WarSclerotic

More on Jewish McCarthyism and Neo-Nazi Smearing (Last Post, I Hope) – Jeffrey Goldberg – National – The Atlantic.

In today’s edition of “How Many Jews Can Dance on the Head of a Pin?,” certified leftist Spencer Ackerman goes after Glenn Greenwald and others — rather successfully, I think — for using anti-Semitic rhetoric to smear (Glenn’s favorite word) Jews with whom they disagree:

Some on the left have recently taken to using the term “Israel Firster” and similar rhetoric to suggest that some conservative American Jewish reporters, pundits, and policymakers are more concerned with the interests of the Jewish state than those of the United States. Last week, for example, Salon’s Glenn Greenwald asked Atlantic writer Jeffrey Goldberg about any loyalty oaths to Israel Goldberg took when he served in the IDF during the early 1990s. (On Tuesday, writer Max Blumenthal used a gross phrase to describe Goldberg: “former Israeli prison guard.”) The obvious implication is that Goldberg’s true loyalty is to Israel, not the United States. For months, M.J. Rosenberg of Media Matters, the progressive media watchdog group, has been throwing around the term “Israel Firster” to describe conservatives he disagrees with. One recent Tweet singled out my friend Eli Lake, a reporter for Newsweek: “Lake supports #Israel line 100% of the time, always Israel first over U.S.” That’s quite mild compared to some of the others.

Ackerman makes this important observation:

Many of the writers who are fond of the Israel Firster smear are–appropriately–very good at hearing and analyzing dog-whistles when they’re used to dehumanize Arabs and Muslims. I can’t read anyone’s mind or judge anyone’s intention, but by the sound of it these writers are sending out comparable dog-whistles about Jews.

By the way, I don’t consider “former Israeli prison guard” a “gross phrase,” just so Ackerman understands. It’s an inaccurate phrase — I wasn’t a guard, I was a military policeman (the actual title of my position was “prisoner counselor,” believe it or not, which meant that I saw after the culinary, hygiene and medical needs of the prisoners, but I also, on more than one occasion, actually did give advice to Palestinian prisoners on how to apply to college in America — I stressed that the essay portion of any application would be an easy home run for any of these Intifada prisoners. A few of them did end up at universities here).

One amusing note: When Max Blumenthal (who now writes a column for a pro-Hezbollah Beirut newspaper, by the way — and no, I’m not making this up) calls me an Israeli prison guard, I invariably receive one or two e-mails like this one, just recently received:

“You can tried to hide your past but it’s not working. We all know now that you worked in a concentration camp for Palestinians.”

As loyal Goldblog readers know, I’ve done a very poor job of hiding my perfidious past: Writing a book about my service at this Israeli army prison camp was probably not the best way to keep this a secret.

But, onward. Here’s Ackerman on why it is important for leftists to avoid smearing Jews they are ostensibly trying to convert to their position on the occupation and on bombing Iran:

The left, I think, will win that debate on the merits, because it recognizes that if Israel is to survive as a Jewish democracy living in peace beside a free Palestine, an assertive United States has to pressure a recalcitrant Israel to come to its senses, especially about the insanity of attacking Iran.

But that debate will be shut down and sidetracked by using a term that Charles Lindbergh or Pat Buchanan would be comfortable using. I can’t co-sign that. The attempt to kosherize “Israel Firster” is an ugly rationalization. It shouldn’t matter that the American Jewish right proliferates the term “anti-Israel.” The easiest way to lose a winnable argument is to get baited into using their tactics. I don’t fetishize false civility; bullies ought to get it twice as bad as they give. People disagree, so they should argue. Shouting is healthier than shutting up.

The handful of Jews who use anti-Semitic terminology to demonize other Jews (and it really is a handful — I’m not sure they could fill a synagogue) do serve an important purpose, however: They open-up space for anti-Jewish invective in mainstream discourse. Here is Lee Smith, also in Tablet:

Why is it that no one bats an eyelash when a former United States national security adviser says, “The Israelis have a lot of influence with Congress, and in some cases they are able to buy influence”? Last week in an interview, Zbigniew Brzezinski accused the government of Israel of a crime. If he has evidence that Israeli officials have broken the law by bribing U.S. politicians, law enforcement authorities should compel him to produce it. But of course Brzezinski’s not really talking about Israelis. What he means is that American Jews have subverted the interests of the United States on behalf of a foreign power.

You don’t need to know much about history to recognize that Brzezinski here is trading in a classic anti-Semitic trope. Why didn’t his Salon interviewer call him out on it? Why hasn’t anyone else? Where are the American elites–the intellectuals, writers, policymakers, and political activists–when it comes to vigilance against anti-Semitism?

An attempt to answer that question must come in a separate post; I’m running off soon to an interview at the TSA (of all things). But I would note that Brzezinski is speaking at an event for his new book this Sunday at the Sixth and I Synagogue (!) in Washington. Maybe someone could go ask him what he thinks of the term “Israel-firster.”

Iran: The showdown over the Strait of Hormuz – The Week.

Tehran threatens to block the world’s busiest oil-shipping route. What would happen if the strait were closed?

Soldiers take part in Iranian naval maneuvers near Iran’s Strait of Hormuz: Tehran has threatened to block the busy oil-shipping route, through which 17 million barrels of oil travel every day. 

