WarSclerotic

Heads Iran wins, tails Israel loses – Times Union.

The International Atomic Energy Agency declared last week that “Iran has carried out activities relevant to the development of a nuclear explosive device.” This falls under the same category of news as “The sky is blue” and “The sun rises in the east.”

The fact that Iran’s leaders, in addition to violently repressing their nation’s pro-democracy movement, are building nuclear weapons capability will be an eye-opener for you only if you’re the kind of person who accepts Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as an authority on Anne Frank. Or if you happened to accept the deeply flawed conclusions of a 2007 U.S. National Intelligence Estimate.

That report asserted Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003, a claim that British, French and German intelligence agencies strongly disputed at the time. The U.N. nuclear watchdog agency — based on credible intelligence from 10 countries and interviews with individuals involved in the weapons program — says Iranian officials did close down a nuclear weapons project after the U.S. invasion of Iraq. But they clandestinely shifted the effort to the civilian side where work continued after 2003 that would be “highly relevant to a nuclear weapon program.”

Who cares if Iran develops a nuclear bomb?

For the Sunni Arab sheikdoms neighboring Iran, including Saudi Arabia, that account for close to a quarter of the world’s daily oil production, revolutionary Shiite Iran is the greatest threat to regional stability. A U.S. diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks quotes Saudi King Abdullah admonishing the United States to “cut off the head of the snake” and launch military strikes to destroy Iran’s nuclear program.

But the greatest fear is in Israel, whose residents know something about annihilation, and who have listened warily as Ahmadinejad has denied the Holocaust while threatening to perfect it. Last week, the Iranian leader ominously warned that Israel’s “end will be near.”

If Israel defends itself and acts preemptively to thwart Iran’s nuclear threat, its critics — many of whom privately want Iran defanged — will condemn it for aggression and unlawful conduct.

But if Israel sits passively and suffers some catastrophic nuclear attack from Iran, then those same critics will say Israel got its due for aggression and unlawful conduct. Heads Iran wins, tails Israel loses.

One of the tragedies of the Palestinian people is that the Middle East’s worst extremists have cynically used them as cannon fodder. Gadhafi in Libya, the Assads in Syria, Saddam Hussein in Iraq, the Wahhabists in Saudi Arabia, the mullahs in Iran — they all have always been willing to redirect domestic discontent by fighting Israel to the last Palestinian.

There’s a corollary to this moral depravity in the West. American and European leaders have always been willing to pursue some vague notion of peace in the Middle East to the detriment of Israel, despite the fact that the region’s greatest problems — poverty, political stagnation, intra-Arab and intra-Muslim slaughter — have nothing to do with Israel.

In its latest expression, President Barack Obama has sought warmer relations with Iran and extended an open hand to its leaders at the expense of Israel’s security. That change in policy might have been justifiable after the 2008 U.S. election. But after three years of increasing repression and now with the IAEA exposure of Iran’s deception, it’s time to consider the less-bad alternatives to an Iranian nuclear bomb.

Israelis have bitter memories of misguided attempts by well-intentioned, peace-loving people to, as Winston Churchill put it, feed the crocodile in the hope that it will eat them last. They can be forgiven for being unwilling to wage peace with a nuclear Iran to the last Jew in the Middle East.

Iranians say nuke project hit by new computer virus – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Revolutionary Guard commander killed in Saturday’s munitions blast.

By Barak Ravid and Yossi Melman

Iran has acknowledged for the first time that it has been the target of a new computer virus designed to do damage to its computers. The admission was made by Iran’s civil defense chief, General Gholam Reza Jalali. He told the official Iranian news agency that computer experts were able to identify the virus, called Duqu, and bring it under control. The Iranians, Jalali said, developed software capable of controlling the virus and a special unit that works to defend the country against cyber attacks has been working around the clock.

The Duqu virus was discovered by the Iranians about a month ago after affecting dozens of countries, including Iran, France, Britain and India. The virus exploits a hitherto unknown weakness in Microsoft’s Windows computer operating system. It was disclosed by the American Symantec computer security firm.

