WarSclerotic

‘Iran has no oil export to Franc… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

    TEHRAN – Iran said on Friday it had no crude exports to France which could be subjected to sanctions over the Islamic state’s disputed nuclear program, the semi-official Mehr news agency reported.

This week France’s foreign ministry first suggested and then back-tracked on the imposition of a unilateral ban on oil from Iran, making clear it would only act over Iran’s nuclear program as part of an EU-wide plan.

“The National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) does not export any crude oil to France to get subjected to sanctions,” head of NIOC Ahmad Qalebani told Mehr.

France imported 20,000 barrels per day of Iranian crude in the first half of 2011, according to United States government data. European Union countries accounted for 18 percent of Iranian crude oil sales in that period, the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) also said.

The French remarks provoked a wave of comment across Europe, suggesting a growing determination to toughen sanctions — an issue that is likely to be central to an EU foreign ministers’ meeting on Dec. 1. The European Union’s energy commissioner said a ban on Iranian oil imports would not be a problem for the European Union’s energy security.

Italy believes sanctions should be tightened against Iran, and is seeking to persuade its companies to stop buying Iranian oil, the spokesman for Italy’s Foreign Ministry said on Friday.

Italy relies on Iran for around 13 percent of its crude oil needs, equivalent to over 10 million tons per year (around 200,000 barrels per day).

“We are deeply convinced that we need to strengthen the pressure of sanctions on Iran and we are ready to discuss sanctions measures with our partners,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Maurizio Massari told Reuters.

“We are applying moral persuasion on our companies to diversify their supplies of oil imports,” he added

The United States and its allies say Iran is trying to build bombs under cover of a civilian nuclear program. Tehran denies this, saying it needs nuclear technology to generate electricity.

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

DEBKAfile Exclusive Analysis November 25, 2011, 9:29 AM (GMT+02:00)

UNIFIL at scene of S. Lebanon blast

First, Hizballah reported the unmasking of a CIA network in Lebanon. Then, Wednesday, Nov. 23, an Iranian lawmaker Parviz Sorouri, a member of the Iranian parliament’s foreign affairs and defense committee, claimed the capture of 12 CIA spies targeting Iran’s military and its nuclear program with the Mossad and regional agencies. Beirut and Tehran had clearly joined forces, debkafile‘s intelligence sources report, to prove they were on top of their security and had smashed dangerous US intelligence networks operating inside their armed forces.

Iran and Hizballah were driven into action by four pressing circumstances:

1. Tehran needed urgently to erase the bad impression left by the explosion which wiped out Iran’s entire missile command, including Maj. Gen. Hassan Moghaddam, at the secret Revolutionary Guards base in Aghadir near Tehran on Oct. 12.
Despite the supreme effort the authorities made to persuade the public that the calamity was caused by a technical malfunction, it brought back memories of former assassinations of top Iranian nuclear scientists, for which Tehran blamed the CIA and the Mossad.

2.  The growing inability of Iran’s leading ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad, to put down the uprising against his rule is in itself a sorry reflection on Tehran’s choice of allies, especially this week when the anti-regime Free Syrian Army raised its head and struck strategic targets in Syria and outside the country, singling out Lebanon.
Furthermore, debkafile‘s intelligence and military sources report, the unexplained explosion at the illegal Hizballah arms dump in the southern Lebanese town of Siddiqin Wednesday, Nov. 23 was the work of the Syrian rebels’ military arm, the FSA. It struck a target representing Assad’s ally which is moreover Tehran’s Lebanese surrogate.

Graffiti left at the scene of the blast said it was revenge for Hizballah’s aide to the Assad regime’s crackdown in Syrian cities and promised more.
The Siddiqin explosion was a shock to high authority in Tehran, Damascus and Beirut.

The Iranian Supreme Ruler’s military adviser, Gen. Yahya Rahim Safavi, had earlier warned that if Iran were attacked, it would not need to launch ballistic missiles at Israel “because all the Zionist cities are within the range of our ally Hizballah’s Katyushas.”

The weapons store explosion at Siddiqin has placed a large question mark over that threat. Tehran will have to take into account that the Syrian rebels can identify Hizballah’s rocket hideouts and launching pads, in which Iran has invested huge sums, and may sabotage them before they can go into action.

Since the destroyed arms depot was lodged in a well-protected Hizballah stronghold, officials in Beirut and Tehran must assume that the saboteurs, who slipped in an out of the site undetected, had local aid.

3.  Both Iran and Hizballah are gearing up for war.  Under cover of a military exercise, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and their Basij militia units last week began organizing in battle array in the various theaters assigned them in the country.
Hizballah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah has been inspecting Hizballah units. In his briefings to their commanders and men, he is warning them that war with Israel, and perhaps other Western armed forces too, is very near and they must be ready.

The difference between victory and defeat, he is saying, may hinge on their ability to detect double agents working in their midst for the Americans and Israelis. Even willingness for sacrifice and superior weaponry are no match for the peril posed from within by these spies.

This was Nasrallah’s first implicit admission of the inability of his and Iran’s security arms to root out US and Israeli penetrations of their forces, and their need to turn to ordinary soldiers for help.

4.  The alleged spy affairs Iran and Lebanon exposed this week are part of their response to US and Western pressure of the past fortnight to halt Iran’s nuclear progress. They are also payback for Washington’s allegation of an Iranian-led conspiracy to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the US.