Why is the Strait of Hormuz so important?
A narrow strip of water separating Iran from Oman, the strait is the major maritime link between the oil-rich Persian Gulf region and the rest of the world. Tankers carry 17 million barrels of oil, about a fifth of the world’s supply, through the channel every day. Five of the planet’s biggest oil producers — Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iran, Iraq, and the United Arab Emirates — rely on the waterway to ship almost all of their energy exports. The waterway is now at the center of the West’s increasingly tense standoff with Iran, which in recent weeks has warned that it would shut the shipping artery if the U.S. or Europe tightened economic sanctions in response to its nuclear program. Iran’s top naval commander, Habibollah Sayyari, said closing the strait would be “easier than drinking a glass of water.” The Obama administration has publicly dismissed the threat as “saber rattling,” but sent word to Tehran through back channels that closing the strait would cross “a red line” and provoke an American military response.

Could Iran actually shut down the strait?
“The simple answer is yes, they can block it,” said Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Over the past two decades, Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard has stockpiled at least 2,000 naval mines. Those garbage-can-size explosives could be slipped into the water by midget submarines and civilian dhows (a kind of sailboat) and other fishing vessels. Although the waterway is 21 miles wide, Iran could make the strait a no-go zone for big vessels by laying mines across the deep, central passage that holds the inbound and outbound shipping lanes, which are each only two miles wide. That operation could be completed in a matter of hours. “All the Iranians have to do is say they mined the strait and all tanker traffic would cease immediately,” said Jon Rosamond, editor of the journal Jane‘s Navy International.

Has Iran ever acted on its threats?
Iran last tried to sabotage shipping during its decade-long conflict with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. When Iraq began attacking Iranian tankers in 1984, Iran responded by targeting vessels headed to and from Gulf ports, and laying mines in shipping lanes. The frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts almost sank after it hit an Iranian mine in 1988, leading President Reagan to order retaliatory strikes. In a single day, the U.S. Navy destroyed two Iranian oil platforms, a frigate, a gunboat, and three speedboats. Today, Iran’s navy is a more formidable enemy. Not only does it have an arsenal of mines 10 times more powerful than those used in the 1980s, but it now boasts “hundreds of advanced cruise missiles and possibly more than 1,000 small, fast attack craft,” U.S. Navy Cmdr. Daniel Dolan wrote in a 2010 report.

How would oil prices react?
They’d skyrocket. Energy analysts warn that even a partial blockage of the strait could send the price of a barrel of oil soaring to $150, up from about $100 today. Gas prices in the U.S. would quickly rise above $4.50 a gallon, and imperil the global economic recovery. But the Islamic Republic itself would likely pay the highest price for closing the strait. The Iranian government generates 65 percent of its revenues from oil exports, almost all of which pass through the waterway. Shutting off that cash stream would devastate Iran’s economy, which is already reeling from international sanctions and mismanagement. By delivering on their threat, said Dennis Ross, a former White House adviser on the Mideast, the Iranians “would basically be taking a vow of poverty.”

What could the U.S. do to reopen the strait?
It can’t just send in minesweepers. Any warship entering the narrow waterway could be easily surrounded by swarms of missile-armed Iranian speedboats, and targeted by anti-ship cruise missiles hidden on Iran’s coastline, islands, and oil platforms. So the U.S. would likely begin any mine-clearing mission by launching aerial attacks on Iran’s naval bases and missile silos. Since that would essentially put the two nations in a state of war, the U.S. would probably go further and embark on a broader offensive against the Islamic Republic. “You’d almost certainly also see serious strikes on their nuclear facilities,” said Anthony Cordesman, a defense expert at Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies. “Once the Iranians have initiated hostilities, there is no set level at which you have to stop escalation.”

So will Iran really close the strait?
Probably not. Most analysts think Iran will find less dangerous ways to dissuade the West from approving new sanctions. If they wanted to disrupt shipping, they could temporarily shut part of the strait for military exercises, or launch one-off hit-and-run attacks they could then blame on pirates. But Iran’s calculation would change if the U.S. or Israel launched a bombing attack on its nuclear facilities. Then a Hormuz shutdown “would happen pretty much automatically,” said Henry Smith of London-based security consultancy Control Risks. “The Iranians have been saying for a long time that is an option, and they would have little choice but to stick to that.”

Sending in the dolphins
If Iran shuts the Strait of Hormuz, the U.S. will likely deploy its best mine detector: Flipper. The Navy has an 80-strong squad of bottle-nosed dolphins, some of which have been trained to find mines and mark their location by dropping an acoustic transponder. Navy divers are then sent in to destroy the explosives. The dolphins’ incredible natural sonar makes them perfect minesweepers: They can distinguish between a nickel and a dime at 100 yards, and among brass, aluminum, and stainless steel — even when the metal is buried under two feet of mud. “They are astounding in their ability to detect underwater objects,” said retired Adm. Tim Keating. Those skills have undoubtedly saved the lives of U.S. military personnel. During the 2003 invasion of Iraq, nine Navy dolphins helped clear more than 100 mines and underwater booby traps placed by Saddam Hussein’s forces.

Iran&39;s Plan To Terrorize The West Using Quds Forces-by PipeLineNews.org.

By REZA KAHLILI

January 27, 2012 – San Francisco, CA – PipeLineNews.org –

Iran is taking several steps to help Syria’s beleaguered President Bashar Assad, assassinate opposition figures and attack Israeli and American interests worldwide, sources have confirmed.

After the recent assassination of Iranian nuclear scientist Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan, deputy director of the first uranium enrichment facility at Natanz, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, ordered retaliation.

He instructed Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the chief commander of the Quds Forces, to prepare the ground for terrorist attacks, first to retaliate against assassination and espionage within the Iranian nuclear program, and second, to go on the offensive to make the West understand that any military action against Iran will create much instability in the world.

The Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah will meet with Iranian Quds Forces in Iraq’s Kurdistan region next week to discuss ways to export arms and explosives to Hezbollah cells and strengthen terrorist cells in the Middle East, according to SepahOnline, the media outlet close to the Revolutionary Guards.

