Week in Review

DoctorZin provides a review of this past week's [8/06/06 - 8/12/06] major news events regarding Iran. (The reports are listed in chronological order, not by importance) READ MORE

Iran behind Hezbollah's war on Israel.

• Amir Taheri, The Times Online considered what Lebanon and the Middle East will look like if Hezbollah (and Iran) wins its war with Israel.
• Amir Taheri, The New York Post explained ways to achieve a real Lebanese peace.
• Daniel Schwammenthal, The Wall Street Journal examined the most recent evidence of European blindness to Hezbollah's terrorism.
• BBC News reported that the Israeli army has released a video showing a Hezbollah fighter admitting to taking part in a raid on Israel and undergoing training in Iran.
• The Guardian argued that the war in Lebanon has become a propaganda tool for Iran.
• Radio Free Europe reported that Iranian Foreign Minister Manuchehr Mottaki described a U.S.-French draft UN resolution on the Mideast conflict as "an operation against Lebanon."
• Michael Oren, The Wall Street Journal argued why the Israel/Hezbollah war affords the world an unprecedented opportunity to establish a new paradigm for combating Islamic extremism.
• Lee Smith, The Weekly Standard questioned whether Hezbollah is an invincible as the media is making it out to be.
• Alan Peters, AntiMullah.com reported on the Azadegan opposition movement is an umbrella leadership organization with an untainted record which is helping to unify the Iranian opposition.
• New York Post reported that despite Iranian denials that Iranian are involved in the fighting in Lebanon, the bodies of members of Iran's Revolutionary Guard were found among Hezbollah fighters killed by Israeli forces.
• Chicago Tribune reported that Lebanese Druze leader Walid Jumblatt has emerged as a lone voice of dissent amid the clamor of pro-Hezbollah cheerleading. "If I were opportunistic, I would tell you now, `Long live Nasrallah.' I am not going to tell you that."
• Rooz Online reported on a speech in Iran by Mohammad Mohsen, a fighter from Lebanese Hezbollah who discussed the role of Iran in helping them realize "that we have to equip ourselves with faith,” that Khomeini told them to "go and fight Israel. It is OK if you die."
• Strategy Page reported that for the third time in the last two years, Lebanese based terrorist group Hizbollah flew an Iranian UAV into Israel. This time Israeli F-16s caught the UAV some ten kilometers off the coast, and shot it down.
• Yahoo News reported that Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shimon Peres has urged the international community to prevent Iran from imposing a "religious empire" across the Middle East.
• News.com.au reported that US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called on Iran and Syria to respect the terms of a resolution adopted by the UN Security Council.
• Haaretz published an interview with (until recently) the head of the research division of Military Intelligence. He gave his views on Israeli intelligence of Hezbullah.
• The White House released a statement by the President welcomes the U.N. Security Council Resolution on Lebanon to bring lasting peace to Middle East. The resolution calls for an embargo on the supply of arms to militias in Lebanon, for a robust international force to deploy to southern Lebanon in conjunction with Lebanon's legitimate armed forces, and for the disarming of Hizballah.
• YNet News reported that Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said the UN resolution aimed at ending the warfare between Israel and Lebanon’s Shiite Muslim Hizbullah group was biased and served only the interests of the Jewish state.
• Alan Peters, AntiMullah considered the question: Will Lebanese Army sent to the south include Hezbollah fighters in disquise?
  

Ahmadinejad's promised message to the world coming soon... August 22nd?

• Omar Fadhil, Philly.com reported that he sees the signs that Iran may be starting to launch the mullahs' version of an Armageddon, exploiting the religious beliefs of devout Shiites in the region.
• Henry Porter, The Guardian argued that the present crisis with Iran reminds him of his grandfathers' stories when learned they would probably be going to war.
• Bernard Lewis, The Wall Street Journal argued that Iran's apocalyptic leaders do not fear killing Palestinians in a nuclear attack on Israel nor do they fear an Israeli nuclear counter attack on Iran because in both cases the Muslim dead will be accepted by Allah into heaven. A must read.
• TCS Daily reported that it was in fact exactly one month ago that the authors wrote a column whose prescience and eerie timing surprised even its authors.\
• John Batchelor, The New York Sun considered why is America apparently waiting to be attacked by Iran before acting on the threat?
• Caroline B. Glick, Jewish World Review explained why jihad is picking up steam now and fanatical Muslims are on the march.
• Joel C. Rosenberg, National Review Online asked: Is Iran planning an apocalyptic strike against Israel and/or the United States for August 22? Such questions are worrying a growing number of officials in the White House, at the CIA, and at the Pentagon, and for good reason.
• Michael Ledeen, The Corner republished an important article: Five Minutes to Midnight - The War Is Coming, No Matter How Hard We Try to Evade It. Full text provided. A must read.
• NewsMax reported that Middle East expert, Professor Walid Phares, warned: "As soon as a cease fire occurs, the "Hezbollah Blitzkrieg" will crumble the "Lebanese Republic of Weimar" and install its own "Khumeinist Republic" on the Eastern shores of the Mediterranean.... Hezbollah would have paved the way for Iran to create the mother of all world threats since Hitler."
• Saul Singer, The National Review Online argued that while the Bush administration began to fight with vigor, we stopped too early, and now it appears we have forgotten we are still at war.
• William Shawcross, The Wall Street Journal argued that while President Bush told the truth to Britain about the alleged massive plot to blow U.S.-bound airliners out of the sky putting it simply: "This was a stark reminder that this nation is at war with Islamic fascists." But in Europe, the truth is so terrible that we are in denial.
  

Iran's Nuclear Program & The UN Security Council.

• Islamic Republic News Agency reported that the Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, Ali Larijani, said Iran will reject both the resolution adopted by the United Nations Security Council on Tehran's nuclear case and the suspension of uranium enrichment.
• Yahoo News reported that Iran's top nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, said that Iran will expand uranium enrichment, in defiance of a U.N. Security Council resolution.
• The Washington Post reported that with deadlines approaching, the State Department said it has seen no indications that Iran plans to comply with U.N. demands that it suspend enrichment of uranium, a key step in making nuclear weapons.
• IranMania reported that Iran will announce its new nuclear policy within weeks, following the UN Security Council resolution.
• MEMRI.org published excerpts from a press conference with Ali Larijani, where he said the Iranian response to sanctions will be painful to the West and will make it shiver with cold. Video.
• Iran Mania reported that a leading member of Iran’s Hezbollah, Hojjat-ol-Islam Baqer Kharraz said: "We are able to produce atomic bombs and we will do that. We shouldn’t be afraid of anyone. The US is no more than a barking dog.”
  

Iranian leaders threats.

• The Guardian reported that Manouchehr Mottaki, Iran's foreign minister, said Tony Blair and George Bush are "co-defendants" in war crimes committed by Israel in Lebanon and should be made to answer for their actions before an international court.
• Richard Beeston, The Times Online reported that Iran threatened to block oil exports to the West if sanctions are imposed.
• CBS News reported that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sat down with Mike Wallace in Tehran in a rare, exclusive interview. Ahmadinejad said that in response to President Bush's failure to answer his 18-page letter: "Those who refuse to accept an invitation will not have a good ending or fate."
• MEMRI.org published excerpts from a press conference with Ali Larijani, where he said the Iranian response to sanctions will be painful to the West and will make it shiver with cold. Video.
• MEMRI.org published excerpts from a Tehran Friday Sermon delivered by Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati. He said: "The Security Council is so weak, so impotent, and is so susceptible to pressure that it in incapable of passing any resolution. ... the gates of the UN and the Security Council should be closed." Video.
  

