Apple – Computer Reuse and Recycling – Apple Store (U.S.).
If you want to upgrade, you can sell your 4s directly back to Apple. Mine (32 gig) would fetch me $330.
Archive for August 29, 2012
Apple – Computer Reuse and Recycling – Apple Store (U.S.)
August 29, 2012Israel warns Iran to ‘choose between nukes and survival’
August 29, 2012Israel Hayom | Israel warns Iran to ‘choose between nukes and survival’.
( Can’t say we didn’t warn ’em… – JW )
Vice PM Moshe Ya’alon speaks at Bulgaria memorial ceremony for victims of last month’s terrorist attack in Burgas and accuses Iran of funding, arming, and training terrorists • Ya’alon calls on the EU to add Hezbollah to list of terrorist organizations.
Shlomo Cesana, Eli Leon, Meital Yasur Beit-Or
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Speaking in Bulgaria on Tuesday, Vice Prime Minister Moshe Ya’alon says, “The dangerous Iranian leaders are serious in their intentions.”
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Photo credit: David Saranga
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The “dictatorial, evil, and bloodthirsty” Iranian regime must be immediately placed in a position in which it needs to choose between developing nuclear weapons and its own survival, Vice Prime Minister Moshe Ya’alon said on Tuesday at a memorial ceremony in Bulgaria for the victims of last month’s terrorist attack in Burgas.
“Harsher sanctions must be imposed on Iran and there shouldn’t be an illusion that we are facing a conventional regime,” Ya’alon said at the main synagogue in the Bulgarian capital of Sofia. “No option should be taken off the table. As soon as possible, before it is too late, the violent and dictatorial Iranian regime must be faced with a dilemma. A bomb or survival.”
“The dangerous Iranian leaders are serious in their intentions,” he said. “This is why they are developing a military nuclear program, which is at a very advanced stage, and they could use this deadly weaponry, also through terror attacks in various locations around the globe,” he said.
Ya’alon expanded on those statements in an interview on Army Radio on Wednesday morning.
“The Iranian regime can only decide to give up its military nuclear project if there is a threat to its survival,” Ya’alon said. “This already happened in 2003 when there was a threat of an American attack and Tehran stopped the program. This can still be repeated. It is possible to bring about a situation in which there is a threat to the regime’s survival via economic sanctions, diplomatic isolation, a credible threat of military action, in addition to moral support for the internal opposition.”
Ya’alon was also asked whether there is a majority in the Forum of Nine in favor of striking Iran’s nuclear sites.
“The situation now is not what it was a month or a year ago or what it will be in the future,” he said. “When the question becomes necessary, it will become clear whether there is a majority or not.”
Ya’alon added that he hoped that “the righteous work would be done by others, but we have to prepare as if no one else will do it for us.”
On Tuesday in Sofia, Ya’alon that Western nations must unite to fight radical Islamist terror and he accused Iran of funding, arming, and training terrorists.
“This terror is often carried out by Iran’s proxy — the murderous Hezbollah organization,” Ya’alon said. “Its goal is to destroy Western culture, spread the Islamic Revolution, and erase Israel from the map,” Ya’alon, who is also Minister for Strategic Affairs, said.
Five Israeli tourists and a Bulgarian bus driver were killed on July 18 when a suicide bomber detonated an explosive device in the vicinity of a tour bus in a Burgas Airport parking lot. Israel has said that Iran and Hezbollah were responsible for the attack.
“We, the state of Israel and the republic of Bulgaria, will not rest until we catch all the wrongdoers who were involved in this terrible attack,” Ya’alon said on Tuesday. “We will pursue them until the end and fight them with all means until we bring them to justice. We will do this without hesitation and without blinking.”
Ya’alon met on Tuesday with Bulgarian Defense Minister Anyu Angelov and called on the European Union to add Hezbollah to its list of terrorist organizations.
The attendees at Tuesday’s ceremony in Sofia included family members of the Israelis killed in the attack.
Yaakov Kolangi, whose son Itzik was killed in the attack, thanked Bulgaria on behalf of the victims’ families.
“Saying the mourner’s prayer on Bulgarian soil definitely gave us closure,” he said.
Iran insists on right to enrich uranium
Iran’s envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency told reporters on Tuesday that Iran would continue to enrich uranium.
