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Iran’s Hezbollah on U.S. Doorstep

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Photo credit: upyernoz

With America’s attention turned to elections, there have been some pretty creepy dealings in the hemisphere that haven’t gotten much note. Iran, which is trying to develop an illegal nuclear weapon and is openly threatening Israel, is not only laughing off any tough talk from the Obama administration, it also made it clear that it means to take any prospect of war from the U.S. to our door to deter it. That’s right, to our door, using Latin America, with Hezb’allah terrorists.

It’s happening fast.

Doing as the Soviets did in the 1980s, Iran’s been creating alliances with America’s enemies and setting up networks of Hezb’allah operatives in places along critical smuggling routes – such as Nicaragua. Last week, Israeli Radio reported a new Hezb’allah base for 30 terrorists in the country, financed by Iran. Any ideas what those bases are really there for?

Not only is Iran bringing its act to our hemisphere, it has advantages the Soviets never did: a wealthy reliable ally in Venezuela’s anti-American Hugo Chavez – who has allowed his country to become a narcotrafficking state and has given Hezb’allah another base of operations, as well as links to Mexico’s drug cartels, whose tentacles extend deep into the U.S. through our unguarded border aided by the Obama administration’s refusal to enforce immigration laws. Cartels are present in 1800 U.S. towns and cities, according to U.S. lawmen and Hezb’allah has made connection with the cartels. Today’s news shows that three Hezb’allah operatives were arrested in Merida, Mexico – a first, because Mexican authorities have long denied the presence of terrorists in their country.

Read more from this story HERE.

Fruits of Biden’s Iraq Policy: Iran using Iraqi airspace to Supply Assad

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Iran has resumed shipping military equipment to Syria over Iraqi airspace in a new effort to bolster the embattled government of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, according to senior American officials.

The Obama administration pressed Iraq to shut down the air corridor that Iran had been using earlier this year, raising the issue with Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki of Iraq. But as Syrian rebels gained ground and Mr. Assad’s government was rocked by a bombing that killed several high officials, Iran doubled down in supporting the Syrian leader. The flights started up again in July and, to the frustration of American officials, have continued ever since.

Military experts say that the flights have enabled Iran to provide supplies to the Syrian government despite the efforts Syrian rebels have made to seize several border crossings where Iranian aid has been trucked in.

“The Iranians have no problems in the air, and the Syrian regime still controls the airport,” said a retired Lebanese Army general, Hisham Jaber, who heads the Middle East Center for Studies and Research in Beirut.

Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., who has played the lead role on Iraq policy for the Obama administration, discussed the Syrian crisis in a phone call with Mr. Maliki on Aug. 17. The White House has declined to disclose details, but an American official who would not speak on the record said that Mr. Biden had registered his concerns over the flights.

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US to Iran: ‘In Case of Israeli Strike, Please Don’t Fire on Our Bases’

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The United States has no intention of joining in a preemptive Israeli strike on Iran and expects the Islamic Republic to refrain from attacking US targets in the case of such an attack, senior Washington officials told their Iranian counterparts, according to a report in Yedioth Ahronoth on Monday.

In recent days, senior administration officials reportedly sent messages to Iran, through diplomats from two European states, addressing the possibility that Israel would launch a unilateral strike and establishing that the US expects Iran to not draw it into a conflict by firing on American army bases and aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf.

Monday’s report came amid widespread debate over the level of coordination between Israel and the US on halting Iran’s nuclear program, which — despite assurances by US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro on Sunday that the relationship is as good as ever — appeared to be strained.

While Israel has warned that the Iranians are quickly approaching a potential weapons capability and that the use of force must be seriously considered, the US says sanctions and international diplomacy must be given more time to work.

Highlighting the disagreement between the two countries on the use of force were reports of a scaling-down of joint US-Israel missile defense exercises in October, and public comments by the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Martin Dempsey, who said last Thursday that he did not want to be “complicit” in an Israeli attack on Iran.

