Israel's top sociopaths are busy little warmongering bees: Barak: If sanctions fail, Iran must be hit --Ya'alon says Tehran is developing missiles capable of reaching the United States. 03 Feb 2012 Claiming that all of Iran's nuclear facilities are vulnerable and that a military option is real and ready to be used if sanctions fail, Israel's top political and military leadership issued a series of warnings to the Islamic Republic on Thursday in some of the most candid comments on the [alleged] nuclear threat in years. Speaking at the Herzliya Conference, Defense Minister Ehud Barak said there was a consensus among many nations today that if diplomacy and sanctions failed to stop Iran, a military strike should be launched. "If sanctions don't achieve the desired goal of stopping [Iran's] military nuclear program, there will be a need to consider taking action," he declared.

Haaretz: 'Certain countries' could take Iran nuclear matter into their own hands, U.K. official says
Haaretz: Panetta lets stand report that Israel may attack Iran by June
Russia Today: ‘Israel to strike Iran in April, May or June’ – US Defense Sec
John Glaser: Israel Ramps Up Push for Attack on Iran
ANSWER: “No War on Iran” protests Feb. 4 set for at least 56 cities - 12 noon at the White House

As tensions between the US and Iran heat up, author Michael T. Winter believes the main reason behind America’s harsh stance is Tehran’s move to seek an alternative to the dollar as an oil currency. - Economic sanctions, spearheaded by the US and, less willingly, the EU could have a disastrous effect on both of their respective economies. If Iran cannot sell their oil to Europe, there are plenty of customers waiting in the wings, and if they come bearing not petrodollars, but gold and sovereign currencies, then all the better for Iran. These sanctions, if enforced, will in effect place a serious dent in the power of the petrodollar. Any rhetoric regarding Iran’s nuclear program and the insistence on crippling it is nothing more than a US attempt to force regime change for one more receptive to maintaining the hegemony of the petrodollar.

During a broadcasted meeting of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, CIA Director, panel Chairperson indicate they met Tamir Pardo in Washington this week; U.S. official: [allegedly] Iran willing to attack U.S. targets if threatened. - The clandestine Washington visit was exposed during a hearing of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which was participated by CIA Director David Petraeus, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, and Dianne Feinstein, who chairs the Senate panel. During the meeting, Feinstein asked Clapper whether or not Israel intended to strike Iran's nuclear facilities, with the top U.S. intelligence official answering that he would rather discuss the issue behind closed doors.

The Independent: Israel sets up elite command unit to strike behind 'enemy' lines

The ANSWER Coalition is calling on everyone to join a demonstration or to organize one on the National Day of Action on Saturday, February 4, to demand: “No War on Iran, No Sanctions, No Intervention, No Assassinations.” The call is sponsored by scores of progressive organizations. - In Washington, D.C., we will gather at the White House on Feb. 4 at 12 noon. A list of events taking place on or around Feb. 4 in cities across the country can be found here. If you or someone in your area is organizing an event on or around Feb. 4, please provide us with the event details so we may publicize it on our website and future emails. Below is an instructive fact sheet developed by the ANSWER Coalition that breaks down the propaganda campaign against Iran carried out by Washington and the corporate media. Please share this with friends, family and co-workers via email and social networking sites.

Two ships of the US Navy, the nuclear submarine USS Annapolis and the destroyer USS Momsen have passed through the Suez Canal into the Red Sea. Although their destination is confidential, they are now getting dangerously close to the Persian Gulf. - The ships’ passage was a major operation for the Suez administration as due to safety reasons they had to close off the canal to all other traffic and even shut down the bridge, disrupting the link between the banks for some four hours. The traffic on the roadways alongside the canal was also restricted, Interfax news agency reports. There are no reports regarding the destination of the vessels, but the news come amid the ongoing crisis in the relationship between the US and Iran. There is mounting speculation that the Annapolis and the Momsen are heading to the Persian Gulf to reinforce the US naval forces already present in the region. Currently the US has two aircraft carrier groups in the region headed by USS Abraham Lincoln and USS Carl Vinson. It is expected that another aircraft carrier, USS Enterprise, will join the strike force in March.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has dispatched a team of inspectors to Iran this weekend, and they began an intensive three-day inspection visit today under growing threats of an Israeli attack against Iran’s civilian nuclear sites. - The visit was being loudly welcomed by top Iranian officials, with their nuclear chief saying that the inspection would finally end international allegations that the program was anything but a legal, civilian program. Foreign Minister Ali-Akbar Salehi added that the IAEA inspectors would be given free and full access to any nuclear sites they requested. The inspection team includes weapons experts, with the expectation that they will grill Iran over the alleged military ambitions of their program. Previous inspections have failed to uncover any solid evidence that there is any military program at all, which has only fueled further accusations from Western nations that Iran is hiding them. The IAEA’s current chief Amano Yukiya, has mostly gone along with these allegations, issuing a report warning that they couldn’t prove Iran didn’t secretly have a weapons program.

A prominent British journalist says the West is selling the possibility of confrontation with Iran by exaggerating the threat of Tehran's nuclear program through media manipulation. - “Manipulation of the media and public opinion through systematic threat exaggeration through which the growing confrontation with Iran is being sold by the US, Israel and West European leaders is deeply dishonest,” wrote Patrick Cockburn in an article published in The Independent on Sunday. Cockburn added that “the supposed aim of imposing sanctions on Iran's oil exports and central bank is to force Iran to abandon its nuclear program before it reaches the point where it could theoretically build a nuclear bomb.” The United States and the European Union have recently slapped unilateral sanctions against Iran's oil and banking sectors based on the allegation that Tehran's nuclear program may consist of a covert military aspect. Iran has repeatedly refuted the allegations, arguing that as a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Tehran has a right to use nuclear technology for peaceful use.

Patrick Cockburn: Sanctions can only deepen the Iran crisis
Stephen Lendman: Selling War

The Israeli military says a drone that can fly as far as Iran has crashed in central Israel on a routine experimental flight.