“Our enrichment activities will never stop,” Asghar Soltanieh said. “We have the right to continue to carry out these activities and we will continue to do so under IAEA supervision. We will not give up our inalienable right to enrichment.”
Also on Tuesday, Iran’s Foreign Ministry said diplomats attending the Non-Aligned Movement conference in Tehran would not be permitted to visit Parchin and other nuclear sites in the country, refuting a report from the previous day that they would be allowed to do so.
Netanyahu faces Begin’s dilemma
August 29, 2012Israel Hayom | Netanyahu faces Begin’s dilemma.
( AMEN ! – JW )
Eli Hazan
Electoral politics and ego. These comprise the essence of arguments made by those critical of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s intention to attack Iran. The main underlying message of these arguments is that Netanyahu has failed in his job and found an easy target to which to divert attention.
Electoral politics and ego. These were also the essence of criticism raised against former Prime Minister Menachem Begin after he decided to attack Iraq in 1981. Browse through newspaper clippings and film segments from that time and one will prominently see then-opposition leader Shimon Peres accusing Begin of attacking Iraq “just for elections.”
The main problem of the arguments made by the opponents of Begin and Netanyahu is their lack of good faith, as well as basic belief in the necessity of the actions. Moreover, the arguments are hollow. Why? Because they ignore that a failed attack could lead to electoral failure.
If Netanyahu was cynical and utilitarian, he would avoid dealing with the Iran problem and push it off forever. Similarly, the claim that political considerations motivated Begin to destroy the Iraqi reactor appeared absurd even at the time, which was shortly after Jimmy Carter lost his 1980 re-election bid for the U.S. presidency. A factor in Carter’s loss was the U.S. military’s failed rescue attempt of the 52 American hostages held in Tehran. Begin saw this example but was not deterred from striking the Iraqi reactor, even though he was explicitly told that there was a chance the operation would fail and that at least two Israeli pilots would not return home.
The considerations for taking action were therefore similar, if not the same, then as they are now. Even the political circumstances are similar. Also in 1981, there was a clash with the American government, the heads of the Israeli defense establishment opposed taking action and the Left claimed that the prime minister was motivated by electoral considerations.
The opposition of the Left should again be examined. Why? Because when a leftist government orders military action, the muses are silent. And the question should be asked: Why is it not political when a leftist government leads an attack? The risks are the same risks, but the media silence, and sometimes support, speaks volumes. Also, the leaders of the nationalist camp don’t create demoralization during leftist-led military operations.
This is how it was, for example, in 1976 when Yitzhak Rabin and Peres ordered the Entebbe operation, which had many risks. Begin, then the opposition leader, supported them. “On this matter, we are together, even if God forbid the operation fails,” Begin said. This is also how it was in 1996, when Peres, then the prime minister, launched Operation Grapes of Wrath in Lebanon, just a month and a half before elections. No one claimed that he ordered this action due to electoral considerations. Netanyahu, then the opposition leader, supported Peres, even though he knew that this could hurt his chances of defeating Peres in the upcoming elections. Netanyahu also supported then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s decision in 2007 to bomb the Syrian nuclear reactor. Needless to say, in these cases, the voices of today’s critics were not heard from afar.
Peres and the opponents of the Iraq operation were wrong 31 years ago. They are also wrong today. Netanyahu must decide whether to implement the “Begin Doctrine,” in the spirit of Churchill, Thatcher and Reagan, or if he will be remembered as the unwitting successor of Chamberlain and the West’s policy of appeasement.
UN nuclear watchdog sets up ‘Iran Task Force’
August 29, 2012UN nuclear watchdog sets up ‘Ira… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.
08/29/2012 15:33
Photo: Herwig Prammer / Reuters
VIENNA – The United Nations’ nuclear watchdog has set up an Iran Task Force to handle inspections and other issues related to the Islamic state’s disputed atomic activities, an internal IAEA document showed on Wednesday.
The brief announcement by the International Atomic Energy Agency, addressed to agency staff, appeared to be an attempt to focus and streamline the IAEA’s handling of the sensitive Iran file by concentrating experts and other resources in one unit.
The Vienna-based UN agency, which regularly inspects Iran’s nuclear sites, has voiced growing concern over the last year of possible military dimensions to the country’s nuclear program. Tehran says its nuclear work is entirely peaceful.