Other sources reveal that several key figures in the Middle East are on the Shiite regime’s list of assassination targets, including Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian National Authority, and several other Sunni authorities within the Iraqi government.

Hezbollah cells, in coordination with the Quds Forces, are to attack U.S. and Israeli interests around the world, even within America itself, the sources said.

On Jan. 13, Kristie Kenney, U.S. ambassador to Thailand, warned of a “real and very credible” threat of a terrorist attack in Bangkok. The warning came as Thai authorities arrested two Lebanese Hezbollah suspects.

Also today, two Azerbaijani citizens were arrested in an alleged plot to assassinate the Israeli ambassador to Baku, Azerbaijan. The suspects, who had been living in the city of Irbil, Iran, have been charged with smuggling weapons and explosives into Azerbaijan.

A source within the Revolutionary Guards has also revealed that Lebanese Hezbollah terrorists have been called on by Iran to protect the Guards base in the town of Mazaya in Syria. The unidentified source told the pan-Arab media outlet Al Arabiya that Iran wants protection for its military advisers who are in Syria to help Assad suppress the uprising against him.

The source, who is close to Soleimani, said the Guard forces in Syria, in coordination with Russia and China, act only as advisers to protect the Assad regime.

He added that Russia has committed to sending an aircraft carrier task force to the area to ensure that “the West knows we will not allow any military adventurism against Syria.”

The Guard commander said there is information that Israel is planning direct interference in the Syrian uprising by forming an anti-Shi’ite coalition, “Therefore we have requested Hezbollah enter into a dialog with the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood to form a united front against Israel.”

The leaders of the Islamic regime in Iran believe that an aggressive terrorist campaign on the world stage along with increased instability in the Strait of Hormuz will send a strong signal to the West to lay off its nuclear weapons program, giving the regime enough time to obtain the bomb and then announce nuclear capability, which they think will checkmate the world.

Mr. Kahlili is a former member of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. He now resides in the United States and writes under the pseudonym, Reza Kahlili. Currently he serves as a senior fellow with EMPact America and teaches at the U.S. Department of Defense’;s Joint Counterintelligence Training Academy. For further background regarding Mr. Kahlili see our in-depth interview here Iranian Defector Reza Kahlili – Iran Runs “Large Network” Through U.S. Mosques And Islamic Organizations. He is the author of A Time to Betray, a book about his double life as a CIA agent in Iran’;s Revolutionary Guards.

The Commentator – ‘Containment’ will not protect the world from the dangers of a nuclear Iran.

‘Containing’ Iran cannot work. In fact, for the sake of accuracy, it is tempting to strike the word ‘containment,’ and call this the Armageddon option. How will the West contain that?

Fail to act now and the West will be haunted by a nuclear Iran

With Iran ever closer to acquiring nuclear weapons, and Western democracies seeking to prevent a fait accompli, a side-debate has opened on whether “prevention” should even be tried.  Serious thinkers – including former President Jimmy Carter and Atlantic Monthly correspondent Robert Kaplan – urge that the West need not prevent a nuclear Iran, but instead can safely “contain” it.

Given the costs and risks of prevention, the appeal of containment is understandable.  After all, containment of a nuclear armed Soviet Union – the West’s grand strategy for several decades – was, in the end, a major success, despite its enormous costs.

More immediately, opting for containment would allow the West to stand down from its tortuous efforts to impose and enforce effective sanctions.  And the burdens of contemplating a military attack on Iran’s nuclear production facilities would, at last, be lifted.

However, a closer look at the requirements, costs, and limits of a successful containment strategy suggests that, in fact, the West should be extremely reluctant to accept a nuclear-armed Iran.

Any such assessment should first define the practices of the Iranian regime that need to be contained.  Simply stated, the Iranian regime has consistently declared, in both words and deeds, that it is an implacable enemy of Western, Judeo-Christian civilization.

Pledged to the destruction of both America and Israel, which it labels “the great Satan” and “the little Satan,” the Iranian government routinely opens legislative sessions and public events with mass cheers of “death to America” and “death to Israel.”

Accordingly, in the 1980s, Iranian terrorist proxies perpetrated, among other things: the 1983 suicide bombing of the U.S. Embassy and Marine barracks in Beirut, murdering more than 350; the 1985 hijacking of a TWA flight in Beirut, in which they tortured and killed a U.S. Navy diver on board; and kidnapping, and subsequently torturing, several Americans in Lebanon throughout the 1980s.

In the 1990s, Iran directed the 1992 suicide bombing of the Israeli embassy in Argentina, murdering 29; the 1994 bombing of the Argentine-Israel association offices, murdering 85; and the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers complex in Saudi Arabia, murdering 19 U.S. airmen and injuring hundreds more.

In the last decade, Iran has been a principal outside supplier of improvised explosive devices and of terrorist training and support for insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, killing and maiming U.S./coalition soldiers.  Its global allies are a gallery of rogue states, including North Korea, Cuba, and Venezuela.

It was Iran that created and still supplies Hezbollalh, one of the world’s most dangerous terrorist organizations.  Hezbollah’s 40,000 missiles in south Lebanon lend chilling weight to Iran’s insistence that “Israel must be wiped off the map.”

Iran’s sphere of influence now runs from the Mediterranean to the Hindu Kush.  It has turned Lebanon and Syria into virtual client states, is fighting for control of Iraq through Moqtada al-Sadr’s Mehdi Army, and lately has threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz, the central artery of global oil transport.

The foregoing history shows that even a non-nuclear Iran has not been successfully contained by the West.  The task will only be immeasurably harder after Iran’s leaders have their hands on a nuclear trigger.

