Iran Affairs

The "New Anti-Semitism" myth versus Islamophobic reality

At a time when Islamophobia is commonplace, promoted in popular entertainment and institutionalized, and defended as a form of free speech; when innocent Muslims face discrimination, are falsely imprisoned and legally tortured; when Israeli settlements continue to expand while more Palestinians suffer in refugee camps, and when the Israeli officials participate in hate-fests where they openly equate Islam with terrorism & push for more wars to kill more Muslims, the US State Department has issued a report which equates criticism of Israel with Anti-Semitism and attempts to stifle debate about Israel.

This State Department report is of course nothing more than a re-hash of the myth of "New Anti-Semitism". The report goes on to repeat the usual standard Zionists spins intended to tar critics of Israel as anti-Semites, stifle debate and justify Israeli atrocities by claiming that critics hold Israel to a higher standard of conduct etc etc.

So here's an interesting re-write of the State Department report - see if I am wrong about any of this:

New anti-Semitism Racist Islamophobia disguised by hatred of Israel human rights abuse and terrorism, report says

Agence France Presse March 13 2008

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Jews Muslims worldwide are facing a new form of anti-Semitism racist Islamophobia disguised by hatred toward Israel terrorism amd human rights abuse, in addition to more traditional forms of racist anti-Semitism Islamophobia, a new US report said Thursday.

"This new anti-Semitism Islamophobia is common throughout the Middle East and in Muslim communities in Israel, United States and Europe, but it is not confined to these populations," the US State Department said in a report for 2007.

It said United Nations bodies, for example, are frequently asked to "commission investigations of what often are sensationalized reports of alleged atrocities and other violations of human rights by Israel Muslim countries," it said.

While the motive may be to defuse a crisis or offer a forum to channel anger, the effect of "unremitting criticism of Israel Muslims and Islam" bolsters the idea that the Jewish state Islam is a leading source of "abuse of the rights of others," it said.

At the same time UN bodies often fail to "pay attention to regimes that are demonstrably guilty of grave violations," it added -- such as when the US repeatedly vetos UN Security Council Resolutions critical of Israel.

"Comparing contemporary Israeli policies Muslims to the Nazis is increasingly commonplace," said the report from the State Department which is (not) required under legislation passed in 2004 to document and combat anti-Semitic Islamophobic acts worldwide.

"Anti-Semitism Islamophobia couched in terms of criticism of Zionism or Israelterrorism or human rights abuses often escapes condemnation since it can be more subtle than traditional forms of anti-Semitism racist Islamophobia, and promoting anti-Semitic racist Islamophobic attitudes may not be the conscious intent of the purveyor," it said.

"Israel's Islamic policies and practices must be subject to responsible criticism and scrutiny to the same degree as those of any other country," it said.

Critics of Israel Islam have a "responsibility to consider the effect their actions may have in prompting hatred of Jews Muslims," it said, adding that hostility toward Israel terrorists has at times manifested itself in violence toward Jews innocent Muslims.

It added that there was a sudden increase in anti-Semitic official Islamophobia incidents worldwide during the war between the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and Israel in 2006 on the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan.
...

You get the point.

Now do you suppose that the State Department would ever issue a real, accurate report on the state Islamophobia like this that acknowledges their own policies of torture etc? Don't hold your breath.

Media and Iran nukes - the propaganda habit.

The Columbia Journalism Review has an extended article on the quality of US media coverage of Iran's nuclear program, entitled "Lost Over Iran: How the press let the White House craft the narrative
about nukes", which I recommend.

It states that some experts and analysts have been questioning the Bush administration claim that Iran was seeking to build nukes... but "What's striking is how rarely such questions were asked by members of the press."

CJR is a great source. Their article debunking Bush's EFPs-from-Iran claims was interesting reading too. McClatchy indeed does a great job questioning Bush too, as the CJR notes.

Course, I've been saying that the media are simply repeating official spin for years now, and I've been totally ignored too!

Actually, in addition to writing a few items, I get invited to do TV interviews -- mostly Channel 4 in the UK for some reason -- and occasionally I participate in various discussion panels. However, the agenda of these panels is always based on the assumption that Iran is indeed seeking nukes. The topic may be "Will sanctions against Iran force it to stop building nukes" -- but never "Is Iran actually building any nukes anyway?"

In one particular case, I was invited to participate in a panel along with Kenneth Pollack at an event at Columbia Univ., but I was later specifically told that I was not to question that assumption that Iran was building nukes -- the debate was going to be limited to whether sanctions were "feasible" and no more -- so naturally I refused to participate.

Combat photojournalism during the Iran-Iraq War 1980-88: watch this!

