Week in Review

DoctorZin provides a review of this past week's [3/27-4/2] major news events regarding Iran.

The EU3 Negotiations with Iran:

• The EU3 considered letting Iran keep a limited nuclear enrichment program that could be used to make bombs. But fortunately, they later rejected the idea.
• Iran was furious over Condi's statement that we need to close the NTP uranium enrichment loophole.
  

Developments in Iran's Nuclear Program:

• Iran allocated $2.5 billion to obtain three nuclear warheads last year according to an exiled opposition group.
• Iran put on a media show of the uranium enrichment facility in Natanz with a guide tour by President Khatami. The US responded.

US Policy and Iran:

• US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice released the DOS report Supporting Human Rights and Democracy: The U.S. Record 2004 - 2005. The excerpt on Iran.
  

Popular struggle inside of Iran:

• Iranians boycott Iran's Islamic Republic day.
• Sporadic clashes follow a more limited celebration in Iran. Plus more unrest.
  

Iran's friends outside of Iran:

• Eli Lake reports that Iranian dissidents are asking for aid from President Bush, not just words.
• Iranian Doctor fled Iran to tell the truth about the death of Canadian reporter Kazemi. As a result, Canada's PM considers new action against Iran. Iran Press News tells the rest of the story.
  

Lunacy in the west:

• ABC's Nightline broadcast an interview of students inside of Iran. An Iranian student who recently escaped Iran published a rebuke of the broadcast's shameful propaganda for the Iranian regime.
• The Washington Post reported, "Past Arguments Don't Square With Current Iran Policy," in which Dafna Linzer alleges President Ford reluctantly offered Iran nuclear technology, but the Weekly Standard tells the rest of the story.

Iran's Neighbors:

• Europeans say Iran is not a threat for nearly six out of ten EU3 adults according to a recent poll.
• Pakistani centrifuges being sent to IAEA at Iran's request.
• Egyptian court rules, Mubarak was the target of an Iranian assassination plot. Iran denies it. Iran blames Israel.
  

Middle East Experts:

• Charles Krauthammer, says it's time to break the true Axis Of Evil (Syrian and Iran).
• FrontPageMag.com has published a symposium on the "nuclear outlaws."
• Dr. Jerome Corsi released his TV ad: Iran Nukes NYC in which New York City is destroyed by Iranian supported terrorists. You can view the ad now.
• Michael Ledeen points out that the MSM doesn’t want to get that the people of Iran want a regime change. ABC's Nightline proves he is right.
• AEI held a Web Event: Is It a Revolution or What? You can view it online here.
• The Power and Interest News Report (PINR) reports that Iran will attempt to fill the vacuum left by the Syrian troops returning home.
• Lawrence F. Kaplan reports administration hawks have insisted on a drop-dead date for the EU3/Iran talks, a few months after Iran's elections in June.
• Richard Clarke is concerned that Iran will either get the bomb or trade concessions soon and that in either case will be stronger.
  

And finally, The Quote of the Week:

Iranians were in the streets chanting:

"Death to those who kill our freedom-fighters. Death to a puppet parliament; Death to armed despots... Bush, Bush, support, protection..."

Saturday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 4.2.2005:

Shame on ABC: An Iranian Student Responds to ABC's Nightline report by Bob Woodruff

The other night ABC's Nightline broadcast an interview from inside of Iran. I received a number of emails about the broadcast. I did not see it, but my readers follow the events in Iran closely they told me they were amazed at the questions in the interview and the naivete or deceit of the interviewer, Bob Woodruff. They were concerned that the American public was given a false understanding of what is happening in Iran. Many said the broadcast appeared to be shameful propaganda for the Iranian regime.

One of those angered by the broadcast was a student who just escaped Iran for supporting its pro-democracy forces there. This student wrote the following public statement to ABC News, Bob Woodruff and the Nightline staff, and asked me to publish it here.

Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

• SMCCDI reports Iranians break Islamist taboos today in massive outdoor event.
• Canada's PM considers new action against Iran for the murder of Canadian reporter Kazemi.
• Charles Krauthammer, says it's time to break the true Axis Of Evil (Syrian and Iran).
• French president Jacques Chirac is to meet next Tuesday with Iranian President Mohammad Khatami.
• Dr. Jerome Corsi warns that an atomic Iran is imminent and that mullahs may have bomb by June.
• Victor Davis Hanson counsels the President not to stop now with his efforts to bring democracy to the Middle East, dispute the dangers.
• Lebanon's The Daily Star makes a compelling argument why the US is unlikely to deal militarily with Iran.
• Eli Lake reports that Iranian dissidents are asking for aid from President Bush, not just words.
• Michael Evans reminds us that April Fools' Day in Iran was the birth of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the horrors that followed.
• And finally, Iran Press News tells the story of the Canadian reporter gang-raped and murdered - Mullahs' style.
  

Shame on ABC: An Iranian Student Responds to ABC’s Nightline report by Bob Woodruff

The other night ABC’s Nightline broadcast an interview from inside of Iran. I received a number of emails about the broadcast. I did not see it, but my readers follow the events in Iran closely they told me they were amazed at the questions in the interview and the naivete or deceit of the interviewer, Bob Woodruff. They were concerned that the American public was given a false understanding of what is happening in Iran. Many said the broadcast appeared to be shameful propaganda for the Iranian regime.

One of those angered by the broadcast was a student who just escaped Iran for supporting its pro-democracy forces there. This student wrote the following public statement to ABC News, Bob Woodruff and the Nightline staff, and asked me to publish it here:

A few nights ago, I was watching ABC's Nightline and I was angered to discover how the main stream media could twist what is happening in my poor country. The report was broadcast just two nights after the deadly protests of Tehran which resulted in death of 8 young Iranian soccer fans.

Nightline’s Bob Woodruff was in Tehran and met with some young Iranians and asked them how they felt about their government, society and freedom.
Unfortunately, he was able to get them to say what he wanted to hear!

He asked them if they knew how the regime arrests freedom loving people or how many newspapers had been shut down.

None of those who were questioned could answer the questions properly. One responded, “I do not know how they arrest people, I have never heard that they arrest people.” Another girl in the session said the same thing. Such statements are beyond belief.

I can speak from personal experience. Iranians know the danger of being arrested in Iran for violating one of the many so called crimes against the Islamic Republic. One may be arrested for simply being with a friend of the opposite sex. I was arrested twice for walking with my girl friend in the streets of Tehran. I know how they arrest people both in public and in private. Most of my friends have been caught for exercising their basic rights of freedom in Iran.

If Bob Woodruff wanted the truth, he should have sought out the stories of those who have been get caught by the regime militias or police forces. Then he would understand why we want an end to this regime.

Mr. Woodruff, “What kind of question was that to ask these young Iranians?” If you wanted to know if the Iranian regime arrests people, just watch CNN or other news channel files on Iran's July 1999 protests and you would be able to see the answer with your own eyes.

Why doesn't the mainstream media talk to people who are willing to talk, people like me and the thousands of Iranians like me who have the courage to talk about the mad Mullahs and their brutal reign?

I felt sorry for those in that interview session with Bob Woodruff. I suspect they were frightened. They were likely afraid of the consequences of their contact with the foreign media. Or they were cowards, lacking the strength to speak out against the Mullahs before a foreign audience. Sadly, they lost a great moment to tell the truth about the regime and I am so sorry for them.

Today, the world needs to know why so many of us in Iran hate the Mullahs ruling our beloved country. The world needs to know why we are so angry and desperate. The sad fact is that Iran’s human rights record is getting worse every day and the only way we can attract the world’s attention to our country's problems is to talk to the mainstream media. I thought reporters coming to Iran would seek out the truth and report it. However, now I really doubt there is any fair and un-biased media existing in this world.

I ask you Mr. Woodruff, we are just learning what the Iranian regime did to the visiting Canadian journalist Zahra Kazemi in the infamous Evin prison. Have you ever heard about her? Have you tried to talk to her family? If you would have talked to her family, you could have found out how they arrest people in Iran from them. You could have also discovered what can happen to those who get caught by the regime. It is so easy to find out the truth in Iran. Mr. Woodruff, turn off your camera and talk to people in the streets of Tehran.

I am not writing here to protest the way my fellow Iranians answered Bob Woodruff’s questions. What I am trying to say is that the left leaning mainstream media in the US appear to have no respect for those who fight for their own freedom!

We, in Iran, do seek a legitimate form of government which respects all groups of people and behave like a civilized regime in the world and represent all Iranians in a very democratic way.

I was so ashamed of my Iranian brethren who did not dare talk about the dirty deeds of the regime. But I can not blame them. I know in what conditions they are living and how frustrating it is!

Perhaps they were really tired of talking because there is no body listening to them!?

What I have been asking myself was it possible that ABC either hired those guys to say what Bob Woodruff wanted them to say and hear or were they just too frightened to speak out.

The truth will come out once my country is free and we proudly take back our country from the evil rule of the radical Mullahs.

God Bless Iran!
Freedom for Iranians!

I hope ABC is listening.