An emboldened Iran will almost certainly sponsor more aggression, while the West will face vastly greater risks in checking such a rise.  Guessing when extremist clerics in Teheran might launch a nuclear strike will dominate and constrain such decisions as, whether to force open a closed Strait of Hormuz, or whether to support Israel in a future war of survival against Hezbollah.

Several analysts, including Ted Bromund and James Phillips of the Heritage Foundation, have eloquently detailed the obstacles to successfully containing a nuclear Iran.  Such as:

1) The lack of reliable allies.  In the Cold War, the Soviet empire was ringed by a core group of vigorous democratic allies from across Europe, to Australia, Japan, and South Korea – all supporters of containment.  By contrast, in the Middle East and South Asia, there would be just one such ally: Israel.

2)  Human rights trade-offs.  Even more so than during the Cold War, the frontlines of a containment coalition in the Middle East and South Asia will have to draw upon unsavoury and dictatorial regimes; the price of their support will include overlooking their human rights abuses.

3)  Constrained budgets.  Maintaining a critical mass of allies and a sufficiently serious, deployable military deterrent are enormously costly, and may need to continue for decades as part of an effective containment policy.  Yet the West is in much worse fiscal shape than during the Cold War.

But among the several asymmetries between the challenges of the Cold War era and those of present-day Iran, the following three are especially problematic.

First, the Manichean, religious zealots who govern Iran may be less deterred by threats of force than the former Soviet leadership.  Ten years ago, former Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani declared that “application of an atomic bomb would not leave anything in Israel but . . . would just produce damages in the Muslim world.”

Recall that this same regime, in its war with Iraq, organized tens of thousands of teenage and pre-teen boys, some as young as nine, into the infamous “Basij” martyrdom units, and sent them into Iraqi minefields to act as human mine-sweepers.  Nine of every ten such boys were reported to have died.

Second, unlike the Soviet empire, several of the threats emanating from Iran are carried out by terrorist proxy groups (which gives Iran some measure of deniability).  Hezbollah’s cadre of suicide bombers are effectively immune to deterrence, and their willingness to risk “everything” greatly exceeds the risk tolerance of the former Soviet gerontocracy.

In sum, how will the West contain a Hezbollah suicide bomber with a nuclear warhead – or a radioactive ‘dirty bomb’ – hidden under a tarp on a flatbed truck?

Last and perhaps most important, unlike the Cold War era, the risk of a proliferation cascade is much greater.  It is generally accepted that, if Iran goes nuclear, the other Middle East regimes will rush to try to follow suit.  If we cannot stop Iran, how will we stop its neighbours?

Here lies the true end-game of the containment option:  not just a nuclear Iran, but a cluster of radical Islamist regimes bristling with nuclear weapons.  For the sake of accuracy, it is tempting to strike the word ‘containment,’ and call this the Armageddon option.

How will the West contain that?

Henry Kopel is a counter-terrorism prosecutor with the US Department of Justice in Connecticut. The views here are his own, and do not reflect the views of the Justice Department

Israel’s Bombing Threat Helped Spur Iran Sanctions, How Will it Affect Iran Diplomacy? | Global Spin | TIME.com.

International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors are due to start three days of talks in Tehran, Sunday, “to resolve all outstanding substantive issues” over Iran’s nuclear work. They plan to hear Tehran’s response to questions raised in the most recent IAEA report on Iran’s nuclear work, which cited evidence of research activity — particularly before 2003 — that may have been focused on warhead design. But nobody’s expecting “all outstanding substantive issues” of the eight-year standoff to be resolved in three days: The aim of the IAEA delegation is to establish Tehran’s willingness to cooperate and provide access to all personnel and sites requested, and to develop a “roadmap” for resolving concerns over aspects of Iran’s program cited in the report. But the nuclear standoff is no mere misunderstanding.

That’s why the U.S. and its Western allies have approved the toughest round of sanctions to date, intended to choke the energy exports that are Iran’s economic lifeline. The purpose of the new measures, say U.S. officials, is to inflict sufficient economic pain on Iran to force its leaders to seek a diplomatic solution. New talks between Iran and the Western powers, China and Russia may be held in the coming weeks, possibly in Turkey. That’s not soon enough, apparently: “To avoid any military solution, which could have irreparable consequences, we have decided to go further down the path of sanctions,” explained French foreign minister Alain Juppé earlier this week, echoing a view commonly expressed by Western decision-makers that unless Iran is seen to be squeezed by “crippling” sanctions that impose a prohibitive cost on its nuclear activities, Israel will launch a unilateral military attack that could trigger a potentially catastrophic war. Israeli leaders, meanwhile, typically tap their watches and warn that time is running out.

Juppe’s comments underscore the effectiveness of Israel’s bad-cop threat in spurring Western leaders to escalate pressure on Iran. And that’s certainly how many Israelis see it: Yedioth Ahronot columnist Sever Plocker, for example, on Wednesday congratulated Israel’s leaders for their success in brandishing the threat of a unilateral military strike to scare reluctant governments into dramatically tightening sanctions. “It certainly looks as though the Israeli campaign launched during the previous fall, where rumors of an imminent Israeli strike on Iran were disseminated, secured its objectives,” wrote Plocker. “Western statesmen clung to this campaign and utilized it in order to impose on Iran the devastating sanctions that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu demanded two years ago already.”

But the Israeli leadership isn’t resting on its laurels. Scarcely had the ink dried on the EU oil embargo when Israel’s Defense Minister Ehud Barak was demanding more sanctions, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was insisting that “very strong and quick pressure on Iran is necessary,” adding that “Sanctions will have to be evaluated on the basis of results. As of today, Iran is continuing to produce nuclear weapons without hindrance.”