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Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood President Makes First Visit by an Egyptian Leader to Iran in Decades

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Egypt’s President Mohammed Morsi arrived in Tehran on Thursday in the first visit by an Egyptian leader to Iran in decades.

The Egyptian president was attending a summit of the Nonaligned Movement, and is supposed to transfer leadership of the 120-nation bloc to Tehran.

Iran’s state TV in a live broadcast showed Morsi being received by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at the summit conference hall in Tehran.

Tehran cut diplomatic relations in 1979 because of Egypt’s peace accord with Israel. Since the 1979 Islamic revolution, Iran has considered Israel as its arch foe.

Iran’s leadership welcomed the 2011 uprising in Egypt that ultimately brought Morsi, an Islamist, to the presidency.

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The “Supreme Leader of Iran” Praises US Occupy Movement

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The Ayatollah Ali Khamenei – the “supreme leader” of Iran – praised America’s “Occupy Wall Street” movement on Thursday, calling it a reflection of people around the world who are “losing their patience” with the dominance of the United States and Israel in the international community.

“Everybody has become tired of this faulty international structure,” Khamenei said in his inaugural address to the Non-Aligned Summit, a gathering of 120 nations now taking place in Tehran.

“The 99-percent movement of the American people against the centers of wealth and power in America and the widespread protests of the people in Western Europe against the economic policies of their governments show that the people are losing their patience with this situation,” Iran’s Fars news agency quoted him as saying.

(The Occupy movement, born in lower Manhattan one year ago, claims to speak for the “99 percent that will no longer tolerate the greed and corruption of the 1 percent. During the fall of 2011, the Occupy movement was charged with antisemitism after several videos showed protesters denouncing Jews.)

“It is necessary to remedy this irrational situation,” Khamenei said, adding that “firm” bonds between NAM member states “can play an important role” in minimizing U.S.-Israeli influence.

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Allen West: Iran is a Growing Threat in Latin America that cannot be Ignored

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Photo credit: Collin Harvey

As we enter into a campaign season wholeheartedly focused on our economic security, let us not forget our national security.

Right here, under our noses, a strategic alliance is being formed between Iran and Venezuela. More than 150 Iranian diplomats are accredited in Caracas — a disproportionate number by any count — demonstrating the Tehran regime’s unusual involvement in Latin America. Over the past few years, this honeymoon between Hugo Chavez and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has given birth to increased military involvement between the two countries, a complex financial web to bypass international sanctions against the ayatollahs and an operational infrastructure for carrying out terrorism against the nations of the free world, especially the United States and Israel.

This growing alliance between their respective military establishments allows Iran to extend its strategic coordination deep into the Western Hemisphere, enabling conventional, nuclear and terrorist capabilities well beyond Tehran’s geographic vicinity. It was revealed recently that Venezuela is building military drones for Iran and has supplied Iran with an unknown number of F-16 warplanes for countermeasure training and radar calibration. Also, the top Venezuelan diplomat in Florida, Consul General Livia Acosta, was expelled in January by the State Department because of her well-documented involvement with an Iranian cyberterrorism plot against American nuclear facilities.

The unholy alliance also has enabled Iran to skirt United Nations‘ and other international economic sanctions meant to slow Tehran’s nuclear weapons program. Venezuela has publicly declared its support for Iran’s nuclear aspirations, and an economic and financial web of joint ventures, accounts and agreements makes it easy for Iran to bypass arms embargoes, banking freezes, oil boycotts and other economic steps taken to slow the theocracy’s nuclear policy of proliferation. For instance, Venezuela provides front companies and facilities to Iran’s petrochemical and arms industries, uses its banking system to middle-man oil payments, and extends political support for Tehran in the international arena in order to bypass international sanctions. This Venezuelan support constitutes a vital lifeline, nurturing the ayatollahs’ bomb, and enables Iran’s nuclear program to grow and strengthen.

Yet the Iranian infiltration of Latin America goes beyond Venezuela.