This is a fascinating and instructive video about wartime journalism during the Iran-Iraq war of 1980 to 1988. Note that it was an Iranian photojournalist named Kaveh Golestan who first exposed Saddam's massacre of the Kurds at Halabja, which was carried out with US-UK support of Saddam's war machine (including his chemical weapons) - this is 1 hour and 30 minutes long.

20th Anniversary of Halabja - Who gave WMDs to Saddam?

March 16th will be the 20th year anniversary of the massacre at Halabja, first documented by Iranian photographer Kaveh Golestan (who was killed in Iraq in 2003)
Ah! Remember the good old days, when the same countries that are railling against the "Iranian threat" today were giving anthrax to Saddam Hussein? Boy, those were good times...

Analysis of thousands of captured Iraqi secret police documents and declassified U.S. government documents, as well as interviews with scores of Kurdish survivors, senior Iraqi defectors and retired U.S. intelligence officers, show (1) that Iraq carried out the attack on Halabja, and (2) that the United States, fully aware it was Iraq, accused Iran, Iraq's enemy in a fierce war, of being partly responsible for the attack. The State Department instructed its diplomats to say that Iran was partly to blame.

The result of this stunning act of sophistry was that the international community failed to muster the will to condemn Iraq strongly for an act as heinous as the terrorist strike on the World Trade Center.
-- Halabja : America didn't seem to mind poison gas,
By Joost R. Hiltermann, International Herald Tribune, Friday, Jan 17 2003

And,

Hypocrisy Seen in U.S. Stand on Iraqi Arms
Mideast: Officials say American intelligence aided Baghdad’s use of chemical weapons against Iran in ’80s.
By ROBIN WRIGHT, Times Staff Writer

WASHINGTON—-A decade before the current showdown over weapons of mass destruction, the United States turned a blind eye when Iraq used American intelligence for operations against Iran that made rampant use of chemical weapons and ballistic missiles, according to senior administration and former intelligence officials.

The attacks against civilian and military targets during the Iran-Iraq War included some of the most pervasive uses of chemical weapons anywhere since World War I. The combination of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and American intelligence eventually helped turn the tide of the eight-year war in Baghdad's favor. The collaboration reached a peak shortly after a secret U.S. estimate projected for the first time that Iran could win one of the century's bloodiest wars. "We knew [the Iraqis] used chemicals in any major campaign," said a former U.S. intelligence official familiar with the American role. "Although we publicly opposed the use of chemical weapons anywhere in the world, we knew the intelligence we gave the Iraqis would be used to develop their own operational plans for chemical weapons."

Now, 10 years later, the United States is trying to rally world support for the use of military strikes to destroy the same kinds of Iraqi weapons—on the grounds that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein should not be allowed to use them in the future. ...

"By 1986, Iraq had proven itself better at the use of chemical weapons than any fighting force in the world," said a former senior U.S. diplomat involved in Iraq. By 1988, Iraq's use of gases had also repeatedly been documented by U.N. specialists. "It was all done with a wink and a nod," said a former U.S. intelligence official. "We knew exactly where this stuff was going, although we bent over backwards to look the other way." Washington knew Iraq was "dumping boatloads" of chemical weapons on Iranian positions, he added.
...
Policy at the time, said another former Reagan official, recognized that "Hussein is a bastard. But at the time, he was our bastard."

And,

Iraqis given anthrax secrets by Porton Down scientists SHYAM BHATIA

01/25/1998
The Observer
Page 003
(Copyright 1998)

THE FATHER of Iraq 's biological warfare programme benefited from a three-day anthrax workshop hosted by scientists from the Government's chemical and biological research centre at Porton Down , Wiltshire.

The embarrassing British link to Iraq 's deadly anthrax research, revealed by United Nations sources, comes only days after Foreign Secretary Robin Cook's assertion that Saddam Hussein makes enough anthrax every week to fill two missile warheads. . .

The West's role in providing Iraq with anthrax know-how began at a key workshop in Winchester in 1988. Among 80 scientists from around the world were Dr Nasser el-Hindawi and his assistant, Dr Thamer Abdel Rahman, microbiologists working for Iraq 's secret biological weapons programme. The programme's aim was to develop weapons to spread anthrax , gas gangrene, botulism toxin, brucellosis, rabbit foot and tetanus...

UN officials describe the workshop as a 'Who's Who of anthrax research'. They say the three-day meeting was devoted entirely to anthrax with 'a full exchange of ideas and materials'. Among the British participants was Harry Smith, now emeritus professor of microbiology at Birmingham University. A world authority on anthrax , he says: 'To be perfectly frank, I didn't know {the Iraqis} were there.'

'My God, it's quite astounding that no one caught on,' said Dr Alastair Hay, reader in chemical pathology at Leeds University, who has been following Iraq 's chemical and biological programme. 'By 1985, Iran had already accused Iraq of carrying out chemical warfare and Iraq 's interest in weapons of mass destruction had already been flagged up. Why bring these people here?' ...

