Report: US Preparing for an Israeli Strike on Iran

Iran is looking at "punishing" those behind the assassination of one of its nuclear scientists, a senior military official said, pointing the finger at the United States, Israel and Britain.

"We consider committing a terrorist act of killing a scientist to be a threat to the nation... We are looking at punishing those who were behind the scenes of the martyrdom (assassination) of Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan," the deputy chief of Iran's joint armed forces, Masoud Jazayeri, was quoted as saying by several media.

Iran's response will be "tormenting" for those responsible, he said, adding: "The enemies of the Iranian nation, such as the United States, Britain and the Zionist regime, should be made accountable for their actions."

The Wall Street Journal is reporting today:

Read More:

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/01/14

Renee Parsons - Israel's Nuclear History as US Troops Deploy to Drill

As the Obama Administration coordinates a global PR campaign of scare tactics for the upcoming attack on Iran, eerily reminiscent of the Bush Administration’s lies of WMD’s to justify its invasion of Iraq, it comes as no surprise that the US Congress has added its voice, enfeebled and corrupt as it is, in repayment for the Israel lobby’s $3 M during the 2010 election cycle, to ban any communication between US and Iran government officials. 
   
Intensifying the drums of war with over-the-top statements that Iran, with an inferior set of missiles and a vastly inadequate Navy, represents ‘the greatest threat to world peace” and that ‘the actions and policies of Iran threaten the national security, foreign policy and economy of the United States” ignore the inconvenient reality that US intelligence has found no evidence of a nuclear weapons capacity in Iran.Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, who needs to cut back on the coffee, recently told 60 Minutes that Iran has “reached a point where they can assemble a nuclear bomb in a year or less’ only to have Pentagon press secretary George Little set the record straight “we have no indication that Iran has made a decision to develop a nuclear weapon.”   

Read More:

http://trueblueprogressivereport.blogspot.com/2012/01/israels-nuclear-history-as-us-troops.html

US-Israel vs Iran: War Games Prelude to War?

The drumbeats of war are on the rise this week as the United States and Israel exchanged threats with Iran and prepared for joint 'wargames' - used to simulate future wars.

UPDATE: At 12:53 PM ET the Associated Press filed a new story reporting on the major joint US-Israel missile defense exercise:

The drill is called “Austere Challenge 12” and is designed to improve defense systems and cooperation between the U.S. and Israeli forces. It follows a 10-day Iranian naval exercise near the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

The Israeli military spokesman did not give a date for the drill Thursday, but a senior military official said it would be in the next few weeks. He said it would be the biggest missile defense drill ever held. He was speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the issue.

Read More:

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/01/05-3

Yaakov Katz - Israel, US to hold largest ever missile defense exercise. Thousands of US soldiers will be deployed in Israel.

Israel is moving forward with plans to hold the largest-ever missile defense exercise in its history this spring amid Iranian efforts to obtain nuclear weapons.

Last week [11-18 December], Lt.-Gen. Frank Gorenc, commander of the US’s Third Air Force based in Germany, visited Israel to finalize plans for the upcoming drill, expected to see the deployment of several thousand American soldiers in Israel.

The drill, which is unprecedented in its size, will include the establishment of US command posts in Israel and IDF command posts at EUCOM headquarters in Germany– with the ultimate goal of establishing joint task forces in the event of a large-scale conflict in the Middle East.

The US will also bring its THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) and shipbased Aegis ballistic missile defense systems to Israel to simulate the interception of missile salvos against Israel.

The American systems will work in conjunction with Israel’s missile defense systems – the Arrow, Patriot and Iron Dome.

Read More:

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=28498

Renee Parsons - Israel's Nuclear History as US Troops Deploy to Drill

As the Obama Administration coordinates a global PR campaign of scare tactics for the upcoming attack on Iran, eerily reminiscent of the Bush Administration’s lies of WMD’s to justify its invasion of Iraq, it comes as no surprise that the US Congress has added its voice, enfeebled and corrupt as it is, in repayment for the Israel lobby’s $3 M during the 2010 election cycle, to ban any communication between US and Iran government officials. 
   