That’s not strictly accurate, of course: Israel’s own intelligence assessment concurs with that of the U.S. that Iran is not currently building nuclear weapons and that it hasn’t yet taken a decision to do so — for now, it is assembling a nuclear infrastructure whose dual-use capability would allow Tehran to build nuclear weapons on a relatively quick time frame once it chooses to do so. Israel’s campaign is focused on preventing Iran getting to the point where nuclear weapons are within reach. A new round of frenzied speculation began this week when the New York Times released online Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman’s lengthy story from Sunday’s magazine, which concludes, based on interviews with top decision-makers, that Israel plans to bomb Iran before the end of this year. Not that we haven’t heard it all before: The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg wrote a similar piece 18 months ago predicting an Israeli attack in the Spring of 2011 — a piece that was, as Goldberg noted in a blog post questioning Bergman’s timeline, based on interviews with many of the same decision makers.

Reiterating the threat of military action is a well-established Israeli tactic: Netanyahu argues publicly that Iran will only concede if it faces a real and imminent danger of military action. “This threat is crucial for scaring the Iranians and for goading on the Americans and the Europeans [into putting more pressure on Tehran],” wrote Haaretz columnist Ari Shavit last summer, castigating Israel’s recently retired Mossad chief Meir Dagan for pooh-poohing the idea of an Israeli strike on Iran. “It is also crucial for spurring on the Chinese and the Russians. Israel must not behave like an insane country. Rather, it must create the fear that if it is pushed into a corner it will behave insanely.”

As my colleague Karl Vick reports, however, question-marks persist over whether Israel in fact possesses the military means to inflict significant damage to Iran’s nuclear facilities. “As formidable as the Israeli Air Force is, it simply lacks the capacity to mount the kind of sustained, weeks-long aerial bombardment required to knock down Iran’s nuclear program, with the requisite pauses for damage assessments followed by fresh waves of bombing,” he writes. “Without forward platforms like air craft carriers, Israel’s air armada must rely on mid-air refueling to reach targets more than 1,000 miles away, and anyone who reads Israel’s order of battle sees it simply doesn’t have but a half dozen or so.”

Still, there’s little doubt that Israel has the capacity to mount a raid, which, while it might leave much of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure intact, could nonetheless provoke Iranian retaliation that escalates into a confrontation that raises pressure for U.S. intervention. That’s  no place the Obama Administration plans to be,  anytime soon, and its efforts are focused on combining  the latest round of sanctions with new outreach efforts aimed at giving Iran a diplomatic off-ramp from the standoff. The focus of the European Union-led talks that may be held in Turkey is on agreement on limited confidence-building steps that could change the dynamic of the conflict.

A number of possible scenarios remain under consideration, including fuel swaps to test the two sides’ willingness to find a compromise. But Israel is skeptical of compromising with Iran, which it accuses of simply playing for time while not changing its basic stance. Bergman writes in his New York Times piece that “the Israelis suspect that the Obama administration has abandoned any aggressive strategy that would ensure the prevention of a nuclear Iran and is merely playing a game of words to appease them. The Israelis find evidence of this in the shift in language used by the administration, from ‘threshold prevention’ — meaning American resolve to stop Iran from having a nuclear-energy program that could allow for the ability to create weapons — to ‘weapons prevention,’ which means the conditions can exist, but there is an American commitment to stop Iran from assembling an actual bomb.”

That’s a critical distinction, of course, because what Iran is currently pursuing is “breakout capacity”: a threshold where it has put the means to build weapons relatively quickly within reach, should it decide to break out of the Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT), expel the IAEA inspectors who continue to monitor all of its enrichment activity and certify its non-military nature, and dash to build a bomb.  Iran currently enriches uranium to civilian levels permissible under the NPT, but the same technology would allow it to produce the high-enriched uranium needed for atomic bombs (which also require considerable precision engineering capacity and the ability to miniaturize a nuclear explosive to the dimensions that can be carried atop a missile). Threshold capacity is hardly unique: Japan, Brazil, Argentina and others are believed to have the means to quickly build nuclear weapons if they chose to.

While Iran’s move towards breakout capacity is viewed as a strategic challenge by its adversaries, Tehran’s  actual transgressions of the NPT fall within the transparency requirements, having done much of its nuclear work in secret before 2003 — and possibly by doing weapons research in the course of that work. It is those concerns that led to the U.N. Security Council order to suspend enrichment, but once they’re resolved, Iran has the right under the NPT to enrich uranium. The Iranian domestic consensus insists that Iran be granted the same rights as any other NPT  signatory, and there’s a growing view among Western officials, which is strongly opposed by France and Israel , that a viable diplomatic solution would see Iran maintaining its enrichment capacity, albeit under tougher inspection and other safeguards against weaponization.

The New York Times reported Tuesday  that “several American and European officials say privately that the most attainable outcome for the West could be for Iran to maintain the knowledge and technology necessary to build a nuclear weapon while stopping short of doing so.” To get there, these officials told the Times, Iran would have to establish trust by demonstrating full transparency and expanding the inspection regime. “Iran,” the report continued, “would have to become a country like Japan, which has the capability to become an atomic power virtually overnight, if need be, but has rejected taking the final steps to possessing nuclear weapons… (But) settling for an Iranian state that could quickly produce a nuclear weapon would be hard for the United States to embrace because of Israel’s deep antipathy toward Iran and Western and other nations’ fears of setting off a regional arms race.” Indeed. Israel’s stated bottom line has been that Iran can’t be allowed to enrich uranium on its own soil, and its position has considerable support on Capitol Hill even though the Obama Administration has moved towards stating that if Iran establishes certifiable international confidence in its intentions, it would have the right to enrich uranium under IAEA monitoring.

