‘Ahmadinejad nixes Ankara trip over Patrio… JPost – Middle East.

Nasrallah warns: Rebels have no chance of … JPost – Middle East.

Photo: REUTERS/Ali Hashisho

BEIRUT – Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, leader of the Lebanese Shi’ite militant movement Hezbollah, said on Sunday the rebels in Syria could not emerge victorious from the 21-month-long uprising against President Bashar Assad.

Nasrallah, a staunch ally of Assad, said: “The situation in Syria is getting more complicated (but) anyone who thinks the armed opposition can settle the situation on the ground is very very very mistaken.” Syrian rebels accuse the Shi’ite Muslim group of sending fighters to neighboring Syria to help Assad overcome the largely Sunni Muslim revolt. Hezbollah denies these accusations.

The uprising started as peaceful demonstrations calling for greater freedoms but turned into an armed insurgency largely in response to heavy crackdown and attacks by Assad forces.

The revolt pits majority Sunnis against Assad’s Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi’ite Islam. With Sunni-Shi’ite sectarian tensions smouldering in the region, Syria’s conflict has drawn Sunni radicals from elsewhere into rebel ranks.

But Nasrallah, whose Shi’ite movement is despised by Sunni hardliners, said the West and some allied Arab countries had lured al-Qaida-affiliated fighters into Syria to be killed.

“I warn al-Qaida: the Americans and the European countries and Arab and Islamic countries have set a trap for you in Syria, and opened for you a battlefield so you come from across the world … to be killed and to kill each other…”

Alarmed by the growing strength and influence of al Qaeda-inspired fighters in Syria, the United States has put the al-Nusra Front on its official blacklist of terrorist organizations, angering many Syrian rebel brigades.

Iran claims Mossad kidnapped Tehran official with Hezbollah ties | The Times of Israel.

Former deputy defense minister Alireza Asgari nabbed in Turkey and transferred to Israel in 2007, senior defense official says

The Mossad seal, quoting Proverbs, reads: “Where no counsel is, the people fall: but in the multitude of counsellors there is safety. (Photo credit: Wikicommons)

The Israeli Mossad spy agency kidnapped Iran’s former deputy defense minister from Turkey in 2007 and moved him to Israel, Tehran’s current Deputy Defense Minister Brigadier General Hossein Daqiqi claimed on Saturday.

Iranian security services “have a lot of evidence proving that members of the Israeli intelligence service have kidnapped [Alireza] Asgari,” Daqiqi told Iranian reporters at a ceremony marking the sixth year since Asgari disappeared while in Turkey, adding he was transferred to Israel, PressTV reported.

Asgari, who was a general in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps with close ties to Hezbollah before climbing the ranks within the Defense Ministry, disappeared from Istanbul in 2007 and initial reports said he had either defected or been kidnapped by a Western intelligence agency.

Among his previous jobs, Asgari was also knowledgeable and deeply involved in Tehran’s nuclear project. A report by Israeli news site Ynet soon after Asgari’s disappearance claimed he was being held by the US, and that he “shed a new light on much of the Iranian regime’s most inner workings, especially regarding the Iranian nuclear development project.”

In 2007, the Sunday Times reported that he defected to the West, possibly to the US, quoting former Mossad chief Danny Yatom.

The report said his defection would provide Western intelligence with a new font of information about Hezbollah-Iranian ties.

“He is a significant figure,” a Western source told the paper at the time. “It has so far been very difficult to get reliable information on how Iran ran its operations in Lebanon. This could be a big break.”

In light of numerous reports claiming Asgari was abducted by foreign intelligence agencies, Iran asked the UN, Red Cross and Interpol to open an investigation into his disappearance.

Despite Tehran’s efforts, there was “no new information” on the topic, Daqiqi said at the gathering on Saturday.

New Palestinian group declares 3rd intifad… JPost – Middle East.

( The photo says it all…  JW )

Jerusalem Post – Breaking News.

