence. Netanyahu and Barak wanted Yoav Galant as IDF chief of staff and did not want Gadi Eizenkot. They got Benny Gantz, who thus far has gone to the trouble of avoiding confrontations with the defense minister and taken steps to set himself apart from Ashkenazi.

Gantz did not fall on his sword and appoint Colonel Sharon Afek military advocate general, as per Ashkenazi’s emphatic recommendation. The present chief of staff also preferred to appoint Rear Admiral Ram Rothberg as navy commander – not Ashkenazi’s recommended choice, Rear Admiral Rani Ben-Yehuda. This, of course, does not mean that Gantz will buckle in every case and under any sort of pressure. It could be that he is storing up goodwill and hoarding proof of the pertinence of his positions in various disputes.

The most reliable experts in Israel estimate that the danger inherent in the Iranian nuclear program will come to fruition in 2014 at the earliest. Their calculation is based on Iran’s leader, Ali Khamenei, taking about a year to decide whether to turn the capability he has been piling up in parallel channels (materials, missiles, warheads ) into nuclear weapons, and another year or more from the moment the decision is made until operational capability is achieved.

Even if, for argument’s sake, we presume that this assumption is shared by the IDF top brass – Gantz and Military Intelligence chief Maj. Gen. Aviv Kohavi – an experienced prime minister or defense minister could opt for another assessment. There are two conditions for doing that: The first is finding another reliable expert, just as Aviezer Yaari, the head of MI’s research branch in the run-up to the Lebanon War, told Begin, Sharon and Chief of Staff Rafael Eitan what they wanted to hear – as opposed to MI chief Yehoshua Saguy. The second is that the person who is assessing the policy and who disagrees with the defense minister not emulate the passivity evidenced by Saguy, who tried to excuse his lame behavior by saying “I moved aside” (and eventually was moved aside by order of the Kahan Commission ).

Barak was angry a few weeks ago at GOC Home Front Command Eyal Eisenberg for having concluded that the chance of a regional conflagration had increased, but it seems that Eisenberg was correct. The regional thermometer shows that precisely because Syria is weak at the moment and Egypt is still governed – although not entirely ruled – by the High Military Council, a major multi-front clash could erupt, with rockets and missiles from north and south on the Israeli home front, in retaliation by Hezbollah and Hamas for a big IDF operation or even as a preemptive strike, at Iran’s behest.

The change in the Shin Bet’s position, with the move from Diskin to Yoram Cohen, came as no surprise. It was foreseen the moment Netanyahu decided to skip over the leading candidate, A., who was too closely identified with Diskin’s thinking. In organizations with a rigid hierarchy, like the Israel Air Force and the Shin Bet, it is enough to screw on a new head to thoroughly alter the organization’s position. When Yitzhak Rabin wanted to cancel the Lavi project, he appointed as IAF chief, in place of the aircraft’s advocate Amos Lapidot, its outspoken opponent, Avihu Ben-Nun. In Cohen, Netanyahu found a Shin Bet chief behind whose back he could hide in agreeing to the same deal he had always described as capitulation to terror.

As for the green light from Washington, Netanyahu and Barak’s gamble is especially big. Maybe they think that Barack Obama will show restraint and that the Arab countries, from Saudi Arabia to Egypt, will secretly be glad to have been spared the necessity of deciding whether to follow in Iran’s footsteps and go nuclear. If the two Israeli ministers are wrong, this is a particularly dangerous illusion. After the statement by U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta on board his flight to Tel Aviv and again at IDF headquarters – that “coordination” is required against Iran – should Israel take action, it would give an impression that there is such coordination. That, as we recall, is how Begin implicated Anwar Sadat at their meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh on the eve of the attack on the reactor in Iraq – four months before Sadat’s assassination.

On the domestic front, Netanyahu’s U-turn in the Shalit affair erased most of the distinctions between the political parties. If every prime minister, from every party, regardless of his presumption to a worldview, eventually gives in to the dictates of reality, what makes the Likud superior to Kadima, or Labor to Yisrael Beiteinu?

To put it in the terms of which Netanyahu is so fond, he behaved like Chamberlain this week, in trying to depict capitulation as an accomplishment. The day is not far off, Netanyahu believes, when Churchill will emerge from him. Until that happens, he would do well to give in once more, this time to the medical residents. They are needed in the hospitals, in preparation for the escalation in honor of which Netanyahu and Barak strove to close the file on a Shalit deal.