The military says there were no injuries in Sunday’s crash, and it was investigating the incident. The Heron TP drone is also known locally as the Eitan. It has a wingspan of 86 feet (26 meters), making it the size of a Boeing 737 passenger jet. It is the largest unmanned aircraft in Israel’s military arsenal.

The drone figures to be featured prominently in any potential Israeli operation against Iran and its expanding nuclear program. Heron TP could provide surveillance, jam enemy communications and connect ground control and manned air force planes. It’s unclear if is could carry a deployable payload in a potential strike.

PressTV: Israeli drone crashes during test flight

An Iranian lawmaker says the Majlis (parliament) Energy Committee has finalized a draft bill to stop the country's oil exports to EU member states in reaction to the bloc's recent decision to ban oil imports from Iran. - Nasser Soudani, deputy chairman of the committee, said on Saturday that the double-urgency bill for halting Iran oil exports to Europe had been finalized in four clauses. “According to one of the main clauses, the Islamic Republic of Iran will halt all oil exports to European countries as long as they continue to ban oil imports from Iran,” he added. The lawmaker said the bill may undergo further modifications as some Iranian parliamentarians believe that oil exports to EU should be stopped for five years.

PressTV: '70 EU refineries to shut for Iran oil ban'

Such public displays have been incredibly common in recent years, but US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Martin Dempsey’s emergency visit to Israel last week may well have had a sense of genuine urgency not often seen. - That’s because increasingly, the long-standing Israeli threats to attack Iran are being taken as a distinct and imminent possibility. Sanctions and announcements related to impending embargoes by the international community seem aimed more at placating Israel and convincing them to hold off on the attack.

Pepe Escobar: Iran Not Isolated - Audio
Jim Lobe: Growing Elite Opposition to Military Option Against Iran

'No One Can Go Out' Insists Steinitz. - In an interview today with Bloomberg Businessweek, Israeli Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz rejected the European Union’s ban on importation of Iranian crude oil, insisting it doesn’t go nearly far enough. Instead, Steinitz called for the international community to impose a full naval and aerial blockade across all of Iran so that “no one can even go out [sic].” This is the only option with any chance of success, he said. Steinitz said a good model for his plan was the Cuban blockade by the United States in 1962, an effort which nearly ended with the annihilation of all life on earth in the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Peter Symonds: Israel prepares for war against Iran - Washington’s allies in Europe are getting ready for war as well. French and British warships accompanied the aircraft carrier, the USS Abraham Lincoln, into the Gulf last Sunday. British Defence Secretary Philip Hammond declared on Monday: “The UK has a contingent capability to reinforce its presence in the region should at any time it be considered necessary to do so.” [...] Claims that Iran is on the point of constructing a nuclear weapon are not supported by facts. The latest International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report—a political document designed to justify the latest US and European sanctions against Iran’s oil exports—provided limited evidence of Iranian research related to aspects of building a nuclear bomb. Much of the “evidence” came from US, European and Israeli intelligence sources. Most of the research projects were discontinued after 2003. Iran continues to deny any plans to build nuclear weapons.

The United States has been brought to the humble state of acting as an attack dog for the Zionist entity, an American political analyst tells Press TV.

The United States is no longer a super power that 'can make decisions that are in her own best interest,' but the country is like an 'unleashed dog' that is simply kowtowing to the Israelis, said Mark Glenn, of the Crescent and Cross solidarity movement in a Wednesday interview. The Idaho-based analyst referred to US President Barack Obama's Tuesday night State of the Union address as 'just one more proof in that direction [US obedience to Israel]'. Obama highlighted the US loyalty to Israel in his speech which was delivered to a joint session of Congress, saying "Our ironclad commitment -- and I mean ironclad -- to Israel's security has meant the closest military cooperation between our two countries in history." The US president's speech is actually a speech "that was written by Israel's foreign policy planners and that means the United States is fighting Israel's wars for her, wherever they may be, if it's Iraq, if it's Afghanistan, if it is Libya, if it is Iran," Glenn said.

William Hague claims blockading Iran is aimed at avoiding conflict, instead of stoking it. Columbia University Professor Gary Sick, who has a special expertise on Iran, viewed the EU oil embargo much differently. He called the efforts “the equivalent of a blockade. It’s an act of war.” - The European Union embargo on Iranian oil imports that was pushed for aggressively by the U.S. is aimed at reducing the risk of conflict and stressing the need for peace talks, according to British Foreign Secretary William Hague. “This is not a set of actions designed to lead to any conflict but to lead us away from any conflict by increasing the pressure for peaceful settlement of these disputes,” he said on Tuesday. Despite years of evidence to the contrary, Hague’s comments passed without an outburst of laughter on the world stage. Washington, and most of the EU, has approached Iran in largely the same way since the Iranian revolution in 1979. That is, with threats, sanctions, and isolation. Instead of bringing diplomacy, it has brought only more bitterness and mistrust.

PressTV: 'EU in for severe crisis due to Iran ban'
PressTV: Norway's Statoil says Iran can still repay its debt to the company despite the EU ban on the country
Peter Symonds: European Union imposes oil embargo on Iran
Chris Floyd: Pups on Parade: EU Obediently Pushes Toward War with Iran

Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman says unilateral sanctions adopted by the European Union against Iran are "unfair" and "doomed to fail." - "The method of threat, pressure and unfair sanctions against a nation that has a strong reason for its approach is doomed to fail," Ramin Mehmanparast said Monday. He added that such measures will not "prevent Iran from achieving its inalienable right" to peacefully use nuclear energy. The spokesman further stated that the EU had adopted the decision under the political pressure of the United States, and advised the bloc to value its interests instead of bowing to Washington. "It seems the American authorities want to disrupt the energy sources of their rivals and weaken their economic rivals under the pretext of piling up political pressure on Iran," he said. Mehmanparast said the oil embargo cannot become real given the European Union's "economic crisis." He emphasized that any country that wants to deprive itself of Iran's vast energy reserves will be "immediately replaced by other countries."