Iranians break Islamist taboos in massive outdoor event

SMCCDI (Information Service):

Today, millions of Iranians celebrated the traditional yearly "Sizdeh Bedar" marking the end of Persian New Year celebration which started on March 20th. Crowds gathered from the late hours of morning in Tehran and in most provincial cities' parks or green areas organizing immense picnics. Many more had already traveled out of cities a few days ago and celebrated this tradition in camp grounds or rural areas by returning to nature which is the purpose of this Persian event.

Many were seen breaking Islamic taboos and the regime's forced "moral code" by dancing or chanting. Some sporadic clashes have been reported from several areas of the capital such as Manzarieh, Darband, and Park Mellat, as militiamen tried to arrest groups of young Iranians seen dancing or girls taking off their mandatory veils.

More important clashes have been reported from some northern and western cities such as Rasht, Babolsar, Saghez, Marivan, and Hamedan. READ MORE

Freedom fighters used the occasion of these gatherings, just as they have done in recent years, in order to shout slogans against the Islamic regime and its leadership which considers all Traditional Persian events as "pagan legacy".

The impact of the historical popular attachment to some of the traditional Persian events, such as Nowrooz, Tchahrshanbe Souri, and Sizdeh Bedar, is to the level that neither the Arab invaders of Iran nor the Islamist clerics have been able to force Iranians to abandon their beliefs throughout the last fourteen centuries. Recently, the regime has had to adapt itself to some aspects of these beliefs and contend with controlling them.

Even religious student groups such as the "Daftar e Tahkim Vahdat" (Daneshguah va Hoze) - Office of Consolidation Unity of Universities and Howze (Islamic schools) - which was until few years ago backing the clerics' or Islamist technocrats' anti-Iranian goals, is trying to adapt itself and had issued a communique asking for mass celebration this year. It's not necessary to say that millions of Iranians and thousands of students are seeing, in the shift of OCU's policy, another desperate try to stay on course and to claim ownership of what was happening every year as well as what will happen this year with or without its consent.

The group which is based on a kind of more 'moderate' Islamist ideology is well known for having actively tried to deviate Iranian students' struggle and to promote Khatami's corrupt gang and sham reforms. Even the imprisonment of some of its members and figure heads, due to power problems within regime's factions, were not able to stop its increasing unpopularity among lucid Iranians and students.

The increasing general negative feeling has been boosted as, recently, some of OCU heads' names have appeared under a controversial project named national call for referendum. This unpopular project which has been presented by some of
the 'former' theoreticians or founders of the Islamic regime's repressive militia, such as Mohsen Sazgara, is in reality another desperate try for a take over of the well-known legitimate aspiration of millions of Iranians for a genuine referendum in Iran on the choice of their future secular political frame.

Sazgara and some abroad based political opportunists are trying to build a false legitimacy for this project by trying to make believe that Iranian Students are endorsing their call.

Some abroad based radio commentators who are also capitalizing on the OCU and Mohsen Sazgara have caused anger among many listeners as they tried, in their program yesterday, to make beleive that what was going to happen today, at the occasion of Sizdeh Bedar, will be due to the OCU's call. The radio commentator and one of his colleagues are also known for some of their destructive roles by trying to surf, for their own agenda, the wave of student protests and trying to deviate it from its natural course and legitimate aspiration by promoting specific small groups among the Iranian student body composed of more than a million and half members.

Resulting from this action, was not only that the "regime was not over on last July 9th" but also, few students and Iranians are listening to such programs after such noticeable tries to take over the students' and popular waves.

Canada's PM considers new action against Iran

Campbell Clark, Globe and Mail:

Although Foreign Affairs Minister Pierre Pettigrew has rebuffed calls for dramatic diplomatic steps, a lawyer for the family of slain photojournalist Zahra Kazemi says they are now "very optimistic" that the Prime Minister's Office is listening to calls for new action against Iran. READ MORE

Marlys Edwardh said Ms. Kazemi's family believes the government is now open to their calls for a broader range of measures, even if it does not have the taste for diplomatic protests like withdrawing Canada's ambassador to Tehran.

"We have a number of things we want to talk about, and they don't all relate to diplomatic initiatives from Foreign Affairs at all," she said.

Calls for Canada to take strong new action have been sparked by revelations that Ms. Kazemi was brutally raped and tortured while in Iranian custody in 2003.

That new information came from Iranian emergency-room physician Shahram Azam, who saw Ms. Kazemi at Tehran's Baghiattulah hospital four days after her arrest.

The information confirmed allegations that Ms. Kazemi had been beaten to death by Iranian security officials after being arrested while taking pictures of a demonstration outside a Tehran prison, although Iran's official position is that she fainted and hit her head.

On Thursday, Mr. Pettigrew called that new information "most disturbing" but added that it did not fundamentally change the nature of the case. He rebuffed calls from opposition critics for Canada to take tougher diplomatic action, including recalling its ambassador.

But yesterday, Prime Minister Paul Martin said the new account means the international community must hold Iran to account for the death, and he suggested new legal avenues might be open on the international stage.

"I think there's no doubt whether you are talking about international courts or whether you are talking about the UN Commission on Human Rights," he said, "I would certainly think the details of what happened to her now in the testimony that has been brought has got to make the world aware of just what Iran is all about and that they have got to be held to account."

Ms. Edwardh said that she and Ms. Kazemi's son, Stephan Hachemi, have been given new hope because the Prime Minister's Office quickly agreed to a request for a meeting with senior advisers even though they know what demands the Kazemi family will make.

"We are very optimistic," she said. "The government knows the kinds of issues we want to put on the table. And I think there is no stomach from Canadians to do nothing."

For one thing, they will ask the government to amend Canada's State Immunity Act so that the families of victims of torture can sue foreign countries in Canadian courts. Under that law now, foreign governments are immune from Canadian court actions. Ms. Edwardh said that she also wrote yesterday to ask for a meeting with Justice Minister Irwin Cotler to make the case for that amendment.

In addition, the Kazemi family is calling for Canada to demand that they negotiate a claim for a financial settlement regarding Ms. Kazemi's death.

"It would be Canada espousing its citizen's claims," she said. If Iran agreed to settle, "it's at least a recognition of some accountability," Ms. Edwardh said.

The United States demanded that Iran mediate a claim for damages caused by the 1979 Tehran hostage-taking, and Iran agreed to talk, she noted.

She said she would also like to see Canada enlist allies with deeper relationships with Iran, like France, to back its demand for justice.

The Prime Minister's foreign-policy adviser, Jonathan Fried, will attend the meeting, and possibly other senior advisers, a PMO spokesman said.

That meeting will focus on legal avenues, rather than potential political steps like withdrawing ambassadors or imposing trade sanctions, which Mr. Pettigrew has rebuffed as unlikely to work.

An aide to Mr. Pettigrew, Sébastien Théberge, said discussions are continuing with the family and lawyers about what can be done on the legal front to push the appeal of the process in the Iranian court.

Canadian diplomats met Thursday with representatives of the Iranian judiciary in Geneva, where a human-rights conference is under way, to reiterate Canada's position that Ms. Kazemi was murdered and Canada expects those responsible to be held accountable.

Canada's new ambassador in Iran, Gordon Venner, has instructions to use every opportunity to impress upon Iranian authorities that the failure to prosecute those responsible will remain an impediment to improving relations, which are now "tense," Mr. Théberge said.

It's Time To Break the True Axis Of Evil

Charles Krauthammer, The Union Leader:

Say what you will about Bashar Assad, dictator of Syria and perhaps the dimmest eye doctor ever produced by British medical schools, but subtle he is not. READ MORE

Since the huge street demonstrations against his occupation of Lebanon, three terror bombings have occurred there, all in heavily Christian, anti-Syrian neighborhoods. Only slightly less subtle was the nearly half-million-man Beirut rally demanding Syria’s continued occupation staged by Syria’s Lebanese client, Hezbollah, followed by the “spontaneous” demonstration Assad orchestrated for himself in Damascus.

Then there is this week’s public admission by a captured Hamas terrorist in Israel that he was trained in Syria. This is the first direct account of such active involvement by Syria, although everyone knows that the Palestinian terror groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad are headquartered in, and assisted by, Syria. Everyone also knows that Syria is abetting the terrorist insurgency in Iraq.

Syria made its intentions unmistakable when Assad sent his prime minister to Tehran to declare an alliance with Iran when world pressure began to build on Damascus following the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri.

All this regional mischief-making is critical because we are at the dawn of an Arab Spring — the first bloom of democracy in Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, Palestine and throughout the greater Middle East — and its emerging mortal enemy is a new axis of evil whose fulcrum is Syria. The axis stretches from Iran, the other remaining terror state in the region, to Syria to the local terror groups — Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad — that are bent on destabilizing Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian Authority, and destroying both Lebanese independence and the current Israeli-Palestinian rapprochement.

Iran is the senior partner of this axis of evil. Syria is the crucial middle party allowing a non-Arab state to reach into the heart of the Middle East. For example, Hezbollah receives its weapons from Iran, shipped through Syria. And Iranian Revolutionary Guards are stationed today in the Bekaa Valley, under Syrian protection.