The key players remain so far from a comprehensive deal right now that questions over the shape of a final deal may seem abstract. But signaling intent could enable, or prevent, progress. The Israelis are openly skeptical of confidence-building measures as have emerged up to now, precisely because they don’t stop Iran’s continued enrichment activity. A diplomatic process — and even sanctions pressure — will take a long time to produce results. The Israelis repeatedly insist that time works to Iran’s advantage.  It remains to be seen, however, what effect the threat of unilateral military action that has helped convince the Europeans to impose an oil embargo will have on shaping the West’s efforts to produce its preferred outcome of a  diplomatic solution.

The Associated Press: APNewsBreak: UN weapons experts going to Tehran.

VIENNA (AP) — The U.N. nuclear agency is including two senior weapons experts on its next mission to Tehran in an unusually clear statement on the team’s prime focus — wresting information from Iranian officials about suspicions the country has secretly worked on atomic arms.

Iran has flatly refused to discuss such allegations for more than three years, saying they were based on phony intelligence from the U.S. and others seeking to harm the Islamic Republic.

But diplomats on Friday told The Associated Press that the weapons experts were part of the U.N team and that Iran had accepted their inclusion after some initial resistance. That suggested that the Islamic Republic was being more conciliatory on the issue of secret weapons work than usual as the International Atomic Energy Agency mission prepares to fly from Vienna to Tehran Saturday.

All six diplomats interviewed said Tehran had not committed to discussing the issue. But three of them added that Iranian officials indicated openness to talking about all topics during the IAEA mission that ends early next week — a departure from standard reluctance by Tehran to exclude give-and-take on the arms allegations.

None of the diplomats expressed confidence of a breakthrough. But the Iranian stance at least allows the mission to have some home of making a dent into Iran’s wall of silence about its alleged clandestine nuclear weapons work.

Any progress on the issue would be significant.

Tehran has blocked IAEA attempts for more than three years to follow up on U.S. and other intelligence alleging covert Iranian work on nuclear arms, dismissing the charges as baseless and insisting all its nuclear activities were peaceful and under IAEA purview.

Faced with Iranian stonewalling, the IAEA summarized its body of information in November, in a 13-page document drawing on 1,000 pages of intelligence. It stated then for the first time that some of the alleged experiments can have no other purpose than developing nuclear weapons.

Iran continues to deny the charges and no change in its position is expected during the Tehran talks with IAEA officials. But even a decision to enter a discussion over the allegations would be a major departure from outright refusal to talk about them.

The diplomats said that the IAEA team was looking for permission to talk to key Iranian scientists suspected of weapons work, inspect documents relating to such suspected work and get commitments for future visits to sites linked to such allegations.

As most often the case, the IAEA team is headed by Herman Nackaerts, the chief agency official in charge of the Iran file — but the makeup of the rest of the team reflects the importance attached by the agency to the trip.

Two diplomats said Friday that nuclear weapons experts Jack Baute of France and Neville Whiting of Britain would accompany Nackaerts.

While both fulfill IAEA functions not directly related to nuclear arms research, they were connected to their nation’s weapons programs before they came to the agency.

One of the diplomats — who is familiar with the thinking that went into setting up the mission — said their inclusion was meant to send a clear signal to the Iranians. He, like the five other diplomats, asked for anonymity in exchange for discussing privileged information,

Also on the team is Rafael Grossi, IAEA chief Yukiya Amano’s right hand — another indication of the importance the agency has attached to the trip.

The three-day visit comes as anxiety grows daily about Iran’s nuclear capacities — and what it plans to do with them.

Since the discovery in 2002 that Iran was secretly working on uranium enrichment, the nation has expanded that operation to the point where it has thousands of centrifuges churning out enriched material — the potential source of both nuclear fuel and fissile warhead material.

Iran says it is enriching only to generate energy. But it has also started producing uranium at a higher level than its main stockpile — a move that would jump start the creation of highly enriched, weapons grade uranium, should it chose to go that route. And it is moving its higher-enriched operation into an underground bunker that it says is safe from attack.

Israel in particular is concerned by Iran’s expanding enrichment capacities — and increasing evidence of secret nuclear weapons work.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Friday the world must quickly stop Iran from reaching the point where even a “surgical” military strike could not block it from obtaining nuclear weapons.

Amid fears that Israel is nearing a decision to attack Iran’s nuclear program, Barak said tougher international sanctions are needed against Tehran’s oil and banks so that “we all will know early enough whether the Iranians are ready to give up their nuclear weapons program.”

The United Nations has imposed four rounds of sanctions against Iran, but veto-wielding Russia and China say they see no need for additional punitive measures. That has left the U.S. and the European Union to try to pressure other countries to follow their lead and impose even tougher sanctions.

“We are determined to prevent Iran from turning nuclear,” Barak told reporters during the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum.

“It seems to us to be urgent, because the Iranians are deliberately drifting into what we call an immunity zone where practically no surgical operation could block them,” he said, alluding to increased Iranian efforts to move their enrichment work deep underground.

Separately at Davos, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon urged a resumption of dialogue between Western powers and Iran on the nuclear issue. He said Friday that Tehran must comply with Security Council resolutions and prove conclusively that its nuclear program is not directed at making arms.

Israel Warns: Iran Moving Closer To Stage Where It Will Be Too Late To Destroy Nuclear Facilities » Matzav.com – The Online Voice of Torah Jewry.

Reviving Western concerns that his government is still contemplating unilateral military action against Iran, Ehud Barak gave one of the clearest signs yet that Israel’s support for new US and EU sanctions remains strictly limited.

“We are determined to prevent Iran from turning nuclear,” he told the World Economic Forum in Davos. “And even the American president and opinion leaders have said that no option should be removed from the table.

