A new raid by the Iranian authorities on an office of the Nobel Peace Prize winner and lawyer, Shirin Ebadi, has been widely condemned.
A US state department official said the raid was another example of Iran's refusal to respect international norms.
The French authorities summoned the Iranian ambassador to inform him of the European Union's disapproval.
Canada said the raid appeared to be part of an effort to impede the work of Ms Ebadi and other rights campaigners.
Human Rights Watch, a US -based rights group, said it was extremely worried about Ms Ebadi's safety, following Monday's raid when officials removed computers and documents from her private office in Tehran.
Earlier this month the Iranian authorities closed the Tehran office of the Human Rights Defenders Centre headed by Ms Ebadi, saying it had operated for eight years without permission.
Ms Ebadi, a 61-year-old lawyer and human rights activist, became Iran's first Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2003.
I agree their ads slid into self-parody, but this is a bit extreme ...
A branch of the Italian clothing retailer Benetton was set on fire in Iran amid angry protests against the Israeli raids in the Gaza Strip, media reports said on Wednesday.
According to the conservative Iranian daily, Jomhuri Eslami, the shop in Dowlat Street, in the north of the capital Tehran, had been attacked by protesters on Tuesday. Benetton is said to be "linked with the Zionist network," a government newspaper said.
Several Benetton stores have opened in the past two years in Iran, where global brands have largely been absent since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
Last year a group of prominent MPs protested against Benetton's presence in Iran, alleging that it was owned by a "Zionist millionaire" and that its fashions were a bad influence on female consumers
Continued on Page 47
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
12/31/2008 14:11 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Or else they'll storm, occupy and/or burn the Gypto embassy, I'm guessing.
I don't think they'll try to destabilize the Gypto gummint: Hozni's thugs are very good at dealing with that, just ask the Islamic Brotherhood ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/31/2008 14:13 Comments ||
Top||
#5
We'll see whether and to what degree they activate proxies throughout the middle east and elsewhere. An Egyptian embassy outside of Teheran might find itself with a missing wall, maybe.
Depends on whether their intent is to look strong or to sow chaos.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit mocked the military records of Iran and the Lebanese Shi'ite Muslim movement Hezbollah in an escalating war of words over Egypt's cooperation with Israel in the blockade of Gaza.
Aboul Gheit, in an interview with Egyptian television broadcast on Monday night, said Hezbollah destroyed Lebanon in 2006 and that its Katyusha rockets and rocket-propelled grenades were nothing compared to the Egyptian army.
Addressing Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, he said: "You are a man who used to enjoy respect, but you have insulted the Egyptian people."
The Egyptian minister also attacked Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who criticised Arab governments on Monday for their lack of response to Israeli raids which have killed some 348 Palestinians in Gaza.
"It's as if hundreds of thousands of Iranians shed their blood over the last 30 years," he said, referring to the Egyptian view that its army bore the brunt of the suffering in wars with Israel for the sake of the Palestinians.
Egypt fought four wars with Israel between 1948 and 1973, losing tens of thousands of soldiers. In 1979, it became the first Arab country to make peace with the Jewish state.
"There are Iranian motives driving Arab parties to play in the interests of Iran," the minister added.
Nasrallah, whose guerrilla forces withstood the Israeli invasion of south Lebanon in 2006, angered the Egyptian government with a speech on Sunday calling on Egyptians to take to the streets in protest at Egyptian policy.
Aboul Gheit replied: "Egypt is big and strong and no one outside it can move anything inside it. Egypt moves when the Egyptian people and the Egyptian leadership ask it to."
#8
This is going to seriously put Egypt's collective nose out of joint. Already they, the Saudis and the Jordanians are rapidly losing patience with the Iranians and their antics, and have been secretly rooting for Israel and the US to kick seven bells out of them.
I think a good counter proposal to Egypt is that they might consider sending a substantial Sunni peacekeeping force to southern Lebanon. Which, of course, would put Hezbollah out of business for good and scare the poop out of the Syrians.
Me thinks the moslem world is going to be fighting amongst themselves.
Posted by: James Carville ||
12/31/2008 11:12 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Of course it makes sense. The mullahs are trying to stir up revolt against the relatively pro-Western leaders in those countries. The Gaza is only the opening gambit it the long postponed conflict with a soon-to-be-nuclear-if-someone-doesn't-do-something Iran.