Over a year ago, Iranian computers were hit by the Stuxnet computer virus, which caused damage to monitoring systems that were used in conjunction with Iran’s uranium enrichment centrifuges at Natanz and at the Bushehr nuclear power plant. The Stuxnet virus caused serious damage to the Iranian uranium enrichment efforts and knocked more than 1,000 centrifuges out of service. Foreign media outlets have attributed the Stuxnet attack to the Mossad espionage agency and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.

According to recent reports, it appears that Iran has managed to deal with the damage inflicted by the Stuxnet cyber attack, although the number of centrifuges operating at its uranium enrichment facility is still much lower than it was over two years ago. The resemblance between Duqu and Stuxnet has prompted computer experts to speculate that they were developed and launched by the same undercover entity, although there is no specific evidence of this.

In a separate development, a Revolutionary Guard commander killed in an explosion at an ammunition depot west of Tehran was a key figure in Iran’s missile program, the elite military force said in a statement Sunday.

Gen. Hasan Moghaddam was killed together with 16 other Guard members Saturday at a military site outside Bidganeh village, 40 kilometers southwest of Tehran. The Guard said the accidental explosion occurred while military personnel were transporting munitions.

The Guard praised Moghaddam, saying the military force will not forget his “effective role in the development of the country’s defense … and his efforts in launching and organizing the Guard’s artillery and missile units,” the semiofficial Fars news agency quoted the statement as saying on Sunday.

Meanwhile on Sunday, senior Iranian officials threatened that Iran could withdraw as a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and from membership in the International Atomic Energy Agency following the release last week of an IAEA report that took Iran to task for its nuclear program. The report cited evidence that the Islamic republic had been carrying out what it called “activities relevant to the development of a nuclear explosive device.”

Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu told his cabinet, which discussed the report on Sunday, that up to this point, “international efforts have not stopped Iran from advancing toward a nuclear bomb,” adding that the Iranians could obtain it faster than what people think. “The IAEA report contains only that evidence that would be admissible in court, but the reality is that there are many other things that we don’t see and therefore were not written about in the report,” the prime minister said.

The speaker of the Iranian parliament, Ali Larijani, roundly attacked the IAEA report, saying it was written in accordance with the demands of Israel and the United States. Iran must consider its continued membership in the international nuclear organization, he added. The comments carry special weight because Larijani is considered close to the supreme leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and is a former head of the Iranian national security council, which reports to the ayatollah. In addition, Larijani represented his country in contacts over the Iranian nuclear program with the IAEA and member states of the European Union.

Iran is a signatory to agreements through which it has consented to IAEA oversight of most of its nuclear facilities and has installed cameras and monitoring equipment that send data directly to IAEA headquarters in Vienna. Most of the information contained in the IAEA report released last week was based on evidence gathered through these oversight activities. Additional information was provided by Western intelligence agencies from 10 countries.

For years, there have been concerns in Israel and the West that Iran could one day do what North Korea did, and announce its withdrawal from the IAEA and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. At that point, its nuclear program would not be monitored by any outside agency and it would be free to advance its covert nuclear program on an accelerated basis to develop nuclear weapons.

Those same sources are of the opinion, however, that if took that step, it would be a clear sign that it was no longer interested in maintaining the appearance of compliance with international conventions and that it unequivocally intended to develop nuclear weaponry. With reporting from the Associated Press.

UN nuclear report puts Iran ‘mystery man’ in spotlight – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, only Iranian official mentioned in IAEA report’s annex, suspected of being key figure in Islamic Republic’s nuclear program. Expert: His security was stepped up after killings of nuclear scientists

Reuters

The shadowy military man believed to be at the heart of Iran’s disputed atomic activities likely lives under tight security and in secrecy to shield him against assassins and keep him beyond the reach of UN sleuths, Western nuclear experts say.

A United Nations nuclear watchdog report this week identified Mohsen Fakhrizadeh as a key figure in suspected Iranian work to develop technology and skills needed for atomic bombs and suggested he may still play a role in such efforts.

Fakhrizadeh, reportedly a senior officer in the Islamic state’s elite Revolutionary Guards, was the only Iranian official named in a detailed annex of the report, which said Tehran appeared to have worked on designing a nuclear weapon.

