Category: Iran

Armada Of U.S. And Israeli Warships Head For Iran

Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
June 19, 2010

More than twelve U.S. and Israeli warships, including an aircraft carrier, passed through the Suez Canal on Friday and are headed for the Red Sea. “According to eyewitnesses, the U.S. battleships were the largest to have crossed the Canal in many years,” reported the London-based newspaper al-Quds al-Arabi on Saturday.

The Israeli newspaperHaaretz reported Egyptian opposition members criticized the government for cooperating with the U.S. and Israeli forces and allowing the passage of the ships through Egyptian territorial waters. The Red Sea is the most direct route to the Persian Gulf from the Mediterranean.

Retired Egyptian General Amin Radi, chairman of the national security affairs committee, told the paper that “the decision to declare war on Iran is not easy, and Israel, due to its wild nature, may start a war just to remain the sole nuclear power in the region,” according to Yedioth Internet, an Israeli news site.

The passage of a warship armada through the Suez Canal and headed for the Persian Gulf and Iran is apparently not deemed important enough to be reported by the corporate media in the United States.

Egypt recently rejected an Israeli request to prevent Gaza aid ships from passing through the Suez Canal. According to a report by al-Jazeera, Israel appealed to Egyptians asking them to prevent the passage of Iranian ships through the Suez Canal. The Egyptians responded that due to international agreements on movement through the Suez Canal, Egypt cannot prevent ships from passing through the canal unless a ship belongs to a state that is at war with Egypt. Iran and Egypt are not at war.

The United States and Israel, the sole nuclear-armed power in the Middle East, have not ruled out a military strike to destroy Iran’s nuclear program.

A number of Israeli politicians and scholars have admitted Israel has used its nuclear weapons for “compellent purposes,” in short forcing others to accept Israeli political demands.

Israel’s threats to use nuclear weapons have increased significantly since it was discovered in 2002 that Iran was building uranium enrichment facilities. Israel’s former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon “called on the international community to target Iran as soon as the imminent conflict with Iraq is complete,” the Sunday Times reported on November 5, 2002. The United States invaded Iraq on March 20, 2003.

Earlier this month Israel leaked to the press that they had permission from Saudi Arabia to use their air space to attack Iran. “In the week that the UN Security Council imposed a new round of sanctions on Tehran, defence sources in the Gulf say that Riyadh has agreed to allow Israel to use a narrow corridor of its airspace in the north of the country to shorten the distance for a bombing run on Iran,” the Sunday Times reported on June 12. On June 14, the ambassador of Saudi Arabia to UK Prince Mohammed bin Nawaf issued a categorical denial of the report.

On June 17, Iran’s parliament warned it will respond in kind to inspection of its ships under a fourth round of sanctions imposed on the country by the UN Security Council. “Even if one Iranian ship is stopped for security-check, we will act likewise and thoroughly inspect any (western) ship passing through the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz,” member of the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Hossein Ebrahimi said.

Also on Saturday, Iran accused the United States of “deception” and insisted its missile program is for self-defense after a top U.S. official claimed that Iran had the capacity to attack Europe. “The Islamic Republic’s missile capability has been designed and implemented to defend against any military aggression and it does not threaten any nation,” Defense MinisterAhmad Vahidi said in a statement carried by state media.

Vahidi announced on April 10 that Iran will use all available options to defend itself if the country comes under a military attack. “Americans have said they will use all options against Iran, we announce that we will use all options to defend ourselves,” Vahidi told the Tehran Times.

Info Wars

June 19, 2010
Iranian aid ships head for Gaza

First ship left Iran Sunday, another leaves this week

* Iran says will continue until Gaza blockade lifted

* 100,000 Iranians volunteer to help the Gazans

(Adds parliamentarians aim to visit Gaza; context)

By Robin Pomeroy

TEHRAN, June 14 (Reuters) – Iran is sending aid ships to blockaded Gaza, state radio said on Monday — a move likely to be considered provocative by Israel which accuses Tehran of arming the Palestinian enclave’s Islamist rulers, Hamas.

One ship left port on Sunday and another will depart by Friday, loaded with food, construction material and toys, the report said. “Until the end of (Israel’s) Gaza blockade, Iran will continue to ship aid,” said an official at Iran’s Society for the Defence of the Palestinian Nation.