“It seems to us to be urgent, because the Iranians are deliberately drifting into what we call an immunity zone where practically no surgical operation could block them.”

Although Israeli intelligence and military officials have privately spoken of Iran’s nuclear programme entering a “framework of immunity”, it is the first time that a senior figure in Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has done so in public.

Israel’s fears that it might soon be too late to launch military action were bolstered earlier this month when Iran announced that it had begun to enrich uranium at its Fordow plant, which is buried so deep within a mountain it may be impossible for Israeli warplanes or missiles to destroy.

Mr Barak’s ministry believes that once the bulk of uranium enrichment is carried out at Fordow, Iran will be in the immunity zone. Israel also reckons that Iran could be in a position to build a bomb within months, although US officials have been quoted as saying that Tehran will not be able to fit a nuclear warhead onto a missile for some years.

Mr Barak’s warning came as inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN’s nuclear watchdog, prepare to resume inspections of Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Yukiya Amano, the organisation’s head, urged Iran to show full co-operation after an IAEA report published last November concluded that Iran appeared to be pursuing the development of a nuclear weapon. Tehran has long insisted that its nuclear programme is peaceful in intent.

Iran has sent conflicting signals over its nuclear intentions. It has agreed to allow inspections and has spoken vaguely of its willingness to resume negotiations on the future of its nuclear programme.

But it has also threatened to seal off the world’s most important oil waterway by blockading the Strait of Hormuz in the Persian Gulf.

In a demonstration of bravado, the Iranian parliament is to meet on Sunday to impose an immediate halt to all oil exports to the European Union.

The EU agreed this week to an embargo on importing oil from Iran, but said it would phase in the sanctions over six months.

If Iran carried out its threat it would pose serious challenges to Greece, Spain and Italy, the EU’s three most vulnerable economies, which account for more than 80 per cent of Iranian oil imports to Europe.

But such a measure would also harm Iran, which exports 18 per cent of its oil to the EU, as there is no guarantee that it would find alternative markets unless it was prepared to sell crude at a heavy discount.

Zionist Organization of America – Press Releases – Obama Rightly Threatens Cut in U.S. Aid to Egypt Over Detention of Americans – But Not Over the Brotherhood’s Declaration to End Israel Peace Treaty Under Which Egypt Receives Aid.

The Obama Administration has appropriately reacted to the detention in Egypt of several American nationals by threatening to cut U.S. aid to Cairo – something it has not done till now, despite explicit Muslim Brotherhood statements about abrogating the Israeli/Egyptian peace treaty, under which Cairo has been the recipient of over $40 billion in U.S. aid over the past thirty years. The Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist organization established in 1928 and precursor of Al-Qaeda and other jihadist groups, recently won a majority of seats in the Egyptian parliament.

A top U.S. official’s son who is working for a pro-democracy group in Egypt has been barred from leaving the country, along with at least five other Americans, escalating a crackdown on such groups by Egypt’s military government. Sam LaHood, the son of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and the director of the Egyptian program of the International Republican Institute (IRI), a Washington-based civil society organization, was turned away from leaving Egypt at Cairo airport earlier this week. The IRI is one of three U.S.-based nonprofit groups in Cairo that were raided and shut down on Dec. 29 by Egyptian authorities, who accused the groups of using foreign funds to support unrest in Egypt. Some of the Americans might even face trials.

As many as 40 foreigners are now on a travel ban list as a result of the Egyptian investigation. Scott Mastic, the IRI’s regional director for the Middle East and North Africa, said, “It’s absolutely an escalation …. To have a strategic U.S. ally issue bans against American citizens is deeply troubling.” In private, State Department officials have also told Egypt that its actions are jeopardizing U.S. aid to Egypt’s military. U.S. military aid to Egypt totals more than $1.3 billion a year. Despite the State Department’s intervention, the Egyptian government has given no sign of backing off its investigation of the American groups (Leila Fadel, ‘Son of U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood barred from leaving Egypt,’ Washington Post, January 26, 2012).

In recent days, the deputy leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Rashad al-Bayoumi said that the Muslim Brotherhood “did not sign the peace accords [with Israel] … We will take the proper legal steps in dealing with the peace deal … To me, it isn’t binding at all. The people will express their opinion on the matter … On no condition will we recognize Israel. It is an enemy entity … We won’t cooperate with Israel in any situation” (Roi Kais, ‘Muslim Brotherhood: Israel peace deal isn’t binding,’ Yediot Ahronot, January 1, 2012). Last year, too, Bayoumi emphasized the objective of abrogating the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty. Also last year, the Muslim Brotherhood leader, Muhammad Badi’, spoke enthusiastically of jihad and called for a state based on Islamic law. He also spoke optimistically about the U.S. heading for a collapse.

ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said, “Egypt is a recipient of massive U.S. aid for one reason only – because it concluded a peace agreement with Israel. Had it not done so, it would never have received over $40 billion of aid from the U.S. taxpayer. Yet, despite an explicit Muslim Brotherhood platform demanding the abrogation of the U.S.-brokered peace treaty and explicit statements by Brotherhood leaders about their intention to end the treaty, President Obama has not threatened to cut off aid to Egypt. To the contrary, he has continued to closely engage the Brotherhood. Only now, when U.S. nationals are being detained, does the State Department raise the issue of continued aid. 

“One must ask why President Obama has been silent until now on cutting U.S. aid to Egypt. It is quite astonishing that, until now, the words, deeds and platform of the Muslim Brotherhood and its spokesmen on the peace with Israel – the very basis of U.S. aid to Egypt – did not induce President Obama to threaten cutting off U.S. aid to Egypt.

“We strongly urge Obama to make it publicly clear that he will cut off U.S. aid if the Egyptian government abrogates the Israeli/Egyptian peace treaty.”