“He is viewed as extremely important,” US-based proliferation expert David Albright said, referring to assessments of Western intelligence officials.

Fakhrizadeh was named in a 2007 UN resolution on Iran as a person involved in nuclear or ballistic activities. An IAEA report the following year also referred to him briefly.

Iranian media rarely mention him. Four years ago, the semi-official Mehr News Agency described him as a scientist working for the Defense Ministry and a former head of the Physics Research Centre, a body also mentioned in the IAEA’s report.

Some Iranian websites said he was a university professor.

But Western analysts acknowledged that little is publicly known about Fakhrizadeh, described by Albright’s think tank as a nuclear engineer who has overseen a number of projects related to weaponization research and development.

“He is a mystery man,” an official, who declined to be named but is from a country which accuses Tehran of seeking to develop atomic bombs, said.

Arak nuclear facility (Photo: EPA)

Greg Thielmann, of the Washington-based Arms Control Association, said he had never seen a photograph of Fakhrizadeh but that he may still be prominent in Iran’s activities.

“He was certainly central to the nuclear weapons program halted in 2003 and I assume he continued to be important in sustaining and perhaps coordinating ongoing work related to future weaponization,” Thielmann said.

That the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has “long been seeking to interview him, and the Iranians have been refusing, is telling,” he said.

A European-based proliferation analyst said he came up with a “big nothing” when he tried to write a paper on Fakhrizadeh.

“He is the one sort of constant that keeps coming up but I must confess I really don’t know much about him.”

Albright said he believed Fakhrizadeh’s security was stepped up after the killings of nuclear scientists in attacks Iran blames on Israeland other foes.

In July, gunmen shot dead university lecturer Darioush Rezaie in eastern Tehran, the third murder of a scientist since 2009. One was killed in a car bomb, the second by a device detonated remotely.

“I would imagine he is in hiding,” Albright said. “But they have to worry because Tehran is not that closed. It is not like Moscowin the Cold War.”

Iran denies Western accusations it is trying to acquire the capabilities to build atom bombs, saying such weapons of mass destruction are against Islam and its nuclear work aims at the peaceful generation of electric power.

But the IAEA report, released last Tuesday amid media speculation of Israeli strikes against Iran, lent independent weight to suspicions in the West that Iran’s nuclear program ultimately has military goals.

“The report can rationally be explained only if a purpose of these Iranian activities was to develop a nuclear warhead to be delivered by a ballistic missile,” a senior Western official said, adding it contained “hard evidence.”

Iran has dismissed the report as “politically motivated” and its findings as based on forged evidence.

The IAEA document painted a picture of a concerted weapons program that was halted in 2003 — when Iran came under increased Western pressure — but some activities later resumed.

The report does not assert that Iran has resumed a full-scale nuclear program, the Western official said.

But, he added, “Since halting its comprehensive and relatively open program in 2003, Iran has continued to engage in activities that have relevance to the development of a nuclear weapon.”

The IAEA’s report said Fakhrizadeh was executive officer of the so-called AMAD Plan, which according to its information carried out studies related to uranium, high explosives and the revamping of a missile cone to accommodate a warhead.

The work stopped rather abruptly in late 2003, the agency said, citing information it had received from member states.

But the data also indicated that some of the activities later re-started and Fakhrizadeh “retained the principal organizational role.” One country had told the IAEA he now heads the Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research.

“The Agency is concerned because some of the activities undertaken after 2003 would be highly relevant to a nuclear weapon program,” the IAEA document said.

One Western diplomat said Fakhrizadeh was the “pervasive thread” in the UN agency’s report.

Citing intelligence sources, Albright said Fakhrizadeh had been “extremely upset” about the 2003 order to halt the work. But he said Fakhrizadeh had continued to receive money and run institutes, also suggesting some activities did not stop.

Iran official: Officer killed in army camp blast was missile expert – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Gen. Hasan Moghaddam was killed together with 16 other Guard members at a military site outside Bidganeh village, 40 kilometers southwest of Tehran.

By The Associated Press

A Revolutionary Guard commander killed in an explosion at an ammunition depot west of Tehran was a key figure in Iran’s missile program, the elite military force said in a statement Sunday.