US-Iranian nuclear talks fail. Iran has plutonium for 24 Nagasaki-type bombs.

DEBKAfile Special Report December 15, 2012, 12:03 PM (GMT+02:00)

Fatman: Implosion-type nuke

The secret, one-on-one nuclear negotiations President Barack Obama launched with Iran have run into a blank wall. A senior Iranian team member, Mostafa Dolatyar, said Friday, Dec. 14 in New Delhi that the diplomatic process for solving the nuclear issue with Iran was in effect going nowhere, because the demand that Tehran halt its 20-percent enrichment of uranium “doesn’t make sense.”

He went on to say: “They [the world powers] have made certain connections with purely technical issues and something purely political. In so far as this is the mentality and this is the approach from 5 + 1 (the Six World Powers) – or whatever else you call it – definitely there is no end for this game.”

debkafile: The phrase “or whatever else you call it” may be taken as Iran’s first veiled reference to the direct talks with Washington that were launched Dec. 1 in the Swiss town of Lausanne.
Mostafa Dolatyar is not just a faceless official. He is head of the Iranian foreign ministry’s think tank, the Institute for Political and International Studies, as well as a senior member of the Iranian team facing US negotiators in Lausanne. His remarks were undoubtedly authorized by the office of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who, through him, posted a message to Washington: If the enrichment suspension demand stands, the game’s over.

After more than 15 years of on-and-off, largely aimless, nuclear diplomacy with world powers and evasive tactics with the UN nuclear agency, Tehran is for the first time showing signs of impatience and not just is usual disdain. This is because two things have changed:

1. For all those years, Tehran availed itself of every diplomatic opening for protracted bargaining about its nuclear program for the sake of buying time, free of pressure, to push that program forward. Now, the Iranians are telling the US and Europe that they have arrived at their destination. For them, time is no longer of essence, as it may be for the West.

2.  The second development was revealed on Dec. 5 by The Wall Street Journal in a short leader captioned “From Bushehr to the Bomb.” This revelation was not picked up by any other Western – or even Israeli – publication despite its sensational nature.
Drawing on US intelligence sources, the paper suggested that the withdrawal of 136 fuel rods from Iran’s nuclear reactor at Bushehr in mid-October – on the pretext of wandering metal bolts – and the rods’ return in the last week of November “could have been a test run for the Iranians should they decide to reprocess those rods into weapons-grade plutonium.”

American, Russian and Israeli nuclear experts have always maintained that the technology for extracting plutonium from fuel rods was too expensive and complicated to be practical – and certainly beyond Iran’s capacity.
The Wall Street Journal begs to differ:  “…experts tell us that the rapid extraction of weapons-usable plutonium from spent fuel rods is a straightforward process that can be preformed in a fairly small (and easily secreted) space.”

This means that Tehran can easily manufacture plutonium bombs without building a large plutonium reactor like the one under construction at Arak.

The paper goes on to reveal that, by this method, Iran could extract 220 pounds (just under 100 kilos) of plutonium, enough to produce as many as “24 Nagasaki-type bombs” – a reference to the World War II bombing of the Japanese city on Aug. 9, 1945.

One of those bombs – nicknamed “Fat Man” (after Winston Churchill) – is equal to 20 kilotons.
debkafile’s military and intelligence sources note that if this disclosure represents the true state of Iran’s nuclear program, the game really is over. The diplomacy-cum-sanctions policy pursued by the West to force Iran to abandon enrichment and shut down its underground facility in Fordo has become irrelevant.  So, too, have the red lines Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu drew so graphically before the UN Assembly on September 27.

What Mostafa Dolatyar was saying in effect is that Iran has outplayed its adversaries up to the game’s finishing line.

18 Children Killed in Grade School Shooting in Connecticut – NYTimes.com.

ברוך דיין האמת

–

( Words are worthless here.  My heart is with the families… MY GOD, MY GOD ! )

Shannon Hicks/The Newtown Bee

State police led children from the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., after a shooting was reported there.