BESA Experts: Iran is an Intolerable Threat – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News.

Arab spring map

Arab spring map

The Begin Sadat Center, a respected think tank based at Bar Ilan University, held a conference on  November 23, 2011 on the subject of  “Israeli Security in a New Regional Envornment”, which focused on the so-called “Arab Spring” and its implicatons. Its experts concluded that the  Arab Spring is not going to result in democracy, despite original hopes in the West, and may make things even worse for Israel.

“As steep as the price for hitting Iran may be, a military strike on Iran will be less painful than the cost of living with an Iranian nuclear weapons threat,” argues former Mossad head Maj. Gen. (res.) Danny Yatom. “The backlash from a strike on Iran’s nuclear sites will not be as bad for Israel as will an Iran armed with nuclear weapons,” he says. “I don’t think that those predicting apocalyptic repercussions of a strike on Tehran are correct, and even if they are, Israel can’t afford to wonder if Tehran will go crazy and bomb us.”

Yatom’s position is diametrically opposed to that of former Mossad head Meir Dagan, who sparked significant controversy earlier this year by stating that an attack on Iran would be a foolish move that would lead to a war with an unknown outcome.

It is impossible to stake the nation’s security on predictions by those who claim a nuclear Iran can be deterred and that the Iranian regime would not launch a nuclear attack, Yatom added. He acknowledged that rocket attacks would likely ensue from Lebanon and Gaza following a Western or Israeli strike against Iran, but added that Israel’s response would be “so painful and crushing that rockets will come to an end. Civilian facilities and infrastructure in Lebanon and Gaza will have to be hit. Innocent civilians could be hurt. But we will have to deliver a crushing blow so that the barrage of rockets against us will not continue.”

The world does not have much time left to act on Iran, the former Mossad head warned, adding that “there is an evaluation that they have crossed the red line. They have the knowledge to make the bomb. All that is needed now is the decision to do it…. The world has a year in which to halt the Iranian nuclear weapons program, probably less.”

Yatom also doubted that sanctions or covert operations could stop the Iranians. “We have only two options: to let Iran get the bomb, or to use military force against their military nuclear program. I think that force will have to be used. But I don’t think Israel should lead. This is, after all, a global problem…. Nevertheless, should the world stand on the sidelines, Israel will be fully entitled to use its natural right to self-defense. To us, the Iranian nuclear weapons program is an existential threat.”

Maj. Gen. (res.) Uzi Dayan, former head of IDF military intelligence and national security advisor to past Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, agreed with Yatom that Iran’s nuclear weapons program must be halted, but felt that sanctions which embargoed Iranian oil and gas and which outlawed transactions with the Iranian National Bank could dissuade the Iranians from proceeding. “While not an existential threat, Tehran’s nuclear program is an unacceptable threat,” he said.

Relating to the turmoil in the Arab world, Dayan said that the upheavals in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Syria, Bahrain and elsewhere “prove once again that the Arab-Israeli conflict is not the central problem in this region.

“The implications for Israel of this unrest are manifold,” he said. “At a time of such uncertainty, Israel must preserve and secure its strategic assets. This is not the time for Israel to be taking territorial or other risks, since we don’t know what is ahead. Israel must maintain defensible borders, with strategic depth, the ability to defend ourselves against attack, and in the Palestinian context – full demilitarization of areas under their control. Israel must guard against the possible emergence of three hostile Palestinian states – in Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza,” he said.

Dayan also called upon Israel to take the diplomatic initiative and advocate for Kurdish independence. “There are some 30 million Kurds in a clearly-defined region spread across four countries. They deserve statehood no less than the Palestinians,” he declared.

Prof. Gabi Ben-Dor of Haifa University, who spoke at the conference about Arab societies, dismissed the notion that a surge of enthusiasm for Western-style democracy lay behind the recent turmoil. “Who says that protests against dictatorship necessarily lead to democracy?” he asked. “Democracy is not what emerged from the revolution against the Tsars of Russia 100 years ago, nor has democracy emerged in many CIS states that threw off the Communist yoke. Thus there is no rational, logical or historical basis for assuming that democracy will result from the revolutions underway today in the Arab world.”

Egypt has a decent chance at a long-term march towards democracy, Ben-Dor said, but only if the military maintains a degree of moderating control over the country and prevents the Islamists from exploiting the situation in order to wrest complete power.

Prof. Efraim Karsh of the Middle East Forum and King’s College London was more pessimistic. “Islam remains the strongest identity framework in Egyptian society in particular, and in Arab society generally,” he said. “The Arab national dictatorships that were layered over this basic Islamic identity for the past 80 years were but a thin veneer of repression. With the fall of these dictatorships, what remains is the core Islamic underpinnings of society, and these will now come to the fore. Consequently, no democratic structures, processes or values are likely to emerge in the Arab world for many generations.”

Panelists at the conference disagreed about Western reactions to the Arab upheavals. Prof. Hillel Frisch of the BESA Center argued that one could discern the emergence of a clear American approach to the changes in the region – a policy construct that emphasizes the promotion of democracy while underscoring the containment of the influence of Iran, Russia and China.

Prof. Karsh and Prof. Eytan Gilboa disagreed. “America is fumbling for responses, reacting differently in each case, without any obvious grand strategy,” Karsh asserted. “Though American responses to each Middle Eastern state can individually make sense, overall strategy seems to be lacking, creating an image of a confused and untrustworthy America,” said Gilboa.

