Israel has faxed a message to Lebanese citizens asking them to send information about Israeli soldiers in exchange for a large reward.
Citizens in northern and southern parts of Lebanon received a fax from an unknown source which offered a USD 10 million reward for information on Israeli soldiers who went missing during earlier aerial attacks on Lebanon, Press TV's Beirut Bureau reported. Post offices in Nabatiyeh, Bint Jabil, Hasbaya, and Marjayoun received copies of the message on Wednesday.
"If you have any reliable information about the fate of missing Israeli soldiers, we guarantee you a cash reward of 10 million dollars," read the text in Arabic. "Your information will remain confidential and we will guarantee your safety," it added, urging readers to dial two numbers, which started with a British area code.
This is not the first time that the Israeli regime has sent illegal messages to Lebanese citizens.
In July, Israel violated UN Security Council Resolution 1701 by penetrating the country's telecommunication network and threatening people with a recorded voice message about the possibility of another war. Following the incident in July, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and commander of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) Major General Claudio Graziano received an official complaint about the Israeli act of sabotage.
UN Resolution 1701 ended the 33-day war that Israel waged on Lebanon in the summer of 2006.
Continued on Page 47
#1
It's illegal for Israel to send faxes now? Wow. In my naivete' it never occurred to me that one could be polluted by seeing a few words on a piece of paper.
An Iranian court has sentenced an Iranian journalist of Arab ethnicity to five years in prison for allegedly inciting a 'revolt' among Arabs in southern Iran. Yousef Azizi-Banitaraf was arrested three years ago and charged by the Revolutionary Court in Tehran with 'inciting revolt' among the Arab population in the south of Iran.
In April 2005, a group of people protested in oil-rich Khuzestan over an alleged letter that was reportedly attributed to Iran's presidential desk, saying that urgent action was needed to change the ethnic demographics of the province.
Banitaraf was arrested and released a few weeks later after he criticised the repression of protesters in the south of the country at a meeting at a Tehran human rights centre.
"The objective of this sentence is to silence the critical voices, and reduce freedom of expression to a minimum," said Banitaraf's lawyer, Saleh Nikbath
Banitaraf, 58, has published more than 25 works on various subjects, including tribal affairs, nomadic tribes and folk storytelling among the people of Khuzestan.
Continued on Page 47
Iran has said the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries should take action to stabilise oil prices. Expectations of weaker energy demand has pushed prices to fall below $60 a barrel for the first time since March 2007.
Gholamhossein Nozari, Iran's oil minister, said that the stability of prices "needed a far reaching decision and further measures," after prices fell from a peak of $147 in July. "We are going to review oil market conditions and if there is a need, there might be an emergency meeting," he said on Tuesday.
Iran depends heavily on oil sales, earning 80 per cent of its revenue from oil exports, and the Islamic Republic set its annual budget on the assumption that oil would trade at $90 a barrel.
After cutting oil production by 1.5m bpd in October, an Opec source said on Tuesday the group may cut oil supplies by a further one million barrels per day (bpd) when it meets in Algeria in December.
Iran, the world's fourth-largest oil producer, has already cut about 200,000 bpd from an output of around 4.04m bpd in line with Opec's October agreement, an Iranian oil official said on Friday.
Elahe Mohtasham, an Iranian analyst at the Foreign Policy Centre in London, told Al Jazeera: "In 2000, Iran established an oil stabilisation fund for rainy days like today where oil prices have dropped. The oil reserve fund's purpose was to keep a surplus, and was obtained in times when oil prices were high, back in July for example.
"But apart from mismanagement ... there is an ideological economic policy behind some of the advisers of President Ahmadinejad. If there were better policies in place, we wouldn't be in such a mess today."
And it's going to get worse, since oil could easily go to $40 a barrel. That means Iran would be earning less than half it planned to earn. Going to be hard for the Mad Mullahs™ to keep the population in line if they don't have cash to spread around to the Revolutionary Guards.
#3
So where do the MMs keep their billions? in Switzerland?
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
11/13/2008 10:09 Comments ||
Top||
#4
So, does Saudi have the margin to put the screws to the Iranians on the downward slide? There were a lot fewer Saudis, and a lot more Saudi margin, back in the 80s during the last time this particular scenario played out.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
11/13/2008 12:11 Comments ||
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#5
They sure bet the farm on $100 a bbl. oil after only a 2 year rally.
Don't know what to tell them. They can cut production, but they will probably need to do that anyway as they are going to run out of storage soon.
#6
It would be nice to see a comprehensive policy from the BO admin that included heavily expanded use of NG, the building of nukes and alternatives to just drive a spike in the price of oil. But I am dreaming.
#7
Iran, the world's fourth-largest oil producer, has already cut about 200,000 bpd from an output of around 4.04m bpd in line with Opec's October agreement, an Iranian oil official said on Friday.
Idiots, that's a sure course to financial ruin, you don't make enough per barrel, so cut the number of barrels.