Iranian Religious Leader: We’re Already Nuclear – Middle East – News – Israel National News.

Iranian flag

Israel news photo: Wikimedia Commons / public domain

Senior Iranian religious leader Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami said on Friday that Iran is already a nuclear state and that Americans have not realized that.

“The United States says it will not allow Iran to be nuclear, but it is so blind that it hasn’t noticed that Iran has already become a nuclear state,” Khatami was quoted by Channel 10 News as having said. He added that the U.S. has become isolated in the region, after its four “slaves” were removed from power. He was referring to former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, former Libyan strongman Muammar Qaddafi, former Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali and former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

Khatami also addressed the EU’s embargo on Iranian oil imports, which was announced this week, and said that the Europeans decided to wait with the implementation of the sanctions until July because their economic situation is no better than Iran’s.

“Why did the Europeans decide to wait half a year before implementing the sanctions? The answer is simple – the Europeans have their own serious trouble – they were hit by the financial crisis,” he said.

Khatami added the embargo will hurt Europe more than it will hurt Iran, because Saudi Arabia will not be able to provide the required amount of oil to Europe, while the sanctions will only hurt 18 percent of Iran’s oil exports.

Pentagon wants commando “mothership” – The Washington Post.

AP – The United States amphibious assault ship USS Ponce sails through the Suez Canal in March 2011. If retrofitted as “the mothership,” the vessel could accommodate smaller high-speed boats and helicopters commonly used by Navy SEALs

he Pentagon is rushing to send a large floating base for commando teams to the Middle East as tensions rise with Iran, al-Qaeda in Yemen and Somali pirates, among other threats.

In response to requests from U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East, the Navy is converting an aging warship it had planned to decommission into a makeshift staging base for the commandos. Unofficially dubbed a “mothership,” the floating base could accommodate smaller high-speed boats and helicopters commonly used by Navy SEALs, procurement documents show.

Special Operations forces are a key part of the Obama administration’s strategy to make the military leaner and more agile as the Pentagon confronts at least $487 billion in spending cuts over the next decade.

Lt. Cmdr. Mike Kafka, a spokesman for the Navy’s Fleet Forces Command, declined to elaborate on the floating base’s purpose or to say where, exactly, it will be deployed in the Middle East. Other Navy officials acknowledged that they were moving with unusual haste to complete the conversion and send the mothership to the region by early summer.

Navy documents indicate that it could be headed to the Persian Gulf, where Iran has threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial shipping route for much of the world’s oil supply. A market survey proposal from the Military Sealift Command, dated Dec. 22 and posted online, states that the floating base needed to be delivered to the Persian Gulf.

Other contract documents do not specify a location but say the mothership would be used to “support mine countermeasure” missions. Defense officials have said that if Iran did attempt to close the Strait of Hormuz, it would rely on mines to obstruct the waterway.

With a large naval base in Bahrain, and one or two aircraft carrier groups usually assigned to the region, the Navy has a substantial presence in the Persian Gulf and surrounding waters. Adding the mothership would do relatively little to bolster U.S. maritime power overall, but it could play an instrumental role in secretive commando missions offshore.

The deployment of the floating base could also mark a return to maritime missions for SEAL teams, which for the past decade have spent most of their time on land in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Other details of the project became public Tuesday when the Military Sealift Command posted a bid request to retrofit the USS Ponce, an amphibious transport docking ship, on a rush-order basis.

Until December, the Navy had planned to retire the Ponce and decommission it in March after 41 years of service. Among other missions, it was deployed to the Mediterranean Sea last year in support of NATO’s air war over Libya.

Instead, the ship will be modified into what the military terms an Afloat Forward Staging Base. Kafka said it would be used to support mine-clearance ships, smaller patrol ships and aircraft.

The documents posted by the Military Sealift Command in December, however, specify that the mothership will be rebuilt so that it can also serve as a docking station for several small high-speed boats and helicopters commonly used by Navy SEAL teams.

Among the vessels listed are Mark 5 Zodiacs, inflatable boats that can carry up to 15 passengers and can roll up into bags, and seven-meter-long Rigid Hull Inflatable Boats, which can carry an entire SEAL squad.

SEAL teams also deploy from regular warships, but most vessels in the Navy’s fleet must patrol or move around on a regular basis. A mothership can stay in one spot for weeks or months, effectively serving as a floating base for commandos as they monitor coastal areas or prepare for amphibious operations.

The U.S. Special Operations Command has sought a transportable floating base for several years, saying that a mothership would expand the range of commando squads operating from small speedboats, particularly in remote coastal areas.

Defense officials said the Ponce will serve as a stopgap measure until the Navy can build a new Afloat Forward Staging Base from scratch. In budget documents released Thursday, the Pentagon said it would fund that project starting next year.

The floating base also could be suited to the coast of Somalia, a failed state that is home to an al-Qaeda affiliate and gangs of pirates. A mothership there would give SEALs or other commandos more flexibility in missions such as Wednesday’s rescue of a pair of American and Danish hostages who had been held for months by Somali pirates.

The term “mothership” is also commonly used to describe a vessel used by Somali pirates. After hijacking a large container or cargo vessel, pirate crews often turn it into a floating base to extend the range of their skiffs or speedboats far into the Indian Ocean, Gulf of Aden and Persian Gulf.

U.S. military officials declined to say what prompted them to give the Ponce a sudden new lease on life. But contract and bidding documents underscore the urgency of the project.

One no-bid contract for engineering work states that the military was waiving normal procurement rules because any delay presented a “national security risk.” Other contract bids are due Feb. 3. The Navy wants the conversion work to begin 10 days later on the Ponce, which is docked in Virginia Beach.