Germ culture to grow the anthrax was freely imported from the US military's centre for chemical and biological research at Fort Detrick, Maryland, via civilian laboratories operated by ATCC, the American Type Culture Collection.

American investigators have established that several shipments of biological material, including 21 batches of anthrax , were licensed for export from the US to Iraq between 1985 and 1988. They were sent to the Ministry of Higher Education and the Ministry of Trade in Baghdad.

And,

Profile: Helping Saddam; Iraqi government ordered anthrax and botulism- producing bacteria from United States in late 1980s

02/22/1998
60 Minutes
CBS, Inc. Burrelle's Information Services
(Copyright (c) 1998 CBS, Inc. All rights reserved.)

HELPING SADDAM

MORLEY SAFER, co-host:

Exactly what weapons Saddam is hiding and where he's hiding them remains a mystery. Where he got them and how he developed them is not. He got a lot of help from the British, the French, the Germans, the Russians and from us. Back in the late '80s when Saddam was considered by some as our friend or at least the enemy of our enemy Iran, we provided Iraq with two of the deadliest substances known to man, bacteria that produces botulism and anthrax . Among those who thought that what we were doing was all wrong was a former deputy undersecretary of defense named Dr. Steven Bryen.

Dr. STEVEN BRYEN (Former Deputy Undersecretary of Defense): Well, it was very complicated before the Gulf War because the administration was trying very hard to be friends with Saddam Hussein, largely because of the great concern about Iran and the fear of Iran. And Iraq was seen as a--a balancer and as a moderate force, whereas Iran was an Islamic force. So there was a lot of pressure to release technology to Iraq ; technology that shouldn't go there, in my opinion.

SAFER: Were people out saying, `Look, this guy is not a very stable ally'?

Dr. BRYEN: People were not saying, `This guy is not a very stable ally.' That was the problem. Official Washington turned a blind eye to that sort of thing because it really wanted very badly to establish a positive relationship with Saddam.

(Footage of Steven Bryen; Department of State building; Saddam Hussein; vintage footage of Kurdish village after nerve gas attack)

SAFER: (Voiceover) Dr. Bryen was the Pentagon's top cop, the man whose job it was to ensure that sensitive technology would be kept from enemies, potential enemies and questionable allies. But he was up against a formidable adversary: the US State Department, who wanted to satisfy Saddam's appetite despite the clear and present danger.

Dr. BRYEN: (Voiceover) Even as late as 1988 when the Kurdish village in- -in Iraq was attacked by helicopters carrying nerve gas, the Washington reaction was still hands off.

SAFER: He realized `Look, I could bomb Kurdish villages with nerve gas, I could use chemical agents against the Iranians.'

Dr. BRYEN: `And the Americans won't say anything about it.' There was no official condemnation by the United States of these attacks. At that point, Saddam had to think we were a heck of a good ally because here we are letting him get away with these things.

(Footage of American Type Culture Collection building; ATCC sign; vials of cultures; storage containers; infectious substance label; photograph of document with close-up of text: 881215 Iraq Atomic Energy Commission)

SAFER: (Voiceover) Getting away with it was easy. The bacteria was simply ordered from this facility, The American Type Culture Collection of Rockville, Maryland, a non-profit supplier of microbes to the world. They're generally used for public health research. The Iraqi orders, including 34 batches of the deadliest bacteria, did not pass through Pentagon watchdogs. They were simply approved by the Commerce Department.

Dr. BRYEN: I was shocked to see that biological samples would be going to the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission because in--it was absolutely clear that--that--that the at--Is--Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission was involved in their nuclear weapons programs and God knows what other weapons programs.

SAFER: I--in very precise terms, what was the--the policy about shipping bacterial cultures like anthrax and botulism to Iraq ?

Dr. BRYEN: I don't think there was a policy in--in--in the administration at the time. I think there was a--a general understanding that a shipment of these kinds of materials was sensitive, required a license.

SAFER: And yet the Commerce Department signed off on them?

Dr. BRYEN: The Commerce Department approved all these licenses. There were a number of licenses. We're not talking about one got through and the others got stopped; we're talking about they all got through, un-- untouched, unstopped.

(Footage of person at computer; ATCC order form coming out of printer; anthrax )

SAFER: (Voiceover) And to find out how to order up some anthrax , just dial up ATCC 's Web site, as we did today, and with the flip of a printer, your order form. Visa and MasterCard accepted. By the way, the effect of inhaled anthrax : one day of flu symptoms, followed by a few days of pneumonia symptoms, followed by death.

