Month: August 2010

from LobeLog: News and Views Relevant to U.S.-Iran relations for August 31st, 2010:

The Wall Street Journal: News columnist Gerald Seib has a convoluted piece on Mid East and Central Asian policy where he says that almost all the U.S.’s regional policy is directed at Iran. Seib writes that Obama’s policies in Iraq, Afghanistan and Israel-Palestine all aim to “clear the decks in order to concentrate more intensely on the paramount challenge posed by Iran and its Islamic extremist friends.” Raising the specter of “a hostile state potentially armed with weapons of mass destruction,” Seib nonetheless affirms the neocon bête noire of linkage between the Israel-Palestinian conflict and the rest of the region. He calls the Mid East talks in Washington this week “an attempt to reduce the danger of a traditional flashpoint, the plight of the stateless Palestinians.”

National Review Online: Robert Costa briefly sums up House Minority Leader John Boehner’s speech to an American Legion Convention in Milwaukee before reproducing the speech in full. Boehner, who would become Speaker should the GOP take the House in November, asserts that “international isolation” will not stop Iran from pursuing the bomb. “Iran is more than prepared to sacrifice the well-being of its people for the chance to fundamentally change the balance of power in the region,” he says. “It is the true source of instability in the region, and we must not naively assume a nuclear-armed Iran would be containable.” Without directly mentioning an Israeli attack on Iran, Boehner says that the U.S. should support Israel as an “island of freedom” and “stick by [its] friends.”

Financial Times (free subscription required): Reporting from Tehran, Monavar Khalaj highlights the still-turbulent domestic politics of Iran. While the current sparring in Iran’s majles — or parliament — is between President Ahmadinejad and fundamentalist hard-liners, the wrangling is in direct defiance of Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei and indicates how difficult it is for authorities to keep a lid on politics there. In fact, self-proclaimed Green Movement supporter and arch-neocon Michael Ledeen has a post at NRO pointing to calls for a new round of Green protests (though Ledeen strikes a patronizing tone by declaring the opposition’s poster “elegant”).

The Washington Institute for Near East Policy: WINEP fellow Simon Henderson warns that arrests of Shiite opposition activists in Bahrain could threaten to bring greater resentment from the island-kingdom’s Shiite majority. Henderson argues that the large number of potentially disenfranchised Shiites, Tehran’s historical claims to Bahrain (although Tehran renounced its claim to the kingdom during the Shah’s rule), and the importance of the island state to U.S. military staging in the region are all reasons for the U.S. to encourage the Bahraini government to avoid an outbreak of anti-government and anti-U.S. protests.

Popcorn sales are soaring across the nation because Obama will give a live Oval Office speech tonight on the U.S. victory in Iraq.

I’m disappointed that Obama will not be giving the speech after climbing out of a jet wearing a flight suit, like George W. did with his “Mission Accomplished” speech in 2003.

I expect that Obama will have at least half a dozen Montana-sized howlers in his speech tonight.

But will he out-BS Bush on Iraq?

Has anyone seen betting odds on this proposition? It will not be easy, considering that Bush spent 6 years shoveling hokum on Iraq.

On the other hand, Obama has embraced most of Bush’s follies. Perhaps he can rise to this challenge as well.

One interesting nugget from Josh Nathan-Kazis’s Forward article on the various Sept. 11 events going on at Ground Zero:

In addition to Wilders, the rally [led by Pamela Geller] will feature a videotaped address by John Bolton, ambassador to the United Nations during the second Bush administration, and speeches by Republican political candidates and by a conservative radio host. Former GOP House speaker Newt Gingrich was previously listed as a speaker, but he is not attending. A spokesman for Gingrich said that he had never intended to attend, and that the listing was based on a misunderstanding.

While it’s impossible to know the actual story, it sure sounds like Gingrich decided that associating himself with the likes of Geller and Geerts Wilders was not a sound political strategy for a 2012 presidential hopeful. Similarly, it’s notable that even John Bolton — who is about as far right as any high-profile U.S. political figure, and who wrote the forward to Geller and Robert Spencer’s latest book — is declining to appear in person. Perhaps Gingrich and Bolton calculated that there is a not-insignificant chance that Geller’s Muslim hatefest will end in some kind of “incident” — see the near-miss at last week’s Ground Zero rally for an idea of what this would look like — in which case participation at the rally would become politically toxic for whoever was involved.

As I wrote a couple weeks ago, one of the most important stories about the whole controversy over the so-called “Ground Zero Mosque” is the extent to which prominent Republican political figures, most notably Gingrich, have mainstreamed a virulently Islamophobic discourse that was once limited to the right-wing fringes. Does Gingrich’s pulling out of the Geller rally mean that he has reconsidered the wisdom of trying to carve out a niche for himself as America’s most prominent Islamophobe? It would be premature to say so for sure, but keep an eye on Gingrich and other prominent Republican opinion-makers in the months to come.

from LobeLog: News and Views Relevant to U.S.-Iran relations for August 30th, 2010:

Haaretz: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is calling for Lebanon’s resistance groups to stand together with Iran. Ahmadinejad’s comments come after last week’s announcement from Iran’s defense minister that Tehran was prepared to sell weapons to Lebanon’s government. Tehran’s overtures to the Lebanese government and Hezbollah have picked up in pace after $100 million in US military aid to Lebanon was suspended earlier this month following a skirmish on the Israel-Lebanon border which resulted in the death of two Lebanese soldiers, a Lebanese journalist and an Israeli officer.