BESA’s Dr. Jonathan Rynhold argued that at present there are no chances of successfully completing a peace process with the Palestinians. A conflict management strategy or an attempt to reach a partial agreement are the only realistic policy choices in hand, he said.

BESA Center director Prof. Efraim Inbar warned of a deteriorating security situation for Israel. “States like Egypt are already losing control of their own territory, and Israel can expect increased cross-border attacks and terrorism. The Turks may ignite a confrontation over energy in the eastern Mediterranean. Israel should not be cutting its defense budget now. On the contrary, Israel should be investing more in the military and in the defense industries – so that we’ll be ready for challenges five years or more down the road.”

DEBKA.

Tom Donilon

It was the linkage that caught Tehran’s attention. On Tuesday, Nov. 22, President Barack Obama‘s National Security Adviser Tom Donilon said that the toppling of Syrian President Bashar Assad‘s regime would serve Iran a serious blow and further isolate the Islamic Republic.
Change in Damascus was inevitable, said Obama’s national security adviser. It would constitute Iran’s greatest setback in the region yet – “a strategic blow that will further shift the balance of power in the region against Iran.”
Donilon spoke in the wake of a new round of tough US energy and financial sanctions against Iran.
He made the first admission by a high-ranking Obama administration official that Washington’s interest in ousting Assad was not just a matter of his nine-month long brutal crackdown of a popular uprising, but even more, as the most momentous strategic defeat confronting Iran in the Middle East.
The statement capped two weeks during which the US was reported to be mustering resources for exercising its military option against Iran’s nuclear program.
In the second week of November, the US Air Force was said to have commissioned the new Massive Ordinance Penetrator, known as the MOP, in September.
This bomb can explode 200 feet underground; it is designed to destroy deeply buried and fortified targets such as the depots Iran is believed to have sunk deep underground to house its nuclear facilities.
US lavishes bunker busters, F-16 warplanes on Arab allies
Then, Monday, Nov. 21, the Pentagon was disclosed preparing for a formal congressional review of an arms sale to the United Arab Emirates, including about 600 satellite-guided bunker-buster bombs. Each weighting 2,000 pounds, they are part of a munitions package for the US ally whose fighter pilots fly the world’s most technologically advanced Lockheed Martin Corp. F-16s.
Two days earlier, on Nov. 19, the Washington Post enthusiastically described Saudi Arabian plans for a military buildup to halt Iran. It drew on Saudi sources to disclose that the army will augment its 150,000-strong forces with an extra 125,000 men and that the National Guard will add the same number of troops to its estimated 100,000.
The Saudi Navy will spend more than $30 billion buying new ships and sea-skimming missiles; the Air Force will procure 450 to 500 additional planes, and the Ministry of Interior was expanding its police and special forces units by about 60,000.
The Saudi shopping list is a rare bonanza for US and European arms producers and merchants.
The WP article did not indicate the length of time that would elapse between Iran’s attainment of nuclear arms and the doubling of the Saudi armed forces, or how long it would take to train Saudi pilots to fly the 72 new Eurofighters from EADS and 84 new F-15s from Boeing on that list.
DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s Gulf sources stress that this stream of US disclosures aimed at more than demonstrating the eagerness of Persian Gulf emirates to spend their way into projects for halting Iran – or even US willingness to support this effort with a lavish supply of sophisticated fighter planes and weapons.
It was meant to address a pointed Saudi grievance.
“Anyone who wants to survive in the Middle East needs a nuclear weapon”
On Nov. 15, the Saudi London-based paper Asharq Alawsat ran an unusual article penned by Saudi Arabia’s most prominent Muslim preacher, Dr. Aaidh al-Qarni, under the headline: “The West wages jihad but forbids us from doing so.”
The message conveyed between the lines was that Saudi Arabia had finally given up on the Obama administration’s Iran and Middle East policies. Having decided to wait no longer for American military or diplomatic initiatives, the oil kingdom had resolved to develop or acquire its own nuclear option to counter a nuclear-armed Iran.
This article would not have seen print without the endorsement of the royal house in Riyadh.
Here are some excerpts:
“… How can the West wage jihad but prohibit us Muslims from doing so… (rhetorical question)
Here I am talking about the fact that the West has produced nuclear missiles yet prevents us from doing so… Its factories produce rockets, bombs, missiles, and frigates, rocket-launchers and aircraft carriers, whilst our factories only produce bubble-gum and Pepsi…
“…Look at the five major nuclear states; how they advise others to abandon their nuclear weapons and oppose the atomic bomb, whilst the United States itself originally gained its respect and political weight because of its nuclear arsenal. They preach to other states and advise all nations to be peaceful, transparent and hospitable, urging them not to manufacture nuclear weapons because this constitutes a global threat.
“In fact, the five major nuclear states do not want other nations to manufacture nuclear weapons so that they can maintain their hegemony, authority and tyranny.
“The West was wise to develop the intercontinental ballistic missile and the atomic bomb, yet it prevents us in the Middle East from doing so because it knows that in order to rule the world and monopolize its wealth, one needs overpowering strength and clear superiority. We in the Middle East are supposed to be content with reading history and reveling in the glories of the past, but this is only good for students in literacy classes…
“Anyone who wants to survive in the Middle East today, therefore, must possess nuclear weapons.”
Saudi Arabia joins the Middle East nuclear race
DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s sources report the same grievance prompted Prince Turki al-Faisal, a former Saudi intelligence chief and adviser to King Abdullah, to voice opposition to an American or Israel attack on Iranian nuclear facilities. At a Washington press appearance on Nov. 15, he declared, “Such an act, I think, would be foolish, and to undertake it I think would be tragic.”
Both comments reflect the policy currently espoused in Riyadh: Saudi has in fact given up on anyone else taking military action against Iran’s nuclear program after waiting in vain for America or Israel to pursue such action. Acting on this conclusion, our military sources report the Saudis have plunged into creating their own multibillion program for building nuclear weapons and acquiring the missiles to deliver them.
They hope to end up with a counterweight to a nuclear-armed Iran across the Persian Gulf.
This program is proceeding in great secrecy at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), at the Red Sea town of Thuwal. This site, spread over more than 36 square kilometers (14 sq. miles), also comprises a marine sanctuary and research facility.
Every American intelligence effort to gain admittance to the campus’s military and nuclear labs have so far been thwarted.