The alliance goes back a long way. Syria under the Assad dynasty was the only major Arab country to support Persian Iran against Arab Iraq in the Iran-Iraq War. They form a true axis because, unlike the 2002 State of the Union axis, all of the parts are connected and working with each other. The last axis of evil — Iran, North Korea and Saddam’s Iraq — was evil but no axis. They were more like points of evil with North Korea included, as I wrote at the time, as a concession to ethnic diversity.

Today the immediate objective of this Iran-Syria-Hezbollah-Hamas-Islamic Jihad axis is to destabilize Syria’s neighbors (Iraq, Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian Authority) and sabotage any Arab-Israeli peace. Its strategic aim is to quash the Arab Spring, which if not stopped would isolate, surround and seriously imperilthese remaining centers of terror and radicalism. How then to defeat it? Iran is too large, oil-rich and entrenched to be confronted directly. The terror groups are too shadowy. But Syria is different.

Being a state, it has an address. The identity and location of its leadership, military installations and other fixed assets are known. Unlike Iran, however, it has no oil of any significance. It is poor and the regime is weak, despised not only for its corruption and incompetence, but also because of its extremely narrow ethnic base. Assad and his gang are almost exclusively from the Alawite sect, a Shiite offshoot considered heretical by many Muslims and representing about 10 percent of the Syrian population.

Syria is the prize. It is vulnerable and critical, the geographic center of the axis, the transshipment point for weapons, and the territorial haven for Iranian and regional terrorists. If Syria can be flipped, the axis is broken. Iran will not be able to communicate directly with the local terrorists. They will be further weakened by the loss of their Syrian sponsor and protector. Prospects both for true Lebanese independence and Arab-Israeli peace would improve dramatically.

As Iraq, in fits and starts, begins finding its way to self-rule, the center of gravity of the Bush Doctrine and the American democratization project shifts to Lebanon/Syria. The rapid evacuation and collapse of the Syrian position in Lebanon is crucial not just because of what it will do for Lebanon, but because of the weakening effect it will have on the Assad dictatorship.

We need therefore to be relentless in insisting on a full (and as humiliating as possible) evacuation of Syria from Lebanon, followed by a campaign of economic, political and military pressure on the Assad regime. We must push now and push hard.

French President to Meet with Khatami

Xinhua News Agency:

French president Jacques Chirac is to meet next Tuesday with Iranian President Mohammad Khatami and Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika at an international conference at the headquarters of UNESCO, local media reported on Friday. According to media reports, Chirac's talks with Khatami over nuclear issue are expected to be held on Tuesday afternoon at the French presidential Elysee palace.

An atomic Iran is imminent ... mullahs may have bomb by June

Dr. Jermone Corsi, WorldNetDaily.com:

Iran has been pursuing a determined clandestine path to obtain nuclear weapons. The National Council of Resistance of Iran just announced that Iran allocated $2.5 billion last year to obtain three nuclear warheads. READ MORE

The NCRI, functions as the political arm of the People's Mujahedeen, itself a questionable group designated by the U.S. government as a terrorist organization. Still, the NCRI has had a history over the past few years of disclosing important elements of Iran's clandestine nuclear program.

Then, too, we have reports that A.Q. Kahn, the discredited father of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, sold the mullahs the key final secrets to produce the weapons-ready metallized form of highly enriched uranium needed in a simple gun-type device, as well as the details for the mirrors and internal mechanisms needed to create the weapon's initial detonation.

Last week, the Islamic Republic of Iran announced the results of a successful test of a new, advanced missile, the Shahab-3, which flew 1,700 kilometers, fast and accurately.

The mullahs are buying time, negotiating with the Europeans. Is history repeating itself? The Japanese ambassadors in Washington, D.C., were negotiating with Secretary of State Cordell Hull on Dec. 6, 1941, even as the Japanese fleet was reading to launch planes against Pearl Harbor.

Now we hear the Europeans are considering conceding to the Iranian argument that under the terms of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty the mullahs have the right to enrich uranium, as long as they don't make bombs.

Recent history provides the relevant example here. In 1994, President Clinton and Secretary of State Madeline Albright entered into an "Agreed Framework" deal with North Korea under which the Clinton administration agreed to provide enough nuclear fuel to North Korea to build two power plants, with the stipulation that North Korea would halt its plutonium weapons program. Clinton even threw in a large quantity of economic aid as an incentive to keep North Korea on the straight and narrow.

What happened? Kim Jong Il built nuclear weapons and defied the world to do anything about it.

Now it's the mullahs chance to play the world for fools. President Bush has decided to allow the Europeans time to see if they can bring the mullahs into a negotiated settlement. Iran remains defiant, refusing to destroy the centrifuge farms they have built to enrich uranium to weapons grade, or the heavy-water plant they have constructed to produce weapons-grade plutonium. Sure, the Europeans have agreed to bring the case to the U.N. Security Council if they cannot produce an agreement. But how long will that take?

The administration – before President Bush and Secretary of State Rice went to Europe – had been prepared to take strong action against the mullahs right now, in March 2005. The decision to work with the Europeans, and void another pre-emptive war, has pushed back the timetable for decisive action.

But if the process stalls much beyond June 17, the mullahs may have won the gambit. If the mullahs can pull off the scheduled presidential election on June 17 without civil disobedience in the streets, the only other shoe that would have to drop is for them to announce that they do have the bomb. Then what is the world to do?

We cannot afford to discover that the mullahs have the bomb by waking up one morning to see a mushroom cloud over New York City or Tel Aviv. An atomic 9-11 is not the type of nightmare awakening the world can bear to experience. Finding out there were terrorists in our midst by seeing the second plane fly into the World Trade Center towers was bad enough.

The time when Iran will have a bomb is imminent ... no matter how many times they swear their intentions are entirely peaceful.

By the way, Dr. Corsi has just priduced a TV ad that depicts an improvised nuclear device being detonated by Iranian-backed terrorists. You can view the ad now. Spread the word!

Don’t Stop Now

Victor Davis Hanson writing for the National Review Online discusses opening pandora’s democratic box.

With the encouraging news of change in the air in Lebanon, Egypt, and the Gulf, coupled with a solidification of democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan, there has arisen a new generation of doubters. Not all are simply gnashing their teeth that their prognostications of doom were wrong, but rather often reflect genuine worries about the viability of emerging democracy in the Middle East. READ MORE

Concerns about illiberal democracy run the gamut. Some fear that Islamists will hijack democracy and install Islamist or other such theocracies. Others worry that the veneer of voting gives legitimacy to otherwise autocratic societies and leaders that will hide their crimes behind the sanction of the "people. "

There is also a vast body of research, both historical and sociological, that suggests democracy is the aftermath of a long slow evolution toward egalitarianism and economic liberalization. Ancient Greek democracy, for example, was an expansion on earlier consensual government. It did not in itself spring forth at Athens in 507 B.C. from the head of Zeus. The revolution that started in 1776, we sometimes forget, was possible because of nearly two prior centuries of English relatively liberal colonial rule, under which small landowners and shopkeepers enjoyed property rights and participated in local councils despite a distant king.

So what makes Americans think we can plop down a democracy on the ashes of Saddam's Gulag, or see free elections in a Beirut that was once the Murder, Inc. of the 1970s and 1980s? How can we even imagine that Dr. Zawahiri's dream of theocracy won't follow from the end of the Mubarak dictatorship?

As the ripples from Iraq and Afghanistan spread, we are warned that success, not failure, is our new concern: The problem is not that the Middle East cannot vote, but that it can — and that the results will be worse than the mess that preceded it.

Aside from the fact that we could never have even dreamed of such a "problem" less than four years ago when an ash cloud hovered over the crater in Manhattan, we need to reflect on a few often-forgotten realities.

First, America had few alternatives. This war was never between good and bad choices, but always a call between something bad and something far worse. The challenge was not about a post-Nazi Germany, which for a decade and a half ruined the old protocols of Prussian parliamentarianism. Iraq was not quite like prompting post-Franco Spain to allow elections when surrounded by European democracies.

No, the dilemma was an exclusively autocratic Arab Middle East. It was a mess where every bankrupt and murderous notion — Soviet-style Communism, crack-pot Baathism, radical pan-Arabism, lunatic Khadafism, "moderate" monarchy, old-style dictatorship, and eighth-century theocracy — had been tried and had failed, with terrible consequences well before September 11.

Only democracy was new. And only democracy — and its twin of open-market capitalism — offered any hope to end the plague of tribalism, gender apartheid, human-rights abuses, religious fanaticism, and patriarchy that so flourished within such closed societies.

It was not just idealism but rather abject desperation that fueled the so-called neoconservative quest to try something new.

Second, while the nature of man remains unchanged, how he communicates has been reinvented. What is bringing the Middle East to the crisis stage is the spread into traditional societies of Western-style popular culture, liberality, and materialism — with all its destabilizing and unforeseen consequences. DVDs, the Internet, rap music, wide-open television and movies — all this and more have titillated once-closed cultures. Globalization also reminded the masses just how far behind the rest of the world Arab society has lapsed under its many faces of autocracy.