PressTV: Chinese supertankers hired for Iran oil
PressTV: 'Europeans to suffer from Iran oil ban'
Jason Ditz: EU Agrees on ‘Gradual’ Iran Oil Embargo
Peter Symonds: European Union imposes oil embargo on Iran

In an apparent show of strength, Washington is deploying a second carrier strike group in the Gulf. US officials also confirmed their commitment to maintaining a global fleet of 11 aircraft carriers despite budget pressure to cut the fleet's size. - “That’s the reason we maintain a presence in the Middle East,” AP cited US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, as saying in a speech to about 1,700 sailors aboard the USS Enterprise. “We want them to know that we are fully prepared to deal with any contingency and it’s better for them to try to deal with us through diplomacy.” Panetta added that the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise is on course for the Persian Gulf – and will steam through the Strait of Hormuz in a direct message to Iran, AP reports. The USS Enterprise, along with the other six ships in the carrier strike group, will deploy to the Middle East in March. It means the US will maintain two carrier strike groups in the Persian Gulf region. The warships are expected to support the country’s battle operations in Afghanistan, its anti-piracy efforts and other missions.

The Zionist Britain Israel Communications & Research Centre (Bicom) has collaborated with the state-controlled British Office of Communications (Ofcom) to ban the alternative English-language channel Press TV in the UK, a political analyst says.

“With anti-Iran sabotage activities high on its agenda, Bicom has worked closely with Ofcom towards eliminating a critical voice: Press TV,” Ismail Salami, Iranian author and Middle East expert, wrote in an article published on Press TV on Sunday. Ofcom revoked Press TV's license and removed the channel from the Sky platform on January 20 for what it claimed to be the news network's breach of the Communications Act. The British media regulator also served Press TV's London office with an order to pay a 100,000-pound fine. “An office with intimate ties to the [British] Royal Family, Ofcom has issued the verdict under the sway of some influential parties in the government and the Bicom firm to boot,” Salami added. He went on to explain the activities and objectives of the Israeli-sponsored company, pointing out that as a “London-based” organization “tasked with inseminating the Zionist political ideology, Bicom also funds those who are in one way or another involved with anti-Iran activities.” “Apart from garnering support for the Zionist regime among Britons, the office also serves as a bridge between the Mossad and MI6,” with its current head, Lorna Fitzsimons, a member of the parliamentary lobby group Labor Friends of Israel (LFI), Salami elucidated.

The Iranian author also pointed to the October 2011 scandal over Adam Werritty -- an “influential member” of Bicom and “an unofficial chief of staff” to the former British Defense Minister Liam Fox -- and his efforts to subvert the Islamic Republic of Iran. “Werritty was financially backed by murky sources such as Bicom. And he was considered an influential member of the organization and a highly regarded agent for Mossad,” he noted.

Gilad Atzmon: Liam Fox Is Not a ‘Useful Idiot’
Gilad Atzmon: This Is How Israel Runs The British Press
Ismail Salami: Unfolding a plot: Mossad at work
Craig Murray: Matthew Gould and the Plot to Attack Iran
Jonathon Blakeley: Atlantic Bridge, Liam Fox, Adam Werritty & Israel

Stephen Lendman: UK Government Suppresses Truth
AWIP: Britain bans Iran-based TV channel

The tale of the DC Five – the five Beltway bloggers at two prominent Democratic Washington thinktanks who have been smacked down (and one fired) for being insufficiently pro-Israel – is hardly a shock to those who know their history. But before we get into that, a few details on what is only the latest chapter in the story of how the War Party operates in this country. [...] The Isra-bots will “argue” that since Iran represents an “existential threat” to Israel’s very existence, anyone who opposes a war with Tehran is calling for a replay of the Holocaust. If you’re for peace, and see no vital US interest in going to war with Iran, well then you’re a “Holocaust-denier.” [...] The case of the DC Five is meant to sow fear among the policy analysts and thinktankers who inhabit the Washington Beltway: “do not cross the line,” they are telling them – and the closer we get to war with Iran, the faster the boundaries of the impermissible are growing. There is a method to this madness: it is a preemptive strike aimed at opponents of US intervention, and on the left as well as the right it is turning out to be quite effective.

Iran is suspicious that UN agencies may have given away information which aided the murder of Iranian nuclear scientist Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan on January 11. - Iranian deputy UN ambassador Eshagh Al Habib told the UN Security Council on Thursday that there was “high suspicion” that, in order to prepare the murder, terrorist circles used intelligence obtained from UN bodies. According to him, this included interviews with Iranian nuclear scientists carried out by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the sanction list of the Security Council, Reuters news agency reports.

An Iranian commander has warned that Tehran is on full alert in case of enemy threats, and has the best submarines in the world ready to “ambush and hit enemy vessels, especially US Aircraft carriers, from the seabed throughout the Persian Gulf.” - Lieutenant Commander of the Iranian Army's Self-Sufficiency Jihad Rear Admiral Farhad Amiri hailed the Iranian submarines as “the best electronic diesel vessels in the world, noiseless and able to easily evade detection as they are equipped with sonar-evading technology," the country’s semi-state Fars news agency reported. The Iranian military official said the vessels can fire missiles and torpedoes simultaneously, underlining that the submarines’ superiority was not just due to their arms and equipment, but also “the tactical issues are very important", given the geographical specifications of the waters surrounding the country. A submarine of this type sitting on the seabed can easily target and hit an aircraft carrier traversing nearby regions, hinting at the US aircraft carriers deployed in the Persian Gulf.

Leslie H. Gelb: Think Before Acting on Iran
Khaleej Times: Iran warns region against stance on Hormuz

The admission discredits Israel's stated claims that Iran presents a threat to their existence. - A nuclear Iran might make it more difficult for Israel to attack its immediate neighbors, according to a senior Israeli military official on Tuesday. Military planning division chief Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel said if Tehran attains nuclear weapons, that could constrain Israel from striking Iranian-backed groups like Hezbollah and Hamas. “If we are forced to do things in Gaza or in Lebanon, under the Iranian nuclear umbrella it might be different,” Eshel said at a briefing in Jerusalem. "Concern" in the U.S. and Israel over Iran’s nuclear program has increased in recent months, bringing harsh economic sanctions and calls from both Americans and Israelis for a unilateral military strike against Iran. The latest event in the controversy came last week when another Iranian nuclear scientist was assassinated in a plot widely suspected as the work of Israel, the U.S., or both. Still, there is no evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program, and the opinion of the U.S. intelligence community, the Obama administration, and the latest IAEA report is that Iran’s enrichment is so far civilian in nature.