DEBKA.

Leon Panetta

An eerie silence has descended on Israel’s air waves after weeks of contentious polemic over whether or not Israel should resort to military action to pre-empt a nuclear-armed Iran. This is not because the debate has gone away or because America has put its foot down against a unilateral attack.
(On Nov. 18, US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta warned that an Israeli attack on Iran would set back its nuclear program by one or two years at most. It would also have implications for U.S. forces in the region and consequences for the world economy.)
The lull in the heated debate is accounted for by DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s military and intelligence sources by the fact that Israeli leaders have come to a final decision, which is to attack Iran’s nuclear program within the next six months, i.e., up until the end of June, 2012 – barring unforeseen changes in Iran.
The changes that could hold up Israel’s plan of attack would including the fall of the Iranian regime under the weight of sanctions – highly improbable (see separate article on Iran’s focus on producing a nuclear weapon); a military coup in Tehran installing a junta which undertakes openly or confidentially to freeze the nuclear bomb program, or the transfer of all Iran’s nuclear facilities to fortified sites underground.
The decision in Jerusalem does not preclude a fresh outbreak of public sparring over in the coming months over if, when and how to strike Iran, as certain events move into place.
Israel urged to hold its horses for new sanctions next spring
In fact, the Netanyahu government came to its decision this week after the Obama administration’s fresh round of sanctions against Iran’s energy and banking sectors omitted to target Iran’s central bank a step that cold have brought the Islamic Republic’s financial and energy sectors to collapse.
It was avoided out of concern that sanctions going all the way would send oil prices skyrocketing and sow havoc in the world economy – even before an attack.
There is still one international station to pass, our sources report, before Israel goes into action:
In late March or early April 2012, the board of governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) convenes against in Vienna for another review of the Iranian nuclear program in the light of the damaging evidence of work on a nuclear bomb reported by the nuclear watchdog earlier this month.
Israel was dismayed by the IAEA board’s wishy-washy resolution on Friday Nov. 20 calling for “intensified dialogue to find solutions to unresolved issues.”
Iran’s ambassador Ali-Asghar Soltanieh responded mockingly that the resolution would merely strengthen Tehran’s determination to pursue its nuclear activities.
In confidential contacts this week, the US tried assuring Israel that the IAEA was constrained by the difficulty of most countries to swallow the evidence the agency’s director Yikiya Amano had presented of Iran’s active development of nuclear weapons. They needed time to digest it and in the spring it would be possible to approach new sanctions.
Barak makes Israel’s first definitive statement of intent
This was one of the messages conveyed to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu by US Undersecretary of State William Burns when he visited Jerusalem and Ramallah this week for another failed bid to revive Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. It was also what President Barack Obama‘s National Security Adviser Tom Donilon was referring to Tuesday, Nov. 22 when he said there was still time to stop the Iranians by sanctions and international pressure.
The first definitive statement of Israel’s intention came from Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak in his CNN interview on Sunday, Nov. 20.
He said then with rare clarity: “It’s true that it won’t take three years – probably three quarters (of a year) – before no one can do anything practical about it [Iran’s nuclear weapons program], because the Iranians are gradually, deliberately entering into what I call a zone of immunity, by widening the redundancy of their plan, making it spread over many more sites.”
When pointedly asked about a deadline after which a strike would be impossible, he replied, “I cannot tell you for sure, nor can I predict whether it’s two quarters or three quarters of a year. But it’s not two or three years.”
These remarks from Barak show Israel has determined to go on the offensive against Iran within the coming six months and stop playing ball with the Obama administration’s foot-dragging.
The fear now is that Washington will hold Israel back until new sanctions are imposed in spring 2012 and then demand a further delay until they take effect.
Ehud Barak tried to shut the door on this maneuver by arguing that the time frame is not dictated by either America or Israel but by the tempo of Iran’s progress toward developing a weapon and how quickly it is able to whisk its uranium enrichment and bomb-making facilities into fortified structures under ground.
A six month gap to be bridged
In DEBKA-Net-Weekly 515, of November 4, we wrote in the lead article that Obama has decided to attack the nuclear program in the fall, timing it for the run-up to the US presidential election.
The gap between the US and Israeli dates for striking Iran has therefore shrunk to just six months.
Neither our Washington nor our Jerusalem sources can report that the White House and the offices of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak are in conversation on ways to bridge this gap.
Such talks may start in mid-January 2012 after the New Year break.
Only then, will we discover if President Obama has come to a final decision on whether America exercises its military option against Iran or takes part in the Israeli operation.
A third scenario worth considering is that the US will launch the second strike around September three or four months after Israel delivers the first strike – as per the time frame charted by Defense Minister Barak.