Reuters: Iranian Intelligence Minister Heidar Moslehi says that investigations into spying allegations against three American hikers detained in Iran will be completed soon. The three hikers–Shane Bauer, Sarah Shourd and Josh Fattal–have been detained since July 2009 when they crossed into Iran from northern Iraq. The hikers have not formally been charged with spying and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in February that the three Americans might be swapped for Iranians jailed in the US. Families of the hikers say the trio strayed across the border accidentally.

Iran Review: Dr. Kayhan Barzegar, Director of International Affairs at the Center for Middle East Strategic Studies in Tehran, writes that the launch of the Bushehr nuclear plant will, “enhance the peaceful nature and legitimacy of Iran’s nuclear program,” and shows that Russia has conceded that Iran is a nuclear state. Barzegar suggests that Russian cooperation in bringing the Bushehr nuclear plant online will bring Moscow closer to Tehran and result in future bilateral nuclear cooperation. Barzegar argues that it is too late to stop Iran’s nuclear program with an airstrike. He concludes, “…[A]irstrikes alone will not be able to stop Iran’s nuclear program and may prompt the country to withdraw from the NPT and pursue, as some western analysts predict, a nuclear weapon capability. In any event, the United States or Israel will be unable to stage air attacks on Iran on grounds that it is enriching uranium. It is also already too late to attack Bushehr, as nuclear fuel has been uploaded into the reactor and any military assault would be concomitant with major health hazards resulting from nuclear radiation and exposure.”

Looks like producers for Dr. Phil and Montel might be waiting awhile if they think they have a celebrity dad-hating story in the making. Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post seemed to have obtained a scoop yesterday rising to the level of Dr. Evil/Scott Evil proportions, excerpting a FaceBook quote from Daniel Assange, 20, that appeared on its face to fuel the growing personal attacks against his father, embattled WikiLeaks founder and director, Julian Assange:

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange’s own son thinks he’s a nightmare when it comes to women.

“That man does have a way of making a lot of female enemies,” Daniel Assange, 21, said about his embattled dad.

Daniel made the Facebook posting after two Swedish women came forward with allegations that led to rape and molestation charges against his dad.

Daniel also wondered about his father’s claim that the accusations were part of a Pentagon “smear campaign.”

“Interesting to see whether this is the result of a government plot or personal grudges,” he wrote.

But later on Friday, Daniel, under the moniker Somnidea on a website called The Sleepy Lammata lashed out at the newspaper, calling the story “godawful sensational tripe”:

I’d just like to note here that the comments in question were very tongue-in-cheek and never intended to be made public like this, much less support the conclusions of the article. The NYP did not interview me or otherwise attain my consent in any way for their publication. I have much respect for my father and his cause, and these ridiculously ill-handled allegations of sexual abuse serve only to distract from the audacious awesomeness that he has actually done.

from LobeLog: News and Views Relevant to U.S.-Iran relations for August 27th, 2010:

Reuters: According to Olli Heinonen, the former chief of U.N. nuclear inspection, Iran has stockpiles of enough low-enriched uranium for as many as two nuclear weapons but will not build a weapon at this time. “In theory, it is enough to make one or two nuclear arms. But to reach the final step, when one only has just enough material for two weapons, does not make sense,” Heinonen said in an interview carried out just before he left office earlier this month.

The Washington Post: The American Enterprise Institute scholar Michael Rubin writes that missing from the list of U.S. consulates in Iraq is any plan for permanent U.S. representation in Najaf. Rubin argues that the importance of Najaf in the Shiite world and the high number of Iranian visitors means, “[t]here is no better place outside Iran for diplomats to interact with ordinary Iranians across socioeconomic divides because everyone, rich or poor, wants to make a trip once prohibited by war and politics.” If the U.S. fails to establish an official presence in Najaf, says Rubin, Iranian influence in the area will rise and, “America’s enemies will define our legacy.”

Sic Semper Tyrannis: Colonel Pat Lang theorizes that Michael Rubin might be angling for an appointment as the first U.S. consul to Najaf.

The Weekly Standard blog: Michael Weiss asks why Obama has failed to do more to help Shiva Nazar Ahari, an Iranian human rights advocate. She has been arrested several times and will stand trial on September 4th for disseminating “anti-regime propaganda” and participating in an “act contrary to national security” through her attendance at gatherings in November and December. Weiss characterizes Ahari, who may face the death penalty, as “clearly pro-West and philo-American.” Weiss’s calls for Obama to publicly show solidarity with Ahari contradicts the advice of Akbar Ganji, the celebrated Iranian journalist and former political prisoner, who warned in May that explicit U.S. government support for the Green Movement would hurt the movement’s legitimacy in Iran.