Dr. BRYEN: The one experience we have with anthrax in Sverdlovsk in Russia where some of this leaked into the air is that it killed people and animals for over 40 miles from where--where the damage occurred.

SAFER: We do know it was a relatively small amount.

Dr. BRYEN: A relatively small amount and it wasn't because the place was bombed; it was because something leaked and it escaped into the a-- air. So when you hit it with a bomb, you potentially could release everything. So it's worrisome to me that we might set loose some of this kind of material.

SAFER: When you were in that job as--as the--the Pentagon's cop to oversee what was going where, did you get into any confrontations?

Dr. BRYEN: Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. I had a big confrontation over the shipment of atropine injectors to Iraq . I blocked it. And atropine is an antidote for nerve gas. And so far as I knew, the only nerve gas in the region was Iraqi nerve gas, so it was clear that they wanted one-- they wanted this for offensive purposes, not for defense.

SAFER: To protect their own troops?

Dr. BRYEN: To protect their own troops, and--and to allow them to use it in fairly close-in situations against--against other forces, Iranians or Americans or whoever. . . .

My prediction: the next "Iranian nukes" scam - an Iranian "nuclear defector"

Some people have notices how the Bush administration is playing the same game about Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program as it did with Iraq's non-existent WMDs.

So here's my prediction: soon, a "dissident Iranian nuclear scientists" will pop up to "prove" that Iran has a nuclear weapons. He'll be yet another slimy little self-serving snake making wild claims, who will quitely slither away once he's exposed as a fraud.

And the media will dutifully propagandize his claims. Happened before, will happen again.

More on multinational uranium enrichment on Iranian soil

Scott Peterson of the Christian Science Monitor has an article entitled "Talk of International Consortium" which discusses a potential solution to the US-Iran nuclear impasse: operating Iran's uranium enrichment facility on a multinational basis on Iranian soil, with the participation of foreign governments and corporations. This potential solution was also recently brought up in an article in the New York Review of Books by a couple of ex-diplomats and a nuclear scientist from the US, which was endorsed by a couple of US Senators. The idea is that operating an enrichment facility on a multinational basis would make it impossible for any enriched uranium to be secretly diverted for potential weapons use without being detected, while at the same time it would recognize Iran's nuclear rights also assuage Iran's perfectly legitimate strategic concerns of having an independent nuclear fuel source.

The author of the article mentions that Iran has made this offer in the past. In fact, Ahmadinejad raised it during his speech to the UN, but others have endorsed a similar solution too, including an expert committee of the IAEA which was set up to address the issue of potential diversion of nuclear material from civilian to military use.

Of course, what Scott Peterson of the Christian Science Monitor fails to recognize is that this suggestion of a multnational enrichment facility, which would address any real nuclear weapons proliferation concerns, has been consistently ignored by US (along with all of other Iranian nuclear compromise offers) for a very simple reason that I have discussed before: THE NUCLEAR ISSUE IS A PRETEXT AND A DISTRACTION. The US position that there should not be any enrichment at all in Iran is not actually based on any real concern about nuclear weapons proliferation, and it never was -- just as the "WMDs in Iraq" claim had no real relationship any actual concerns about WMDs in Iraq. In fact, every time Iran has made a compromise -- such as when Iran suspended enrichment for 2 years during the Paris Agreement -- the US has simply increased its demands and deliberately placed more obstacles in the way of resolution. Why do you suppose that is?

The US needs to keep the the nuclear dispute with Iran alive, one way or another. Why else do you think the US waiting until the last moment to present the "Laptop of Death" claims to the IAEA? It was a last-ditch effort to prevent the IAEA from issuing Iran a clean bill of health. Why do you think that Rice insists that Iran first give up its nuclear rights before the US will negotiate with Iran on its nuclear rights? Why do you think the Bush administration insists on the ridiculous position that Iran should not even have the "knowledge" of nuclear technology, or (as they demanded more recently) that Iran must "confess" to seeking nuclear bombs? All of these are proof that the US is not really interested in resolving the nuclear dispute

Thus, no amount of Iranian compromise offers -- not even the quite generous (and totally non-obligatory) Iranian offer to allow multinational enrichment on Iranian soil -- will ever satisfy the Bush administration, which is using the nuclear pretext to pursue an anti-Iran and pro-Israel agenda that was set long ago, and which requires subjugating Iran. That is what's really going on. So all this talk about nuclear matters simply misses the real issue and allows the Bush to distract people from his true agenda: sparking a conflict with Iran to suit Israe, and monopolize nuclear enrichment.

Anyway, at the risk of perpetuating the myth that this dispute really has anything to do with nuclear issues, I think it is obvious that before such an offer of multinational enrichment can be accepted by Iran, all sanctions on the importation of high technology have to be totally and permanently removed. Otherwise, no such solution can work.