DEBKA.

(I find this story almost impossible to believe. – JW)

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

Iran is preparing to stun the world with the revelation that it has produced its first nuclear weapon and qualifies for the status of nuclear power.
Reporting this from Iranian and intelligence sources, DEBKA-Net-Weekly cites some of them as predicting that Tehran may drop this bombshell in days.
The highest levels of the Iranian regime are still locked in frenzied debate over the if and when to drop it, but Supreme Ruler Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is said to have made up his mind. He is confident that the shock value of an Iranian nuclear fait accompli will make the world stumble in its tracks and arrest the rolling snowball of sanctions and military threats inundating Iran and its allies, specifically Syria.
While Khamenei’s inner circle is behind the Supreme Ruler, the National Security Council and its chairman Saeed Jalili are against coming out of the nuclear closet. In a detailed report, they recommend that Tehran continue to deny its nuclear program has any non-peace elements. And if they are overruled, they advise careful tactical steps be taken to pave the way for full disclosure of the bomb program.
In any case, not all the technical obstacles for practically manufacturing Iran’s first nuclear weapon have been overcome.
Satellite surveillance holds up pivotal experiment
For instance, the detonator for triggering a chain reaction that causes a nuclear explosion has been assembled – but not tested.
The first experiment scheduled for mid-November at the containment vessel in the Parchin military complex southeast of Tehran, where the Iranians are conducting hydrodynamic experiments, had to be postponed because if it had taken place, it would have confirmed the International Atomic Energy Agency’s allegations whose release on Nov. 8 set the world by its ears.
The IAEA accused Iran of developing a detonator and presented satellite pictures of “a large steel container for carrying out tests with explosives as powerful as nuclear weapons.”
Our military and intelligence sources report efforts to secretly move the containment vessel to another, more secret, testing site much farther away from Tehran and prying Western eyes. But this is getting harder every day because two Israeli and several US and British spy satellites are watching Parchin and other suspicious sites like eagles and taking overlapping photos of the slightest movements. This is holding up the pivotal experiment.
Tuesday, Nov. 22, reports came in from IAEA headquarters in Vienna that satellite surveillance had picked up increased activity at an Iranian site suspected of clandestine work on the weapons project. One official cited intelligence from his home country indicating that Iran was trying to cover its tracks by “sanitizing” the site to remove traces of nuclear activity. Two other sources confirmed increased activity but reserved judgment on its nature.
Khamenei aims to ward off sanctions and relieve Syria of pressure
These reports are taken in Tehran as attempts to bully Iran into discontinuing its nuclear experiments.
However, Khamenei and his advisers are not deterred; they are said to be resolved to go public on Iran’s first atom bomb – whether or not the detonator experiment goes ahead in the coming days. He is convinced that the powerful effect of full nuclear disclosure would counteract the heavy pressures weighing down on Tehran in three main areas:
1. Spiraling economic sanctions:
The Iranian government is extremely disturbed by the latest series of sanctions announced by the US, Britain and Canada Monday, Nov. 21, which target its banks on the pretext of money laundering concerns and prohibit their own banks from doing business with Islamic Republic.
Despite the availability of the banking systems of Russia, China, India, Brazil, Malaysia and Indonesia, Iran’s business links with the West are blocked and it expects more tough sanctions are in the pipeline.
2. Syria:
When President Barack Obama‘s National Security Adviser, Tom Donilon linked the toppling of Assad with Iran’s strategic situation in the Gulf region and the Middle East (See a separate article in this issue: The Saudis No Longer Waiting for US, Developing Own Nuclear Strike Capability), Tehran saw confirmation of what it had long suspected: Western denials of plans for military intervention in Syria mask operations already ongoing to overthrow Bashar Assad like Muammar Qaddafi.
(See a separate assessment of the Syrian situation in this issue.)
Amid preparations for this eventuality, Khamenei and his aides believe that by publicly owning up to the possession of a nuclear weapon – or actually conducting nuclear tests – Tehran would give the Assad regime a nuclear shield and an extra lease of life of six months to a year.
Iran would also gain time to reorganize the Lebanese Shiite Hizballah for taking on Israel without Syria: Assad’s army is too exhausted from months of fighting dissidence at home to join the fight against Israel.
3. The US Presidential Election:
It is feared in Khamenei’s circle that President Obama will set out to destroy Iran’s nuclear capabilities in order to enhance his chances of a second term in the November 2012 election.
Members of the Supreme Ruler’s bureau don’t believe assertions from Washington that the US administration is standing up to Israel’s clamor for military action. They see them as a smokescreen for detailed operational networking in top secrecy. The US official argument that a military strike would delay Iran’s nuclear progress by no more than a year or two is seen as a tactic for putting Iran off guard.
In the view of Khamenei’s military advisers, US cruise missiles are capable of destroying or irreparably crippling Iran’s nuclear installations.
The strategy the Iranians attribute to Washington is simple: A US missile strike on Iran would provoke Iranian counter-strikes against Saudi Arabia and Israel, at the very least. If Tehran shoots missiles at Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Gulf emirates or any other Middle East countries, it would be committing suicide by offering the US and Israel ample grounds for wiping out Iran’s entire military infrastructure including its missile launchers, causing the Islamic regime in Tehran to fall.
And if the operation against Iran’s nuclear facilities is surgical enough to keep most civilians and strategic infrastructure out of harm’s way, Washington would hope for the Iranian people to rise up and topple the regime themselves – or that is how the Supreme Ruler’s close aides calculate the thinking in the Obama administration.
However, according to our Washington sources, most US policy makers take the opposite view: they believe the destruction of Iran’s nuclear program would push the people back into the regime’s embrace.
Counter-arguments to nuclear disclosure
The Security Council Council’s report, presented to the Supreme Ruler – and revealed here DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s Iranian sources – argues that full disclosure of a nuclear bomb in Iranian hands would give the international community the legal pretext for acting in concert and with greater vigor than ever before against the Islamic regime until its eventual demise.
Both camps, backers and opponents of nuclear transparency, draw on North Korea to prove their contrary points:
The Khamenei party argues that Pyongyang was able to preserve its rogue regime and gain international respect and benefits only after arming itself with a nuclear arsenal.
The Jalili faction answers back that North Korea has gained nothing from its nuclear status.
In any case, the North Korean case cannot serve Iran as a model because it is far less sensitive than a nation wedged at the heart of the worlds’ biggest oil reserves.
But Ayatollah Khamenei reamains unconvinced. His implacable resolve not to give an inch on Iran’s nuclear ambitions was underlined in a speech last week when he said: “We are not aggressors. But if Israel or the U.S. decides to attack us, we will break them apart from the inside.”
Israel and neighboring Arab countries reject the theory of some Western analysts that this was an empty boast and are taking it seriously as a nuclear threat.
Iran’s hardliners take center stage
Reactions from Tehran to the toughening of sanctions in the wake of the IAEA report are uniformly hard line.
The powerful Majlis Speaker Ali Larjani, a former nuclear negotiator said Monday, Nov. 22: “The West knows that we will respond.”
Senior military officer Gen. Mohammad Bagheri said Tuesday: “Under the orders of Khamenei, Iran is planning a radical change in its strategic policy in the near future.”
As deputy chief of the Iranian General Staff’s Intelligence and Operations unit, Gen. Bagheri who is rarely seen in public made this statement to the Iranian parliament.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was told to hold his tongue on the nuclear issue because the Supreme Ruler wants the limelight for himself and has in any case targeted the president and his clique for a purge.
DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s sources in Tehran are convinced that within a few days, Khamenei will wind up the high-key deliberations in progress. He will then brief the nation’s leaders on his decision before making it public.