A new report to be circulated to IAEA member states later this week is expected to say that Iran has installed 350 new centrifuges in its underground Fordow facility since May, AFP quoted Vienna-based diplomats as saying on Wednesday.
Iran is enriching uranium to a fissile concentration of 20 percent — easily upgraded to the 90 percent needed for bombs — at Fordow, buried deep inside a mountain near the holy Shi’ite city of Qom to protect it from foreign attack.
The Vienna diplomats also expect the report to chastise Iran over sanitizing its military base at Parchin.
The ongoing sanitization efforts, meant to eliminate evidence of possible nuclear work at the site, may make inspections “pointless,” according to the diplomats.
Iran indicated on Monday it might allow diplomats visiting Tehran for this week’s Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit to inspect the Parchin military base, which UN nuclear experts say may have been used for nuclear-related explosives tests.
When asked about the possibility, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammad Mehdi Akhoundzadeh said: “Such a visit is not customary in such meetings…. However at the discretion of authorities, Iran would be ready for such a visit,” the Iranian government-linked news agency Young Journalists Club reported.
Any visit to Parchin by NAM representatives would do little to calm Western concerns or those of the IAEA whose talks with the Iranians ended on Friday without agreement.
The UN body suspects that Iran has conducted explosives tests in a steel chamber at Parchin relevant for the development of nuclear weapons, possibly a decade ago.
Last week diplomatic sources said Iran had covered the building believed to house the explosives chamber with a tent-like structure, fueling suspicions about a clean-up there.
Iran says Parchin, a vast, sprawling complex southeast of Tehran, is a conventional military facility and has dismissed allegations about it as “ridiculous”.
‘West urges Arabs not to target Israel at IAEA’
Western envoys are urging Arab states not to berate Israel over its assumed nuclear arsenal at the UN atomic agency’s annual conference, fearing this could imperil wider efforts for a nuclear weapons-free Middle East, diplomats say.
A senior diplomat said Arab countries would criticize Israel but were divided over whether to submit a resolution on the issue to next month’s annual General Conference of the United Nations’ 154-nation International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
Diplomats said Arab states had not yet decided whether to propose a non-binding but symbolically important draft text criticizing “Israeli Nuclear Capabilities” at this year’s week-long meeting that starts on September 17.
They expressed concern that an Arab move against Israel would discourage the Jewish state from attending the talks due to be held later this year on a nuclear arms-free Middle East.
An Egyptian plan for an international meeting to lay the groundwork for the possible creation of a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction was agreed at a review conference on the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 2010.
Reuters contributed to this report.
Russia is disengaging from Syria: Arms shipments stopped, warships exit Tartus
August 29, 2012Russia is disengaging from Syria: Arms shipments stopped, warships exit Tartus.
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report August 29, 2012, 4:44 PM (GMT+02:00)
Russian Navy in Tartus
Russian naval vessels have unexpectedly departed the Syrian Mediterranean port of Tartus and Russian arms shipments to Syria have been suddenly discontinued. debkafile’s military sources reveal that those and other steps indicate that the Russians are rapidly drawing away from the Syrian arena to avoid getting caught up in the escalating hostilities expected to arise from military intervention by the US, Europe and a number of Arab states. Russian intelligence appears to have decided that this outside intervention is imminent and Moscow looks anxious to keep its distance for now.
According to our military and Russian sources, these drastic steps must have been personally ordered by President Vladimir Putin. He is believed to have acted over the objections of some of his army and naval chiefs. This would explain the mixed statements issuing from Moscow in recent days about the disposition of Russian personnel at the naval base in Tartus and Russian military personnel in Syria.
Wednesday, Aug. 22, Commander of the Russian Navy Vice Adm. Viktor Chirkov said that if the fighting in Syria reached Tartus, Moscow may decide to evacuate the base. He stressed that this decision would have to be taken on the authority of President Putin. He was the first Russian official to suggest the possibility of an evacuation.
A week later, Aug. 28, Russian chief of staff Gen. Nikolai Makarov denied anything had changed in the working procedures of Russian military personnel in Syria or that there were any plans to evacuate the Russian naval base in Tartus:
“I think it’s too early to draw conclusions [from the situation in Syria],” said the general. “No one is running away from there.”
When a Russian journalist pressed the general and ventured to ask whether Moscow was terminating its military involvement in Syria, Marakov retorted, “Why are you so worried about Syria?”