Here's more information on Iran's offer of multinational uranium enrichment, in case you're interested:

Iran seeks $350 mln foreign cash for uranium plant

9 November 2005 Reuters News
English
(c) 2005 Reuters Limited

TEHRAN, Nov 9 (Reuters) - Iran said on Wednesday it was confident it would attract investment of up to
$350 million from foreign companies to help it complete its first uranium enrichment plant -- a project Washington wants Iran to scrap.

In a move Tehran says will prove to the world that its nuclear ambitions are entirely peaceful, the government last week approved a plan to allow private or state-owned foreign companies to participate in its uranium enrichment project.

The offer has fallen on stony ground in Washington and the European Union, chief critics of Iran's nuclear programme which hope to persuade Tehran to abandon its drive to produce its own nuclear fuel.

But the head of Iran's Atomic Energy Agency, Gholamreza Aghazadeh, said similar joint ventures had been carried out with nuclear projects in Europe, and Iran was confident it would attract investors for its Natanz enrichment plant.

"In the coming months we will have good news regarding this project," the official IRNA news agency quoted him as telling a news conference for local reporters.

"Eventually the West will have no choice but to participate," he said....

And,

Iran offers world 35% nuclear stake Al-Jazeera.net Wednesday 09 November 2005, 22:37 Makka Time, 19:37 GMT

Iran's offer pertains to the Natanz nuclear plant

Iran says it will give the outside world a 35% share in its uranium enrichment programme as a guarantee that its contentious nuclear project won't be diverted toward weapons.

Vice President Gholamreza Aghazadeh said on Wednesday that allowing foreign countries and companies a role in Iran's uranium enrichment programme is the "maximum concession" Tehran can offer, state-run television reported.

Aghazadeh, who also heads the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran, said foreign governments and companies can hold a 35% share for investment and practically contribute in and monitor the uranium enrichment in Natanz, central Iran.

"The 35% share is not only investment. They will have a presence in the process (of uranium enrichment) and production (of nuclear fuel)," Aghazadeh said.

"It's the best kind of international supervision totally negating any possibility of diversion (toward
weapons)," he said...

And,

Iran allows foreign firms up to 35 per cent investment in nuclear facilities
9 November 2005
BBC Monitoring Newsfile

Text of report by Iranian TV on 9 November

Head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization [Gholamreza Aqazadeh] has announced details for the participation of private and public sectors of other countries in Iran's nuclear programme.

In a news conference, Gholamreza Aqazadeh pointed to a proposal made by the president at the UN, and explained the way in which a bill was approved by the cabinet, and said: Such a participation would be in
the sensitive and significant facilities in Natanz and its aims are removing doubts about any kind of
diversion of Iran's nuclear programme, creating confidence and showing the transparency of our
country's nuclear activities.

Mr Aqazadeh explained the areas in Natanz nuclear facilities in which foreign companies can participate,
and said: Such participation would be in the form of holding shares, participating in the management board
and benefiting from the transfer of technology.

The head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization added: On the basis of a set of rules and regulations which
has been drawn up, as a result of such participation, foreign private and public sectors can have up to 35
per cent investment in Natanz nuclear facilities.

Source: Vision of the Islamic Republic of Iran Network
2, Tehran, in Persian 1900 gmt 9 Nov 05

When spying = "Information Trading"

According to the New York Times, the AIPAC spying trial is really just about "information trading".
Yes folks, this sort of spying...sorry, I meant "information trading"... is so routine in Washington that it is really actually legal -- or so the defense attorneys of the pro-Israeli agents claim. "Everyone does it" is their defense.

And you know what? They'll probably win. It probably is true that Israeli spying is so routine and institutionalized that it is in effect quite legal.

"Chemical Ali" and his backers

"Chemical Ali", the Iraqi official responsible for Saddam's chemical warfare, is to be hanged. ISN has an interesting article on why the real culprits who backed and armed "Chemical Ali" have thus far avoided justice:

Iran complained bitterly to the international community. Several UN missions were dispatched to Iran, but only two UN resolutions addressed the chemical attacks, both weakly worded and failing to make explicit Iraq's violation of the Protocol. One of the resolutions did not even name Iraq explicitly as the originator of the attacks on Iran...

Iraq purchased many of its weapons from the West, even during the period after the Kurdish massacre in 1988. Before the Gulf War, Iraq was supplied by a number of countries including Russia, France, Brazil, the US and the UK. German companies sold components for purifying uranium as well as materials for Iraq's mustard and nerve gas.

Note that these same countries that are sanctioning Iran for its nuclear program have Iranian and Iraqi blood on their hands. This is the real, ugly world.

Israel: Hyping Iran threat, blackmailing US into war.