Iranian dissident's.

• Rooz Online published a report on the interrogation of Ramin Jahanbegloo and the bizarre accusations that he had confessed responsibility for creating a large network known as ‘web’ to gather classified information on political, social, cultural and economic groups and activists.” These agents are after deceiving officials, particularly clerics, who lack the simplest knowledge about common Internet and cyberspace activities.
• Iran Press News reported that Iranian student leader, Ahmad Batebi is now being detained and if new charges are not leveled against him, he will only have to complete the nine years remaining on his original prison sentence in Evin prison.
• Radio Free Europe reported that imprisoned Mansoor Osanloo, the president of the Syndicate of Workers of the Tehran Bus Company, a prominent leader of Iran's workers movement, was released today from jail on bail after having spent seven months in prison.
• Rooz Online published excerpts of a letter by Iranian dissident Akbar Mohammadi written days before his murder in prison. In the letter he warned: "I believe authorities are preparing to humiliate and kill me..."
• Iran Watch Canada reported on Mr. Ahmad Batebi's 12th day of his hunger strike in Evin prison.
• Time Magazine reported that Akbar Ganji went to Hollywood to gain support for his "reformist movement" where Ganji said: "The U.S. has to stop its one-sided support of Israel."
• Bridget Johnson, World Politics Watch reported on how Iran's regime is attempting to snuff out the stars of the Iranian opposition, with an update on Ahmad Batebi. Photo.
  

Human Rights and Freedom of the Press in Iran.

• Iran Press News reported that two young men, Ali Ramezani and Ebrahim Karimi were arrested and charged with “being in contact with Kurdish political parties”.
  

The corruption in the Iranian leadership.

• Iran Press News reported that a brother of the State Inspector general of the Islamic Republic of Iran was arrested for being a heroin smuggler.

The Iranian Economy.

• Iran Press News reported that Alijanzadeh, the governor of Ghaem-shahr said 20,000 workers lose their jobs in the Iranian province of Mazandaran.
• Dow Jones Newswires reported that because Iran is ignoring the UNSC resolution on its nuclear program, Japan might have to ditch its plan to secure oil from the massive Azadegan field in Iran.
  

Iran and the International community.

• Hindustan Times reported that Pakistan has asked Iran to monitor the Indian consulate in the Iranian border city of Zahidan, alleging it was aiding nationalist rebels in the southwest Balochistan province.
• People Daily Online reported that Iran has assured Pakistan that no one from the Baluchistan Liberation Army (BLA), a militants' group banned by Pakistan, will be allowed to take refuge in its border areas.
• Iranian.ws reported that China is pursuing a troubling, tricky alliance with radical, rightwing Islam, or Islamism, despite concerns about its own restive Muslim population.
• The New York Times reported that Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, said Iran is pressing Shiite militias here to step up attacks against the American-led forces because of the Israeli assault on Lebanon.
• Iran Focus reported that an armed militia launched a massive raid on the offices of a prominent Iraqi Shiite cleric vehemently opposed to Iranian regime.
  

The US Congress on Iran.

• The Hill reported that momentum is building for Iran Freedom and Support Act. sanctions Bill. Contact your Senators and ask for their support of the Iran Freedom Act.
• Reuters reported that a group of U.S. senators pressed China on its ties with North Korea and Iran.
  

Must Read reports.

• John Batchelor, The New York Sunconsidered why is America apparently waiting to be attacked by Iran before acting on the threat?
• Lee Smith, The Weekly Standard questioned whether Hezbollah is an invincible as the media is making it out to be.
• Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, The Weekly Standard reviewed George Michael's new book The Enemy of My Enemy: The Alarming Convergence of Militant Islam and the Extreme Right, about the unlikely alliance between Islamic radicals and the neo-Nazi far right.
• Insight Magazine reported that Bush and Condi have clashed over Israel; with the president overruling her for the first time. "I've never seen her so angry," an aide said.
• Nidra Poller, TCS Daily discussed "French Duplomacy" and how France is trying to impose on its American partner.
• Alan Peters, AntiMullah considered the question: Will Lebanese Army sent to the south include Hezbollah fighters in disquise?
  

The Experts.

• Bernard Lewis, The Wall Street Journal argued that Iran's apocalyptic leaders do not fear killing Palestinians in a nuclear attack on Israel nor do they fear an Israeli nuclear counter attack on Iran because in both cases the Muslim dead will be accepted by Allah into heaven. A must read.
• Amir Taheri, The Times Online considered what Lebanon and the Middle East will look like if Hezbollah (and Iran) wins its war with Israel.
• Amir Taheri, The New York Post explained ways to achieve a real Lebanese peace.
• Newt Gingrich, The Washington Post responded to a column, yesterday, by Richard Holbrook who asserted the Iranian nuclear threat is far less dangerous than violence in southern Lebanon. Nevertheless, Holbrooke has set the stage for an important national debate.
  

Photos, cartoons and videos.

• Cox & Forkum published a cartoon: Changement de Rythme.
• MEMRI.org published excerpts from a press conference with Ali Larijani, where he said the Iranian response to sanctions will be painful to the West and will make it shiver with cold. Video.
• MEMRI.org published excerpts from a Tehran Friday Sermon delivered by Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati. He said: "The Security Council is so weak, so impotent, and is so susceptible to pressure that it in incapable of passing any resolution. ... the gates of the UN and the Security Council should be closed." Video.
• Cox & Forkum published a cartoon: First Casualty.
• Bridget Johnson, World Politics Watch an update on Ahmad Batebi. Photo.
• Cox & Forkum published a cartoon: Mullah Justice.
• The Peoples Cube published a graphic: If today's New York Times editors were in charge in 1943...
• You Tube hosted a video of an execution of an Iranian girl. A lengthy but revealing story.
• Petition Online features a call to free imprisoned Iranian student leader Ahmad Batebi. Check it out.
• Aish.com released a video on the photo fraud in Lebanon.
  

The Quote of the Week.

CBS News reported that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sat down with Mike Wallace in Tehran in a rare, exclusive interview. Ahmadinejad said that in response to President Bush's failure to answer his 18-page letter:

"Those who refuse to accept an invitation will not have a good ending or fate."

Tags: iran, news, nuclear, lebanon, isreal, iraq,

Sunday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 8.13.2006:

Iranian hardliner: Iran will build the bomb.

• Iran Mania reported that a leading member of Iran’s Hezbollah, Hojjat-ol-Islam Baqer Kharraz said: "We are able to produce atomic bombs and we will do that. We shouldn’t be afraid of anyone. The US is no more than a barking dog”

Bush praises the UNSC resolution on Lebanon.

• The White House released a statement by the President welcomes the U.N. Security Council Resolution on Lebanon to bring lasting peace to Middle East. The resolution calls for an embargo on the supply of arms to militias in Lebanon, for a robust international force to deploy to southern Lebanon in conjunction with Lebanon's legitimate armed forces, and for the disarming of Hizballah.

Iran criticizes it...

• YNet News reported that Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said the UN resolution aimed at ending the warfare between Israel and Lebanon’s Shiite Muslim Hizbullah group was biased and served only the interests of the Jewish state.

Peters sees a major loop hole in the resolution.