Iran has sent aid to the coastal territory in the past via Egypt. It was not immediately clear if the latest shipments would do the same, or try to dock in Gaza itself.

Reuters

June 14, 2010
“Greater Middle East” gradually becoming a reality

No matter how strongly the Government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan may support the current administration of Ayatollah Khamenei, Tehran simply does not believe it and would not admit even the thought of Turkey being representative of the Muslim world.

“Greater Middle East” is gradually becoming a reality. The struggle for the place of a regional power between Turkey and Iran, both bordering with Armenia, has slipped “under the carpet”, and let no one be caught at the support that Erdogan gives to the nuclear program of Iran. Armenia, in this case, must build relations with its neighbors, based on the belief “my enemy’s enemy is my friend”. And though this system sometimes fails, it works in general, and it will work in case of Armenia, especially since the relations were unruffled, and became even better after certain incidents. Similarly, the Israeli-Turkish relations may smoothly grow into Armenian-Israeli. But in the latter case there is still a long way to go.

PanARMENIAN.Net – Relations with Iran are good in general and have a tendency to expand, particularly in the energy sector. Iran has already built two small hydropower plants on the Araks River; the Iran-Armenia pipeline, built within the program of diversification of energy supplies to Armenia, is successfully completed. Construction of a petroleum refinery in Southern Armenia (Meghri) is in the design phase. Feasibility study was carried out by Russian and Armenian specialists. The two countries have had no hard or bloody past, and the Armenian community in Iran, amounting to about 200,000 people, enjoys the locals’ respect. In the Karabakh issue Iran is neutral, but she is always ready to offer her services as a mediator. However, Iran cannot become an OSCE Minsk Group member, and, consequently, she cannot be an intermediary. Yet, it must be admitted that with Iran’s support there would have been registered some progress in this issue. Let us not forget that Iran is in rather difficult relations with neighboring Azerbaijan, which lays claims to the province of Southern Azerbaijan, and believes that it is her territory. Despite the positive statements by Azerbaijani officials about the “excellent relations with the friendly Islamic country”, everything is not actually so rosy. Azerbaijan’s territorial claims, coupled with the controversial status of the Caspian Sea could seriously damage relations between these two countries. In addition, Azerbaijan with extreme nervousness responds to the Armenian-Iranian relations, considering them as treacherous on the part of the Islamic country.

As for Armenia, she needs normal relations with Iran, as the latter is one of the two land routes linking the country with the outer world. The Iranian route is longer but safer than the Georgian one. On the other hand, friendship with Iran is now a bit problematic because of the nuclear program. However, according to U.S. diplomats in Yerevan, the United States realizes the importance of Iran for Armenia (in blockade) and therefore regards the Armenian-Iranian relations with favour.

There is another equally important aspect in Iran’s ambition to become a regional power: Islamism. The Islamic Republic believes that she should be the advocate of Islam in the region, and no one can replace her in this issue. Supported by Saudi Arabia, Turkey also seeks dominance in the region and gradually parts with secularism, thus rivaling Tehran. However, Iran simply will not allow such a turn of events. No matter how strongly the Government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan may support the current administration of Ayatollah Khamenei and how hard it may try to persuade Tehran that it respects Islamic values, Tehran simply does not believe it and would not admit even the thought of Turkey being representative of the Muslim world. The recent story of Free Gaza, which, at large, was meant to win the affection of the Arab world and show it that Islam for Ankara is more important than a close relationship with Israel, highlighted a number of problems that Turkey has with the Arab world, despite the fact that Erdogan solemnly declared: “The Turk cannot live without the Arab”. Nevertheless, however sad it might be for Ankara, Hamas has already refused her services, stressing that it prefers to deal only with Egypt.

At first sight, Turkey is in normal relations with all the neighbors – from “brotherly” to “neutral”. But the Turkish-Azerbaijani alliance believes that Armenia, in particular, must leave the security zone around the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic and give up the process of international recognition of the Armenian Genocide. The reality is that it is still too early to speak of normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations, and there are several reasons for it. There are serious internal political processes going in Turkey. The state of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has deteriorated after the scandalous resignation of major opposition member Deniz Baykal, as new leader of the Republican People’s Party Kemal Kilicdaroglu is determined, if not to win the elections next year, at least to reduce the number of deputies from the AKP. Premier Erdogan is obviously losing popularity, and in this respect improved relations with Armenia would be fatal for him. Turkish opposition, which is already unhappy with the foreign and domestic policy of Turkey, could easily dethrone the unwanted premier. However, hardly will the army intervene this time, since the Prime Minister has taken care to gain the ear of most of the military. But Turkey is a country quite unpredictable in some issues, and what will happen after the referendum on September 12 is difficult to predict.