Gregory Levey at Salon.com reports that the Israelis and their agents in Washington are "once again" hyping the Iran threat:

Meanwhile, in Washington, various interest groups with hard-line views on Iran and the Middle East have been working vigorously to refocus U.S. and world attention on Iran as an imminent threat. They include Evangelical Christians and conservative Jewish lobbyists ...

Yeah yeah -- same old same old. But "once again"?? When did they ever stop?

More interestingly, I am noticing a new spin emerging in these sorts of articles: the suggestion that unless Israel manages to get the US to attack Iran first, then Israel has some sort of inherent right to attack Iran on its own.

In effect, this would be Israel again starting a war, and demanding that the US finish it. This is usually known as blackmail. What exactly is this Israeli attack on Iran going to accomplish other than involving the US? Nothing -- just like the Israeli bombing of Iraq's nuclear reactor at Osirak was actually a pathetic failure.

So anyway, lets watch this new spin and see how it develops.

PS: I don't believe for a moment that this third-rate "Mossad" guy operated anywhere except behind a desk.

Dubious Nuclear Data Basis for New Sanctions on Iran

Ronda Hauben has an article in Telepolis (an online news magazine from Germany) which I recommend:

The laptop is of dubious origin and its supposed information has been in the hands of the US government since 2004. The US waited until a few days before the [February 2008] IAEA report was due out before turning over material to the IAEA to make available. By so doing the US helped to turn a report highly favorable to Iran's cooperation with the IAEA into one that was associated with studies related to military objectives though no proof existed to support such allegations....

Iran is presented with the obligation to prove the absence of something, even though the Report goes on to acknowledge that "with the exception of the issue of the alleged studies, which is outstanding, the Agency has no concrete information about possible current undeclared nuclear material."

EU, US try to re-write IAEA report to suit themselves

Apparently the EU and US think they can manufacture their own reality:

International Atomic Energy Agency Director Mohamed ElBaradei had said on Monday his inspectors had clarified all but one remaining issue of nuclear proliferation concern. The rest were "no longer outstanding" and this "was encouraging".

But Britain, France and Germany, who sponsored a third round of U.N. Security Council sanctions imposed on Iran on Monday, cast Iran's recent behavior in a distinctly more negative light than ElBaradei at a 35-nation IAEA Board of Governors meeting.

Hitchens' idea of solving the US-Iran conflict

Christopher Hitchens, the big supporter of the US invasion of Iraq, think's he's figured out a way to solve the US-Iran dispute: blackmail the Iranians into giving up their nuclear rights by promising them aid in case of an earthquake.

Yes folks, the Bush administration did such a wonderful job rebuilding their own country after Katrina, that other countries should wish to suffer similar natural disasters.

This is the sort of insane BATSHIT CRAZY ravings of a lunatic that gets published in the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal.

Honestly, I hate reading stuff like that. It makes me feel infected.

"Iranian nukes" is just a pretext

I've always said that the "Iranian nukes" claim is mostly irrelevant and just a pretext for regime change and regional dominance which was planned long ago.

That's why repeated Iranian nuclear compromise offers and peace feelers were spurned and lied about, even though they would have addressed any real concerns of nuclear weapons proliferation. And that's also why the US has only increased demands for concessions whenever Iran has shown any flexibility, has consistently tried to undermine the IAEA's findings on Iran, has manufactured fake claims against Iran, and has sabotaged or undermined European attempts at reaching compromise with Iran, and why the Bush administration has imposed unreasonable preconditions on any negotiations -- in short, they really don't want to see the nuclear issue resolved since that would deprive them of a convenient pretext.

Quite the opposite, they want to cause a war.

So the next time the media attempts to distract you with all the technical mumbo-jumbo about nukes and nuclear weapons and whether really has nukes or not, ask yourself if they're actually simply missing the bigger issue of a pre-determined US policy to undermine Iran which has nothing to do with nukes anyway.

Iranian nukes in the propaganda cycle

I've been thinking some more about the Washington Post's article entitled ""UN says Iran may not have come clean on nuclear past"

Note what has happened: the US presented these "alleged studies" claims obtained from the "Laptop of Death" to the IAEA. The IAEA's Deputy Director for Safeguards then presents it to the Board of Governors. An anonymous US diplomat takes notes of the presentation, and then he or she gives the notes over to a Washington Post reporter...who publishes an article attributing the claims to the UN.

Man, talk about a spin-cycle!

This is how you get others to say things which wouldn't sound so credible if you said them yourself.

UK Parliament report on Iran's nuke program - Summarily Debunked.