• Alan Peters, AntiMullah considered the question: Will Lebanese Army sent to the south include Hezbollah fighters in disquise?

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

• Newt Gingrich, The Washington Post responded to a column, yesterday, by Richard Holbrook who asserted the Iranian nuclear threat is far less dangerous than violence in southern Lebanon. Nevertheless, Holbrooke has set the stage for an important national debate.
• Petition Online features a call to free imprisoned Iranian student leader Ahmad Batebi. Check it out.
• Aish.com released a video on the photo fraud in Lebanon.

Tags: iran, news, nuclear, lebanon, isreal

Will Lebanese Army sent to the south include Hezbollah fighters in disquise?

Alan Peters, AntiMullah:

I must admit that I did not know the Lebanese "army" could field 15,000 people and was under the impression that their military was less than 10,000 "fighting" personnel.

Thus when they offered 15,000 individuals to the UN as part of the monitoring force, my mind wondered whether this would include several thousand Hezbollah (or even Syrian or Iranian fighters) being given Lebanese military uniforms and thus have free movement back and forth and "at will" access into the "off limits" or restricted areas of South Lebanon.

Similary, if the Lebanese military arrives with a thousand extra uniforms, they can dress any Hezbollah trapped in the restricted zone and get them out witout anyone noticing. READ MORE

Am I maliciously maligning the Lebanese? Not at all. Remember the Lebanese military were ready to fight alongside Hezbollah so their sympathies are not with seeing justice done and the UN resolution correctly implemented. In reality, they have a totally opposite mind set.

In both scenarios, the disguised Hezbollah, Syrians or Iranians would be free to carry and transport weapons, ammunition, supplies etc., as they travel in both directions under cover of Lebanese uniforms and Lebanese identity documents.

The UN forces foreign nationals, French, other European or whatever, who might be tasked with preventing Hezbollah activity, would not be able to distinguish between "genuine" Lebanese soldiers and disguised Hezbollah. And if there were any Arab countries in the UN forces, who might - with emphasis on "might" - be able to spot a difference, would they actually arrest a Hezbollah member? To benefit or protect Israeli interests?

To take this one step further, ostensibly Lebanese troops given duties, which include interdiction of Hezbollah activity, could in fact be "disguised" Hezbollah - resulting in the fox watching the hen house. Who - other than the Lebanese military themselves - and they will not tell - would know or could know the difference?

Arms and amunition that was consequently moved to re-arm and re-supply the Hezbollah in the area would pass as Lebanese army requirements and who would be expert enough to tell the difference?

What will happen if the Israeli forces spot this happening and a firefight ensues between the Israelis and some men in Lebanese military uniforms? How will Israel prove that the dead are Hezbollah? Almost certainly the disuised men will have been issued forged ID by sympathetic, senior Lebanese military officials. Or will have these created after the fact.

The only way I can think of to prevent this certain problem is to deny the Lebanese forces from deploying and becoming the stalking horse used by Hezbolah or other anti-Israel fighters and run into bogus sovereignty complaints by Lebanon rather than clearly creating a huge loophole in the intent of the UN resolution.

If the Lebanese are genuine in their concern and desire for Israel to leave South Lebanon, then they should not object to such an obvious and logical problem that they would create.

As in everything I write, I try to also provide a workable solution not always simply describe the challenge - unless my analytical and experienced mind cannot come up with anything. Admittedly I do not let political correctness or emotion override pragmatic, useful solutions and bow to hust feelings - in this case of the Lebanese government - which cannot ensure the loyalty of their 15,000 men to the UN Resolution or intentions rather than loyalty to the Hezbollah against whom it has been designed.

Iran: UN resolution serves Zionist regime

YNet News:

Iran said Saturday that the UN resolution aimed at ending the warfare between Israel and Lebanon’s Shiite Muslim Hizbullah group was biased and served only the interests of the Jewish state.

“UN resolution 1701 is completely one-sided and it serves the Zionist regime’s interests,” Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki was quoted as saying by state television.

“Some amendments need to be incorporated into the resolution. The Lebanese people and government views needs to be taken into consideration for the resolution to be accepted by them,” he added during a visit to Yemen. READ MORE

The UN Security Council on Friday unanimously called for an end to the bloodshed between Israel and Hizbullah and for the deployment of a 15,000-strong international peacekeeping force.

Resolution 1701, drawn up by the United States and France after protracted haggling, also calls for Israeli troops to be withdrawn from southern Lebanon after an end to the fighting.

Iran does not recognize the existence of the Jewish state.

Egypt calls for immediate Israeli ceasefire

Iran helped to create and arm Hizbullah in 1982 in response to Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, and Teheran stands accused by the United States and Israel of fomenting chaos in the region by channeling weapons to the guerrillas.

Iran denies the allegation, saying it provides only moral support to the movement.

Egypt on Saturday said Israel should immediately observe a ceasefire following the adoption of UN Security Council resolution calling for a halt to hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.

“Israel must observe an immediate and complete ceasefire in order to allow the political agreement—achieved after significant efforts—to be applied,” Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit said in a statement.

“The first condition of this political accord is the Israeli army’s total withdrawal from all Lebanese areas it entered since the start of the crisis, in order to allow the Lebanese army to take control of the situation in the south of the country," he added.

President Welcomes U.N. Security Council Resolution to Bring Lasting Peace to Middle East

The White House:

I welcome the resolution adopted yesterday by the United Nations Security Council, which is designed to bring an immediate end to the fighting sparked last month by an unprovoked terrorist attack on Israel by Hizballah, a terrorist group supported by Iran and Syria. The United States and its allies have been working hard since the beginning of this conflict to create the conditions for an enduring ceasefire and prevent armed militias and foreign-sponsored terrorist groups like Hizballah from sparking another crisis.

Yesterday's resolution aims to end Hizballah's attacks on Israel and bring a halt to Israel's offensive military operations. It also calls for an embargo on the supply of arms to militias in Lebanon, for a robust international force to deploy to southern Lebanon in conjunction with Lebanon's legitimate armed forces, and for the disarming of Hizballah and all other militia groups operating in Lebanon. These steps are designed to stop Hizballah from acting as a state within a state, and put an end to Iran and Syria's efforts to hold the Lebanese people hostage to their own extremist agenda. This in turn will help to restore the sovereignty of Lebanon's democratic government and help ensure security for the people of Lebanon and Israel. READ MORE

The loss of innocent life in both Lebanon and Israel has been a great tragedy. Hizballah and its Iranian and Syrian sponsors have brought an unwanted war to the people of Lebanon and Israel, and millions have suffered as a result. I now urge the international community to turn words into action and make every effort to bring lasting peace to the region.

The Only Option Is to Win

Newt Gingrich, The Washington Post:

Yesterday on this page, in a serious and thoughtful survey of a world in crisis, Richard Holbrooke listed 13 countries that could be involved in violence in the near future: Lebanon, Israel, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Uzbekistan, Somalia. And in addition, of course, the United States.

With those 14 nations Holbrooke could make the case for what I describe as "an emerging third world war" -- a long-running conflict whose latest manifestation was brought home to Americans yesterday with the disclosure in London of yet another ghastly terrorist plot -- this one intended to destroy a number of airliners en route to America.