Intensifying the drums of war with over-the-top statements that Iran, with an inferior set of missiles and a vastly inadequate Navy, represents ‘the greatest threat to world peace” and that ‘the actions and policies of Iran threaten the national security, foreign policy and economy of the United States” ignore the inconvenient reality that US intelligence has found no evidence of a nuclear weapons capacity in Iran.Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, who needs to cut back on the coffee, recently told 60 Minutes that Iran has “reached a point where they can assemble a nuclear bomb in a year or less’ only to have Pentagon press secretary George Little set the record straight “we have no indication that Iran has made a decision to develop a nuclear weapon.”  

Read More:

http://trueblueprogressivereport.blogspot.com/2012/01/israels-nuclear-history-as-us-troops.html

Ari Shavit - Israel has never been so ugly

Netanyahu's weak leadership and moral laxity are what unleashed this frenzy. The fact that he has not put a stop to the dark forces that have always oozed from our depths is what brought us to this situation, but it is not yet too late.

By Ari Shavit

http://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/israel-has-never-been-so-ugly-1.401501?trailingPath=2.169%2C2.225%2C2.227%2C

We have never been so ugly. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanayhu seeks to silence the call to prayer over the loudspeakers of the country's mosques, and to shut down Channel 10 television. Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman expresses support for the Russian "democtator" who has just rigged elections. Defense Minister Ehud Barak stands by while Jewish settlers victimize Palestinians and ultra-Orthodox religious nationalists victimize female soldiers.

Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman is trying to turn the Supreme Court into other one of his subsidiaries. Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein is working to prevent the media from reporting on investigations against public figures. Deputy Health Minister Yaakov Litzman excludes women from participation in an official award ceremony.

Coalition chairman Zeev Elkin undermines and neuters civil society. Religious fanatics exclude women, tyrannize secular citizens and spit at priests. Jewish terrorists burn Muslim houses of worship, invade Israel Defense Force bases and attack soldiers.

Click to read more ...

Uri Avnery - Gingrich, Israel and the Palestinians

WEEKEND EDITION DECEMBER 16-18, 2011

HTTP://WWW.COUNTERPUNCH.ORG/

by URI AVNERY

What a bizarre lot these Republican aspirants for the US presidency are!

What a sorry bunch of ignoramuses and downright crazies. Or, at best, what a bunch of cheats and cynics! (With the possible exception of the good doctor Ron Paul)”.

Is this the best a great and proud nation can produce? How frightening the thought that one of them may actually become the most powerful person in the world, with a finger on the biggest nuclear button!

BUT LET’S concentrate on the present front-runner. (Republicans seem to change front-runners like a fastidious beau changes socks.)

It’s Newt Gingrich. Remember him? The Speaker of the House who had an extra-marital affair with an intern while at the same time leading the campaign to impeach President Bill Clinton for having an affair with an intern.

But that’s not the point. The point is that this intellectual giant – named after Isaac Newton, perhaps the greatest scientist ever – has discovered a great historical truth.

The original Newton discovered the Law of Gravity. Newton Leroy Gingrich has discovered something no less earth-shaking: there is an “invented” people around, referring to the Palestinians.

To which a humble Israeli like me might answer, in the best Hebrew slang: “Good morning, Eliyahu!”  Thus we honor people who have made a great discovery which, unfortunately, has been discovered by others long before.

Click to read more ...

Joshua Holland - Has the Israel Lobby Gone Too Far?

By Joshua Holland, AlterNet

Posted on December 16, 2011, Printed on December 17, 2011
http://www.alternet.org/story/153468/has_the_israel_lobby_gone_too_far

When Josh Block, a former communications director for the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), sent an “oppo dump” about a group of progressive journalists and bloggers at the Center for American Progress (CAP) and Media Matters to a list-serv of conservative journalists and asked them to push the narrative that the writers were echoing “the words of anti-Semites,” he probably didn't think much of it. 

After all, this is how self-identified “pro-Israel” activists have long policed the discourse surrounding the Middle East conflict and the “special relationship” that exists between the United States and Israel.