But he didn’t answer the question.
debkafile‘s military sources disclose that the Russians have taken five significant military steps with regard to Syria in the last two weeks:
1. They cancelled a large-scale naval exercise dubbed “Caucasus 2012” scheduled to start mid-August in the eastern Mediterranean opposite the Syrian coast;
2. Warships from three fleets – the Northern, Baltic and Black Sea – concentrated opposite Syria have dispersed and returned to their bases;
3. Syrian President Bashar Assad was notified that Moscow was halting military aid to his army – except for intelligence updates and advice on logistics from Russian military advisers;
4. Moscow has not clearly announced a freeze on arms shipments, including replacement parts for Russian weapons, which make up the bulk of the Syrian army’s weaponry. Officials have only said, “There are no large Russian weapons shipments planned in the near future to Syria.”
5. The only Russian naval ship left in Tartus – a floating Russian Navy PM-138 shipyard – is also under orders to depart Tartus and return to the Black Sea in September.
A Russian source disclosed that all the remaining Russian personnel in Tartus have gathered on the floating shipyard, except for two officers on shore. This vessel and the remaining personnel are evidently packed up and ready to sail at any moment out of the Syrian port.
US ‘Responds’ to Iran with Second Warship in Gulf
August 29, 2012US ‘Responds’ to Iran with Second Warship in Gulf – Global Agenda – News – Israel National News.
“When the world calls, we have to respond,” says US defense chief Panetta as the second American aircraft carrier heads for the Gulf.
By Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
First Publish: 8/29/2012, 10:37 AM
Sideboys render honors to Panetta as he arrives aboard the USS John C. Stennis
Reuters
“When the world calls, we have to respond,” U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told sailors before a second American aircraft carrier headed for the Persian Gulf this week. The urgency of the United States to boost its defenses in the Gulf was indicated by its recalling the sailors early from leave to board the ship for the Middle East, four months ahead of schedule.
The USS John C. Stennis, which can carry 90 warplanes, is heading to the Gulf as Iran continues to challenge the world by advancing its unsupervised nuclear program.
The USS Stennis will join the U.S. Enterprise Strike Group and poses a strong deterrence to any Iranian plans to try to block the Gulf or to attack commercial oil tankers. The Strike Group includes a guided missile cruiser and four guided missile destroyers.
“It’s tough,” Panetta told sailors before they left port. “We’re asking an awful lot of each of you. And frankly, you are the best I have — and when the world calls, we have to respond.”
“Obviously Iran is one of those threats that we have to be able to focus on and make sure that we’re prepared to deal with any threats that could emerge out of Iran,” Panetta told reporters.
The Obama administration, which previously has said that solving the Palestinian Authority demand for independence is the key to peace for the entire Middle East region, has increasingly shown signs that reflect Israel’s warnings that the regime in Tehran is dead set to fulfill its stated intention to annihilate Israel, leaving the United States without a committed democratic ally in the region.
“The very existence of the Zionist regime is an insult to humankind and an affront to all world nations,” Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in a speech this month. “Confronting Zionists will also pave the way for saving the whole humankind from exploitation, depravity and misery.”
The beefed up American naval presence in the Gulf parallels concerns in Israel that sanctions may be hurting the Iranian economy but are not enough to stop Tehran’s drive for nuclear capability.
The American-backed sanctions include numerous loopholes that have enabled countries such as Japan and North Korea to continue importing oil from Iran, which depends on the black gold for most of its foreign exchange earnings.
The U.S. State Dept. continues to push for diplomacy to convince Ahmadinejad to pressure him to allow full inspection of its nuclear facilities by United Nations inspectors.
“We are focused on combining diplomacy and pressure, trying to get Iran to be serious at the negotiating table and we are in full consultations with the Israelis about the picture that we see, and we will continue to make those points clear,” spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said last week.
Diplomats: Iran installed 350 new underground centrifuges
August 29, 2012Diplomats: Iran installed 350 ne… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.
08/29/2012 10:38
Photo: REUTERS
A new report to be circulated to IAEA member states later this week is expected to say that Iran installed 350 new centrifuges in its underground Fordow facility since May, AFP quoted Vienna-based diplomats as saying on Wednesday.
Iran is enriching uranium to a fissile concentration of 20 percent — easily upgraded to the 90 percent needed for bombs — at Fordow, buried deep inside a mountain near the holy Shi’ite city of Qom to protect it from foreign attack.