But while Holbrooke lists the geography accurately, he then asserts an analysis and a goal that do not fit the current threats. READ MORE

First, he asserts that the Iranian nuclear threat is far less dangerous than violence in southern Lebanon. Speaking of the Iranian-American negotiations, Holbrooke asks, "And why has that dialogue been restricted to the nuclear issue -- vitally important to be sure, but not as urgent at this moment as Iran's sponsorship and arming of Hezbollah and its support of actions against U.S. forces in Iraq?"

In fact an Iran armed with nuclear weapons is a mortal threat to American, Israeli and European cities. If a nonnuclear Iran is prepared to finance, arm and train Hezbollah, sustain a war against Israel from southern Lebanon and, in Holbrooke's own words, "support actions against U.S. forces in Iraq," then what would a nuclear Iran be likely to do? Remember, Iranian officials were present at North Korea's missile launches on our Fourth of July, and it is noteworthy that Venezuela's anti-American dictator, Hugo Chávez, has visited Iran five times.

It is because the Bush administration has failed to win this argument over the direct threat of Iranian and North Korean nuclear and biological weapons that Americans are divided and uncertain about our national security interests.

Nevertheless, Holbrooke has set the stage for an important national debate that goes well beyond such awful possibilities as Sept. 11-style airliner plots. It's a debate about whether we are in danger of losing one or more U.S. cities, whether the world faces the possibility of a second Holocaust should Iran use nuclear or biological weapons against Israel, and whether a nuclear Iran would dominate the Persian Gulf and the world's energy supplies. This is the most important debate of our time. It rivals both Winston Churchill's argument in the 1930s over the nature of Hitler and the Nazis and Harry Truman's argument in the 1940s about the emerging Soviet empire.

Yet Holbrooke indicates that he would take the wrong path on American national security. He asserts that "containing the violence must be Washington's first priority."

As a goal this is precisely wrong.

Defeating the terrorists and thwarting efforts by Iran and North Korea to gain nuclear and biological weapons must be the first goal of American policy. To paraphrase Abraham Lincoln, if violence is necessary to defeat the terrorists, the Iranians and the North Koreans, then it is regrettably necessary. If they can be disarmed with less violence, then that is desirable. But a nonviolent solution that allows the terrorists to become better trained, better organized, more numerous and better armed is a defeat. A nonviolent solution that leads to North Korean and Iranian nuclear weapons threatening us across the planet is a defeat.

This failure to understand the nature of the threat is captured in Holbrooke's assertion that diplomacy can lead to "finding a stable and secure solution that protects Israel." If Iran gets nuclear weapons, there will be no diplomacy capable of protecting Israel. If Iran continues to fund and equip Hezbollah, there will be no stability or security for Israel. Diplomacy cannot substitute for victory against an opponent who openly states that he wants to eliminate you from the face of the earth.

Our enemies are quite public and repetitive in saying what they want. Not since Adolf Hitler has any group been as bloodthirsty and as open. If Holbrooke really wants a "stable and secure" Israel he will not find it by trying to appease Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas.

This issue of national security goals will be at the heart of the American dialogue for some time. If our enemies are truly our enemies (and their words and deeds are certainly those of enemies) then victory should be our goal. If nuclear and biological threats are real, then aggressive strategies to disarm them if possible and defeat them if necessary will be required.

Holbrooke represents the diplomacy first-diplomacy always school. We saw its workings throughout the 1990s, as Syria was visited again and again by secretaries of state who achieved absolutely nothing. Even a secretary of state dancing with Kim Jong Il (arguably a low point in American diplomatic efforts) produced no results; such niceties never do in dealing with vicious dictators.

The democracies have been talking while the dictators and the terrorists gain strength and move closer to having the weapons necessary for a terrifying assault on America and its allies. The arrests yesterday of British citizens allegedly plotting to blow up American airliners over the Atlantic Ocean are only the latest example of the determination of our enemies. This makes the dialogue on our national security even more important.

Richard Holbrooke has established a framework for a clear debate. The Bush administration should take up his challenge.

The writer, a former speaker of the House, is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and author of "Winning the Future: A 21st Century Contract with America."

Iranian Hardliner Says Iran will Produce Atomic Bomb

Iran Mania:

A leading member of Iran’s Hezbollah, Hojjat-ol-Islam Baqer Kharrazi after years of silence delivered a harsh speech against the reformists and the administration in Iran, Iran Emrooz reported.

“I kept silent over the past 14 years, because Hezbollah needed to be restructured and I was busy with training the forces. Although no Iranian media reflected Hezbollah leaders’ recent meeting with head of Iran’s State Expediency Council, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, I should say we elaborated on Hezbollah’s activities for Rafsanjani in detail and the former president was amazed with our progress.” Kharrazi claimed.

“We don’t need any guardian. And if necessary we will select our own president, ministers and parliament members. For without the Hezbollah forces the Islamic Revolution will collapse from within.” the hardliner added.

Referring to the Sunni population in Iran’s western, eastern and southern borders, Kharrazi said: “Presently the country’s borders are controlled by Sunnis. We have to counter their growth in the country.”

On Iran’s nuclear issue, Kharrazi noted: “We have oil, gas and all other natural resources and thus we don’t need interaction with other countries. We are able to produce atomic bombs and we will do that. We shouldn’t be afraid of anyone. The US is no more than a barking dog” READ MORE

Pointing to Iranian Peace Prize Laureate and human rights advocate the Hezbollah member noted: “Shirin Ebadi should not think that she can act as Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan. Hezbollah just needs a wrong gesture from her to shoot her. It was the leader’s blessing that has kept her alive to this day.”

Iran Mania buried the lead. Their tile for this story was: Iranian hardliner blasts reformists.

Petition: Free Ahmad Batebi

Petition Online:

To: United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights

8-14 Avenue de la Paix
1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland

In the summer of 1999, 21 year old film student Ahmad Batebi arrived at a peaceful student protest held in front of his school at University of Tehran. A vigilante mob supported by the special security police had already attacked the protestors injuring several students, arresting numerous others and killing at least one.

Batebi who was trained as an emergency paramedic by the Red Crescent Society of Iran was assisting the injured when he came across a severely injured friend and held his friend's bloody t-shirt above his head to show the cruelty of the attackers. Several journalists and photographers took pictures of his gesture and one eventually found its way to the cover of London's prestigious The Economist. Preparing for a movie where he was to play the role of Jesus Christ, Batebi had long hair and a beard at the time, making him an attractive subject for such a dramatic pose.

Batebi was arrested on that day and was later brought to trial in front of the special "revolutionary court" in Tehran. His "trial" lasted only a few minutes and he was denied having a lawyer present to defend him. The Economist cover was used as part of the evidence against him and to prove his "counter-revolutionary" activities. He received a death sentence but internal and international pressure, finally caused the authorities to reduce his sentence to 15 years.

Ahmad Batebi has been subjected to solitary confinement, physical and mental torture during his captivity so far and will be a 36 year old man when and if released at the end of his sentence. All for a bloody t-shirt and a picture.

We, the undersigned, appeal for your involvement on Batebi's behalf based on principals of Universal Declaration of Human Rights, to which Iran is a signatory.

His arrest, trial and detention are clear violations of Articles 9, 10, 11, 18, 19 and 20 of this significant document adopted and proclaimed by the General Assembly of the United Nations in December of 1948 and as such mandates your immediate intervention.

Furthermore, we call upon the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran to meet its international obligations and free all political prisoners and others held based on their religious or ideological opinion and belief.