But the effects of modernism were not just to reinforce a sense of failure and despair. Just as Western globalization reminds the Arab Street of what it is missing out on, so too it can offer instantaneous encouragement and support for political reform in a way impossible just years earlier. Demonstrations are flashed onto millions of television screens. Dissidents can fly back and forth to the Middle East in hours; and reports from Baghdad to the university lounge stream back and forth across oceans in a matter of seconds.

So a democrat in the Middle East has access to global education, support, and financial backing as never before. While it is accurate to say that there is almost no history of free voting in the Middle East, one can also hope that millions of Arabs see and learn from democracy everyday as they watch European, American, Turkish, and now Iraqi and Afghan democratic societies in action. That the Palestinian territories were right next to Israel, for all the tragedy of that juxtaposition, helps to explain why they are voting in a way impossible in Jordan or Egypt.

Democracy is now the rule, not the exception, and the Arab world is not so much in fear of going out on a limb as of being left behind.

Finally, there were historical accidents that helped to isolate the Arab world in ways that precluded the democratic evolution now going on in unlikely places like Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

Most important was the curse of oil. Petroleum made the Middle East the battleground of the Cold War, where the West excused right-wing autocracy if it promised to keep Communists out and keep the oil flowing. Petrodollars, in turn, warped the economy, allowing corrupt elites to avoid structural reforms and to stave off internal revolt by bribing the masses with entitlements, which only created greater appetites and resentment all at once. Nigeria, Venezuela, and Mexico are proof enough how petroleum either ensures a corrupt status quo or makes it even worse.

It was not so much the creation of Israel but the startling success of the Jewish state in a sea of Arab failure that so distorted Middle East political discourse — and out of envy and pride diverted all indigenous failure onto the Jews. Their liberal and successful nation, in an otherwise inhospitable terrain, was a daily reminder of what could be possible in such an impoverished region. The Israelis, after all, had plenty of enemies, no oil, few people — and yet thrived in the desert in a manner unthinkable in Egypt, Jordan, or Syria.

There is still oil and there is still Israel. Yet slowly there has grown a new realism about both. While elite Westerners may drive to their 'no blood for oil' rallies in upscale cars, in the Middle East most acknowledge that oil in not stolen, but hawked at sky-high prices.

The villain is no longer the old idea of Aramco or 'big oil,' but the absence of transparency that allows an Arab elite to rake in billions without popular scrutiny. For all the hatred of Israel, millions in the Middle East are beginning to see that Arafat was more a kleptocrat than a leader, and that Israel, not Syria, got out of Lebanon.

In Iraq, we do not see mass rallies castigating Americans for the presence of oil tankers in the Gulf or protests daily damning the Jews. Iraqi democrats control their own oil and have enough problems with car bombs and Islamists without wasting time blaming them on Israel.

None of us know whether we are witnessing the foundations of radical and positive changes in the Middle East, or false starts and brief detours from the usual pathologies. Many of us have written of the perils in thinking that mere voting is ipso facto the answer. But for better or worse, here we are and we can only press on in ways that transcend even threatening tyrants and encouraging reformers.

For our own part, the United States desperately needs an energy policy, one that combines alternate energy sources, radical conservation, nuclear power, and increased fossil-fuel production — and transcends shrill partisan debate. It is critical to curb our petroleum appetite not just to help our economy, curb foreign debt, and address trade imbalances, but more importantly to lower the world price of oil, and thus to keep obscene profits out of the hands of petrocracies that so easily appease terrorists and deform their economies. The only thing worse than a dictator is a rich oil-fed dictator whose failures are masked by largess.

Finally, the United States must somehow forge a policy of consistency. True, a Gen. Musharraf is a neutral of sorts, and on occasion a convenient ally in hunting down terrorists. But for all his charm and the need to work with Pakistan, he is still a dictator, and a bullet away from a nuclear theocracy. Selling him high-priced F-16s is perhaps good policy in the short-term, but inconsistent with spending American blood and treasure for elections in Iraq and Afghanistan. It ultimately will send a terrible message to both Pakistani democratic reformers and to the world's largest democracy in India, which not long ago itself was on the verge of war on its border.

Sooner rather than later, Americans must also face the embarrassing fact that giving billions to the Egyptian dictator Mubarak, providing good-behavior money to the king of Jordan, and now giving jets to a Pakistani autocrat are all in the long-term as damaging to the United States' efforts to reform the Middle East as they are in the present smoothing the ruffled feathers of hurt strongmen.

The next problem we face is not that we have pushed democracy too abruptly in once-hostile lands, but that we have not pushed it enough into so-called friendly territory. It is, of course, dangerous to promote democracy in the Middle East, but more dangerous still to pause in our efforts, and, finally, most dangerous of all to quit before seeing this bold gambit through to its logical end — an end that alone will end the pathologies that led to September 11.

— Victor Davis Hanson is a military historian and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. His website is victorhanson.com.

The U.S. is straight-jacketed in attacking Iran

Lebanon's The Daily Star's commentator N. Janardhan makes a compelling arguement why the US is unlikely to deal militarily with Iran. In conclusion the author states:

The lesson then is that a U.S. attack is never publicized in advance, certainly not if it cannot be legitimized. Though an attack is unlikely, if the U.S. does decide to go after Iran, it will probably be a surprise as well.

Iranian Dissidents Asking Aid from Bush

Eli Lake, The NY Sun:

An Iranian dissident says he wants President Bush to clearly state that America "respects and would welcome" a new elected leadership of Iran if a movement to change the regime through nonviolent action succeeds.

In an interview yesterday with The New York Sun, Ghassem Sholeh Sadi said the movement inside Iran pushing for a constitutional referendum was debating the best strategy for the months leading up to June 17, when presidential elections are scheduled. Mr. Sholeh Sadi spoke to the Sun from Paris after arriving there from Tehran in February.

Until now, the plan laid out by most of the student groups calls for a passive boycott of the election, with supporters avoiding the polls. This tack was tried last February after most of the reformist legislators inside the Majlis were barred from running for office.

But Mr. Sholeh Sadi said the opposition is considering a more daring tactic: street protests in major cities in the hopes of bringing the government to a halt. "There are two major ideas being debated," he said. "Some groups support the idea of boycotting the elections. But after the events in Kyrgyzstan, there is an idea to try to turn the election into a referendum and uprising. This could snowball. In Bishkek, it started with 1,000 people, then the number got much bigger. In Iran, the number is much higher. We could start with a few but then get millions." READ MORE

The Bush administration so far has been cool on the referendum movement in Iran, which the Sun first reported in December. To start, the online petition for the referendum, at the Web site www.60000000.com, has only garnered a little more than 35,000 signatures to date. At the same time, the State Department recently granted a visa to one of its leaders, Mohsen Sazegara, a founder of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard who arrived here this week to begin a three-month residency with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Like many of the leaders of the referendum movement in Iran, Mr. Sholeh Sadi was an early supporter of Ayatollah Khomeini. He even served in the parliament between 1989 and 1997, before the election of President Khatami, who promised but failed to deliver more political freedoms. We were supporting freedom and democracy in 1979," Mr. Sholeh Sadi said. "This has been diverted, the cause has been diverted. Our security forces are supposed to bring security and peace to the country, not a force of oppression and not for killing the people."

While a member of parliament, Mr. Sholeh Sadi was critical of policies of unofficial prisons and gave speeches blasting the justice ministry for their arbitrary detentions. In 1999, then a professor of political science at the University of Tehran, he wrote an article for Khordad newspaper broaching the government's policy of disappearing dissidents in what are called "unofficial prisons."

Mr. Sholeh Sadi crossed a line in 2002 when he wrote an open letter to Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khameini publicly refusing to recognize his religious authority. Its opening lines pointedly left out the honorific "Ayatollah." "If you really possess the conditions of religious authority, among which are the conditions of religious scholarship and justice seeking, then I will choose you," Mr. Sholeh Sadi wrote. "But I have my doubts concerning you."

The letter compelled the Islamic Republic to begin pressing a variety of charges against Mr. Sholeh Sadi, who briefly left Iran for Europe after publication of the letter. When he returned to Iran, he was arrested and spent time in the infamous Evin prison, where he said yesterday he was beaten and suffered broken bones near his neck. "Most of my friends told me to pipe down. I am charged with taking actions against the internal security of the country, administering propaganda. Too many charges to name."

Nonetheless, he said he plans to return to Tehran next month. In the interview yesterday, he said President Bush's recent statements of support for the opposition inside his country. But he was also critical. "On two occasions in his inaugural and State of the Union address, Mr. Bush gave Iran a high place of importance. But myself, as one of the leading figures in the opposition, I have seen no deed. I have heard words but no deeds from the administration."

He also criticized what he said was an inconsistency of rhetoric between the State Department and the White House. "There needs to be a unified message to support us." He recommended the State Department issue more visas for opposition leaders to visit America, but did not say that he wanted any money from the administration.