#5
They would have gone after the US embassy but, well, you know, it's not there anymore yet.
Fixed - sadly I can see the Obambi administration placing another US embassy in Tehran..... to open up a conversation is all (and discuss terms of our surrender...).
Gee. Maybe their education isn't as, err, politically correct"rounded" as it is in the West.
TEHRAN, Iran -- Hard-line Iranian student groups have appealed to the government to authorize volunteer suicide bombers to leave Iran and fight against Israel in response to the Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip.
The government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had not responded to the call by Wednesday. Five hard-line student groups and a conservative clerical group launched a registration drive on Monday, seeking volunteers to carry out suicide attacks against Israel.
"Volunteer student suicide groups ... are determined to go to Gaza. You are expected to issue orders to the relevant authorities in order to pave the way for such action," the students advised Ahmadinejad in an open letter, a copy of which was made available to The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Volunteer suicide groups have made similar moves in the past and the government never responded to their calls. However, some hard-liners have claimed they successfully but secretly left Iran and carried out attacks against Israel. Their claims could not be verified.
The hard-liners started signing up volunteers after Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a religious decree on Sunday that said anyone killed while defending Palestinians in Gaza against Israeli attacks would be considered a martyr.
In a speech Tuesday, Ahmadinejad called for the trial of Israeli leaders on charges of massacring Palestinians in Gaza. His comments come a day after Iran's judiciary set up a court to try Israeli leaders for such "crimes."
Iran considers Israel its archenemy and Ahmadinejad has repeatedly called for Israel to be "wiped off the map." Iran also is Hamas' main backer, though Tehran denies sending weapons to the Islamic militant Palestinian group that took control of the Gaza Strip in June 2007.
Israel's airstrikes on Gaza have sparked outrage in Iran and throughout the rest of the Muslim world. Four days of Israeli air strikes have killed 374 Palestinians and prompted Arab and international condemnation and a global diplomatic push to end the fighting. Israel says it launched its campaign in retaliation for rocket fire aimed at civilians in southern Israeli towns.
Iranian student leaders claim that more than 10,000 people throughout Iran have registered for volunteer suicide attacks in the past three days. At a gathering Tuesday in Tehran to support Gazans and condemn Israeli attacks, hard-liners were distributing registration forms to volunteers.
Volunteer Ali Reza Takrim Namini said a "sense of religious obligation" made him register for suicide attacks against Israel. Another volunteer, Mostafa Babaei, said he was "willing to sacrifice" his blood in defense of Palestinian Muslims.
Hard-line students regularly rally in front of Egypt's interest section office in Tehran to condemn Cairo's refusal to reopen the Rafah border crossing with Gaza for humanitarian supplies. They have warned they will storm the mission by Thursday if Egypt doesn't condemn the Israeli attacks keeps the border crossing closed.
Protesters are also holding daily gatherings in front of Jordanian and Saudi embassies to denounce Arab silence over the Israeli bombing.
The Iranian Red Crescent has sent a ship carrying 2,000 tons of food to Palestinians living in Gaza to be delivered through Egypt and an Iranian military plane landed in Cairo Monday with 24 tons of food and medicines for Gaza. The head of Iran's Red Crescent, Masoud Khatami, said three more ships were waiting to be loaded with humanitarian aid, and Iranian hospitals were ready to receive injured Gazans, according to the official IRNA news agency.
Continued on Page 47
#1
You mean, soft dick iranian students who seek not only the 72 virgins promised but also the perpetual erections promised to those who go in paradise.
#4
I think it's a good idea. Load a couple hundred of them onto a transport plane, fly over Israel, and have them jump out. 150 pound dumb bombs; messy, but not too dangerous except for a direct hit.
Hamas' missile attacks on Israel last week, and Israel's thunderous re sponse, may only be the prelude for the next big Middle East confrontation between America and Iran - and a defining moment for the new Obama presidency. Imagine if, in the summer of 1941, Adolf Hitler had approached Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt with this deal: I will cease hostilities and leave the British Empire alone, if you leave me alone to finish my extermination of the Jews. Expect Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to offer a similar deal to Barack Obama come January.