France announces, withdraws solo… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

(I should have known better than to feel good about the French. – JW)

    PARIS – France’s Foreign Ministry first suggested and then “clarified” a policy to impose a unilateral ban on imports of oil from Iran, making clear on Thursday it would only act over Tehran’s nuclear program in coordination with European Union partners.

In an initial statement posted on the ministry website, in response to a Reuters question, Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said:

“The interruption of Iranian oil purchases is among the measures proposed by France to its partners. We will apply this at a national level.”

Another spokesman later called the wording ambiguous, adding: “The decision at a national level will be in coordination with our European partners.”

Nevertheless the French remarks led to a wave of comment across Europe showing determination to toughen sanctions — a drive that is likely to be central to an EU foreign ministers’ meeting on Dec. 1.

“We are discussing wide-ranging sanctions (on) Iran with partners in the EU,” a UK Foreign Office spokeswoman said, adding Britain expects to announce sanctions on further Iranian “entities and individuals.”

The EU energy commissioner said a ban on Iranian oil imports would not be a problem for the European Union’s energy security.

“This is not a problem. It can be substituted by OPEC and others.” EU Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger said.

While most of Iran’s oil goes to Asia, it still supplies significant volumes to Europe via the Suez Canal.

US government data shows EU countries accounted for 18 pct of Iranian oil purchases in the first half of 2011 or 450,000 bpd. Italy was the leading buyer with 180,000 bpd, Spain took 137,000 bpd and France 20,000 bpd.

The director of Italy’s national oil industry body said Italian sanctions on imports of Iranian crude were inevitable.

The United States, Britain and Canada on Monday announced new sanctions on Iran’s energy and financial sectors in steps aimed at raising pressure on Tehran to halt its nuclear work, which is internationally thought to have a weapons dimension. Iran says it is aimed at peaceful atomic energy.

France has been pushing hard to convince allies to also impose sanctions on Iran’s oil exports and central bank, despite concerns among other Western governments that such moves could hurt the world economy as well as Tehran.

France bought more Iranian oil in the first half of the year to make up for disruption from Libya.

French oil industry body UFIP said on Thursday France would easily make up for an Iranian crude import shortfall.

Valero’s initial statement was in response to a Reuters question whether the government would force French oil major Total to stop its crude shipping business with Iran.

Shares in Total, France’s biggest oil company, were down 1.6 percent at 34.75 euros by 1536 GMT after accelerating losses to 2 percent in the wake of the ministry’s first statement. The European energy sector was down 1.1 percent at the time.