One reason for the inconsistencies in America's Iran policy is its support for European-led negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program. Mr. Sholeh Sadi said yesterday that it was wrong to assume most Iranians supported the Mullah's quest for nuclear weapons.

"The reason is that if the leaders get the nuclear weapon, then no domestic development would be possible," he said. "If they have nuclear weapon, they will close the doors to all freedoms of the people. The fact is, if the regime is in possession of nuclear weapon, our possibilities for changes become almost impossible."

Mr. Sholeh Sadi said he sees two possibilities for his country now. "I see the situation in the region to be pregnant for two kinds of developments, a velvet revolution like Ukraine or Georgia - or now in Kyrgyzstan - even what happened in Poland or many other places could happen," he said. "But I also see a possible military intervention by America."

April Fools' Day in Iran

Michael Evans,WorldNetDaily.com:

On April 1, 1979, the greatest April Fool's joke of all time was played on the people of Iran. Ayatollah Khomeini proclaimed the "first day of God's government," and established himself as the grand ayatollah. The events that followed that proclamation have had a lasting effect not only in Iran, but in the entire Middle East. READ MORE

The newly-crowned grand ayatollah showed the rest of his Arab brethren how to unify secular, social and religious groups in their hatred for the shah and the United States and use it as a political and military tool to overthrow the government – and he started it all while not even in the country. With the storming and capture of the U.S. Embassy on Nov. 4, 1979, he showed that the West was far from all-powerful. Suddenly, Islam became the David beginning to defeat the new Goliath of the "Great Satan" of America and "the illegitimate offspring of the Great Satan," the nation of Israel.

When the Israeli Mossad reported to the CIA in 1978 that Shah Muhammad Reza Pahlavi's position in power was shaky and would not hold, Jimmy Carter did the unthinkable and betrayed the shah, all in the name of human rights.

Despite the United States' surprise, the Saudis welcomed the overthrow of the shah in more ways than one. Saudi Arabia benefited from the Iranian revolution as it cut off Iranian oil to the West. Saudi oil revenues again grew disproportionately, just as they had after the OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) embargo of 1973.

As a result, between 1982 and 2002, 1,500 mosques, 210 Islamic centers, and 2,000 Muslim schools were built in non-Muslim countries in order to promote Wahhabism. The Saudis also donated academic chairs for Islamic studies to Harvard Law School and the University of California in Berkley, as well as grants supporting Islamic research at American University (in Washington, D.C.), Howard University, Duke University, and Johns Hopkins University.

Since 1973, Saudis have spent $87 billion to spread Wahhabism throughout the U.S. and the Western Hemisphere. Thus Khomeini provided Saudis not only with an example, but also furthered their means.

The Saudis also began to purchase arms from the United States about this time. It was in February of 1978 that Jimmy Carter informed Congress he wanted to sell 50 F-15 fighters to Saudi Arabia. Despite objections from Israel, pro-Israel lobbyists, and demonstrators marching in the streets with signs saying things such as "Hell No to the P.L.O." and "Aid to Israel! Best Investment for America," the sale was eventually approved.

Hezbollah (Iran's "Party of Allah") contributed to the rise of Islamism by creating something that eventually became known as "asymmetrical terrorist attacks." The term asymmetrical was used because their attacks were disproportionately one-sided. These were not battles with visible soldiers on each side wearing distinguishing uniforms shooting at each other over a no-man's land – these were sudden, surprise kamikaze attacks that were aimed to kill as many as possible with no opportunity to retaliate. There was simply no one alive at which to return fire.

Under their careful manipulation of zealous minds, a new "H" bomb – the "Human" bomb had been created – one that could be used to zero in on any target with greater precision than any of America's smart bombs, and cost millions less – unless, of course, you want to include that loss of the life the bomb is strapped to, a cost that those who send them never consider.

This demonic invention and ideology was exported to Palestine and the poor Arab masses.

I was in Beirut in October 1983 when two such attacks in the form of two truck bombs were launched against the U.S. and French troops stationed there. The explosions killed 241 U.S. military personnel and 58 French paratroopers. I remember the chaos and panic that rippled through the streets that day. The result was that the foreign troops withdrew and Lebanon was turned into a terrorist incubation center, where Christians were killed and children in day-care centers and kindergartens were taught the glory of being martyred for Allah as suicide-bombers against Israel. America had lost its first significant battle in the war on terrorism ... and we didn't even know we were at war.

It was President Jimmy Carter (known for his bent toward appeasement) who championed human rights, especially among freedom fighters (aka terrorists). Mr. Carter unlocked Pandora's Box when he permitted the destabilization of Iran. (I personally knew the American general to whom he gave the order to overthrow the shah of Iran.) Because of the Carter policy of appeasement, the USSR responded with the invasion Afghanistan.

The United States then partnered with Saudi Arabia to fund and train "freedom fighters" to battle the Soviets in Afghanistan. The tab for that project was $10 billion – the Saudis matched the funds. Osama bin Laden was one of the American trainees in Afghanistan.

At his inauguration, Jimmy Carter chose the Scripture in Micah 6:8: "He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God."

Perhaps had he chosen II Chronicles 7:14, as did President Ronald Reagan – "if my people who are called by my name shall ... repent of their wicked ways ... I will heal their land" – a spirit of repentance in America may have prevented the April Fools' nightmare in 1979.

Today, Iran stands on the brink of another encounter with the United States or Israel because of the proliferation of facilities with nuclear capabilities. This time, the joke may well be on Iran. President Bush is being pushed inexorably toward the unenviable position of having to take out Iran's nuclear reactors, or allowing Israel to do so. It will surely happen before April Fools' Day 2006.

Michael D. Evans is the author of "The American Prophecies," an Amazon and Barnes and Noble No.1 best seller, and a New York Times best seller. He is also the founder of America’s largest Christian coalition, the Jerusalem Prayer Team.

Gang-Rape and Murder - Mullahs' Style

Iran Press News:

A doctor employed at Bagheeyehollah Hospital in Tehran (connected with the revolutionary guards) where Zahra Kazemi, deceased Iranian/Canadian photojournalist was transfered before dying, left Iran and for the first time, in an interview with a German publication divulged that the regime's interogators and goons had brutally gang-raped the photojournalist while she was under qustioning and torture.The German weekly, Die Zeit [in the Thursday, March 31st issue] states that Kazemi was delivered to the hospital directly after undergoing severe torture in prison; she died on July 11th, 2003. Dr. Shahram Azam, who examined Kazemi at the hospital was able to provide a firsthand account. Fifty four year old Kazemi was in a coma when delivered to the hospital in the early hours of June 27th 2003; her body was covered with contusions and as such, she was transfered to the emergency room of Bagheeyehollah Hospital. READ MORE

Dr. Azam reports that it was quite clear that she had been severely tortured and brutally gang-raped. He went on to say that the regime's authorities (the security forces and the judiciary) continue to play the blame game and therefore at this juncture felt that there was nothing left for him to do but to leave Iran and find a way to inform the world of the regime's barbarous nature and the brutality perpatrated on the Iran people, on a daily basis, all over Iran for 26 years now.

Dr. Azam left Iran with his wife and daughter and has moved Canada on assylum for the time being.

Friday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 4.1.2005:

Iran Nukes NYC - the ad

New York City is destroyed in major new television ad being launched by Dr. Jerome Corsi (of the swift boat vets fame) on his new Iran Freedom Foundation website.

The chilling commercial depicts an improvised nuclear device being detonated by Iranian-backed terrorists. You can view the ad now. Spread the word!

BREAKING! Islamic Republic News Agency reports Europe Rejects Iran's Proposal for Limited Uranium Enrichment. Great News!

Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

• The NY Times discusses the Presidential WMD Commission report and Iran. A few excerpts on Iran.
• Iran had requested that to be briefed on the workings of Canada's new Advance Passenger Information database. Hmmm
• FrontPageMag.com has published a symposium on the "nuclear outlaws."
• SMCCDI reports on today's boycott of Iran's Islamic Republic day.
• Captains Quarters takes a look at The New Republic's Martin Peretz who argues that George Bush deserves more credit for the spread of democracy in the Middle East.
• And finally, a FBIS translation of Potsdam Cicero article on Zarqawi and his Iranian sponsorship, "The World's Most Dangerous Man."

Europe Rejects Iran's Proposal for Limited Uranium Enrichment

Islamic Republic News Agency, IRNA:

Europe has rejected an Iranian proposal to keep a limited uranium enrichment program and demanded once again a permanent cessation of Tehran's uranium enrichment activities, the daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung said Friday.

According to the report, the Europeans argued that Iran's plan for a pilot centrifuge project for uranium enrichment could be diverted by Iranian scientists to gather findings for military use. ...

Bush Panel Finds Big Flaws Remain in U.S. Spy Efforts

The NY Times discusses the Presidential WMD Commission report and Iran. A few excerpts on Iran:

Deleted from the commission's public report were 91 additional pages that appear in a classified version, mostly a discussion of the nuclear programs in Iran and North Korea, and of covert operations. According to officials who have reviewed the commission's 11 specific findings about those two nations, which Judge Silberman and Mr. Robb declined to discuss even in general terms, the classified version includes a review of the parallel pitfalls that could affect judgments of how many nuclear weapons North Korea has built, or how long it will be until Iran can manufacture its own uranium weapons.