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Ramin Mehmanparast has said that Iran has documents that prove certain Western countries’ support for terrorists and plans to release them in the future. - Mehmanparast made the remarks during his regular press briefing on Tuesday in reply to a question about the diplomatic efforts that Iran has made to pursue the issue of the assassination of Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan, a graduate of Sharif university in chemical engineering and an official at the Natanz nuclear enrichment facility, who was killed in Tehran on January 11. Commenting on the assassination, he said, “The true faces of the self-proclaimed advocates of human rights and the campaign against terrorist are revealed in such scenes, and we are seeking to release documents showing certain Western countries’ support for terrorists.” “We expect the self-proclaimed advocates of human rights and the campaign against terrorism to show how serious they are about dealing with terrorism and condemning it,” he added.

Just when you think you've heard it all, it gets worse. I turned on the radio late last night to hear a little soothing music but ... oops wrong station. This creepy little non-human by the name of Bill Cunningham was taking hate speech to a whole new level. He almost makes Savage and Limbaugh look like choirboys. In a quick summary here's what he was saying: "Dresden was good. Hiroshima was double good. If you're going to fight a war, kill the civilians, burn 'em, they deserve it." Expanding to Iran he says: "I'd warn the Iranians a few days in advance to get the heck out of Dodge. I would obliterate [a favorite word used at least a dozen times] the 20 largest cities. Women, children, they all need to die. 20 million killed would be a good start. Then we would go in and take all of their resources and bring them back to the US."

The Indian foreign secretary says New Delhi will continue to import oil from Tehran and does not seek a US waiver as protection against Washington's sanctions on the Iranian oil sector. - "We have accepted sanctions which are made by the United Nations. Other sanctions do not apply to individual countries," Ranjan Mathai was quoted by Reuters as saying on Tuesday. Implying that India did not see the new US sanctions against Iran's oil as binding, he added, "We continue to buy oil from Iran." US President Barack Obama signed a new law on December 31, 2011, which seeks to impose fresh economic sanctions against Iran's Central Bank and oil sector.

Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan with his son, Alireza.

Killing our enemies abroad is just state-sponsored terror – whatever euphemism western leaders like to use.

On the morning of 11 January Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, the deputy head of Iran's uranium enrichment facility at Natanz, was in his car on his way to work when he was blown up by a magnetic bomb attached to his car door. He was 32 and married with a young son. He wasn't armed, or anywhere near a battlefield.

Since 2010, three other Iranian nuclear scientists have been killed in similar circumstances, including Darioush Rezaeinejad, a 35-year-old electronics expert shot dead outside his daughter's nursery in Tehran last July. But instead of outrage or condemnation, we have been treated to expressions of undisguised glee. "On occasion, scientists working on the nuclear programme in Iran turn up dead," bragged the Republican nomination candidate Rick Santorum in October. "I think that's a wonderful thing, candidly."

Deutsche Welle: Iran makes arrests in scientist's death
Fars News Agency: Students Urge UN to Study Israel's Role in Assassination of Iranian Scientists

Officials Lobby Against Attack on Iran as Military Leaders Bolster Defenses - U.S. defense leaders are increasingly concerned that Israel is preparing to take military action against Iran, over U.S. objections, and have stepped up contingency planning to safeguard U.S. facilities in the region in case of a conflict. President Barack Obama, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and other top officials have delivered a string of private messages to Israeli leaders warning about the dire consequences of a strike. The U.S. wants Israel to give more time for the effects of sanctions and other measures intended to force Iran to abandon its perceived efforts to build nuclear weapons. Stepping up the pressure, Mr. Obama spoke by telephone on Thursday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and U.S. Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will meet with Israeli military officials in Tel Aviv next week.

A top military advisor to the Supreme Leader of Islamic Revolution stressed Iran's ability to guarantee security of global energy supplies in the Persian Gulf, Strait of Hormoz and the Sea of Oman, but at the same time cautioned that the country will use all means to defend its interests in time of threat. - Speaking to reporters here in Tehran on Monday, Supreme Leader's Advisor for Military Affairs Major General Yahya Rahim Safavi pointed to a letter sent to Iran on the Strait of Hormoz, and noted that the strait is a strategic waterway both for global trade and global energy. Safavi further said Iran's coastal line is stretched from Iraqi Southeastern Al-Faw peninsula to Guatr in the Sea of Oman and for this very reason Iran can control and guarantee security of global energy in this region. An estimated 40 percent of the world's oil supply passes through the waterway. The United States has said it would not allow Iran to block the Strait, calling it a "red line" for the US military. In response, Lieutenant Commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Brigadier General Hossein Salami dismissed the US warning over the closure of the strategic strait, and stressed that powerful Iran acts on its own and never asks for anyone's permission to carry out what it desires. In relevant remarks earlier this month, a senior Iranian legislator stressed that Iran will use all its capabilities and possibilities to defend the country against foreign threats and the country will use the Strait of Hormoz as a defensive tool and will close the waterway if it comes under threat.

Israeli Officials Say Drill Will Take Place in Summer - With growing concern about the prospect of a US or Israeli attack on Iran, reports coming out of the Israeli media today say that a massive “defense drill” which was seen by many as part of the groundwork for such a war has been postponed. Unnamed Israeli officials quoted on Israel’s Channel 2 say that the drill has been postponed because the US wants to “avoid causing further tensions in the region” and that it will now be held in the summer. The deployment of thousands of US troops to Israel for the drill had raised red flags across the region, with many fearing that an attack was in the offing. The last time a drill anywhere near this size was held was in 2009, and that only involved about 1,000 US troops – this time reports had about 9,000 in Israel. There was no indication from the reports what that US troops sent to Israel for the drill will do now that it has been postponed, as leaving them inside Israel for the next 6-7 months in anticipation of the drill would likely be provocative in and of itself.