Sincerely,

The Undersigned

To sign the petition click here.

Photo Fraud - Video

Aish.com:

Click on the photo to view the video.

Saturday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 8.12.2006:

Is Iran about to launch a war in the Middle East in the next 10 days? A sobering analysis.

• Caroline B. Glick, Jewish World Review explained why jihad is picking up steam now and fanatical Muslims are on the march.
• Joel C. Rosenberg, National Review Online asked: Is Iran planning an apocalyptic strike against Israel and/or the United States for August 22? Such questions are worrying a growing number of officials in the White House, at the CIA, and at the Pentagon, and for good reason.
• Michael Ledeen, The Corner republished an important article: Five Minutes to Midnight - The War Is Coming, No Matter How Hard We Try to Evade It. Full text provided. A must read.
• NewsMax reported that Middle East expert, Professor Walid Phares, warned: "As soon as a cease fire occurs, the "Hezbollah Blitzkrieg" will crumble the "Lebanese Republic of Weimar" and install its own "Khumeinist Republic" on the Eastern shores of the Mediterranean.... Hezbollah would have paved the way for Iran to create the mother of all world threats since Hitler."
• Saul Singer, The National Review Online argued that while the Bush administration began to fight with vigor, we stopped too early, and now it appears we have forgotten we are still at war.
• William Shawcross, The Wall Street Journal argued that while President Bush told the truth to Britain about the alleged massive plot to blow U.S.-bound airliners out of the sky putting it simply: "This was a stark reminder that this nation is at war with Islamic fascists." But in Europe, the truth is so terrible that we are in denial.

Bush and Condi split for the first time.

• Insight Magazine reported that Bush and Condi have clashed over Israel; with the president overruling her for the first time. "I've never seen her so angry," an aide said.

Condi warns Iran and Syria: Respect the UNSC resolution.

• News.com.au reported that US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called on Iran and Syria to respect the terms of a resolution adopted by the UN Security Council.

Iran encourages increased attacks in Iraq.

• The New York Times reported that Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, said Iran is pressing Shiite militias here to step up attacks against the American-led forces because of the Israeli assault on Lebanon.
• Iran Focus reported that an armed militia launched a massive raid on the offices of a prominent Iraqi Shiite cleric vehemently opposed to Iranian regime.

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

• Haaretz published an interview with (until recently) the head of the research division of Military Intelligence. He gave his views on Israeli intelligence of Hezbullah.
• Nidra Poller, TCS Daily discussed "French Duplomacy" and how France is trying to impose on its American partner.
• Reuters reported that a group of U.S. senators pressed China on its ties with North Korea and Iran.
• The Peoples Cube published a graphic: If today's New York Times editors were in charge in 1943...
• You Tube hosted a video of an execution of an Iranian girl. A lengthy but revealing story.

Tags: iran, news, nuclear, lebanon, isreal, iraq,

'Arc of Extremism'

William Shawcross, The Wall Street Journal:

It took President Bush to tell the truth to Britain about the alleged massive plot to blow U.S.-bound airliners out of the sky. In his first comment on the apparently foiled attempt, he put it simply: "This was a stark reminder that this nation is at war with Islamic fascists."

He is right, but in the first news reports in Britain yesterday, the words "Islamic" or "Muslim" were hardly mentioned, let alone the dread word "fascist." Instead the common code-words on television were that the 24 men arrested were "British-born" and "of Pakistani origin." No mention of their Islamist ideology. Does the BBC think they might turn out to be from Pakistan's embattled Christian minority? I don't think so.

In Europe, the truth is so terrible that we are in denial. READ MORE

Perhaps it is understandable. We simply do not know how to deal with the fact that we really are threatened by a vast fifth column, that there are thousands of European-born people, in Britain, in France, in Holland, in Denmark -- everywhere -- who wish to destroy us. You see this denial in the coverage of Israel's war against Hezbollah. The deaths in Lebanon are utterly tragic. But if you watched only British television, particularly the BBC, you would be hard-pressed to understand that Israel has been forced into a war for its survival. Last weekend people marched in an anti-Israel march though London carrying banners proclaiming "We are all Hezbollah Now."

As the historian Victor Davis Hanson recently pointed out, there is a moral madness at work here. We refuse to admit there is a pattern to global terrorism. We are terrified of being called "Islamophobic." European papers are frightened to publish cartoons which some Muslims demand we censor, but are happy to portray the Israelis as latter-day Nazis. Not for nothing does Mr. Hanson say that we have forgotten the lessons of 1938.

In a live BBC interview recently I called Hezbollah "Islamofascists." The charming interviewer said nervously, "That's a very controversial description"; I replied that it was merely accurate. She brought the interview to a swift close. But it's not just Hezbollah, of course. The same ideology of hate inspires al Qaeda, the inspiration if not the controller of the British bombers.

In Britain we are actually quite lucky. We have a prime minister who, in my view, has committed many errors at home; but abroad Tony Blair has a clear vision, both moral and pragmatic, of the threat that we face. And for this he is mocked and abused as nothing more than George Bush's "poodle."

In a thoughtful recent speech in Los Angeles, Mr. Blair spoke of fighting an "arc of extremism." That is Islamic extremism, whether it is inspired al Qaeda or by Tehran, whether its footsoldiers are Sunni or Shiite, whether they were born in Britain or southern Lebanon or Iran or Saudi Arabia. As Mr. Blair said, the battle is over the values that are to govern the future of the worlds. "Are they those of tolerance, freedom, respect for difference and diversity or those of reaction, division, hatred?"

"This is war" said Mr. Blair. Alas, it is. Wherever they were born, the men who want to blow up airliners, who want to destroy Israel and, not coincidentally, who want to kill all hope of a decent society in Iraq -- are Islamofascists who are united in hatred of us. The sooner we in Europe understand that, and that they must be defeated, the safer everyone -- Christians, Jews, Muslims, nonbelievers -- will be.

Mr. Shawcross is author of "Allies: Why the West Had to Remove Saddam" (PublicAffairs Press, 2005).

Apocalypse Now?

Joel C. Rosenberg, National Review Online:

Is Iran planning an apocalyptic strike against Israel and/or the United States for August 22? If so, what should the U.S. do to protect Americans and our ally? Such questions are worrying a growing number of officials in the White House, at the CIA, and at the Pentagon, and for good reason.

As a devout Shiite Muslim, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is telling colleagues in Tehran that he believes the end of the world is rapidly approaching. He also believes that the way to hasten the coming of the Islamic Messiah known as the “Hidden Imam” or the “Mahdi” is to launch a catastrophic global jihad, first against Israel (the “little Satan”) and then against the U.S. (the “Great Satan”). What’s more, Ahmadinejad is widely believed to be pursuing nuclear weapons that would give him the ability to carry out his apocalyptic religious views. Some experts even speculate that Iran may already have several atomic bombs and the means to deliver them.