I say again Idiots.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
11/13/2008 20:34 Comments ||
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#8
They won't go broke. There will just be less money for the mullahs to steal. Iran's terrestrial oil lifting cost is $2-3/barrel. Double that for offshore oil. Add another $2 for transport/processing onto tankers.
Posted by: ed ||
11/13/2008 22:22 Comments ||
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#9
Oil lifting and transport costs may be low, but when you have MMs on the dole, and a big nuke program going, there ain't much left for the unwashed and ignorant masses
Posted by: Alaska Paul in Nikolaevsk, AK ||
11/13/2008 22:42 Comments ||
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A former high-ranking Karensky Khatami official says the former Iranian president will 'definitely' run for office in the next presidential election. Hossein Marashi, the vice president for cultural heritage and tourism in the Karensky Khatami administration, was quoted by Tabnak as saying that political factions in Iran already know about Karensky Khatami's decisions. "Yeah. We're a shoo-in!"
Representing the Reformist Party, Karensky Khatami was the Iranian president from 1997 to 2005. The Iranian scholar and cleric is an iconic political figure in the country.
It has been widely speculated that Karensky Khatami will make a comeback on the Reformist platform and challenge the incumbent president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in the 10th presidential election scheduled for June 12, 2009. "Karensky Khatami will definitely participate in the 10th presidential election," said Marashi, a close ally to the former president. "Although he is yet to officially and publicly announce his candidacy, the political society in Iran is in on his decision," he added.
Marashi stressed that Karensky Khatami's reported hesitations before deciding on the issue was logical considering the office he will run for. "I have to give serious consideration before I decide whether to run in the election. Personally, I have neither the desire nor enthusiasm to return to power," Karensky Khatami said late October.
While claiming that he would need assurance of his executive powers before running for the presidency, Karensky Khatami had repeatedly said that he would decide to do whatever serves the best interests of the country.
Mehdi Karroubi, a member of Iran's National Confidence Party, has already announced his candidacy in the country's 2009 presidential election. Hojjatoleslam Hassan Bukharin Rowhani, a member of Iran's Expert Assembly, is also expected to run for office.
Continued on Page 47
This article starring:
Hojjatoleslam Hassan Rowhani
Hossein Marashi
Posted by: Fred ||
11/13/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11138 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
Parking on the left wishes to become the parking on the right. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari arrived in Damascus on Tuesday, on a surprise visit two weeks after a US raid on a Syrian village launched from Iraq that caused tensions with Baghdad. Damascus criticized an initial government statement in Baghdad that appeared to condone the October 26 helicopter-borne raid on a Syrian border village.
Continued on Page 47
Posted by: Fred ||
11/13/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11139 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
The head of Lebanon's ruling coalition Saed Hariri called on the Arab League Tuesday to investigate the alleged "confessions" of a terrorist group broadcast on Syrian state television that accused his Future movement of funding the group that carried out September's deadly car bombing in Damascus, local press reported. Y'don't suppose Saad's caught the same whiff of old flounder we have, do you?
Hariri called on Secretary General Amr Moussa to form "an Arab committee that would investigate the confessions," according to a report in the Daily Star.
Alleged members of the al-Qaeda linked Fatah al-Islam appeared to confess on Syrian TV last week to carrying out the car bombing that killed 17 people, mainly civilians, in the Syrian capital in September. They claimed that the explosives used were smuggled in from northern Lebanon, where the extremist group battled the Lebanese Army last year at the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp.
Wafa al-Abssi, the daughter of Fatah al-Islam leader Shakr al-Abssi, said that the group had received money from Saad Hariri's Future Movement, which is part of the March 14 coalition that leads Lebanon's anti-Syrian parliamentary majority and is heavily backed by the U.S. Hariri called the allegations "fabrications and lies" in a statement released shortly after the broadcast.
In an interview with the Voice of Lebanon Tuesday MP Ahmad Fatfat also called for the confessions to be referred to the Arab League in hopes a "fact-finding mission" would "put an end to the exploitation of the Fatah al-Islam issue."
Another Future MP, Hadi Hbeish, told Future TV Tuesday that the confessions were fabricated by the Syrian intelligence.
During a visit to Syria Tuesday Interior Minister Ziyad Baroud said discussions about the televised confessions were on the agenda for his meeting with Syrian counterpart Bassam Abdul Majid. "We asked for more information and details and to look into the investigation and we will take necessary measures accordingly," said Barroud.
He was in Syria to discuss security cooperation and finalize the formation of a joint Lebanese-Syrian committee.
Continued on Page 47
Posted by: Fred ||
11/13/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11134 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
#1
PAKISTANI DEFENCE FORUM > SHAH MEHMOOD QURANI: THE SECURITY OF IRAN IS THE SECURITY OF PAKISTAN; + TOPIX > NUCLEAR TRACES SHOW SYRIA'S NUCLEAR TRAIL AGAIN LEADS BACK TO PAKISTAN.
OTOH, FARK.com > IRAN LAUNCHES/FIRES MORE SURFACE-TO-AIR PHOTOSHOPS.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Israel has faxed a message to Lebanese citizens asking them to send information about Israeli soldiers in exchange for a large reward. 
A former high-ranking 