The nature of intelligence about Iraq differed greatly from what is known about the nuclear programs in Iran and North Korea. But when asked whether the current assessments of those two countries suffer from the same problem the commission said had plagued the Iraq analysis - an assumption that because a country is caught buying illicit goods, it knows how to assemble them - Mr. Robb would say only, "We found systemic problems throughout the community." But Judge Silberman interjected, saying those problems did not necessarily affect assessments of Iran and North Korea.

Iranian Official Visited Canada After Kazemi Row

CBS, myTELUS:

CBC Radio has learned that while publicly denouncing the killing of Zahra Kazemi in July 2003, Canadian officials quietly allowed an Iranian government official to visit Canada. E-mails obtained under the Access to Information Act show that Customs officials were concerned about the visit becoming public. One e-mail said: "We should keep this as low-key as possible."

Iran had requested that one of their officials, Seyed Abu Talib Najafi, be briefed on the workings of Canada's new Advance Passenger Information database, designed to identify potential threats to civil aircraft before they board. READ MORE

Two e-mails within Canada Customs suggested there were concerns: "What's our position about the requesting country?"..."in view of the current situation with Iran."

This was because the Department of Foreign Affairs had, eight days ago, recalled Canada's ambassador in Iran because it had refused Canadian inquiries about the Zahra Kazemi case. Kazemi, a Montreal-based photojournalist was beaten to death after being arrested after photographing a Tehran prison riot. Iran maintains her death was accidental.

Foreign Affairs told Customs officials it's only concern was "whether he (Najafi) will be able to get his visa in time."

In dozens of e-mails, there is no mention of Zahra Kazemi, and no one questions why Canada would help a Iran, considered by some to be a brutal police state. As well, no one asked why a government with a known track record of sponsoring terrorist attacks might want such information.

With just days to go before the visit, a flurry of e-mails revealed last-minute concerns about Najafi's identity. Canada believed his first name was Nasser. Only after he landed in Canada did they learn it was Seyed Abu Talib Najafi.

Chrystiane Roy, Iran desk officer at Foreign Affairs, informed Customs that if Najafi already had a visa, "it would be too late to do any screening." That e-mail was sent after Najafi was already en route to Canada.

In the end, it was only the great North American blackout of August 14, 2003, that prevented the briefing session.

Instead, Rachelle May, now acting director general of the Canada Border Services Agency took him across the street for a coffee. In a report sent afterwards to Foreign Affairs, she writes "he showed interest in Advanced Passenger Information."

She adds. "He was pleased that I took the time to meet him."

Symposium: Nuclear Outlaws

FrontPageMag.com has published a symposium on the "nuclear outlaws." The participants included: Henry D. Sokolski, Michael Rubin and Jed Babbin.

Iranians boycott Islamic republic day

SMCCDI (Information Service):

April 1st (12 Farvardin) marks the beginning of the Theocratic system in Iran.

Millions of Iranians stayed home or used their vacation day in order to stay afar from official gatherings. They intended, once again, to show their rejection of the Islamic republic and its ideology. READ MORE

In a two-day sham referendum staged, in 1979 and after the take over of the country by Islamists, Iranians had to accept the establishment of the clerical regime in their country. The founder of the Mullhacracy, Rooh-Ollah- Khomeini, had stated: "Only one world, the Islamic republic and that's it!"

Thousands were forced to put a Green Color ticket, meaning "yes", in the ballot boxes placed under surveillance of armed militiamen. Those trying to put the Red color ticket, meaning "no", were beaten up or arrested.

Since then, Iran has plunged into backwardism and political, economical and social chaos. Thousands have been executed, millions have fled the country and several thousands died in war with Iraq due to the ill-policies of the new regime which qualified it as a "divine benediction".

Many of those, such as, Mohsen Sazgara, Shirin Ebadi or Mehranguiz Kar, who are actually promoted by some American and European circles, are well known for having helped the formation of such a disaster in Iran. Worst, they're known for having tried to save such a system till just few months ago and at least till the popular boycotts of regime's last two sham elections.

Bush Deserves More Credit For Democracy's Spread

Captains Quarters reports that:

The New Republic's Martin Peretz ventures into nearly uncharted territory for the Left, even the center-Left, in the latest edition of TNR. He argues that George Bush deserves more credit for tranforming the Middle East than given him by the media and punditry, and takes them to task for their "churlishness."

Thanks for pointing this out, Captain Ed.

Blogosphere Preview: Iran Nukes NYC - the ad

New York City is destroyed in major new television ad being launched by Dr. Jerome Corsi (of the swift boat vets fame) on his new Iran Freedom Foundation website.

The chilling commercial depicts an improvised nuclear device being detonated by Iranian-backed terrorists. You can view the ad now in this blogosphere exclusive.

The ad is the brainchild of Dr. Jerome Corsi, co-author of the best seller Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry. The ad is designed to educate the American public of the threat to the United States of a nuclear Iran. Just as the swift vets ads created tremendous controversy in the 2004 election, this ad likely generate significant media controversy.

The ad is being prepared for broadcast in the NYC and Washington DC markets in their initial ad buys. The ads were produced by the same team that produced the excellent documentary, In the Face of Evil: Reagan's War in Word and Deeds.

Titled: “An Atomic 9/11: When Evil is Appeased,” the attack is based on a scenario described in Dr. Corsi's newly released book, Atomic Iran: How the Terrorist Regime Bought the Bomb and American Politicians.” The publisher has shipped approximately 200,000 copies to major bookstores across the nation.

You may now see the videos on the IFF website here:

You may also see the TV ad here and the extended version here.

Dr. Corsi hopes the blogosphere will spread the word of the ads just as it did for the swift boat vets ads last year.

READ MORE

Dr. Corsi explains that an Atomic 9/11 is an imminent threat once a terrorist state like Iran has the capability to develop nuclear weapons.

“The major technical problems that have kept terrorists from exploding improvised nuclear devices (IND) within American cities are solved once a terrorist regime like the Islamic Republic of Iran has the capability to manufacture a nuclear weapon and deliver it in containers to a major US port. The device can be picked up by sleeper terrorist cells, assembled, and driven into the heart of the city, where it can be detonated at the height of an ordinary business day.”

The destruction that could result from a successful Atomic 9/11 attack on a major US city like New York would be enormous. “In the blink of an eye,” Dr. Corsi says, “the United States could be reduced to second class economic status.” The scenario described in Atomic Iran shows that a 150-kiloton IND exploded in New York would reduce much of the city to rubble. Some 1.5 million people would be killed instantly, with another 1.5 million certain to die over the next few days.

The television commercials while shocking were produced for more than their scare value. “I wrote Atomic Iran and founded the Iran Freedom Foundation,” Dr. Corsi points out, “to warn America of the approaching danger, in the hope that the catastrophes describe in the book can be avoided if we are alerted in advance to the threat.”

The IFF hopes that the availability of the commercials for free viewing over the Internet will generate sufficient donations to begin buying air time. The IFF was established in January 2005, and is headquartered in Washington, D.C., as a 501-c3 Foundation with the ability to accept donations on a favorable tax basis once the IRS issues a tax status determination.

The IFF commercials also contain a clip of John Kerry’s statement in the first debate of the 2005 presidential campaign, where he stated he was in favor of the United States giving nuclear fuel to Iran for peaceful purposes. Dr. Corsi in writing Atomic Iran has criticized four Democratic senators – Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, Joe Biden, and Hillary Clinton – for having accepted campaign donations from the pro-mullah lobby in the United States.

“The Democrats just don’t seem to get it,” Corsi argues. “President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright started this ridiculous policy by giving nuclear fuel to North Korea for peaceful purposes. Then Kim Jong-Il turned right around and made nuclear weapons out of the fuel. The Democrats are about to make the same mistake again, but they don’t seem to have any problem taking campaign contributions from the mullahs’ friends in America.”

The IFF has begun working with Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) and Sam Brownback (R-Kansas), as well as Congressman Steve King (R-Iowa) to produce legislation that will support the opposition movements within Iran. “We have an action plan described on our website to reach across in solidarity to the freedom advocates within Iran,” explains IFF President and CEO Bijan Sepasy, Ph.D., himself an Iranian-American born in Iran and naturalized as a US citizen. “We plan to use radio, television, and the Internet to communicate our support of peaceful change and freedom in Iran.”

The IFF has called for demonstrations of solidarity in the United States prior to the June 17 elections in Iran. “If thousands of Iranians came to the streets in protest on June 17,” Dr. Sepasy argues, “the repressive theocracy could fall. Look at the impact of the recent demonstrations in Lebanon. The freedom movement is taking hold throughout the Middle East. Why not also in Iran?”