In recent days, Ahmadinejad and his advisers have said that Iran will answer the world regarding the future of its nuclear program on August 22. That happens to be a very significant date for Muslims: It is the anniversary of the supposed “night flight” by Mohammed from Saudi Arabia to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem to heaven and back again. There is a worry that Ahmadinejad is planning some sort of apocalyptic attack as his ‘“response” on August 22. If so, time is short and the clock is ticking. READ MORE

It is hard for many Americans to imagine an Iranian leader (or any other world leader) actually trying to bring about the end of the world by launching a nuclear attack to destroy millions of Jews and Christians. But it is precisely this type of attack that I wrote about in my recent political thrillers, The Ezekiel Option and The Copper Scroll. One of my goals was to help people understand this brand of radical Islamic thinking and its implications for Western civilization. On page 358 of The Ezekiel Option, a fictional Islamic character insists that Israel is going to be “wiped off the face of the map forever.” Five months after Option was published last June, Ahmadinejad gave a speech vowing to wipe Israel “off the map” forever. In the novel, Iran forms a military alliance with Russia and starts buying state-of-the-art weaponry from Moscow to accomplish its apocalyptic objectives. Last December, fiction again became reality, when Iran signed a $1 billion deal with Russia to buy missiles and others weapons.

Muslims are not the only ones who have apocalyptic end-times views, of course. As an evangelical Christian from an Orthodox Jewish heritage, my novels are based on a number of “end times” prophecies that the Bible says will be fulfilled in “the last days.” For example, the Hebrew Prophet Ezekiel — writing 2,500 years ago — described a future Middle Eastern war to annihilate Israel that is known today by Bible scholars as the “War of Gog and Magog.” Jews and Christians who take Ezekiel’s prophecies seriously believe that at the last minute the God of Israel will supernaturally intervene to defeat Israel’s enemies in this war. By contrast, the Muslim version of the “War of “Gog and Magog“ found in the Koran concludes with Muslims winning. The Ezekiel Option and The Copper Scroll imagine how such prophecies could play themselves out in modern times. But suddenly this is no longer the stuff of fiction. Ahmadinejad actually seems intent on launching the “War of Gog and Magog.”

Bernard Lewis of Princeton University, arguably the world’s foremost expert on Middle Eastern history, wrote an essay for the Wall Street Journal last Tuesday warning that Ahmadinejad’s apocalyptic objectives could lead to a “cataclysmic” attack on August 22. Lewis observed that there it is not possible to say with any certainty that such an attack is planned, but he felt compelled to explain to Americans just how dangerous Ahmadinejad’s thinking is, especially in light of Islamic, Jewish, and Christian “end times” theology, such as the “War of Gog and Magog” and “Armageddon.” How, Lewis asked, can you negotiate with a man who believes it is his religious duty and mission to bring about the end of the world? How can you deter a man who wants to die and go to paradise, but believes he won’t actually die in such a war because Allah is on his side to kill millions of “infidels”?

Lewis’s warning was prudent and needed, as was his careful explanation of the apocalyptic thinking driving the Iranian leadership at present. But Lewis’s conclusion was puzzling. He writes:

“How then can one confront such an enemy, with such a view of life and death?” he wrote. “Some immediate precautions are obviously possible and necessary. In the long term, it would seem that the best, perhaps the only hope is to appeal to those Muslims, Iranians, Arabs and others who do not share these apocalyptic perceptions and aspirations, and feel as much threatened, indeed even more threatened, than we are. There must be many such, probably even a majority in the lands of Islam. Now is the time for them to save their countries, their societies and their religion from the madness of MAD [the Cold War policy of Mutual Assured Destruction].”

’This is indeed a wise “long-term” strategy, trying to win over Islamic moderates, but Lewis writes as if the danger posed by Iran is not an immediate one, as if we have the luxury of relying on far-sighted strategies. But ’Lewis himself is suggesting that Iran may be planning “cataclysmic” attacks to begin as early as August 22. That doesn’t leave a lot of time for long-term planning. We all hope and pray that August 22 is not the day Ahmadinejad has chosen to launch the apocalypse, but there is little doubt in the White House and at the CIA that the Iranian leader is feverishly trying to build, buy, or steal nuclear weapons, and that he will quite likely use them once he has them.

All of this raises very serious questions for the president and the nation. How much time do we have to pursue a diplomatic track with Iran? At what point do we have to conclude that negotiations are going nowhere? Are we prepared to live with a nuclear-armed Iran? If so, how? If not, what is the president prepared to do to protect Americans and our allies from an Iranian nuclear-strike, or nuclear blackmail?

In his famous “axis of evil” speech on January 29, 2002, President Bush made the following case:

“We will work closely with our coalition to deny terrorists and their state sponsors the materials, technology, and expertise to make and deliver weapons of mass destruction. We will develop and deploy effective missile defenses to protect America and our allies from sudden attack. And all nations should know: America will do what is necessary to ensure our nation’s security. We’ll be deliberate, yet time is not on our side. I will not wait on events, while dangers gather. I will not stand by, as peril draws closer and closer. The United States of America will not permit the world’s most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world’s most destructive weapons.”

Today, the country is deeply divided over whether using military force in Iraq was the right thing to do. But the Iranian nuclear threat is now far worse than the Iraqi threat of having or obtaining weapons of mass destruction was then. President Bush has a decision to make and precious little time to make it. For let’s be clear: should Iran go nuclear on this president’s watch, all the gains made to date in the War on Terror will be wiped out overnight. That is not a legacy this president wants, nor one this nation can afford.

— Joel C. Rosenberg, a one-time aide to former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Deputy Prime Minister Natan Sharansky, is a New York Times best-selling author of Middle East-based political thrillers. His new novel is The Copper Scroll. His forthcoming non-fiction book is entitled Epicenter: Why The Current Rumblings In The Middle East Will Change Your World.

Syria, Iran warned to honour UN plan

News.com.au:

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called on Iran and Syria to respect the terms of a resolution adopted by the UN Security Council overnight in a bid to end a month of fighting between their ally, Hezbollah, and Israel.

"We call upon every state, especially Iran and Syria, to respect the sovereignty of the Lebanese government and the will of the international community," she said in an address to the Security Council.

She also said "Hezbollah now faces a clear choice between war and peace" in light of the resolution, which was unanimously adopted by the 15-member council. READ MORE

The resolution, drafted by France and the United States, calls on Israel and Hezbollah to immediately cease hostilities following a month of fighting that has left more than 1000 Lebanese and over 120 Israelis dead.

It also calls for Israeli forces to withdraw from positions they have occupied in southern Lebanon in parallel with the deployment of Lebanese army units and a robust international military force in the region to prevent future Hezbollah attacks on Israel.

If implemented fully by Lebanon, the resolution will end Hezbollah's existence as a militia armed and supported by Iran and Syria.

The US administration was frequently criticised in recent weeks for refusing to deal directly with either Syria or Iran in its efforts to end the fighting in Lebanon.

Critics argued that the two states, as the primary providers of weapons and financial support to Hezbollah, needed to be part of any effective plan to halt Hezbollah attacks on Israel.

Ms Rice and President George W. Bush defended the stance, saying Damascus and Tehran had in the past failed to respond to approaches aimed at easing tensions between Israel and its Arab neighbours.

Ms Rice said the UN text should "open a path to lasting peace between Lebanon and Israel that will end the suffering and violence of this past month."

"The people of the Middle East have lived too long at the mercy of extremists," she said.

"It is time to build a more hopeful future. This resolution shows us the way."

Immediately before Ms Rice spoke, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan lamented that it took the Security Council's major powers a month to achieve the overnight ceasefire proposal.

"I would be remiss if I did not tell you how profoundly disappointed I am that the council did not reach this point much, much earlier," he said.

"All members of this council must be aware that this inability to act sooner has badly shaken the world's faith in its authority and integrity," he said.