In 2009, an influential Israeli think-tank carefully cherry-picked posts from the Huffington Post, Daily Kos and Salon, quoted them out of context and concluded that “progressive blogs and news sites in the United States are a new field where Jew-hatred, in both its classic and anti-Israeli forms, manifests itself.” Avocates of maintaining the destructive status quo in the Middle East have long attempted to define a “new anti-Semitism” to include criticism of the Israeli government that goes beyond the pale, as they define it. (So-called pro-Israel groups have managed to get the EU to adopt a "working definition" of anti-Semitism that includes harsh criticism of the Israeli government -- a definition Block sent to journalists to ostensibly prove his case.) 

But Block appears to have made a crucial miscalculation. He wasn't smearing Middle East studies professors, Palestinian rights activists or liberal bloggers; he went after two very mainstream Washington DC think-tanks that are closely connected with the Democratic establishment. And he did so at a time when the debate over U.S. policy towards Israel is becoming more partisan than ever before (the GOP has worked hard to paint Obama as “anti-Israel”) and tensions between the White House and the Netanyahu government are running high.

The backlash was swift. Just as Joe McCarthy, having terrified Hollywood screenwriters with his red-baiting over-reached when he peddled conspiracy theories about the military high command being infested with Communists, Block appears to have picked the wrong target. In doing so, he exposed the inner workings of what scholars Steve Walt and John Mearsheimer called the “Israel lobby,” and proved that reckless charges of anti-Semitism are used to narrow the discourse.

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Jeremy R. Hammond - Newt Gingrich's Invented History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Gingrich’s Serial Hypocrisy Knows No Bounds

By Jeremy R. Hammond

Global Research, December 12, 2011

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=28180

The Republican presidential candidates are falling all over themselves competing for who can be the most “pro-Israel”, with Newt Gingrich taking the game to a whole new level  last week when he said in an interview with The Jewish Channel that Palestinians were an “invented” people. When asked whether he considered himself a Zionist, Gingrich responded (his emphasis):

Well, I believe that the Jewish people have the right to have a state, and I believe that the commitments that were made at the time—remember, there was no Palestine as a state. It was part of the Ottoman Empire. And I think that we’ve had an invented Palestinian people who are in fact Arabs and who were historically part of the Arab community. And they had a chance to go many places, and for a variety of political reasons, we have sustained this war against Israel now, since the 1940s, and it’s tragic.

Shall we take that as a “Yes”? During the ABC News Republican debate in Iowa on December 10, Gingrich defended his comments by saying:

Is what I said factually correct? Yes. Is it historically true? Yes. Are we in a situation where every day rockets are fired into Israel while the United States—the current administration—tries to pressure the Israelis into a peace process. Hamas does not admit the right of Israel to exist and says publicly, “Not a single Jew will remain.” The Palestinian Authority Ambassador to India said last month, “There is no difference between Fatah and Hamas, we both agree Israel has no right to exist.” Somebody ought to have the courage to tell the truth. These people are terrorists. They teach terrorism in their schools. They have textbooks that say, “If there are 13 Jews and nine Jews are killed, how many Jews are left?” We pay for those textbooks through our aid money. It’s fundamentally time for somebody to have the guts and stand up and say, “Enough lying about the Middle East.”

Click to read more ...

Ira Chernus - Gingrich on Palestine: Small Truths In A Big Lie

Published on Monday, December 12, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/12/12-1

by Ira Chernus

If Newt had really said what the headlines claimed:  “Gingrich Calls Palestinians an ‘Invented’ People,” I would have shrugged and said, So what? Americans are an invented people too. So are British, Chinese, and every other national group. We’ve been teaching that in our college classrooms for twenty years or more as an obvious no-brainer.

But that’s not what Gingrich said.  He said “We,” apparently meaning the United States, “have invented the Palestinian people.” Wrong! The Palestinians invented themselves, at least as early as the first Palestinian National Congress in 1919. So it’s the “we,” not the “invented,” that should get headlines and stir angry reactions.

Gingrich got another small piece of the truth right when he said that the Palestinians “are in fact Arabs and are historically part of the Arab people.” the dream of one big pan-Arab nation was a powerful idea before World War I. But it died for all practical purposes after that war when Britain and France divvied up the Middle East between them and started creating new nations.

Those smaller mistakes by Newt and the mass media pale, though, before their big ones. Read the whole transcript.

Click to read more ...