Officially, the offer will be Iranian cooperation with the West in Iran's nuclear program, possibly including United Nations inspections - if the United States reverses course on its support for Israel, including its actions against Hamas in Gaza. Iran expert Ze'ev Maghen of Bar-Ilan University thinks this may be what top Iranian officials are preparing to offer the West in a kind of crude devil's bargain. In short, Iran's price for getting along with America, "the Great Satan," will be our acquiescence in the destruction of "the Little Satan," Israel.
Would Obama accept such a pact? Certainly many on his foreign-policy team, including Vice President Joe Biden, are on the record urging direct talks with Iran as a path to resolving the nuclear impasse - even if others on his team, like Hillary Clinton or Rahm Emanuel, resist. The problem is that Iran will clearly see a US policy of direct talks on the nuclear issue as a green light to its larger ambitions.
The violence in Gaza should remind us of who really pulls Hamas' strings, namely Iran. Iran wants to be the first nuclear power in the Middle East, and it wants to destroy Israel. What few Americans realize, including (it seems) key Obama foreign-policy aides, is that Iran doesn't need to achieve the first objective in order to secure the second.
Iran doesn't have to rely on a nuclear bomb to annihilate Israel. It simply has to continue to close the Hamas-Hezbollah-Syrian noose around the Jewish state, until Israel is forced to allow Palestinians to reenter Israel and perhaps offer them citizenship, which could lead to the effective end of the "Zionist entity." But Tehran knows this can't be done without US acquiescence. The mullahs will certainly assume that an offer for direct talks will open the door to charging a price for peace in Iraq and future Iranian nuclear cooperation: namely, that America stand idly by while Israel gradually ceases to be an independent Jewish state.
The actual timetable and details - such as an Obama administration forcing Israel to return to pre-1967 borders, or forcing it to accept Jerusalem as the capital of a Palestinian state, or yielding on "the right of return" for Palestinians - don't matter. What counts is that Iran will get the credit for crippling and then perhaps, ultimately, eradicating Israel and for tricking the Americans into helping Iran to do it. In 2006, Ahmadinejad disclosed the outline for such a deal in an open letter to President Bush, stating that Muslim hostility to the West will never cease until the West abandons its support for Israel. Sooner or later, he is bound to make a similar offer to President Obama, this time possibly including a deal on Iran's nuclear program.
The problem, of course, is that such an offer will be worthless. Iran has systematically lied to UN and European Union officials and cheated on agreements on its nuclear program for years. Why should it change now? If Iran can fool the new administration into unwinding its policy of support for Israel, then it will see no reason why it can't bluff its way into completing a bomb. All the same, the pressure will be on Obama for some kind of "accommodation." Time and the willpower for a military option, such as bombing Iran's nuke sites, is running out. Since 2005, the Bush administration has tried every diplomatic avenue for that accommodation short of direct talks, without much result. The temptation to start direct talks as the crucial next step will be almost overwhelming.
Obama has said Israel has a right to self-defense and to an undivided Jerusalem. But he has a life-long association with the New Left, which has an instinctive hostility to Israel as the representative of an "imperialist" West. And the New Left has had a sympathy for Palestinian activists no matter how militant - like Obama's friend Rashid Khalidi. We also know Obama's view of Iran, that it's "a tiny country" that doesn't "pose a serious threat to us." The harm Iran can do to Israel is another matter. The Hamas-Hezbollah-Syrian noose around Israel's neck is tightening. Even if the Olmert government somehow manages to degrade Hamas' military strength, that still leaves Hezbollah and Syria, with Iran lurking in the background. Will America take a firm stand to prevent the noose from closing - even if that means dealing with a permanently hostile Iran?
Despite its many mistakes in dealing with Tehran, the Bush administration never yielded to the temptation of the devil's bargain. We'll soon find out if Obama is made of the same stuff.
Continued on Page 47
#1
All this blather is based on a false supposition: that Obama Hussein and the USA can "force" Israel into suicide. Israel is an independent state, and can't be forced to do anything. A cessation of US support would be a blow, but not a terribly serious one. Other states would fill the vacuum. I could see India stepping up, for example.
#2
I don't know about that. Israel's economy is not in strong shape. We provide a few billion in military aid, money that is rather fungible, and taking that away would hurt the Israelis.
In the short term the Israelis could withstand the Paleos. In the longer term, a lack of US support, coupled with increasing (and increasingly open) Iranian support for the Paleos, would indeed draw the noose tighter. That has a snowball effect: less immigration into Israel, more emigration out, slower economy, etc., etc.