A Foreign Affairs Committee of the British Parliament has come out with a new report which claims that Iran could have a nuclear "breakout capacity" by 2015. In addition to repeating the standard neocon talking points accusing Iran of giving aid to the Taliban and such, they are essentially repeating three forms of rhetorical fallacies that I have discussed previously: they're resorting first to "ambiguity" and "shifting the burden of proof" by deliberately conflating a nuclear weapons "capability" with a perfectly legal, IAEA-monitored civilian nuclear program, demanding that Iran prove it won't possibly use is civilian program to possibly make a bomb sometime in the indefinite future - which is of course impossible to prove. Note that no one is demanding that S. Korea prove it won't make a bomb, for eample, even though they were caught violating their NPT safeguards. Then, they also resort to the "slippery slope" argument, which claims that Iran's nuclear program somehow will supposedly cause a regional cascade of nuclear weapons proliferation, in disregard of Israel's existing nukes and the growing regional popularity of nuclear energy which predates Iran's nuclear program.

First, regarding the claim about an Iranian "breakout capacity": A breakout capacity is defined as the theoretical capability of a nation to make a nuclear bomb, if it should ever decide to do so.
The beauty of invoking a "breakout capacity" is that any country with a basic nuclear program can be similarly accused of obtaining a "breakout capacity" since there's no real difference between civilian and military nuclear technology. Currently, there are about 49 countries which already have this "breakout capacity", according to ElBaradei himself.

This argument also has the benefit of avoiding the issue of evidence, as I have mentioned:

The absence of any actual evidence of an Iranian nuclear-weapons programme is being smoothed over through the use of ambiguities. This is usually done by conflating a nuclear-weapons programme with a nuclear-energy programme. Legally, the two are quite distinct: according to the terms of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), countries like Iran are entitled to obtain and possess civilian nuclear technology for peaceful purposes "to the fullest extent possible" and "without discrimination". That is why a number of other countries have developed the same nuclear-enrichment technologies that Iran is developing now, including Brazil, and why the United States encouraged and supported Iran's nuclear programme under the shah.

The intentional conflation of a nuclear weapons programme with a nuclear-energy programme takes several forms. For example, in addition to overt references to a weapons programme, there may be references to Iran's nuclear "threat", or vague statements about Iran's nuclear "ambitions", or even more tenuously, allusions to Iran's "intentions" to obtain a nuclear-weapons "capability".

Funny how this UK Parliamentary report meets that description perfectly! Of course, in addition, this form of argument has the benefit of shifting the burden on Iran to somehow prove that it won't do something at some point in the indefinite future -- an impossible task.

In short, to demand that Iran not have a "breakout capacity" is really to demand that Iran give up her inalienable sovereign right to nuclear technology based on nothing more thane hypoctitical suppositions about possible future conduct, and to expect her fall behind all the other countries that have or will develop this technology as nuclear fuel becomes the sole source of power in the future - thus forcing Iran to become forever and ever reliant on the whims of foreign powers to decide when or if they will sell Iran -- at inflated prices, no doubt -- the nuclear fuel it would need to keep its population from freezing in the dark.

In fact, not only does the Committee report quite deliberately conflate a perfectly legal nuclear energy program with "making nukes", it goes on to claim that this theoretical Iranian "breakout capacity" would spark regional nuclear proliferation. Again, I have dealt with this discredited "slippery slope" argument before:

It is highly ironic that Iran's mere capability to build nuclear weapons can supposedly spark this uncontrollable cascade of nuclear proliferation, and yet Israel's existing nuclear weapons are not said to have this effect. Indeed, if we are to accept, as the fallacious argument assumes, that one country's nuclear capability will force other countries to acquire their own nuclear deterrent, then the real regional culprit for proliferation must be the original nuclear power in the region: Israel. Note also that similar predictions of regional arms races have not been made when, for example, Brazil recently acquired the same nuclear technology that Iran is seeking to develop. Finally, the argument assumes that the other countries in the region aren't already working to develop their own nuclear programmes...

So there you go: the British Parliament's Foreign Committee report, debunked in toto in 4 paragraphs.

Look folks, Iranians aren't fools. You'll need to do better than this nonsense.

Using the IAEA to undermine the Iran NIE

Gareth Porter reports, the documents provided to the IAEA about "alleged studies" carried out by into weaponization of nukes were probably sourced from the Israelis who gave it to the MEK who handed it to German intelligence. But, the US media is ignoring all this and is instead playing up the "alleged studies" documents, claiming that "according to the United Nations" it is possible that Iran continued its "nuclear weapons program" past 2003. They're quite deliberately overlooking what the IAEA report actually said (that it has "no credible evidence in this regard") and are instead trying to play up the "alleged studies" as much as they can since otherwise the rest of the Feb 2007 IAEA report was favorable to Iran.

