by Jimmy DeYoung
Speaking at a recent gathering of politicos at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, the former PM of Spain Jose Aznar said that Russian President Vladimir Putin told him not to worry about Iran because as Putin said,
"Israel will take care of Iran".
Putin made these statements after Aznar entreated the Russian president not to sell the S300 anti-aircraft missiles to Iran which would allow Iran to set in place a defensive system that could deter an Israeli preemptive strike on Iran’s nuclear weapons program.
The former Spanish PM also held a meeting with the Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who told Aznar that Israel was a historic cancer condemned to disappear and that it was inevitable that there would be an open confrontation between the Jewish state and Iran.
Continue Reading »
by Ryan Mauro
The Iranian regime believes what it says and can achieve its stated objectives. That’s the blunt truth that few can accept.
To determine Iran’s strategy, we must determine its goals and ideology. President Ahmadinejad consistently states that he acts in order to "hasten the arrival" of the Mahdi, also called the Hidden Imam, who is to appear during the End Times to bring victory over the enemies of Islam. Since at least July 2010, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei has been telling his inner circle that he has met the Mahdi, who promised him an imminent return.
A number of voices opposed to a potential Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities reassure us that the regime is a rational actor and we should not take this rhetoric seriously. Former Mossad director Meir Dagan went so far as to say Iran is "very rational." The statement made headlines but their simplicity is misleading. Dagan actually said that Iran is "not exactly our rational." What Dagan likely meant is that the regime weighs costs and benefits. It rationally pursues goals that we’d consider irrational.
Continue Reading »
by Jim Fletcher
-
dis·in·for·ma·tion [dis-in-fer-mey-shuhn, dis-in-] noun
-
false information, as about a country’s military strength or plans, publicly announced or planted in the news media, especially of other countries.
If I can say it this way, the Iranian threat is almost becoming comical.
Long-time readers of “Israel Watch” know that I don’t mind saying my worldview is informed by the presupposition that the Bible is true.
Continue Reading »
by Terry James
It’s like the proverbial broken record–or, I guess that would be “broken CD” in today’s jargon. This summer will be the time of that explosion in the Middle East that will set the world aflame, with petroleum the accelerant that ignites the conflict. We have heard the same dire predictions for at least the past five years. Still, the explosion hasn’t come.
I’ve received numerous copies of Joel Rosenberg’s blog article with the title “War this Summer?" and I’ve heard him talking about all-out war in the Middle East since before he spoke to the Pre-Trib Research Center group in Dallas a number of years ago. Rosenberg is not the only one who has declared early in every year recently past that war will erupt during the summer. Many have predicted that something would happen to spark war so violent that that prophetic region will not be able to contain the devastation. The likely results, it has been said by some, will be the “presumed” Psalms 83 war, or even the Gog-Magog war of Ezekiel 38-39.
Continue Reading »
by Jimmy DeYoung
Iranian President Ahmadinejad, the Iranian military chief, and even the leadership of the Supreme Council of Iran, the Ayatollahs, the Islamic leaders, say that they are prepared for an attack from Israel, the United States, or any other nation that may decide to move against the Islamic Republic. The Iranian threat to the Middle East, Europe, and even to the United States, is the development of a nuclear weapon of mass destruction in Iran that could be used to destroy the Jewish state as has been called for by the Iranian president.
Israel recognizes Iran as their number one threat and have put in place a strategic plan to make certain that Iran does not have a nuclear weapon of mass destruction that could be fired on the Jewish state and that plan may well be a preemptive strike against Iran.
Continue Reading »
by Chris Schang
This past weekend we witnessed the resumption of long stalled nuclear talks between Iran and the six major world powers known collectively as the P5+1. This groups includes the US, Britain, China, Russia, and France plus Germany. The talks were heralded as a positive step in the right direction by the EU representatives. However, Israeli PM Netanyahu called them a "freebie" for Iran as the talks basically went nowhere and although there is another meeting scheduled for late next month, nothing really became of the meeting. Today, the U.S. lawmakers called the talks "inadequate" and called for more sanctions. The Haaretz news website reported:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has harshly criticized the talks on Saturday between Iran and six world powers, saying "my initial impression is that Iran has been given a freebie" to carry on with its nuclear program. Netanyahu said the decision to continue the talks on May 23 gives Tehran five more weeks to enrich uranium as it likes. "I think Iran should take immediate steps to stop all enrichment, take out all enrichment material and dismantle the nuclear facility in Qom," Netanyahu said in a statement. "I believe that the world’s greatest practitioner of terrorism must not have the opportunity to develop atomic bombs."
Continue Reading »
by Jim Fletcher
A few years ago, at the height of the controversy over the Israeli pullout from Gaza, I visited with Caroline Glick in the lobby of the Mount Zion Hotel.
Listening to Caroline—I believe her to be the finest pure journalist anywhere today—give a hard-eyed assessment of the fallout from the pullout, with a backdrop of the Old City walls in the picture window behind her, I couldn’t help but wonder why this type of sane reasoning can’t find its way into politics.
Caroline, the Jerusalem Post’s deputy managing editor (I highly recommend her book, Shackled Warrior: Israel and the Global Jihad), is petite, but don’t let that fool you. A reserve officer in the IDF, she made aliyah in 1991, from her native Chicago. She doesn’t mince words, and her assessments of both the political and military situation in the Middle East is dead-on. I am reminded of the comment from CAMERA’s Andrea Levin a few years back, speaking of the insipid Anthony Lewis: “He’s always wrong.”
Continue Reading »