PressTV: Iran confirms receiving US Hormuz letter
PressTV: 'Obama ready to give Iran strike order'

Jason Ditz: Top Israeli Official Slams Obama For Not Being More Hostile to Iran - One of the top officials in the Israeli cabinet, Vice Premier Moshe Yaalon has condemned President Obama today, saying that he is not being nearly hostile enough toward the Iranian government and needs to impose harsher sanctions. Yaalon, who also holds the position of Strategic Affairs Minister (a cabinet position created explicitly for moving against Iran), insisted that Obama was trying to avoid an embargo on Iran’s oil exports “for fear of oil prices rising this year, out of election-year considerations.”

Magazine report claims Israeli spies used fake US spy identities to work with Pakistani fighters targeting Iran. - Agents with Israel's spy agency, Mossad, have posed as CIA agents in operations to recruit members of the Pakistani group Jundallah, according to a report in US-based Foreign Policy magazine. Using US dollars and passports, the agents passed themselves off as members of the US Central Intelligence Agency in the operations, according to memos from 2007 and 2008, said the report which was published on Friday. It is "unclear" whether the recruitment programme is ongoing. [Bullshit! - It's obviously going on 24/7] "Israel has done this before. I know of a report very widely accepted in the US of Israeli Mossad agents in the United States, actually recruiting American Muslims," Mark Perry, who authored the report, told Al Jazeera.

Mark Perry: False Flag - A series of CIA memos describes how Israeli Mossad agents posed as American spies to recruit members of the terrorist organization Jundallah to fight their covert war against Iran. Buried deep in the archives of America's intelligence services are a series of memos, written during the last years of President George W. Bush's administration, that describe how Israeli Mossad officers recruited operatives belonging to the terrorist group Jundallah by passing themselves off as American agents. According to two U.S. intelligence officials, the Israelis, flush with American dollars and toting U.S. passports, posed as CIA officers in recruiting Jundallah operatives -- what is commonly referred to as a "false flag" operation.

According to a January 13, 2012 Reuters news report, Dmitry Rogozin, the Russian ambassador to NATO who has been appointed deputy prime minister in charge of Russia’s defense sector, told news reporters at a Brussels press conference that Russia would regard any military attack on Iran as a “direct threat to our security.” Will the crazed neocon warmongers and the Washington morons listen?

Reuters: Russia says would be threatened by Iran military action
Russia Today: Any conflict on Iran is a direct threat to Russia’s security – Rogozin
Reuters: Russia fears Israel is pushing U.S. toward Iran war

The United States is not at war with Iran yet, but just in case,the Pentagon says they want to be prepared. To do so, the Department of Defense has dispatched 15,000 troops to the neighboring nation of Kuwait. - Gen. James Mattis, the Marine Corps head that rules over the US Central Command, won approval late last year from the White House to deploy the massive surge to the tiny West Asian country Kuwait, which is separated from Iran by only a narrow span of the Persian Gulf. The latest deployment, which was ushered in without much presentation to the public, adds a huge number of troops aligned with America’s arsenal that are now surrounding Iran on literally every front. In late 2011, the US equipped neighboring United Arab Emirates with advanced weaponry created to disrupt underground nuclear operations. In adjacent Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq, American military presence has long been all but enormous. While the US has not placed any boots on the ground in Iran, an unauthorized surveillance mission of a US steal drone in December prompted Tehran to become enraged at Washington. US officials insist that Iran is on the verge of a nuclear weaponry program, despite lacking sufficient evidence or confirmation. During the drone mission, Iran authorities intercepted the craft and forced it into a safe landing. Tensions have only worsened between the two nations in the month since, but Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said that stealth missions into Iran will continue “absolutely,” despite ongoing opposition from overseas.

PressTV: 'Iran war: Next on Washington agenda'
Russia Today: Fear and loathing in Central Asia: Will US go to war with Iran?

The Pentagon has quietly shifted combat troops and warships to the Middle East after the top American commander in the region warned that he needed additional forces to deal with Iran and other potential threats, U.S. officials said.

Marine Corps Gen. James Mattis, who heads U.S. Central Command, won White House approval for the deployments late last year after talks with the government in Baghdad broke down over keeping U.S. troops in Iraq, but the extent of the Pentagon moves is only now becoming clear. Officials said the deployments are not meant to suggest a buildup to war, but rather are intended as a quick-reaction and contingency force in case a military crisis erupts in the standoff with Tehran over its suspected nuclear weapons program. The Pentagon has stationed nearly 15,000 troops in Kuwait, adding to a small contingent already there. The new units include two Army infantry brigades and a helicopter unit - a substantial increase in combat power after nearly a decade in which Kuwait chiefly served as a staging area for supplies and personnel heading to Iraq. The Pentagon also has decided to keep two aircraft carriers and their strike groups in the region. Earlier this week, the American carrier Carl Vinson joined the carrier Stennis in the Arabian Sea, giving commanders major naval and air assets in case Iran carries out its recent threats to close the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic chokepoint in the Persian Gulf, where one-fifth of the world's oil shipments passes.

Iran needs to get in front of these terrorist attacks against nuclear physicists. The attacks are always made using two people on a motorcycle attaching the bomb to the car with magnets. The terrorists obviously know whose car to attack, and the movements of that car. They must have insiders at the universities where the physicists work to associate each targeted physicist with a particular vehicle, and are trailing the cars from the universities. In order to catch the terrorists, Iranian authorities will have to start covertly following these cars themselves (they may even consider dummy cars). All they need to do is catch one pair of terrorists to break the terrorist network and determine who is behind the attacks. My guess: MEK being run by the CIA, working for their Jewish masters to create the idea that there must be a nuclear bomb program or else there would be no reason to kill all these scientists and passersby.

