Intelligence expert who rewrote book on Iran ** Almost single-handedly he has stopped - or, at the very least, postponed - any US military action against Iran.
His report marks a decisive moment in the battle between American neoconservatives and Washington's foreign policy and intelligence professionals - between ideologues and pragmatists. It provided an unexpected victory for those opposed to the neocon plans for a military strike......"We seem to have lucked out and have individuals who resist back-channel politics and tell it how it is," he said. "That is what the CIA and other agencies are supposed to do." Score one for the good guys.
US intelligence official defends report on Iran "The task of the Intelligence Community is to produce objective, ground truth analysis," which is totally the opposite of what the neocons have been dishing out for years, culminating in a US attack on a nation that had not attacked us, and had nothing to do with 911.
Iran protests over US 'espionage' Iran has sent a formal protest letter to the United States, accusing it of spying on Iran's nuclear activities.
CNN a Casualty of Iran NIE Rather than deal with facts, the show was set in a future where Iran has become a nuclear threat.
Russia reiterates twin-track approach to Iran
Iran drops dollar from oil deals: report Major crude producer Iran has completely stopped carrying out its oil transactions in dollars, Oil Minister Gholam Hossein Nozari said on Saturday, labelling the greenback an "unreliable" currency.
Gulf countries speak out against military option in Iran ** "We are not for the military confrontation option,".....being "pushed into a military confrontation with Iran" would not be in the interest of the GCC countries.
Gates calls for anti-Iran missile shield US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has called for an "air and missile defence umbrella" over the Gulf region to deter missile attacks by Iran.
US Defence Secretary sees Iran as threat to US and Mideast Gates rejected suggestions the US applied a double-standards policy towards Iran and Israel, which has never confirmed it has a nuclear arsenal but is widely believed to be the only state in the Middle East with such weapons, estimated to number 200.
Gulf Challenges US on Iran, Israel "We can't really compare Iran with Israel. Iran is our neighbor, and we shouldn't really look at it as an enemy," said Sheik Hamad. "I think Israel through 50 years has taken land, kicking out the Palestinians, and interferes under the excuse of security, blaming the other party."
U.S. support for Israel is very unpopular in the Middle East, even among closely allied Gulf states, and Washington's unconditional support for Israeli nuclear development has complicated its push against Iran.
U.S. report on Iran's nuclear program 'flawed,' says Israel's ex-deputy defense minister Isarel and consequently its lobby (including the neocons) in the States are on the offense - their cries getting more shrill by the minute. It's rather reminiscent of the boy who cried wolf.
'US report ended attack option on Iran' ** "It looks like this ends the military option against Iran for now. Israel won't attack alone. Iran's facilities are too many and spread too far apart." ......Time reported that Israel's leaders were surprised and disappointed by the American report, understanding that it considerably lessened the likelihood of an American strike on Iran, an action Israel hoped the US would take if sanctions failed to stop the Iranian nuclear program. I wouldn't discount Cheney and the neocons. They might cook something up to get their attack on Iran, as they've done in the past with Iraq (via the Office of Special Plans).
Bush Spins Iran's Centrifuges ** Judging from President George W. Bush?s words and body language he is far from giving up on ways to "justify" attacking Iran's nuclear program ? weapons-related or not. He appears convinced he must honor the pledge he has made to Israel's current leaders to eliminate what they have called an "existential threat" to Israel......
there is no sign that Gates wants to abet using Iranian meddling in Iraq as a pretext for a military strike on Iran. Gates?s well-deserved chameleon-like reputation counsels caution here, since a word from Cheney or Bush could conceivably make Gates a fervent champion of this pretext for war.
Two Strikes by Charley Reese The worst of the lot are those who pose as journalists but who really are water-carriers for the administration, the Republican Party, the neoconservative clique or, in some cases, Israel. They deserve to have their foreheads tattooed with the word "whore." Then when people see them on television pontificating, they will know that those journalists are a bought bunch.
Smoking Laptop Follies For years, now, the neocrazies have been running around in circles of diminishing radii, hysterically demanding that we nuke Iran, all because the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards asked a small Iranian design firm way back in 2001 to produce a set of technical drawings for a small facility to convert Iranian yellowcake ? even then all subject to Iran's Safeguards Agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency ? into uranium-tetrafluoride?
Gulf countries challenge U.S. on Iran and Israel at security conference "Not considering Israel a threat to security in the region is considered a biased policy that is based on a double standard," said Abdul-Rahman al-Attiyah, the secretary general of the six-member Gulf Co-operation Council. It sure is. And it's the same double standard that George Washington warned about in his Farewell Address.
Unilateral military strike still an option, senior ministers insist ** Binyamin Netanyahu, the popular rightwing opposition leader, was asked whether Israel should launch its own military operation. "We always prefer international action, led by the United States, but we have to ensure that we can protect our country with all means," he told the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz yesterday.
Israel no nuclear threat to neighbours, says Gates Was it Iran that annihilated Lebanon last summer? Was it Iran that wiped Palestine off the map and in its place established by force the state of Israel? Was it Iran that committed war crimes during an attack on the USS Liberty that took the lives of 34 Americans? Is it Iran that has ignored tens of UN resolutions for nearly sixty years?
The Warpath to Regime Change ** From 2003 to 2005, Wurmser and his neoconservative colleagues were in denial about the increasingly obvious reality that the U.S. occupation of Iraq was actually boosting Iranian influence there rather than shaking the regime's power at home, according to former NSC specialist Mann. She was well acquainted with the neoconservatives' thinking from her associations with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy in the 1990s, and she told IPS that she was "astounded" to hear neoconservatives in the administration suggest as late as 2005 that the situation in Iraq was on track to help destabilize the Iranian regime.
Go home or go to jail, Lebanon tells Iraqi refugees
Nuclear fallout / Who's right here? ** Over the last year, a certain hope has developed in Israel that the U.S. would do our dirty work for us; because what is possibly going on, quietly and secretly, between President Bush and his spiritual advisers will lead Bush to the conclusion that his supreme moral obligation is to remove the Iranian nuclear danger threatening Israel before he passes his job on to his successor.
....Is Israel capable of presenting the Americans with any information that can prove to the Americans their new evaluation is wrong? And what new policy will Jerusalem need to formulate on the Iranian issue, based on the reasonable assumption the U.S. will not change its mind?.....The report will most likely also have an indirect effect on the Israeli-Palestinian process. If Israel no longer enjoys the full support of the Americans on nuclear matters, then Israel is likely to feel less committed to make concessions and move forward in talks with the Palestinians. Hmm, so that last sentence suggests, as I and some others have too, that Israel is only putting on a dog and pony show for this peace agreement in order to get the US to attack Iran?...
The New Republic and National Review fabricate Middle East news ? Say it Ain?t so?
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