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Egypt Allows Iranian Navy Ship Through Suez After Complaining About US Ships Just Last Year

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Egypt has again allowed an Iranian Navy ship to pass the Suez Canal toward Syria.

A senior official said the Egyptian Navy approved the passage of an Iranian ship loaded with weapons to move from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The official said Egypt dismissed a request by the United States to stop the Iranian ship at the canal.

“The Egyptian Navy refused a U.S. request to strike an Iranian ship loaded with weapons that was on its way to Syria through the Suez Canal,” Mohab Mamish, chairman of the Suez Canal Authority, said.

Mamish, a former member of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, said he was authorized to make all decisions on the canal, a leading earner of revenue for Egypt.

Mamish, whose remarks were also reported by Egypt’s official daily Al Ahram, said the Egyptian military objected to deployment of U.S. Navy ships at the southern entrance of the canal in January 2011. At the time, President Hosni Mubarak faced massive unrest, which led to his ouster by the military 18 days later.

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Massive Cyberattack: Act 1 of Israeli Strike on Iran?

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Talk in Israel of a military strike on Iranian nuclear facilities has reached a fever pitch. Last week brought the news of an alleged “war plan” leaked to a blogger. This week, a well-informed military correspondent in Jerusalem reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is “determined” to attack Iran before the U.S. election. Two weeks ago, an outgoing government minister told Israelis to prepare for a war that would last 30 days.

David Makovsky of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy has his own contacts in the Israeli leadership. He says there’s more going on here than just war talk. “I think there’s a 50-50 chance before the U.S. election of an Israeli strike,” he says.

The alleged war plan that was recently leaked said an Israeli strike would begin with an unprecedented cyberattack designed to paralyze the Iranian regime and blind it to what was happening on its territory. The Internet, telephones, radio and television transmissions, the electrical grid would all be taken out.

That’s an attention grabber: The world has never seen a cyberattack remotely that dramatic.

John Bumgarner, chief technology officer at the U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit, says the plan does make sense, at least in theory: “Israel has very good cybercapabilities. Some of the best computer scientists in the world come out of the Israeli military and intelligence branch,” he says. “Some of the best cybertools that are currently used in the world come out of Israel.”

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Romney’s National Security Pick, ex-World Bank President, causes concern in pro-Israel community

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Mitt Romney’s pick of Robert Zoellick to lead his national security transition team, announced earlier this month, is said to be “roiling” his campaign staff and causing a “firestorm” within foreign policy circles, especially among pro-Israel stalwarts.

Zoellick is said to be an “old-school Republican,” a foreign policy realist in the mold of his mentor, former US secretary of state James A. Baker, who was well-known for his clashes with the American pro-Israel community. Zoellick worked for Baker at the State Department and Treasury Department during the George H.W. Bush administration. Under George W. Bush, Zoellick spent 16 months as Condoleezza Rice’s deputy secretary of state, but is not considered to have close ties to the latter Bush’s foreign policy team.

During his five-year tenure as president of the World Bank, which concluded in June, Zoellick came under fire for authorizing hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of projects in Iran despite multiple UN Security Council resolutions in place against the Islamic Republic.

In 2007, a dozen US congressmen from both sides of the aisle sent Zoellick a letter urging the bank to cut its ties with Iran. “In our view, it would be consistent if, as the Security Council condemns the actions of President Ahmadinejad, the World Bank would suspend funding for his government,” said the letter, which can be read on the AIPAC website.

The lawmakers said the bank was funding nine projects in Iran totaling $1.4 billion and had set aside $220 million for Iran in 2007 and another $870 million for the next three years. They also noted that the US was the top investor in the World Bank, having contributed $950 million in 2007 and $940 million in 2006.

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Video: Order to strike Iran issued in Israel today

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This commercial, just released on Israeli TV, features John Cleese of Monty Python fame. Cleese plays a US general and he, along with two other western generals, listen to Israeli pleas to allow them to strike Iran. English with Hebrew subtitles.