PressTV: Iranians hold funeral for terror victim
PressTV: Khamenei: CIA, Mossad behind Iran killing
Stephen Lendman: Waging Covert War on Iran
Jim Lobe: Whoever Killed the Scientist Was Aiming at Much More
John Glaser: Bolton Says Sanctions and Assassination Programs Are ‘Half-Measures,’ Argues for War
AWIP: Another nuclear scientist killed in Iran; Israel accused

Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev has said the threat of a US military attack against Iran, heavily supported by the US Israeli lobby, is escalating. - Patrushev, who served as Director of Russia’s Federal Security Service, the FSB from 1999 to 2008, believes the United States may get itself involved in yet another war, at least partially due to Israeli influence. "There is a likelihood of a military conflict escalation, to which the Americans are being pushed by Israel," he said in an interview with Interfax. Americans who identify themselves as Jewish (but not necessarily religiously) are estimated at 6,489,000 (2.2% of the population) according to the US Census Bureau. Yet despite these modest numbers, Israel enjoys what could be described as disproportionate influence in US politics due to lobbying groups like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Some researchers argue that the US decision to invade Iraq, for example, was largely motivated by pressure from these pro-Israeli groups.

PressTV: 'US preparing for every option on Iran' - US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro has described Iran as a regional threat, saying Washington will resort to “all necessary means” to stop Tehran's [civilian] nuclear program.

Iran is outraged at the recent assassination of its nuclear scientists, but lacks the political leverage to do anything about it diplomatically and the military and intelligence capacity to defend itself. - Tehran urged the U.N. Security Council and Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday to condemn Tuesday’s assassination which resembled previous killings of Iranian nuclear scientists and which are probably being carried out buy the U.S. and Israel. Tehran has called them terrorist attacks aimed at sabotaging their nuclear program, which all evidence suggests is civilian in nature. [...] The U.S. denies any role in the murders, while Israel is slightly more open about it. In August, the German newspaper Der Spiegel leaked an admission by an Israeli intelligence officer that Mossad, Israel’s spy agency, was behind the assassinations. And the French newspaper Le Figaro this week reported that Israeli Mossad intelligence agents are operating in Kurdistan, where they are recruiting Iranian exiles to work against the Iranian regime.

PressTV: Iran urges UN to condemn terror acts
Fars News Agency: Iran's Letter to UN Lambasts Foreign Terror Campaign against Iranian Scientists

According to sources in Iran, a nuclear scientist was killed in Tehran today by a bomb placed on his car by a motorcyclist. It is very clear to most of us who stands behind these continuous attacks on Iran’s scientists and military personnel. However, the discrepancy between Hebrew and English press reporting on the incident is pretty staggering and demands some deliberation.

While the Israeli English outlet Ynet reports on the incident in a pretty cold manner, it goes as far as reporting on “mysterious explosion in Iranian capital”, the Hebrew Ynet is happy to suggest that Israel is probably behind all those ‘mysterious attacks’.

The Hebrew publication ends its coverage of the story stating that yesterday Chief of Staff - Major General Benny Gantz, said that 2012 would be a “critical year for Iran”. he refered specifically to “continued pressure (on Iran) from the international community and the things that happen to them unnaturally". It doesn’t take a genius to gather that if General Ganz speaks about future “unnatural” events, he must be closely familiar with the details of such events!!!

While the English Ynet, operates as a Hasbara outlet, spreading Israeli propaganda for the Goyim and English speaking Jews, the Hebrew version, is there to boost the Israeli morale. And as it happens, Israeli love to see their ‘enemies’ being, terrorised, slaughtered and murdered.

The true ‘mysterious’ nature of the Jewish state and its relation with the world is indeed a disturbing one and a reason for serious concern.

PressTV: Santorum: Death of Iran experts wonderful
Frank Gardner/BBC: Iran and the undeclared campaign
Alex Lantier: Iranian nuclear scientist assassinated in Tehran
AWIP: Another nuclear scientist killed in Iran; Israel accused

Two assailants on a motorcycle attached a magnetic bomb to the car of an Iranian university professor working at a key nuclear facility, killing him and wounding two people on Wednesday, a semiofficial news agency reported.

The attack in Tehran bore a strong resemblance to earlier killings of scientists working on the Iranian nuclear program. It is certain to reinforce authorities' claims of widening clandestine operations by Western powers and allies to try to cripple nuclear advancements.

The bomb killed Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, a chemistry expert and a director of the Natanz uranium enrichment facility in central Iran, the semiofficial Fars news agency reported. Natanz is Iran's main enrichment site, but officials claimed earlier this week that they are expanding some operations to an underground site south of Tehran with more advanced equipment.

PressTV: 'Mossad, MKO killed Iranian scientist'
Fars News Agency: Terrorists Kill Commerce Deputy of Iran's Nuclear Enrichment Site
The Age: Car bomb kills nuke scientist in Iran
BBC: Iran car explosion kills nuclear scientist in Tehran
Russia Today: Mossad it again? 4th Iranian nuclear scientist bombed
Fars News Agency: Official Blames Zionist Regime for Assassination of Natanz Official

Tehran’s leadership has decided to order a blockade of the strategic Strait of Hormuz if the country’s oil exports are blocked, a senior Revolutionary Guard Commander said as reported by Iranian press. - The strategic decision was made by Iran's top authorities, Ali Ashraf Nouri said, as cited by the Iranian Khorasan daily. "The supreme authorities … have insisted that if enemies block the export of our oil, we won't allow a drop of oil to pass through the Strait of Hormuz. This is the strategy of the Islamic Republic in countering such threats," Nouri said. Until now, there had been no official confirmation of Iran’s military having direct orders to block the Strait. However, Tehran has been threatening to block the strategic waterway – one of the world's most important oil routes – if the West slapped more sanctions on its oil exports or risked hostile military act of any kind. Meanwhile, Iran is planning a new round of “massive” naval drills codenamed The Great Prophet, which will be carried out by the country’s elite Revolutionary Guard with its own air, naval and ground forces, separate from those of the regular military.