The Vienna diplomats also expect the report to chastise Iran over sanitizing its military base at Parchin.
The ongoing sanitization efforts, meant to eliminate evidence of possible nuclear work at the site, may make inspections “pointless,” according to the diplomats.
Iran indicated on Monday it might allow diplomats visiting Tehran for this week’s Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit to inspect the Parchin military base, which UN nuclear experts say may have been used for nuclear-related explosives tests.
When asked about the possibility, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammad Mehdi Akhoundzadeh said: “Such a visit is not customary in such meetings…. However at the discretion of authorities, Iran would be ready for such a visit,” the Iranian government-linked news agency Young Journalists Club reported.
Any visit to Parchin by NAM representatives would do little to calm Western concerns or those of the IAEA whose talks with the Iranians ended on Friday without agreement.
The UN body suspects that Iran has conducted explosives tests in a steel chamber at Parchin relevant for the development of nuclear weapons, possibly a decade ago.
Last week diplomatic sources said Iran had covered the building believed to house the explosives chamber with a tent-like structure, fueling suspicions about a clean-up there.
Iran says Parchin, a vast, sprawling complex southeast of Tehran, is a conventional military facility and has dismissed allegations about it as “ridiculous”.
Reuters contributed to this report.
Why is Iran suddenly admitting to sending troops to Syria?
August 29, 2012Why is Iran suddenly admitting to sending troops to Syria?Israel News – Haaretz Israeli News source..
A Wall Street Journal report highlights the first apparent admission by an IRGC general that his men are indeed operating in Syria. Does this signal a new phase of the Syrian revolution?
Iranian Revolutionary Guard members celebrate after launching a missile during a maneuver, July 3, 2012. P
Reports of members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) operating alongside pro-Assad forces have been circulating for many months, practically since widespread fighting broke out in Syria almost a year and a half ago. The Wall Street Journal highlights the first apparent admission by an IRGC general that his men are indeed operating in Syria.
General Salar Abnoush is quoted by the Journal saying in a speech to volunteers (according to Iranian news agency Daneshjoo) – “Today we are involved in fighting every aspect of a war, a military one in Syria and a cultural one as well.”
Other sources cited by the Journal confirm that the decision was taken by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, urged by the commander of the IRGC’s elite Qods Force, General Qadim Solaimani and while the actual deployment has not been officially announced or confirmed, Iranian defense minister Ahmad Vahidi said that “Syria is managing this situation very well on its own, but if the government can’t resolve the crisis on its own, then based on their request we will fulfill our mutual defense-security pact.” And Syrian National Reconciliation Minister Ali Haidar, in Tehran this week, said that “the people of Syria will never forget the support of Iran during these difficult times.”
Does this signal a new phase of the Syrian revolution? Is Iran signaling now an upping of the ante as the first foreign country to go further than supporting one of the sides in Syria with arms and guidance, but also with its own soldier?
Here are four possible explanations and of course any combination of them is also possible.
1. General Abnoush’s speech was not for publication and the censors somehow let it pass onto a minor website. The ministers’ quoted by the Journal are only posturing and whether or not Iran has troops in Syria is still not something Tehran is interested in broadcasting.
2. Iran wants to bolster its position before the convening of the “Committee of Four” to search for a solution regarding Syria, proposed by the Egyptian government, which will include also Saudi Arabia and Turkey. The other three members of the committee are in favor of Bashar Assad’s departure and in various degrees support the Sunni revolutionaries – Iran knows it will be in a minority as Assad’s only supporter and wants more cards at hand to play in the talks. The recent round of violence in Lebanon can also be seen as an attempt by Iran to show its regional rivals that it holds the keys to stability in Arab lands.
3. While western, Arab and Israeli intelligence agencies are constantly updating their assessments of Assad’s longevity, again and again surprised that he is still holding out, the IRGC (and its subsidiary Hezbollah) is certainly the foreign organization with the best inside knowledge of the accurate situation of Syrian security forces. An overt intervention on Assad’s side may be an indication that they are aware of an imminent internal collapse and an emergency last-ditch measure to save their ally.
4. This is another of Iran’s attempts to divert attention from its nuclear program, especially on the eve of another IAEA report that is expected to detail new attempts at hiding weapons programs and hundreds more uranium enrichment centrifuges in operation.
I think that elements of all these four possibilities are true.
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