Gen. Hasan Moghaddam was killed together with 16 other Guard members Saturday at a military site outside Bidganeh village, 40 kilometers southwest of Tehran. The Guard said the accidental explosion occurred while military personnel were transporting munitions.

	Under a portrait of the late Iranian revolutionary founder Ayatollah Khomeini, Sam-6 missiles are displayed by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.
	Photo by: AP

The Guard praised Moghaddam, saying the military force will not forget his effective role in the development of the country’s defense … and his efforts in launching and organizing the Guard’s artillery and missile units,” the semiofficial Fars news agency quoted the statement as saying Sunday.

The Revolutionary Guard is a key Iranian military force closely tied to the country’s powerful clerics.

Moghaddam headed a “self-sufficiency” unit of the Guard’s armaments section.

Iranian officials did not explain why Moghaddam was at the site at the time of the explosion.

Saeed Qasemi, a Guard commander, said Iran owes its missile program to Moghaddam.

“A major part of (our) progress in the field of missile capability and artillery was due to round-the-clock efforts by martyr Moghaddam,” Qasemi told the conservative news website rajanews.com.

Another Guard commander, Gen. Mostafa Izadi, called Moghaddam a “founder of the Guard’s surface-to-surface missile systems.”

An exiled Iranian dissident group, the Mujahedin-e Khalq or MEK, has claimed that the blast hit a missile base run by the Revolutionary guard rather than an ammunition depot.

Lawmaker Parviz Soroori was sure the blast was accidental.

“No sabotage was involved in this incident. It has nothing to do with politics,” Soroori was quoted as saying by the parliament’s website, icana.ir.

Qasemi said Moghaddam was one of a few Guard commanders favored by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

“The exalted leader had a special interest in him,” he said.

Iran’s arsenal boasts missiles with a range of about 2,000 kilometers that were designed for Israel and U.S.¬ targets. The missile capability, along with Iran’s nuclear program, are among the reasons why Israel considers Iran its most dangerous enemy.

The Revolutionary Guard, Iran’s most powerful military force, is in charge of Iran’s missile program.

Iran’s chief Guard commander, Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafari, and other top officials visited Moghaddam’s family Sunday to offer condolences. Moghaddam’s body will be buried Monday.

Obama: U.S. not taking any option off table over nuclear Iran – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

U.S. president says economic sanctions against Tehran have ‘enormous bite,’ expresses confidence that Russia, China understand the threat that a nuclear-armed Iran would pose.

By The Associated Press

Defending his efforts to contain Iran’s nuclear ambitions, President Barack Obama said economic sanctions against Tehran have had “enormous bite,” and he will consult with other nations on additional steps to ensure that Iran does not acquire an atomic weapon.

Obama expressed confidence Sunday that Russia and China in particular understand the threat that a nuclear armed Iran would pose and said their leaders agree that Iran cannot weaponize its nuclear power and trigger a nuclear arms race in the region.

	Obama expressed confidence Sunday that Russia and China in particular understand the threat that a nuclear armed Iran would pose.
	Photo by: AP

The president, answering questions at a press conference during an Asia-Pacific economic summit, did not specifically say he would consider military action if Tehran were to persist in arming itself with a nuclear weapon. But he added: “We are not taking any options off the table. Iran with nuclear weapons would pose a threat not only to the region but also to the United States.”

A report Friday from the International Atomic Energy Agency provided new evidence that Iran’s nuclear program includes clandestine efforts to build a bomb. The report, circulated among the UN watchdog agency’s member countries, includes satellite images, letters, diagrams and other documents. It alleges Iran has been working to acquire equipment and weapons design information, testing high explosives and detonators and developing compute models of a warhead’s core. Taken together, it’s the most unequivocal evidence yet that the Iranian program ranges far beyond enriching uranium for use in energy and medical research, which is what Tehran says it’s for.

In meetings Saturday with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev nor Chinese President Hu Jintao, Obama sought to rally support for putting new pressure on Iran’s regime. But there was little public sign either country was ready to drop its opposition to additional sanctions.