An Iranian court on Monday convicted an American man of working for the CIA and sentenced him to death, state media reported. - Iranian authorities allege that Amir Mirzaei Hekmati, a former U.S. Marine, received special training at U.S. bases in Iraq and Afghanistan before being dispatched on a spy mission in Iran. Mirzaei, 28, was born in Arizona but holds dual citizenship. Mirzaei has 20 days to appeal the court’s decision, which comes at a time of increasing tensions between Tehran and Washington. The U.S. is pursuing tough sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program, and a series of assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists and mysterious explosions at military and industrial sites have prompted Iran to keep closer tabs on dual nationals visiting the country.

PressTV: Iran sentences CIA operative to death
Fars News Agency: Judicial Decree for Execution of CIA Spy in Iran Issued
Al Jazeera: Iran sentences 'CIA agent' to death
Russia Today: Iran sentences American ex-Marine to death for spying

Justin Raimondo: The Return of the Chickenhawks - What a joy to see Ron Paul take down Newt “Chickenhawk” Gingrich in front of millions of Americans. Slogging through fifteen Republican presidential debates was totally worth it just to witness this defining moment. Dianne Sawyer, who sounded like she was on Quaaludes, raised her eyebrows quizzically as she asked him if he stood by his previous characterization of Newt as a “chickenhawk.”

PressTV: Romney the liar tells tall tales on Iran

With tensions around the Strait of Hormuz sky-high, Iranian plans to conduct the country's "greatest naval war games” could coincide with joint US-Israeli exercises in the Persian Gulf. With both sides taking positions, could a real battle be looming? - ­Hopefully the massive exercises will remain just that. But with three armies on the playing board, one spark could be enough to ignite an all-out war. Iran, which recently held a 10-day naval exercise near the Strait of Hormuz to demonstrate its military prowess, is now planning new, ‘massive’ naval drills codenamed The Great Prophet. The drills will be carried out by the country’s elite Revolutionary Guard, which has its own air, naval and ground forces separate from those of the regular military. On Thursday, the semiofficial Fars news agency quoted the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's naval commander, Admiral Ali Fadavi, as saying the next round of war games would be "different" from previous ones, AP reports.

BusinessInsider: Iran Is Now Gearing Up For Its 'Greatest War Games Ever' In The Strait Of Hormuz
Fars News Agency: Senior MP Warns US against Continued Military Presence in Region
Russia Today: Iran ‘recommends’ US stay out of Persian Gulf - Video
AWIP: Israel and US to stage major defense drill
AWIP: Thousands of US soldiers to be deployed in Israel for drill

From a 2009 US/Israel defense drill

The Israeli military is gearing up together with U.S. forces for a major missile defense exercise, the Israeli military announced Thursday, as tension between Iran and the international community escalates.

The drill is called "Austere Challenge 12" and is designed to improve defense systems and cooperation between the U.S. and Israeli forces. It follows a 10-day Iranian naval exercise near the strategic Strait of Hormuz. Israel's military said the drill with the U.S. was planned long ago and is not tied to recent events. Both Israeli and U.S. officials said the exercise would be the largest-ever joint drill by the two countries. The Iranian war games came as the West was adopting new sanctions against Tehran over its nuclear program, charging it is making weapons. Iran insists its program is peaceful. Israel [says she] considers Iran a strategic threat because of its nuclear and missile programs and support of violent groups in Lebanon and Gaza, as well as frequent references by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Israel's destruction.

AWIP: Thousands of US soldiers to be deployed in Israel for drill
AWIP: Push by Zionist top officials in Washington and Tel Aviv to devise anti-Iran scenarios

The U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines must combine resources to thwart any efforts by countries such as China and Iran to block America’s access to the South China Sea, the Persian Gulf and other strategic regions, according to a draft of a Pentagon review.

The U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines must combine resources to thwart any efforts by countries such as China and Iran to block America’s access to the South China Sea, the Persian Gulf and other strategic regions, according to a draft of a Pentagon review.

New York Times: EU Agrees in principle to ban on Iranian oil

“I’m really excited about a lot of his ideas,” Cpl. Thorsen told CNN pundit Dana Bash from Paul headquarters in Ankeny, Iowa Wednesday night. “Especially when it comes to bringing the soldiers home,” added Thorsen. “I’ve been serving for ten years now and all ten of those have been during wartime. I’d like to see a little peacetime army and I think he has the right idea.”

Almost immediately, CNN’s Bash began berating the veteran and questioning him over his support for a candidate that would want to largely discontinue America’s foreign military presence. Bash pointed the camera towards a large tattoo on the solder’s neck that recognizes the September 11 terrorist attack and asks Thorsen how he could consider a candidate like Paul while other Republicans write him off as a security threat.

“Some Republicans out there have been saying that Ron Paul would be very dangerous for this country because he wants to bring troops like you back from your post from all over the world,” said Bash. “I think it would be even more dangerous to start nitpicking wars with more countries,” responded the vet.

At that point, CNN’s broadcast became scrambled, but Thorsen managed to begin, “Someone like Iran.” The soldier managed to squeeze off the word “Israel” before the broadcast ceased and the network returned to Blitzer live from in-studio.

CNN’s latest attempt at censoring Rep. Ron Paul’s message from the masses comes days after the network broadcast an edited interview of the candidate in which he is portrayed as agitated and irritated by a CNN host grilling him over controversial newsletters penned under the congressman’s name from the 1990s. After the broadcast, an unedited version of the interview circulated to the Web and showed that the station had largely doctored the original piece.

China has voiced strong opposition to the US-led push for unilateral sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program, reiterating that Tehran's nuclear issue must be resolved diplomatically. - "China has consistently believed that sanctions are not the correct way to ease tensions or resolve the issue of Iran's nuclear program," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said at a news briefing in Beijing on Wednesday. "The correct path is dialogue and negotiations. China opposes putting domestic law above international law to impose unilateral sanctions on another country," he said. Hong also defended China's oil and trade ties with Iran and criticized the Western sanctions that could frustrate such relations.