If this is where Iran has been going it's clever, but of course it depends on finding an American president who would strike the bargain. Perhaps Bambi is that one, in which case, look out.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/31/2008 8:10 Comments ||
Top||
#4
I have to agree with Scooter. Israel isn't going down without a fight. The worst thing Iran could do is to back them into a corner. It would be glass parking lot time for Tehran.
I also have a bone to pick with the author's history. Hitler did offer to let the Brits keep their empire in exchange for letting him dominate the continent (FDR wouldn't have been involved because the US wasn't at war with Germany then). Churchill had the spine to tell him to pound sand. Sadly, that appears to have used up most of the spine in Britain.
#5
Well,
Maybe Obama will cut a deal with Ahmadini-Baby.
However, this will not really change anything fundamentally. - While the US under Obama can economically and militarily make us seriously hurt, I don't think this can finish us in only four years. and I think by this time there would be another republican at the white house.
Even if the US completely abandons us, in my view this will lead to a no holds barred nuclear confrontation between Israel and the Arabs
Remember Massada?
Any American politician and the American President have to realize that most of us (Israeli's) have nowhere to go and we will fight to the end (and if we have to take a few hundred million Arabs with us -so be it !).
It doesn't sound very nice but life isn't always fare.
Posted by: Elder of Zion ||
12/31/2008 8:49 Comments ||
Top||
#6
We also know Obama's view of Iran, that it's "a tiny kitty country" that doesn't "pose a serious threat to us."
#7
Any American politician and the American President have to realize that most of us (Israeli's) have nowhere to go Unfortunately, that is NOT the case judging from what gets into the MSM.
#9
If Sloe Joe and the Magic Man think that their big surprise is the abandonment of Israel and cuddling up to the Muzz, they are going to see a complete turn over in Congress in two years. And, they may be prosecuted for war crimes.
#10
Let me destroy this country, and I will cooperate. Of course I already agreed to cooperate, then changed my mind, but I won't change my mind again, honest!
You know they only offer this insult because our leaders keep coming back for more.
#11
So with Israel outta the way, who moves into the top spot on their list? If Barry wants to know the answer to that one, tell him to look in a miirror.
#12
It would be glass parking lot time for Tehran.
I'm afraid so. If the US no longer supports Israel, what's to stop them and what choice would they have? There would be a much better chance for peace if we'd glass Tehran for them just to make sure it gets done right. Peace through strength, you know. Maybe we could give 'em a little Hiroshima or Nagasaki and then ask if they want to talk.
The Iranian judiciary confirmed on Tuesday that a prominent Iranian-Canadian blogger is under arrest over remarks he allegedly made about key figures in the Shiite faith, local media reported. Hossein Derakhshan's "case is under preliminary investigation and he is in custody," the ILNA news agency quoted judiciary spokesman Ali Reza Jamshidi as saying. "Among the accusations, there are issues involving 'Aemmeh Athar' and some charges that have been made," Jamshidi said, referring to the 12 successors of the Prophet Mohammad who are central figures in Shiite Islam. The spokesman did not say when Derakhshan was arrested or where he was being held.
His highly political Internet diary, hoder.com, has not been updated since October 30 and some reports outside Iran said he had been arrested on November 1 shortly after arriving in Tehran on a private visit.
A conservative Iranian website said in November that Derakhshan had been arrested over suspicions of spying for Israel. Dubbed the Iranian "blogfather," Derakhshan, 34, sparked a revolution in blogging in the Islamic republic by posting precise instructions in 2001 on how to set up Persian-language blogs, which have burgeoned to around 70,000 in recent years.
Derakhshan visited Iranian archfoe Israel using his Canadian passport in 2006 and chronicled his experience on his Persian and English blogs, saying he sought to show Israelis and Iranians a different image of each country. "This might mean that I won't be able to go back to Iran for a long time, since Iran doesn't recognize Israel ... and apparently considers traveling there illegal. Too bad, but I don't care," he wrote in January 2006. "As a citizen journalist, I'm going to show my 20,000 daily Iranian readers what Israel really looks like and how people live there," he said.
Derakhshan worked as a journalist for Iran's reformist press in the late 1990s before moving to Canada, mainly writing about the Internet.
In the past, Derakhshan was strongly critical of Iran's conservatives but in the past year he has expressed support for hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his defiant stance against the West.