By JOSEPH GOLDSTEIN and WILLIAM K. RASHBAUM

Eighteen children were killed on Friday morning in a shooting at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., about 65 miles northeast of New York City, according to a person who had been briefed on the shooting. Another law enforcement official said preliminary reports suggested there could be as many as 20 fatalities, ranking it among the worst mass killings in United States history.

One state official said that an adult gunman was believed to be dead in the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School. The gunman was in possession of at least two firearms, the official said. There was some speculation that there were two gunmen involved in the mass shooting.

A 9-year-old boy who is a student at the school said he was in the gym when the shooting erupted.

“We were in the gym, and I heard really loud bangs,’’ said the boy, as he stood shivering and weeping outside the school with his father’s draped around him. “We thought that someone was knocking something over. And we heard yelling and we heard gunshots. We heard lots of gunshots. We heard someone say, ‘Put your hands up.’ I heard, ‘Ddon’t shoot.’ We had to go into the closet in the gym. Then someone came and told us to run down the hallway. There were police at every door, there were lots of people crying and screaming.’’

Another student at the school told an NBC affiliate in Connecticut: “I was in the gym and I heard like seven loud booms, and the gym teachers told us to go in the corner and we huddled. We all heard these booming noises, and we started crying. So the gym teachers told us to go into the office where no one could find us. Then a police officer told us to run outside.”

State police said the Newtown police called them shortly after 9:30 a.m., according to Lieutenant J. Paul Vance of the Connecticut State Police. “On and offduty troopers responded to the school and with Newtown police immediately upon arrival entered the school and began an active shooter search,’’ Lieutenant Vance said.

Meredith Artley, the managing editor of CNN.com, has a friend who works at the school. “She volunteers with the school as well,” Ms. Artley said on CNN.

The woman was in close vicinity to the shooting, which happened in the hallway, according to Ms. Artley. “She described it as a ‘Pop, pop, pop,’” Ms. Artley added. “She said three people went out into the hall and only one person came back, the vice principal, she said, who was shot in the leg or the foot, who came crawling back. She cowered under the table and called 911. She never saw the shooting. There must have been a hundred rounds.”

President Obama was briefed on the shooting at 10:30 a.m., the White House said.

Danbury Hospital said it was treating three patients from the shooting scene, according to its Facebook page. The hospital, which is not far from the elementary school, said it was on lockdown.

At Danbury hospital, stunned-looking personnel in white coats looked shaken as they gathered in small groups talking about the shooting. In a corner near the gift shop, one woman comforted a weeping colleague.

In the coffee shop, a few customers finished their sandwiches at the lunch counter and the cashier wiped tears from her eyes as she rang up customers.

In a mostly empty fifth floor waiting room, three women watched local coverage of the tragedy, shaking their heads at each new horrifying detail.

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy arrived at the scene of the shooting on Friday afternoon.

The school, located among wooded hills and suburban tracts in Fairfield County, 12 miles east of Danbury, serves kindergarten through fourth grade. The school has about 700 students.

“It’s just a liittle country school,’’ said Robert Place, 65, as he stood near the scene. “The look is very 50s or 60s. One floor. It’s always had a good reputation. People come to Newtown for the schools.’’

The school’s principal, Dawn Hochsprung, was reportedly one of those shot. But at the home of her daughter Cristina Hassinger, in Oakville, Conn., the family was still awaiting any news of her fate.

“We’re looking for any hope,” said Ryan Hassinger, the son-in-law of the principal. “If she’s in the hospital, any chance is better.”

He said that his wife, Cristina, 28, and “her sister are there now,” with Connecticut State Troopers, and that he and other relatives were awaiting word on any news.

“I looked on Twitter and it says that she is passed,” said Mr. Hassinger. But, he added, the family was, “just waiting.”

A photograph published by a local newspaper, The Newtown Bee, showed a line of children being escorted out of the school with some of the children crying.