The United States will continue to deploy its warships in the Gulf, a defense spokesman said on Tuesday after Iran threatened to take action if the U.S. Navy moves an aircraft carrier into the Gulf.

When asked later Tuesday if the U.S. intends to send naval reinforcements to the Gulf in response to Iranian talk of closing the Strait of Hormuz, Pentagon spokesperson George Little did not answer directly but said, "No one in this government seeks confrontation over the Strait of Hormuz. It's important to lower the temperature." Also referring to Iranian threats on Tuesday, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said the U.S. saw "these threats from Tehran as just increasing evidence that the international pressure is beginning to bite."

Earlier on Tuesday, Iran said it would take action if a U.S. aircraft carrier which left the area because of Iranian naval exercises returns to the Gulf. The state news agency IRNA quoted army chief Ataollah Salehi as saying that "Iran will not repeat its warning ... the enemy's carrier has been moved to the Sea of Oman because of our drill. I recommend and emphasize to the American carrier not to return to the Persian Gulf." Iran completed 10 days of naval exercises in the Gulf on Monday, and said during the drills that if foreign powers imposed sanctions on its crude exports it could shut the Strait of Hormuz, through which 40 percent of the world's traded oil is shipped.

Fars News Agency: Senior MP: Persian Gulf Needs No Big Brother
PressTV: US vows to keep warships in PG
Russia Today: Iran ‘recommends’ US stay out of Persian Gulf - Video
Jason Ditz: US Vows to Keep Warships in Persian Gulf
AWIP: Iran warns US carrier to stay out of Persian Gulf

Iran's army chief has warned the US to keep its aircraft carrier, the USS John C Stennis, which recently left the Persian Gulf during Iranian military exercises, away from the area.

"We recommend ... to the American warship that passed through the Strait of Hormuz and went on to the Gulf of Oman, not to return to the Persian Gulf," The Associated Press cites Gen. Ataollah Salehi as telling Iran's official IRNA news agency. "We don't have the intention of repeating our warning, and we warn only once," Salehi was quoted as saying in comments also posted on the Iranian armed forces website, AFP reported.

Salehi did not give details of the action Iran might take if it returned, nor did he name the carrier, Reuters reported. The carrier — one of the US navy's biggest vessels — reportedly passed through the key Gulf oil supply route of the Strait of Hormuz last week. It was heading east across the Gulf of Oman, after a visit to Dubai's Jebel Ali port, through a zone where the Iranian navy was holding its maneuvers. It left the area because of 10 days of Iranian naval exercises in which they fired a number a new missiles.

CBS: Iran warns U.S. to keep ship out of Gulf
Haaretz: Iran threatens to take action if U.S. carrier returns to Persian Gulf

A former CIA analyst says the notion that stirring up hostilities towards Iran will make Israel more secure will prove to be “the big mistake of the century.”

“If this rhetoric spins out of control, if there are incidents in the Persian Gulf or the Strait of Hormuz that lead to wider hostilities, as night follows the day, this could spin not only into a regional war but even farther; and... of Israel, I fear, may cease to exist,” Ray McGovern told Press TV US Desk. “If they impose sanctions on Iran's oil, not even a drop of oil will be allowed through the Strait of Hormuz,” he warned.

Iran's First Vice President Mohammad-Reza Rahimi warned on December 27 that imposing sanctions against the country's energy sector will prompt Tehran to prevent oil cargoes from passing through the strategic Strait of Hormuz. Iran's Navy Commander Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari also said on December 28 that Iran has complete command over the strategic waterway and that “closing the Strait of Hormuz is very easy for Iranian naval forces.”

AhlulBayt News Agency: Former CIA analyst: Israel can cease to exist if Iran attacked

Ray McGovern & Elizabeth Murray: Urging Obama to Stop Rush to Iran War - A torrent of war propaganda against Iran is flooding the American political scene as U.S. neocons and Israeli hardliners see an opening for another war in the Middle East, a momentum that ex-CIA analysts Ray McGovern and Elizabeth Murray urge President Obama to stop.

Secret documents have revealed that the British government clandestinely supplied the former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's regime with military equipment during his eight-year-long imposed war on Iran. - Although the British government had repeatedly denied allegations that the UK assisted Saddam Hussein in his eight-year imposed war on Iran insisting Britain was officially neutral, revealed files show that former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher provided the Iraqi regime with 78 different types of military equipment. The revelations are a severe blow to the British establishment and take the lid off its hypocritical nature, as the UK was a signatory to the UN Security Council resolution 479 adopted on 28 September 1980.

The drill, unprecedented in size, will include the establishment of US command posts in Israel and IDF command posts at EUCOM headquarters in Germany - Israel is moving forward with plans to hold the largest-ever missile defense exercise in its history this spring amid [alleged] Iranian efforts to obtain nuclear weapons. Last week, Lt.-Gen. Frank Gorenc, commander of the US’s Third Air Force based in Germany, visited Israel to finalize plans for the upcoming drill, expected to see the deployment of several thousand American soldiers in Israel.

Jason Ditz: Joint Chief to Reassure Israel on Threatening Iran

As tensions between Iran and the West over Tehran’s threats to block a crucial oil supply route increase, there is much speculation whether the situation will evolve into a full-scale military conflict. But could it be just a game of chicken?

The US has positioned two warships in the area where the Iranian navy has been carrying out military drills. Iran’s navy chief earlier claimed that closing the Strait of Hormuz would be an easy job for the Iranian forces. In response the US said that interference with the transit or passage of vessels through the route would not be tolerated. Investigative writer Edwin Black told RT that full military conflict would cripple the oil-dependent US – as well as the rest of the world.

The Telegraph: WAR DRUMS: Iran films US aircraft carrier near Strait of Hormuz...
Stephen Lendman: Spoiling for Another Fight?
Stephen Lendman: Escalating Anti-Iranian Tensions
Peter Symonds: US/Britain prepare for war against Iran