That the US media would try to put the worst possible spin on the IAEA report was predictable. However, what's interesting is that they're also using the claims about the "alleged studies" to undermine the 2007 NIE which said that Iran had stopped its supposed nuclear weapons program in 2003 -- a conclusion which had stuck in the craw of the warmongers and the Israelis quite badly. Remember, no sooner had the NIE come out than Bush rushed over to Israel to assure Olmert that he didn't believe his own intelligence agencies. Ever since then, the warmongers have been trying to undermine the NIE.

The media, however, are playing along and dutifully acting as mouthpieces. Take the Wahington Post's report today: "UN says Iran may not have come clean on nuclear past"

They make a point of attributing this claim -- quite falsely -- to the UN or IAEA in order to give it credibility. What really happened is that an IAEA official gave a briefing to the the IAEA Board of Governors about the "alleged studies" (what the IAEA report calls it) that Iran supposedly carried out on the weaponization of nukes. The fact still remains that the source of these claims is ultimately nothing more than the same "Laptop of Death" -- and as the IAEA report itself made clear, the IAEA itself only obtained these "documents" a few days before the report was issued, and was still studying the documents. The UN has not reached any conclusions nor has it made any allegations against Iran regardless of what the Washington Post claims.

The other Iranian 'dictator' -- the other Iran sanctions.

This isn't the first time that an Iranian "dictator" has had the impertinence to insist that Iran freely use its own resources for its own people's benefit, only to be faced with sanctions and financial restrictions by the US and UK as a result...

Click on the exerpts of Wall Street Journal from to read them:

Uranium enrichment: good for us, not for Iran

AP reports:

Even as the government continues to oppose Iran's efforts to enrich uranium for power plants, projects to do just that are under way in this country.

General Electric Co. and USEC Inc., along with European rivals Urenco Ltd. and Areva Inc., are pushing billions worth of new U.S. enrichment plants or technology so they don't miss the new uranium boom.

Read more about Iran and uranium enrichment factoids.

Iran-US nuclear impasse

The Feb 2008 IAEA report said that the IAEA had received information on weaponization studies carried out by Iran.

The same report also said that it was just now presented with information on these "alleged studies," despite the fact that the US has been shopping the information around for 3 years as proof on Iranian perfidy, and that the IAEA has seen no diversion of nuclear material for those "alleged studies" nor does it have "any credible information in that regard."

Other than that, according to the report, all the other allegations against Iran have been resolved. Sounds to me like Iran has been essentially proven truthful, and the IAEA report was favorable to Iran -- but you wouldn't know it from reading the US media coverage.

The IAEA has asked for additional transparency measures from Iran for proving that no "undeclared" activities exist. The proof that there are no undeclared activities is provided through the Additional Protocol. Iran isn't legally bound by it, but again according to this report, Iran has voluntarily implemented it though on an "ad hoc" basis, and the IAEA says it has no evidence of any undeclared activities existing in Iran either.
Note that even though Iran is not bound by the Additional Protocol, Iran voluntarily implemented the Additional Protocol for 2 years as a good faith gesture, as certified by the IAEA itself, only to be cheated during the Paris Agreement negotiations process. However, Iran has said that it would ratify the Additional Protocol onces its legal rights are recognized...compare this to Egypt, recently held up by Sec of State Rice as a model nuclear aspirant, which has refused to sign the Additional Protocol.

ElBaradei has, during some of his TV interviews, made some policy proscriptions about "regional security arrangements" etc. and has asked Iran to provide additional transparency measures that go beyond even the Additional Protocol. The IAEA can ask all it wants, but it is in no position to demand this, nor are the other policy views of ElBaradei legally binding on Iran. Iran has already done more than it was required, for example by suspending enrichment for 2 years -- only to be cheated.

Iran has offered a solution -- multinational enrichment on Iranian soil. Others have endorsed this solution as the best way out of the Iran-US impasse. The US has instead steadfastly insisted that the Iranians be deprived of even the "knowledge" of nuclear technology and, far beyond demanding a suspension on enrichment, now further demands that Iran "confess" to seeking bombs. The US also spurned Iran's comprehensive peace offer in 2003.

Clearly, the Bush administration has no interest in resolving this dispute and needs it as a pretext for another agenda. Thus no amount of Iranian compromises will ever suffice, and the demands on Iran will only increase if Iran shows any willingness to compromise -- just as happened during the Paris Agreement negotiations. As the blatantly transparent Israeli lobbying in the US for the launch of a war on Iran proves, the matter is not so much about nukes as it is to establish Israeli dominance in the Mideast in the short run, while also monopolizing the technology for manufacturing nuclear reactor fuel - the sole source of power in the near future.

Under these circumstances, the belief that an Iranian compromise on the nuclear matter will be met with matching compromise from the US side, is simply naive. The world simply does not work that way, and powers do not make compromises out of a sheer moral impulse. Instead, they do so out of temporary politicial necessity.