Next door to the school in front of a senior center, a 20-year-old woman was with her 4-year-old sister who was in the school at the time of the shooting. The older woman cam to pick up her younger sister along with their mother. The four-year-old girl had her arms and legs wrapped around her older sister.

When a reporter asked the 20-year-old woman what the little girl knew of what had happened, the woman said, “Absolutely nothing, and we don’t plan to tell her anything.”

IDF officer: Gaza border the quietest in 20 years – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Senior IDF officer tells Reuters Hamas took major blow during Operation Pillar of Defense; says army won’t keep to surgical strikes in next round

Reuters

Israel’s offensive on Gaza has deterred Hamas from new hostilities despite its claims of victory and the front is now at its quietest in 20 years, a senior Israeli military officer said.

Vastly lopsided shelling exchanges over eight days killed 170 Palestinians and 6 Israelis before the November 21 truce brokered by Egypt.

Hamas, which for the first time managed to fire rockets towards Tel Aviv and Jerusalem during the conflict, says it won in the absence of an Israeli ground invasion that might have toppled its Gaza administration.

The officer said Hamas should be allowed to save face after failing to inflict more pain on the Jewish state.

“Their jubilation was not from victory, it was from their relief at being able to emerge from shelters,” said the officer, who could not be identified by name under military regulations.

“They took a major blow and they have to patch up their honor,” he said.

There have been scattered confrontations since, with Israeli troops killing two Palestinians who neared the border fence.

The officer said such incidents were rare and lacked the backing of Hamas and other armed Palestinian factions, which he said were now “thoroughly daunted” by Israel and trying to shore up the calm or at least avoid breaching it.

“A quiet like we had over the past month hasn’t happened in 20 years,” the officer said.

Harsher than next

The officer would not be drawn on how long the calm might hold but threatened heavier bombing in any future offensive.

Though Israel killed the Hamas military chief, Ahmed al-Jaabari, in a November 14 air strike, the officer said several other commanders had been spared because non-combatants were nearby.

During the fighting, Israeli officials accused terrorists of sheltering in Gaza’s Shifa hospital and other civilian sites.

In the next round, the officer, said, “I won’t fire on Shifa. But I won’t be able to keep to sterile strikes like I did in this round. I intend to kill the brigade commanders and battalion commanders wherever they are.”

Gaza hospitals said at least half of the Palestinian dead in the offensive were civilians. Israel put the number of slain combatants at 120, around two-thirds of the toll.

Iran negotiator pessimistic on p… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

IAEA reports progress in Iran nuclear talks – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Deputy director of UN atomic agency says talks to be held on January 16 expected to lead to deal on investigation into Tehran’s nuclear program

Reuters

Talks between the UN atomic agency and Iran are expected to lead to a deal next month on how to conduct an investigation into Tehran’s disputed nuclear program, the chief UN inspector said after returning from Tehran on Friday.

“We were able to make progress,” Herman Nackaerts, deputy director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), told reporters at Vienna airport after Thursday’s discussions in Tehran.

More talks are due with Iran on Jan. 16.

“We expect to finalize the structured approach and start implementing it then shortly after that,” he said, referring to a framework agreement that would allow the IAEA to resume its long-stalled investigation into suspected atomic bomb research in Iran.

“We had good meetings,” Nackaerts added.

The comments were in line with those made by Iran’s ambassador to the IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, to Iranian media after the one-day meeting in Tehran. Iranian media also said a new meeting would take place in the capital on Jan. 16.

Nevertheless, Iran’s state TV says there’s no agreement with the UN nuclear watchdog agency on visiting the Parchin military base.

The IAEA suspects Iran tested explosives that could be used in nuclear weapons there. Iran denies that and says the evidence was “forged.”

Iran, one of the world’s largest oil producers, denies Western allegations it is seeking to develop the means and technologies needed to assemble nuclear weapons.

Its economy is struggling with the burden of increasingly tough Western sanctions.

AP contributed to this report