Arabs give Syria a day to allow monitors; rebel army calls for air strikes on targets.

Al Arabiya

Thursday, 24 November 2011

The Arab League has given Syria a day to sign a protocol allowing monitors into the country or the regional body will press ahead with plans to impose economic sanctions, Egypt’s envoy to the League said on Thursday as Free Syrian Army called for foreign air strikes on “strategic targets” in Syria.

The sanctions could include a suspension of commercial flights to Syria and a halt to dealings with its central bank, the envoy, Afifi Abdul Wahab, told reporters in Cairo, according to Reuters, as Syrian activists told Al Arabiya that as many as 27 civilians were killed by the gunfire of security forces on Thursday.

“Tomorrow is the deadline for Syria to sign. If they don’t sign, the economic and social council (of ministers) will meet on Saturday to discuss economic sanctions,” he said adding that if Syria did not sign foreign ministers would meet again on Sunday to review the proposed sanctions.

 We are not in favor of the entry of foreign troops as was the case in Iraq but we want the international community to give us logistical support 

Free Syrian Army chief Riyadh al-Asaad

Meanwhile, Free Syrian Army chief Riyadh al-Asaad on Thursday called for foreign air strikes on “strategic targets” in Syria as part of a drive to topple the regime, in a telephone interview with AFP.

“We are not in favor of the entry of foreign troops as was the case in Iraq but we want the international community to give us logistical support,” said FSA chief Colonel Asaad, who is based across the border in Turkey.

“We also want international protection, the establishment of a no-fly zone, a buffer zone and strikes on certain strategic targets considered as crucial by the regime,” he said.

In contrast, the leader of the main Syrian opposition group in exile said after talks in Paris on Wednesday that his organization does not want to see rebels launch armed attacks on President Bashar al-Assad’s forces.

Amid fears of the deadly anti-regime protests in Syria since mid-March turning into civil war, Burhan Ghaliun of the Syrian National Council said the FSA should try to avoid direct confrontation with regime troops.

“We would like this army to carry out defensive actions to protect those who have left the (regime’s) army and peaceful demonstrations, but not take on offensive actions against the army,” he said.

Seven military pilots were killed when gunmen attacked their bus in the center of the country on Thursday, opposition sources told AFP.

The attack, carried out by “armed Bedouins,” took place near the city of Palmyra, said an opposition member based in the flashpoint region of Homs, and was claimed by the rebel Free Syrian Army.

At least 11 security force members were killed by army defectors in Syria’s flashpoint city of Homs on Thursday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a statement sent to AFP in Nicosia.

“Eleven soldiers and members of the security forces were killed in skirmishes on Thursday with deserter troops in the Homs region,” the rights group said.

Earlier, the group said at least two civilians were killed when a sniper killed a man in the Bayyada area of Homs, where security forces shot dead another civilian during a raid in Karm al-Zeitoun district.

On Tuesday, six children and five mutinous soldiers were among 34 people killed across Syria, according to the Britain-based group.

Leader of the so-called Syrian Free Army, Col. Riyadh al-Asaad. (File photo)

Meanwhile, France said on Thursday it will seek Arab support for a humanitarian corridor in Syria, the first time a major power pushed for international intervention in the eight-month uprising against President Assad.

Foreign Minister Alain Juppe, who first floated the proposal for humanitarian intervention on Wednesday, gave more details of the plan and said he would propose it to a meeting of Arab League foreign ministers gathering in Cairo to discuss Syria.

Iraq’s foreign minister said Damascus had accepted a plan to send monitors to Syria, seen as a last-ditch attempt to avert Arab League sanctions. There was no immediate confirmation from Syria, according to Reuters.

After months in which the international community has seemed determined to avoid any direct entanglement in a core Middle East country, the diplomatic consensus seems to be changing.

The Arab League suspended Syria’s membership two weeks ago, accusing Assad of failing to fulfill a Nov. 2 pledge to halt the violence and withdraw troops from cities.

This week, the prime minister of regional heavyweight Turkey – a NATO member with the military wherewithal to mount a cross-border operation – compared Assad to Hitler, Mussolini and Qaddafi, and called on him to quit.

Juppe said international monitors should be sent to protect civilians, with or without Assad’s permission. He insisted the proposal fell short of a military intervention, but acknowledged that humanitarian convoys would need armed protection.

“There are two possible ways: That the international community, Arab League and the United Nations can get the regime to allow these humanitarian corridors,” he told French radio on Thursday. “But if that isn’t the case we’d have to look at other solutions … with international observers,”

Asked if humanitarian convoys would need military protection, he said: “Of course… by international observers, but there is no question of military intervention in Syria.”

He added that he had spoken to partners at the United Nations and U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, and would speak later on Thursday to the Arab League. On Wednesday Juppe also embraced the exiled opposition Syrian National Council as a legitimate group that France sought to work with.

In a sign of Paris’ growing frustration at events on the ground, Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said France was particularly concerned with what was happening in the city of Homs, which has become a centre of resistance against Assad.

“Information from several sources tell us that the situation in Homs is particularly worrying. It would appear to be under siege today, deprived of basic materials and experiencing a brutal repression,” he said.

“A way must be found so that this city is supplied with humanitarian aid,” he added.