"It is absolutely vital that the fighting now stop," Mr Annan told the gathered council representatives, who in addition to Ms Rice included the foreign ministers of France, Britain and several other countries.

Five Minutes to Midnight

Michael Ledeen, The Corner:

One of the best publications around is called "The Intellectual Activist," and its editor, Robert Tracinski, has just written an exceptinally good piece on the inevitability of war, and the astonishing refusal of so many to accept that fact and act accordingly. Newt Gingrich says the same thing in his oped today in Washington Pravda. Tracinski's is much longer, but it's worth it. You need a subscription to TIAdaily, but here's the piece, which deserves our serious attention:

TIA Daily • August 10, 2006

Five Minutes to Midnight

The War Is Coming, No Matter How Hard We Try to Evade It

by Robert Tracinski

I have noticed a recent trend in war commentary, starting a few weeks after the beginning of the current conflict in Lebanon. The trend began with a series of analogies between recent events and the events of the 1930s, leading up to World War II. READ MORE

In the August 2 Washington Times, for example, Kenneth Timmerman referred to the Lebanon War as "Islamofascism's 1936." Just as the Spanish Civil War that began in that year was a preview of World War II—the 1937 bombing of Guernica was Hermann Goering's test of the ability of aerial bombing to destroy cities—so Timmerman argues that the Lebanon War is a preview of a larger conflict: "Iran…is testing the international community's response, as it prepares for a future war." (Jack Wakeland made a similar point in the July 19 edition of TIA Daily.)

For others on the pro-war right, the preferred analogy is 1938, the year in which Western appeasement of Hitler emboldened him to further attacks. That year's Munich Agreement—the "diplomatic solution" to a German-fomented crisis in Czechoslovakia, abandoned Czechoslovakia to Hitler in exchange for promises that British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain claimed would guarantee "peace for our time." On August 7, the headline of a Washington Times editorial asked: is the Bush administration's proposed diplomatic solution for Lebanon an attempt to secure "Peace in Our Time?"

Over at National Review Online, Jonah Goldberg picks 1939, wondering if Israel will fall to a Sunni-Shiite pact, just as Poland fell to a Nazi-Soviet pact, while John Batchelor, writing in the New York Sun, is more ecumenical, citing analogies to 1936, 1938, 1939, and even America in 1941.

British commentator David Pryce-Jones, in his blog at National Review Online, sums up the general sense of things:

I have often wondered what it would have been like to live through the Thirties. How would I have reacted to the annual Nuremberg Party rallies, the rants against the Jews, and Hitler’s foreign adventures which the democracies did nothing to oppose, the occupation of the Rhineland and Austria, Nazi support for Franco in the Spanish civil war, and the rest of it. Appeasement was then considered wise, and has only become a dirty word with hindsight….

Now Iran is embarked on foreign adventures in Iraq and Syria and Lebanon. It is engaged on all-out armament programs, and is evidently hard at work developing the nuclear weapon that will give it a dimension of power that Hitler did not have…. Appeasement is again considered wise.

What these commentators are picking up is not an exact parallel to any one event of the 1930s—hence their scattershot of historical analogies. Instead, what they are picking up is a sense of the overall direction of world events: we are clearly headed toward a much larger, bloodier conflict in the Middle East, but no one in the West wants to acknowledge it, prepare for it, or begin to fight it.

The phrase that best captures this sense of foreboding struck me in a long and interesting account of wartime Israel by Bernard-Henri Levy.

Zivit Seri is a tiny woman, a mother, who speaks with clumsy, defenseless gestures as she guides me through the destroyed buildings of Bat Galim—literally “daughter of the waves,” the Haifa neighborhood that has suffered most from the shellings. The problem, she explains, is not just the people killed: Israel is used to that. It’s not even the fact that here the enemy is aiming not at military objectives but deliberately at civilian targets—that, too, is no surprise. No, the problem, the real one, is that these incoming rockets make us see what will happen on the day—not necessarily far off—when the rockets are ones with new capabilities: first, they will become more accurate and be able to threaten, for example, the petrochemical facilities you see there, on the harbor, down below; second, they may come equipped with chemical weapons that can create a desolation compared with which Chernobyl and Sept. 11 together will seem like a mild prelude.

For that, in fact, is the situation. As seen from Haifa, this is what is at stake in the operation in southern Lebanon. Israel did not go to war because its borders had been violated. It did not send its planes over southern Lebanon for the pleasure of punishing a country that permitted Hezbollah to construct its state-within-a-state. It reacted with such vigor because the Iranian President Ahmadinejad’s call for Israel to be wiped off the map and his drive for a nuclear weapon came simultaneously with the provocations of Hamas and Hezbollah. The conjunction, for the first time, of a clearly annihilating will with the weapons to go with it created a new situation. We should listen to the Israelis when they tell us they had no other choice anymore. We should listen to Zivit Seri tell us, in front of a crushed building whose concrete slabs are balancing on tips of twisted metal, that, for Israel, it was five minutes to midnight.

It is, indeed, "five minutes to midnight"—not just for Israel, but for the West. The time is very short now before we will have to confront Iran. The only question is how long we let events spin out of our control, and how badly we let the enemy hit us before we begin fighting back.

We can't avoid this war, because Iran won't let us avoid it. That is the real analogy to the 1930s. Hitler came to power espousing the goal of German world domination, openly promising to conquer neighboring nations through military force and to persecute and murder Europe's Jews. He predicted that the free nations of the world would be too weak—too morally weak—to stand up to him, and European and American leaders spent the 1930s reinforcing that impression. So Hitler kept advancing—the militarization of the Rhineland in 1936, the Spanish bombing campaign in 1937, the annexation of Austria and the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938, the invasion of Poland in 1939—until the West finally, belated decided there was no alternative but war.

That is what is playing out today. Iran's theocracy has chosen, as the nation's new president, a religious fanatic who believes in the impending, apocalyptic triumph of Islam over the infidels. He openly proclaims his desire to create an Iranian-led Axis that will unite the Middle East in the battle against America, and he proclaims his desire to "wipe Israel off the map," telling an audience of Muslim leaders that "the main solution" to the conflict in Lebanon is "the elimination of the Zionist regime." (Perhaps this would be better translated as Ahmadinejad's "final solution" to the problem of Israel.)

Like Hitler, Ahmadinejad regards the free nations of the world as fading "sunset" powers, too morally weak to resist his legions of Muslim fanatics. And when we hesitate to kill Muqtada al-Sadr in Iraq, when we pressure Israel to rein in its attacks on Hezbollah, when we pander to the anti-Jewish bigotry of the "Muslim street"—we reinforce his impression of our weakness.

The result has been and will be the same: Iran will press its advantage and continue to attack our interests in the Middle East and beyond. The only question is when we will finally decide that Iran's aggression has gone too far and its theocratic regime needs to be destroyed.

But the delay has been and will be costly. When the wider war comes, Lebanon won't be the only nation plunged into turmoil. Iraq will also get much worse, since Sadr is almost certain to lead a Shiite uprising against American troops in support of his masters in Tehran. And the terrorist plot uncovered today in Britain should cause us to recollect that Iran has a long-standing global terrorist network that it could use to strike in Europe and even in America.

Writers on the pro-war right (along with a very small number of pro-war liberals) sense that this war cannot be avoided, and they are beginning to prepare themselves—and their readers—to fight. Few of them are yet prepared to say that we need to strike immediately at Iran, though a few are beginning to contemplate this necessity. (See Joel Rosenberg in today's National Review Online.)