, 11 June 2010

June 13, 2010
Saudis test clearing skies for Israel to bomb Iran: report

A general view shows the Saudi capital Riyadh

(AFP)

LONDON — Saudi Arabia has conducted tests to stand down its air defences to allow Israeli warplanes to use its airspace in any bombing raid on Iran’s nuclear facilities, The Times newspaper reported Saturday.

“The Saudis have given their permission for the Israelis to pass over and they will look the other way,” a US defence source in the region told the paper.

“They have already done tests to make sure their own jets aren?t scrambled and no one gets shot down. This has all been done with the agreement of the (US) State Department.”

Riyadh denied the British report on Saturday, calling it “false” and “slanderous,” the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported.

“Saudi Arabia has followed the false and slanderous allegations reported by some British media that it would let Israel attack Iran via its airspace,” SPA quoted a foreign ministry official as saying.

The kingdom “rejects violating its sovereignty or the use of its airspace or territories by anyone to attack any country,” the unidentified official said, noting that Saudi Arabia does not have diplomatic ties with the Jewish state.

Israel, which regards Iran as its principal threat, has refused to rule out using military action to prevent Tehran developing nuclear weapons. Iran says its nuclear programme is aimed solely at power generation.

The Times said Riyadh, which views Iran as a regional threat, had agreed to allow Israel to use a narrow corridor of its airspace in the north of the country to shorten the distance in the event of any bombing raid on Iran.

It said that a source in Saudi Arabia said the arrangement was common knowledge within defence circles in the kingdom.

“We all know this. We will let them (the Israelis) through and see nothing,” the source told The Times.

, 12 June 2010

June 12, 2010
Erdogan’s Troubling Friends

This article first appeared at FrontPage Magazine.

In 1974, when Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was president of the Istanbul youth group of the MSP (the Islamist National Salvation Party), he wrote, directed, and starred in a play called Mas-Kom-Ya, which addressed subversive elements in Turkish society: masons, communists and yahudi (Jews). This very same performer has managed to convince gullible Western politicians that Turkey is committed to EU membership. Equally convincingly, he has played to the Arab gallery since his AKP (Justice and Development Party) came to power in 2002.

Erdogan’s tirade against Shimon Peres during a panel discussion at last year’s World Economic Forum in Davos – “you know very well how to kill” – earned plaudits all around the Arab world. The Lebanese daily Dar A-Hayatsuggested that Erdogan should restore the Ottoman Empire and be the Caliph of all Muslims. By some accounts, this has been identified as the driving force behind Turkey’s expansionist foreign policy, which has been dubbed “neo-Ottoman.”

This new course obviously played out in Turkey’s role in the Gaza flotilla incident. According to Debka (an open source intelligence website) the flotilla was personally sponsored by Erdogan, and according to the same source, he is even prepared to sail aboard the next flotilla himself. Some awareness of the consequences must have been know, as a week before the flotilla sailed, Ankara threatened Israel with reprisals if it was impeded.

The connection between the flotilla’s organizer, the Turkish-based IHH (Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms and Humanitarian Relief), and Hamas is well documented, and it created a stir when Hamas leader Khaled Mashal was officially invited to Ankara in 2006.

Ankara’s support for Iran’s nuclear program, ostensibly for peaceful purposes, is likewise a cause for concern in the Western world, and President Abdullah Gül has admitted in an interview with Forbes magazine that “it is their final aspiration to have a nuclear weapon in the end.”

Turkey and Syria have agreed on a long-term strategic partnership and Erdogan continues to defend Sudan’s president, Omar al-Bashir (who is on the International Criminal Court’s wanted list) with the claim that “a Muslim can never commit genocide.”

Also alarming is the secret meeting between Prime Minister Erdogan and a Sudanese financier, Dr. Fatih al-Hassanein, during an Arab League summit in Khartoum in 2006. Dr. al-Hassanein is believed to have ties with al-Qaeda and other Islamist movements (e.g. in Bosnia).