Iranian doctor who examined Kazemi says he struck no immigration deal

OTTAWA (CP) - The Iranian doctor who revealed graphic details about the torture of Zahra Kazemi says he struck no immigration deal with Ottawa in exchange for going public.
Dr. Shahram Azam thanked Canada on Thursday for fast-tracking his refugee claim. But he says it was his duty as a doctor to publicize evidence of horrific rape and torture - even if his relatives in Iran may suffer consequences. Asked if Ottawa fast-tracked his case in exchange for his chilling medical account, Azam said through a translator: "No, there was no talk of that."

Kazemi, an Iranian-born photojournalist with Canadian citizenship, died July 10, 2003. She had suffered a brain hemorrhage linked to a vicious head blow and was in a coma for several days.
The Montreal resident had been arrested 17 days earlier while photographing student-led protests outside a Tehran prison.

No one has been convicted in connection with her death. Critics and Kazemi's family have blamed Ottawa for not doing enough to hold Iran accountable.

Azam says he was on duty in the emergency room of Tehran's Baghiatollah hospital when the dying woman was brought in from prison on a stretcher.

She had been in custody for four days.

Azam said it was his duty to report what he saw - something he could not do under his home country's Islamic Republic government.

"I don't think this is possible to do in a country like Iran."

Azam was shaken by what he saw, he told a news conference Thursday on Parliament Hill.
"I am a physician who swore to save people's lives.

"When I saw with my own eyes that somebody has been tortured, without any doubt, it affected my mental (state)."

The former army doctor, wounded during the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, was allowed last August to leave Iran for related medical treatment in Finland. He later made his way to Sweden where he applied for political asylum in Canada.

Foreign Affairs officials first interviewed him there in November.

Azam backed up his claims with documentation that he is a physician who was on duty the night Kazemi was brought to the hospital, he said.

Azam said he saved his notes from Kazemi's clinical assessment and gave them to Canadian officials.

A spokesman for Foreign Affairs Minister Pierre Pettigrew said it's not up to Ottawa to confirm the doctor's story.

"We have to take it for what it is," said Sebastien Theberge.

"There's no corroboration and we're not in the business of corroboration. That's the business of the courts."

Ottawa does what it can to fast-track refugee applications for those in danger, said Stephen Heckbert, spokesman for Immigration Minister Joe Volpe.

"When people are in need of protection, they're generally in need of protection now. We do what we can to expedite that process."

Heckbert would not discuss specifics of Azam's case, but said refugee claims typically take from three months to two years. The doctor arrived in Vancouver less than five months after first meeting federal officials. He now lives in Montreal with his wife and 12-year-old daughter but declined to discuss future plans out of fear for his safety.

He's also worried about relatives in Iran who might be punished because he spoke out.
"It's possible," he said when asked if they could face repercussions. "It depends on (the Iranian government's) reaction."

Zarqawi's sponsor? Iran - Important New Information

FBIS Translation of Potsdam Cicero article on Zarqawi, thanks to Dan Darling.

The article is "World's Most Dangerous Man" by Bruno Schirra.

Supported by Iran, gone underground in Iraq, Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi has been pulling the strings of Islamist terrorism, becoming Usama Bin Ladin's new crown prince and an unscrupulous Holy War fighter. ... READ MORE

Who is Ahmad Fadil Nazal al-Khalayleh? "A drunkard and a randy bastard," is the response of someone who knows him, but refuses to reveal his identity. In Zarqa, a dreary industrial town in Jordan, everyone knows Ahmad Fadil Nazal al-Khalayleh, and just two years ago, everyone knew a story about him. All were agreed that never, ever would Ahmad do all the things of which he has been accused. Never! He belongs to the Beni Hasan tribe and the clan of the Al-Khalaylehs. He is not a Palestinian, as has always been claimed. A Beni Hasan tribesman, people in Zarqa kept saying, would never do such things.

Well, back in the 1980s, when he was young, he drank and got entangled in petty crime. He was a flamboyant character in the youth gangs in Zarqa. He failed his final exam at high school, yet then, people say, he pulled himself together, working in the municipal administration for two years, married, stopped drinking and started to pray in the Al-Husayn-Ibn-Ali Mosque, returning to the path of the right faith, thanks be to Allah. Ahmad a terrorist? Never.

Yet all this is what people in Zarqa said two years ago, long before Ahmad Fadil Nazal al-Khalayleh started to cut his victims' heads off. Now, in the first few weeks of the New Year, it is difficult to find someone who would be prepared to talk. They are afraid now. They are afraid of him, because his arm seems to be long, although he is far away in Iraq. One of the neighbors keeps turning to look around whether someone watches him while he speaks. "No one is safe from him," he says with a shudder, "not you in Europe either." And then, after all, he starts telling what happened back then, when Ahmad Fadil Nazal al-Khalayleh was arrested for the first time. He was charged of sexual harassment, the term the Jordanian Penal Code uses for attempted rape, as a result of which Al-Khalayleh served a short term in jail. "In the past, he drank whisky, now he is a monster, drinking blood."

Who is Ahmad Fadil Nazal al-Khalayleh? "He is the most dangerous terrorist in the world," the friendly gentlemen of the General Intelligence Department (GDI) in Amman say. They must know. After all, Ahmad Fadil Nazal al-Khalayleh tried to blow up their offices some time ago. When the Jordanian secret service GID stopped a truck on the Syrian-Jordanian border in the night of 31 March last year, it discovered explosives hidden in the cargo. The driver and the co-driver were subjected to meticulous questioning, commonly known as torture. What they disclosed got the GID interrogators into a state of utter panic. Plans exist for a concerted action to blow up the US Embassy, the office of the prime minister, the residential home of the GDI director, and the headquarters of the Jordanian secret service with the help of 20 tons of explosives.

What paralyzed the investigators was the information they got during the interrogations: a second series of explosions is to release highly toxic chemical warfare agents. Is this the expected chemical weapons attack that all intelligence services fear? In the course of their investigations, the Jordanians then come across Muwaffaq Ali Ahmad Odwan and Azmi Abdal Fatah Hajj Yussef Jaiousi. After tapping their phones and keeping them under surveillance, the investigators strike out. Odwan is killed, while Jaiousi is arrested. Both are acknowledged experts for explosives. Both were instructed by Ahmad Fadil Nazal al-Khalayleh to carry out a chemical mega attack. At least 80,000 people could have been killed in this terrorist attack, the Jordanian authorities believe. Had the attack been successful, "this would have torn to pieces the entire Middle East," Jordanian GID officers say today, "because without state support from Syria and Iran, Al-Khalayleh's career would never have come to this point."

Who is Ahmad Fadil Nazal al-Khalayleh? Initially, he was just a man having many names and holding even more passports. One was issued in the name of Jan Ellie Louise. Al-Khalayleh used the British passport just as the real Iranian ones made out in the names of Ibrahim Kasimi Ridah and Abdal Rahman Hasan al-Tahihi. There is just no passport for one of Al-Khalayleh's many names. It is the name under which he has become famous worldwide. Within the shortest possible time, Al-Khalayleh has become the Flying Dutchman of bloody Islamist terror, stepping out of the shadow of Usama Bin Ladin. How far he left Bin Ladin's shadow behind is proven by numerous files and dossiers put together both by Western and Middle East secret services as well as information and documents compiled by German security authorities.

They do not only show the career of headhunter Al-Zarqawi, but also that his career in the name of Allah could only take place because God's killers were supplied with logistical support, money, and weapons by state organizations in a number of Middle Eastern states. Top of the list of Al-Zarqawi's sponsors: the Islamic Republic of Iran and the hardliners from the group around the Al-Quds Brigades of the Revolutionary Guards, the Pasdaran. It is Germany's Federal Office of Criminal Investigation (BKA), of all places, that has confirmed that Iran "provided Al-Zarqawi with logistical support on the part of the state." According to BKA files, Iran used to be "an important logistical basis."

The BKA files list nine other passports and identity cards from Lebanon, Iran, Palestine, and Yemen that Al-Zarqawi undoubtedly used to travel over the past three years. His radius of action covers Iraq, Iran, Syria, Jordan, Turkey, the Pankisi Valley in Georgia, and the northern Caucasus. In these countries Al-Zarqawi is not only able to draw on an army of sympathizers of the Holy War, that is, members of rather diverse Islamist networks who are at his disposal when necessary, he also has his own cells of active Holy Warriors in this semicircle across borders: in North Africa, Spain, France, and Italy, as well as in Germany: German security authorities suspect that at least 150 of his followers live, above all, in Bavaria, Baden-Wuerttemberg, and Berlin. His network is attached to radical mosques such as the Al-Nur Mosque in the Berlin district of Neukoelln or the Multicultural Centre in Neu-Ulm. These are radical jihadists for whom Al-Zarqawi's ideology according to which "the jihad can only be fought successfully by resorting to terrorism" is the sole yardstick of their actions.