Washington repeated an appeal on Wednesday for U.S. citizens to leave Syria: “The U.S. Embassy continues to urge U.S. citizens in Syria to depart immediately while commercial transportation is available,” the embassy said on its website.

The U.S. navy said the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush arrived this week in the Mediterranean. It made no reference to the unrest in Syria and said the ship would continue through the Mediterranean en route to the United States.

A Western diplomat in the region said about the U.S. aircraft carrier: “It is probably routine movement but it is going to put psychological pressure on the regime, and the Americans do not mind that.”

“The darkness of the Middle Ages”

Syrians living in Egypt wave a large Syrian national flag and shout slogans against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during a protest before the Arab League foreign ministers emergency meeting, at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo. (Reuters)

Syria’s bloodshed could pitch the Muslim world into “the darkness of the Middle Ages,” Turkish President Abdullah Gul said on Wednesday.

A day earlier, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan criticized the “cowardice” of Assad, once a close ally, for turning guns on his own people.

Erdogan spoke of the fate of defeated dictators from Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini to Muammar Gaddafi, who was lynched by a mob last month at the end of an uprising that ultimately won the support of the West and Arab League states.

Speaking after a meeting with Syria’s opposition National Council on Wednesday, Juppe described it as “the legitimate partner with which we want to work” — the biggest international endorsement yet for the nascent opposition body.

NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu said allies were watching the situation in Syria with great concern, but reiterated that the alliance had no intention to intervene in Syria as it had done in Libya.

“There’s been no request and there is no specific discussion about these proposals,” she said in response to Juppe’s proposal.

She said the situation in Syria could not be compared with Libya, where NATO had a clear United Nations mandate for intervention and support from the Arab League.

The violence in Syria itself showed no signs of abating.

Authorities blame the bloodshed on armed groups, who they say have killed more than 1,100 members of the security forces since the unrest erupted in March. Syria has barred most independent media from Syria, making it difficult to verify accounts from activists and officials.

Thousands of soldiers have deserted the regular army since it started cracking down on the eight-month protest movement, inspired by Arab uprisings which have toppled the leaders of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen.

On Wednesday, state news agency SANA reported funerals of nine soldiers and policemen killed by “armed terrorist groups.”

Assad, 46, seems prepared to fight it out, playing on fears of a sectarian war if Syria’s complex ethno-sectarian mosaic shatters and relying on support of senior officials and the military.

However many experts say Assad, who can depend mainly on the loyalty of two elite Alawite units, cannot maintain current military operations without cracks emerging in the armed forces.

Syria: Iraq’s Muqtada al-Sadr Reported Sending Fighters to Prop Up Assad Regime – International Business Times.

(Photo: REUTERS / Khaled al-Hariri)

Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr reacts during a news conference after meeting with former Iraq’s Prime Minister Iyad Allawi in Damascus July 19, 2010.

By Anissa Haddadi

Iran CIA agent claims ‘linked to… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

 By YAAKOV LAPPIN

    Iran’s claim to arresting 12 CIA agents in its territory is linked to clandestine efforts by Tehran to disperse missiles around the country, a senior Iran analyst in the US told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday.

Professor Raymond Tanter, adjunct scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, and founder of the Washington-based Iran Policy Committee, said the Iranians were moving and testing missiles “that would form the first response” to an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear sites.

“The rollup of alleged western spies in Iran involves the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC),” Tanter said, adding that this was an organization which “operates all of Iran’s Scud missiles and provides the military leadership for Iranian missile production.”

“Events in Iran concern surreptitious testing and movement of missiles at an IRGC facility during mid-November to harden and hide them from surprise attack,” he added.

Referring to a mysterious and powerful blast that rocked a missile base on the outskirts of Tehran earlier this month, killing General Hassan Moghaddam, the architect of Iran’s missile program, and at least 16 other Iranian officials, Tanter said, “The accident in Iran is consistent with statements by Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak that Tehran seeks to create a ‘zone of immunity,’ which spreads missile sites around. The goals are to increase the costs of an Israeli first strike, lower the likelihood of success, and decrease the time window of opportunity for Israel to attack Iran.”

Earlier on Thursday, Iran’s IRNA official media outlet said the supposed agents were planning to attack Iranian targets. The report quoted a senior Iranian security official as saying that the alleged spies were planning to carry out espionage attacks to “damage Iran both from inside and outside with a heavy blow, using regional intelligence services.”

“Fortunately, with swift reaction by the Iranian intelligence department, the actions failed to bear fruit,” the official, named as Parviz Sorouri, a member of Iran’s foreign policy and national security committee, added.

Sourouri also said the alleged agents were working with “the Zionist regime.”

Tanter said that “there is a humongous need for human intelligence from inside Iran,” adding, “The best source to complement western intelligence on the IRGC is the main Iranian opposition organization, the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MeK), which is under siege in Iraq but still maintains an effective intelligence network in the Iranian national security establishment.”

On Tuesday, unnamed US officials were quoted by Reuters as saying that Hezbollah too “succeeded in identifying and arresting informants within its ranks who were working for the CIA,” and described the development as an apparent “serious setback for US intelligence.”

“Some former US officials said that the CIA informants, believed to be local recruits rather than US citizens, were uncovered, at least in part, due to sloppy procedures – known in the espionage world as ‘tradecraft,’ – used by the agency,” Reuters said.