What has caused another stir is the friendship between Prime Minister Erdogan and a Saudi businessman, Yassin al-Qadi, who, according to the U.S. Treasury and the United Nations Security Council, is a major financier of Islamic terrorism. Erdogan’s advisor and co-founder of the AKP, Cüneyd Zapsu, was also al-Qadi’s partner.

Erdogan defended al-Qadi publicly on Turkish television, declaring: “I trust him the same way I trust my father.” And a case against al-Qadi was dropped when in 2006 the Chief Public Prosecutor decided: “Al-Qadi is a philanthropic businessman and no connection has been found between him and terrorist organizations.”

The truth is beginning to catch up with Erdogan. Last week, in an interview given to the Wall Street Journal, Fethullah Gülen, who, although a resident in the USA, is reckoned to be Turkey’s most influential religious leader, criticized the Gaza flotilla. He also commented: “.. some people in the United States consider Turkey as sitting at the epicenter of radicalism.”

It is now up to the hot-tempered Mr. Erdogan and his government to dispel this image — or to continue confirming it.

Robert Ellis is a regular commentator on Turkish affairs in the Danish and international press.

June 9, 2010
Israel worried by new Turkey intelligence chief’s defense of Iran

Israeli sources believe Hakan Fidan aided in orchestrating an intentional change in relations between Israel and Turkey.

By Amir Oren

The Israeli defense establishment – and especially the Mossad’s foreign relations department, which maintains ties with Turkey’s national intelligence organization (MIT ) – is concerned over the recent appointment of Hakan Fidan as head of that organization, and the implications of that appointment vis-a-vis Turkish relations with Israel and Iran.

Ten days ago, Hakan Fidan, 42, a personal confidant of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, assumed the post of head of MIT, which combines the functions of the Mossad and Shin Bet security force.

Israeli security sources believe last week’s the Mavi Marmara incident reflects an intentional change in relations between Israel and Turkey – orchestrated by Erdogan, along with Fidan and Foreign Minister Ahmed Davutoglu.

There is no concrete information, however, regarding Fidan’s involvement in the incident or his ties with IHH, the group that organized the flotilla.

In meetings between Mossad officials and others in the local political-security establishment, it was noted that Fidan has close ties with Erdogan’s Islamist party, and that during the past year he was deputy director of the prime minister’s office and played a central role in tightening Turkish ties with Iran, especially on the nuclear issue.

Fidan’s appointment at MIT will help strengthen Erdogan’s control over certain civilian elements in the Turkish intelligence community, both in terms of determining foreign and defense policy, and also vis-a-vis members of the senior military echelons, who are considered to be a central threat to the Islamist party’s power.

To date intelligence ties between Israel and Turkey have been good, in parallel to the good relations between the Israel Defense Forces and the Turkish military, and their respective intelligence services.

In April the last head of MIT, Emre Taner, retired after a five-year stint. Erdogan appointed Fidan as acting head then, but he only formally took over late last month. Fidan served in the Turkish military for 15 years, until 2001, but was not an officer.

MIT has extensive authority, in both internal security and foreign intelligence gathering. Its chief answers directly to the prime minister, although the law obliges him also to report to the president, the chief of staff and the country’s National Security Council.

Fidan completed a B.A. at the University of Maryland, and he completed his master’s and doctorate in Ankara. His dissertation was a comparative analysis of the structure of U.S., British and Turkish intelligence organizations.

After his military service, Fidan served in the Turkish embassy in Australia, and last year he represented Ankara in the International Atomic Energy Agency, where he defended Iran’s right to carry on with its nuclear program for “peaceful purposes.”

With Davutoglu, Fidan formulated last month’s uranium transfer deal between Turkey, Brazil and Iran.

Apparently, he supports the idea of splitting MIT’s authority into an internal and an external intelligence organization, like in Israel, Britain and the United States. It is reported that he intends to concentrate on “institutional” tasks and to work with an independent security service, one of whose main purposes is to deal with the Kurdish PKK organization – partly to deflect criticism of his appointment.

In Israel there is concern Fidan’s appointment will have a two-pronged effect: on one hand, that exchange of intelligence between the two countries will be harmed, and on the other, that Israel will have to limit the transfer of information to Turkey, out of a concern that it may be passed on to enemy organizations or states.

, 07.06.10

June 7, 2010