The BKA has described and analyzed the career of Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi and the ramifications of his global network in a 125-page report dated 6 September 2004. Each page is stamped "VS -- for official use only, not to be used in court, reference file only." No wonder: not all of the findings can be used in preliminary proceedings in Germany. Not all of the sources on which the compendium is based have the reputation of strictly following the rules of the law when carrying out investigations. A total of 392 footnotes present data, sources, and facts with determination. Business trips of German investigators to Rabat in Morocco, Amman in Jordan, to France, and
Italy, reports on findings put together by the German intelligence service (BND), the FBI, the CIA, and recurring briefings of French and Israeli offices outline the career of Al-Khalayleh al-Zarqawi and the growth of his international "Network of Arab Mujahidin." "In our view, Al-Zarqawi must be seen as the leader of an independent terrorist network working autonomously," the German analysis says.

The international secret service community regards Al-Zarqawi as "the currently most dangerous man in the world." Jordanian and German investigators say in unison that, "Bin Ladin represents an idea and an ideology today. The man is good as a myth only, showing up the United States in its futile attempts at apprehending him. Al-Zarqawi, by contrast, is a man of action. He has his own functioning network and also access to other networks. Al-Zarqawi is Bin Ladin's new crown prince."

Western services are concerned most of all about Al-Zarqawi's efforts to carry out his terrorist attacks with chemical weapons in the future.

He has a good deal of experience. After 1989, when he only experienced the final stages of the Holy War against the Shuwari, the Russians, in Afghanistan, he initially worked as a reporter for the Islamist paper Al-Bunyan Al-Marsous, and later for the Islamic Relief Committee, an Islamic Non-Governmental Organization which, according to Western and Middle Eastern services, channeled money into the hands of radical jihadists for over a decade. In 1994, Al-Zarqawi was sentenced to lifelong imprisonment in Jordan for planning terrorist attacks. He met Abu Qatada and Al-Maqtisi, two radial preachers, in jail. Here, he completed his change from radical Islamist to absolute jihadist, for whom naked terrorism is ultimate reason and precondition for success in the Holy War. Five years later, Al-Zarqawi is released following a general amnesty -- and returns to Afghanistan. There, he offers his services to Usama Bin Ladin and his security chief Seif Al-Adel. Bin Ladin entrusts him with the leadership of a "fully finished camp in Herat," BND officers say. Although he has formally never regarded himself as a member of Bin Ladin's Al-Qa'ida and has probably not sworn the oath of allegiance, cooperation between the two has always been very close.

At the time, permanent streams of God's Holy Warriors from Germany, France, Britain, Spain, and North Africa arrive in Al-Zarqawi's training camp. The courses focus, among others, on training biological and chemical terrorist attacks. It is here where Al-Zarqawi recruits both the leaders and the ranks for his subsequent network. It is here where he establishes his global contacts with other groups of the jihad.

After the war in Afghanistan, Al-Zarqawi sets up new camps and safe houses in Zahedan, Isfahan, and Tehran. His European followers come to Tehran, bringing with them money and new passport identities and collecting instructions. Communication is handled through middlemen and by phone. The German BND listens in: it has tapped Al-Zarqawi's Swiss satellite telephone with the number 0041-793686306 and his Iranian cell phones with the numbers 0098-9135153994 and 0098-218757638.

Supported by radical groups within the secret service of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, Al-Zarqawi may safely use the landline number 0098-9112311436. In Isfahan, he uses a telephone with the number 0098-9112399346, which is registered under the name of Ahmad Abdul Salam, Bahar Street, Block No. 27, Kukak Area, Asfahan, Iran. In urgent cases, his followers can reach him under his fax No. 0098-218757638. German security authorities confirm on the quiet what their Jordanian colleagues also see as the reason of why Al-Zarqawi was, and is, as a Jordanian investigator adds, so successful: "The fact that the two sides hate one another for religious reasons has never prevented them from cooperating very closely."

In 2002, Al-Zarqawi travels from Tehran to Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Iraq. He cooperates with the antediluvian Islamist killers of Ansar al-Islam. He positions his deputy in the Shura, the highest body of Ansar al-Islam. Al-Zarqawi sets up a small chemical laboratory in the inhospitable mountains behind Kurmal and Biyarra in the border area with Iran. With him is Abu Wal, a high-ranking leading member of Ansar al-Islam and a fanatic jihadist. In his former life, Abu Wal used to be a major of Saddam Husayn's Military Intelligence Service and as such was assigned to keep an eye on Ansar al-Islam, supporting it in its war against the Kurds that Saddam
hated.

This was a bizarre alliance in Ansar al-Islam's territory, comprising Al-Zarqawi with his fanatic hatred of Shiites, the hardliners of the Shiite Islamic revolution, former Ba'th secret service officers, and the internationalists of the Holy War. The alliance manages to survive the course of time and continues to work to date. "Al-Zarqawi is using Saddam Husayn's secret service structures today," a high-ranking officer of the
Jordanian GID says. "He knows them from the past." Both Jordanian and Western intelligence services watch Al-Zarqawi's followers traveling via Tehran to Iraq, mainly from and through Europe, to fight the crusaders in the Holy War. It is no one-way traffic. Fighters, equipment, and weapons are smuggled out of Iraq into Europe. When German investigators arrested Lokman M. in Munich in 2003, they found out that he had established a virtual travel agency for trips to Iraq and back. "This is a rat line of which we only know that it exists," a German BND officer groans. "We have no idea of its course and where it goes and who else is involved in the organization. Yet at one point, we will have the Big Bang [previous two words published in English] right here in Europe, and it will all be Al-Zarqawi's doings." It is an admission of impotence behind which is sheer horror -- that there is something in all the rumors, clues, and meager evidence and that Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi will finally manage to carry out his chemical mega attack.

How far Al-Zarqawi's experiments have really progressed to carry out terrorist attacks using chemical warfare agents in Europe is something the European services do not know exactly. "All we know is that he is working on it," one secret service official says. Investigators suspect that one center of Al-Zarqawi's efforts to produce and distribute chemical warfare agents is situated in the northern Caucasus and in Georgia today. "Georgia, as a rule, is mentioned in the same breath with suspected activities to produce poisons," the BKA investigators write in their documentation, listing the names of those involved: "The main activist is said to have been Adnan Sadiq Muhammad Abu Injila, alias Abu Atiya, who is said to have carried out experiments with cyanide and ricin in the Pankisi Valley in Georgia to produce contact poison. Abu Atiya is said to have graduated from the camp in Herat and to be a confidante of Al-Zarqawi." According to intelligence service findings, Al-Zarqawi's loyal follower Abu Atiya is assumed to have "organized and coordinated the dispatch of toxic material." Ricin and cyanide were intended to be used, among others, in a terrorist attack in Britain.

Abu Atiya is also said to have assigned terrorists to carry out attacks in Europe. The BKA has named witnesses: Rashi Zuhayr, one of Al-Zarqawi's Holy Warriors. "He was arrested when he tried to cross a border holding forged identity papers. When questioned, Rashi admitted to have been asked by Abu Atiya to spy out targets in the United Kingdom for attacks involving poison and conventional weapons together with other persons. The information gained from Rashi led to further arrests, enabling the authorities to avert a major terrorist threat in the United Kingdom." The European investigators, who try to get onto Al-Zarqawi's network and his chemical terror plans, feel like "poking about in a fog. Sometimes, we catch someone more or less accidentally, giving us bits of information. And then we often do not know for a long time whether they are any good," one investigator grumbles. In the case of Al-Zarqawi's chemical attack plans in Britain, the investigators were lucky. The information they had been given by Rashi Zuhayr coincided with that given earlier by another detainee. He is number three in the Al-Qa'ida hierarchy: Abu Zubaydah, who has been detained by the United States since 2002 and been interrogated in custody. BKA investigators say that the information delivered was really explosive. "It also confirms the information supplied by Abu Zubaydah that Al-Zarqawi and his network planned to carry out poison attacks in the United Kingdom. A large number of the people who are in contact with Rashi in Europe is said to come from North Africa, therefore finding it easy to enter neighboring countries," the BKA investigators wrote.

Yet even without the use of chemical warfare agents, Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi may look back at a murderous track record in Europe. In the early hours of 11 March last year, 10 explosive devices detonated within minutes in four commuter trains in Madrid. A total of 191 people died, more than 1,600 were severely injured. On 22 March 2004, General Laanigri, who is in charge of the Moroccan security apparatus, announced his view of who is behind the assault: "Al-Qa'ida established a network in Europe long ago," a German investigator quotes the Moroccan security chief. "Responsibility for this and for the planning of attacks rests with Al-Zarqawi. He has deliberately recruited Moroccans and other people from Maghreb states. The point is to destabilize the entire Maghreb region out of Europe to establish an Islamic state of God in the region in the long term." The claim that the Moroccan authorities made at the time is a certainty for Spanish examining judge Balthasar Garzon. He has laboriously investigated the links between the perpetrators and Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi. This theory is that the attacks in Madrid were carried out on the instructions of Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi.

For the German investigators, this is not the end of the new star in the jihadists' sky. "Perhaps we will all be lucky," one of the investigators says. "Perhaps the Americans accidentally stumble across him in Iraq. But who would ever have so much luck."

Dan says he will produce more commentary of this later today.