The left also senses the impending war, but they have a very different reaction. Their favorite analogy is not the prelude to World War II, but the beginning of World War I.

It is widely acknowledged that World War II was made far more horrible by the years in which free nations appeased Hitler, allowing him to strengthen his armies before he took over Europe. That analogy lends itself to one conclusion: the sooner we attack Iran, the better.

World War I, by contrast, is largely regarded as the result of a giant, tragic mistake, a failure of diplomacy in which the great powers of Europe, seeking a network of alliances that would guarantee a "balance of power," instead trapped themselves into a senseless war. This is the use made of the analogy by Henry Porter in The Guardian.

With a shudder, I realise I am writing this on 4 August, 92 years to the day that my grandfathers, both serving officers and in the same regiment, learned they would probably be going to war. I do not know how long they thought they would be fighting for or if they expected to survive (both did), but I am fairly sure that neither had an exact idea of the complex forces that brought them to France and Mons by the end of month.

Few people in 1914 saw things as clearly as we do now...the building of alliances, the accumulating tension in Europe, and the setting of numerous invisible hair triggers across the Continent and the colonies. Without being alarmist, I wonder if, in future, students will look back on 2006 and observe similar developments and point to some of the same drift, blindness, and ambition that characterised the beginning of the last century.

Porter literally ignores the role of Iran in driving this conflict and instead blames the looming regional war on the alleged tendency of President Bush and Prime Minister Blair to view the conflict as a "struggle between the values of democracy and the tyranny of violent fundamentalism: a vision of a primordial conflict between the forces of light and darkness." Instead, Porter advocates that we drop the dangerous guidance of morality in favor of a "huge diplomatic effort with all concerned taking part."

In today's Washington Post, Richard Holbrooke, US ambassador to the UN under the Clinton administration, uses the same analogy for the same purpose:

Barbara Tuchman's classic, "The Guns of August,"…recounted how a seemingly isolated event 92 summers ago—an assassination in Sarajevo by a Serb terrorist—set off a chain reaction that led in just a few weeks to World War I. There are vast differences between that August and this one. But Tuchman ended her book with a sentence that resonates in this summer of crisis: "The nations were caught in a trap, a trap made during the first thirty days out of battles that failed to be decisive, a trap from which there was, and has been, no exit."

Preventing just such a trap must be the highest priority of American policy…. Every secretary of state from Henry Kissinger to Warren Christopher and Madeleine Albright negotiated with Syria, including those Republican icons George Shultz and James Baker. Why won't this administration follow suit, in full consultation with Israel at every step?... The same is true of talks with Iran, although these would be more difficult….

Containing the violence must be Washington's first priority.

Note that the idea that we can settle all of this just by sitting down and talking with Iran and Syria—with no reference to the ideas, statements, goals, and actions of the Iranian regime—give the left's pronouncements on the coming war an air of unreality.

That is most striking in a recent article by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, an ersatz "liberal" who specializes in expressing grave concern about genocide and oppression, while counseling America against any military action to stop the killers and tyrants.

Responding to the question, "How can one negotiate with those who would destroy you?," Kristof blithely answers:

France is showing leadership in pressing for such a lasting deal, and Mr. Bush should push that diplomatic effort with every administration sinew.

Terms of a genuine settlement might involve an exchange of prisoners, Israel giving up the Shebaa Farms area (if not to Lebanon, then to an international force), and an Israeli promise not to breach Lebanese territory or airspace unless attacked. Hezbollah would commit to becoming a purely political force and to dismantling its militia, with its weaponry going to the Lebanese armed forces. Israel would resume talks with Syria on the Golan Heights, the US would resume contact with Syria, and Syria would agree to stop supplying weaponry to Hezbollah (or allowing it in from Iran). Syria and Hezbollah would then pledge cooperation with a robust international buffer force along the border. Some of this may have to come in stages: for example, with Hezbollah first leaving the border area and then giving up its weaponry….

So let’s stop the killing and start the talking.

All of this is obviously a fantasy. Kristof offers not a single piece of evidence that Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah—who together conspired to initiate this war—would simply agree to stop arming and plotting against Israel.

Over on HBL, Harry Binswanger mentioned this passage and started a discussion trying to explain how Kristof could engage in such a massive, open evasion. He came to some good conclusions, but I don't think anyone has yet put together the big picture. This small evasion is just one tiny appendage of a much larger evasion.

The larger evasion is this: the left senses that a regional war is coming, that Iran is hell-bent on starting it, and that there is no way to avoid it. But all of this runs directly counter to their whole world-view. Rather than questioning that world view, they simply assert that this can't be happening. They have to believe that something, anything—no matter how implausible—will stop it from happening. If we just get everyone together and talk, and we keep tinkering with diplomatic solutions until we find something that works, surely we can find a way to avoid a regional war in the Middle East. Can't we? Please?

And so the left confirms the right's sense that the appeasement of the 1930s is the best historical precedent for the current era.

Fortunately, George Bush is not Neville Chamberlain. He has already waged two wars, in Afghanistan and Iraq. Imagine if, during the 1930s, the Allied Powers had already joined forces to defeat the fascists in Spain, then invaded Italy and overthrown Mussolini's regime. It would have made the coming conflict easier—but it would not have defanged our most dangerous enemy.

Unfortunately, George Bush is not Winston Churchill. It is as if, having suppressed fascism in Spain and Italy, we were still appeasing Germany and subordinating our interests to a wobbly consensus at the League of Nations. Just as Germany was the central enemy in the European theater of World War II, so Iran is the central enemy in the Middle East today.

Observing the events of today—the hesitation and uncertainty, the stubborn clinging to the fantasy that the enemy can be appeased if we just keep talking and find the right diplomatic solution—I now feel that, for the first time, I really understand the leaders of the 1930s. Their illusion that Hitler could be appeased has always seemed, in historical hindsight, to be such a willful evasion of the facts that I have never grasped how it was possible for those men to deceive themselves. But I can now see how they clung to their evasions because they could not imagine anything worse than a return to the mass slaughter of the First World War. They wanted to believe that something, anything could prevent a return to war. What they refused to imagine is that, in trying to avoid the horrors of the previous war, they were allowing Hitler to unleash the much greater horrors of a new war.

Today's leaders and commentators have less excuse. The "horror" they are afraid of repeating is the insurgency we're fighting in Iraq—a war whose cost in lives, dollars, and resolve is among the smallest America has ever had to pay. And it takes no great feat of imagination to project how much more horrible the coming conflict will be if we wait on events long enough for Iran to arm itself with nuclear technology. Among the horrific consequences is the specter of a new Holocaust, courtesy of an Iranian nuclear bomb.

The good news, such as it is, is that the air of foreboding about this new war is somewhat exaggerated. Yes, the conflict will become larger and bloodier—far bloodier than it would have been had we acted earlier. But Iran is not Nazi Germany—a large, united, economically and technologically advanced nation that could nearly equal our military capability. Iran is a poor, backward nation with a large, restive dissident movement. Its military bluster is a hollow shell hiding its underlying weakness. It's time to break that shell and kill the monster inside—before it grows any bigger and more powerful.

We can all sense that the war is coming. It is vital for America to seize the initiative and fight it on our terms, when we have the maximum advantage.

It's five minutes to midnight. The time to strike Iran is now.