He has also criticized the positions of Israel and the United States on Iran's nuclear program, which they claim is a cover for a weapons drive, something Tehran strongly denies.
The blogger has also been critical of many Iranian reformists and human rights activists.
Derakhshan's blog is filtered by many Internet service providers in Iran, which has blocked access to more than 5 million Internet sites, whose content is perceived by authorities as immoral.
Several bloggers have been detained over their writings and on Tuesday the Iranian Parliament adopted legislation that imposes jail terms of up to two years and fines for those convicted of Internet crimes.
The offences include "spreading lies" which disturb the public mind as well as publishing and promoting pornographic material on the web, news agencies reported.
It also penalizes service providers who fail to filter material branded as illicit by a watchdog body.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/31/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11143 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
What on earth drove Mr. Derakhshan to go back to Iran? Unless he went in on a false passport, it just makes no sense for him to expect to remain untouched.
Iran's official news agency says dozens of hardline students have broken into the British Embassy residence in Teheran. The IRNA agency says the students accuse Britain of supporting Israel's air assault on the Gaza Strip. The agency says the students stormed the compound Tuesday evening and pulled down the British flag. IRNA says the students then hoisted a Palestinian flag at the compound's entrance before police forced them to leave. The news agency says the break-in lasted about an hour and that the area is now calm. No injuries were reported. British Foreign Secretary David Miliband has called for an immediate cease-fire by both Israel and Hamas.
Continued on Page 47
Posted by: Fred ||
12/31/2008 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11146 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
Hey, they can't do that, BARACK hasn't been sworn in yet [20 days]!
PRINCE > Uh, uh, Gonna Party Harty like its 1977???
#9
the UK called for israel to quit the strikes why are they targeting them?
Because they target those who won't fight back, and as Mr. Mendiola observed, Barack ain't in office yet.
Posted by: regular joe ||
12/31/2008 11:45 Comments ||
Top||
#10
I got good news. Israel is not going to listen to Barack. Now that Israel has learned to win the media propaganda war, Israel doesn't need the U.S. Presidency to defend them around the world. Also, the Democrats wouldn't dare withholding funds or munitions to Israel. It will be political suicide.
This is a whole new day for Israel, a paradigm shift. From now on, Israel will do whatever is takes to defend her people. The only thing that can hurt Israel is, Israeli politics.
#12
As has been said many timess beforel the Isreali government should simply ignore "world opinion" and kill any, and all, people/governments tryiing to do them harm. Just sayin' (again), ya' know.
An Iranian student group announced on Monday that it is recruiting volunteers to fight Israel as the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah called on Palestinians to launch a new uprising in the face of Israel's three-day assault on Gaza.
The students said that they had started their campaign in response to a religious decree issued by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Sunday stating that anyone who died in the defense of Gaza would be deemed a martyr. "In response to the supreme leader's orders for a jihad (holy war), students from the bassij militia are going to register... to go to fight in the occupied Palestinian territories," the Fars news agency quoted one of the students' leaders, Alireza Zahedi, as saying. Yeah, they'll probably be getting there about the same time I will. Which is half past never...
Fars said that several hundred students had already signed up and that the recruits would soon hold a parade. Ooooooh, a parade! Will they learn how to goose step?
Khamenei ruled on Sunday that "all... believers in the Islamic world are required to defend in any way they can the defenseless women, children and people of Gaza. "Anyone who is killed in this legitimate and sacred defense is a martyr," he said. I, of course, will remain here and think up more inspiring Muslim stuff to say...
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.
A new raid by the Iranian authorities on an office of the Nobel Peace Prize winner and lawyer, Shirin Ebadi, has been widely condemned. 
Iran's official news agency says dozens of hardline students have broken into the British Embassy residence in Teheran. The IRNA agency says the students accuse Britain of supporting Israel's air assault on the Gaza Strip. The agency says the students stormed the compound Tuesday evening and pulled down the British flag. IRNA says the students then hoisted a Palestinian flag at the compound's entrance before police forced them to leave. The news agency says the break-in lasted about an hour and that the area is now calm. No injuries were reported. British Foreign Secretary David Miliband has called for an immediate cease-fire by both Israel and Hamas.
An Iranian student group announced on Monday that it is recruiting volunteers to fight Israel as the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah called on Palestinians to launch a new uprising in the face of Israel's three-day assault on Gaza. 