Four rounds of UN sanctions have caused economic hardship in Iran, but have yet to force any change in the nuclear program.

Obama declined to directly respond to criticism of his Iran policy from Republican presidential candidates Saturday, including former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s declaration that Obama’s re-election would mean a nuclear armed Iran. But he took a swipe at his foes anyway.

“Now is this an easy issue?” he asked. “No, anyone who claims it is, is either politicking or doesn’t know what they’re talking about.”

He also rejected assertions from GOP candidates such as Herman Cain and Michelle Bachmann that they would be willing to use the interrogation practice known as waterboarding, a simulated form of drowning, on suspected terrorists.

“Let me just say this: they’re wrong,” Obama said emphatically. “Waterboarding is torture, it’s contrary to America’s traditions, it’s contrary to our ideals, that’s not who we are, that’s not how we operate. We don’t need it … and we did the right thing by ending that practice.”

“Anyone who has read about and understands the practice of waterboarding would say that that is torture, period,” he added.

Obama, hosting the APEC conference in his home state, took questions in the late afternoon sunshine of a quintessential Hawaii scene, with palm trees and blue waters sprawled out behind him.

The president challenged China to move more quickly to let its currency to appreciate more rapidly and ending measures that disadvantage or pirate foreign intellectual property.

“It’s time for them to go ahead and move toward a market-based system for their currency,” he said.

Barak hopes there will be more e… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

    “May there be more like it,” was all Defense Minister Ehud Barak had to say on Sunday when asked about the mysterious explosion that rocked an Iranian missile base on Saturday, killing 17 members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps.

Iranian news sites identified one of the dead as Brig.- Gen. Hassan Moghadam, a top IRGC officer responsible for the development of some of Iran’s most advanced weapons. The explosion took place inside a base called Bid Ganeh, west of Tehran, which is reportedly used to manufacture and store Iran’s long-range ballistic missiles.

The cause of the explosion was unknown and Iran claimed it occurred when soldiers were moving explosives between bases. There was some speculation on Sunday that sabotage had caused the blast and Israel was involved with the assistance of local Iranian opposition groups.

Barak, interviewed by Army Radio, said he did not have details on the blast except that there had been an explosion.

It was not the first time that mysterious explosions struck in Iran. In recent years, a number of scientists have been killed in car bombings and dozens of IRGC officers have also been killed in various plane crashes.

In related news, Iranian officials said they were investigating the death of Ahmad Rezaie, son of Mohsen Rezaie, a senior Iranian conservative politician who ran for president in 2009. Rezaie, the son, was found dead in a Dubai hotel on Sunday and while suicide appears to be the cause of death, Iranian officials have raised suspicions of foul play. Israel was accused of killing a senior Hamas terrorist in a Dubai hotel in 2010.

The death of Rezaie was interesting due to the identity of his father, who is wanted by Interpol for his alleged involvement in the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, which killed 85 people. He was head of the IRGC at the time of the bombing.

His death could have been caused also by Iranians. Rezaie left for the US in 1998, where he openly criticized his father and the Islamic regime before returning home five years later.

He left Iran again in 2009.

Also Sunday, Iran admitted that some of its computer systems have been infected by a new Stuxnet-like virus called Duqu. The virus was discovered several months ago and is believed to be a more advanced version of the Stuxnet virus which attacked Iran’s Natanz nuclear facility last year.

Stuxnet is believed to have destroyed about 1,000 centrifuges at Natanz that were being used to enrich uranium.

Israel and the US have been accused of creating Stuxnet.

Head of Iran’s civil defense branch Brig.-Gen. Gholamreza Jalali told the official IRNA news agency that Duqu was discovered inside computer systems but Iran had developed a way to contain and neutralize the malware.

All facilities and equipment that were affected with this virus have been cleaned, and the virus is under control, he said according to Tehran Times.

Security software firm Symantec said in a report last month that it 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.

Security firms including Dell Inc’s SecureWorks, Intel Corp’s McAfee, Kaspersky Lab and Symantec say they found Duqu victims in Europe, Iran, Sudan and the US.

Jerusalem Post staff and Reuters contributed to this report.