Israeli spymaster: Be ‘prepared’ to attack

Former Mossad chief Shabtai Shavit says Israel should be ready to attack if sanctions fail to sway Iran to renounce its nuclear program.

“As an intelligence officer working with the worst case scenario, I can tell you we should be prepared, we should do whatever necessary on the defensive side, on the offensive side, on the public opinion side for the West, in case sanctions don’t work,” Shabtai Shavit told the Sunday Telegraph.

“What’s left is a military action,” he continued.

Israel has stepped up its rhetoric against Iran and is said to be preparing its public for a war against the oil-rich Islamic Republic.

The New York Times quoted Pentagon officials last week as saying that over 100 Israeli F-16 and F-15 fighter jets staged a maneuver over the eastern Mediterranean and Greece between May 28 and June 12.

As part of the maneuver, Israeli jets flew over 900 miles, roughly the distance from their airfields to a nuclear enrichment facility in the central Iranian city of Natanz.

On June 6, Israeli deputy prime minister Shaoul Mofaz told the Yediot Aharonot that Tel Aviv would attack Iran if the country did not halt its nuclear activities.

In his comments to the Sunday Telegraph, the former Mossad chief also warned that American approval was not a necessary pre-requisite for Israel to carry out an air strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

“When it comes to decisions that have to do with our national security and our own survival, at best we may update the Americans that we are intending or planning or going to do something,” Shavit said.

MT/MR/GM

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UN: Iran sanctions will halt drug fight

Western sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program could hinder Tehran’s campaign against drug traffickers, the UN warns.

Western nations have told Iran that they could cut off any new help to Iran’s anti-drug units unless Tehran halts its uranium enrichment activities but the EU has not yet decided on whether to trim its aid to Iran’s anti-drug fight, AP reported on Tuesday.

A “heroin tsunami” could hit Europe if the drug interdiction by Iran is weakened, warned Antonio Maria Costa, the director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime. “ We should definitely assist Iran in this respect.”

Roberto Arbitrio, head of the UN drugs and crime office in Iran, said the war on drugs should be viewed as “a non-political area of mutual interest.”

Overall opium production in Afghanistan has more than doubled in the last four years and smuggling the drug into Iran is the first step toward reaching Western markets.

Afghanistan produced 93 percent of the world’s opium last year, and about 50 percent of the drugs leaving the country flowed towards Iran, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime says.

“Cooperating with Iran in Afghanistan on this and other issues is not a favor we do for Iran but something we need to do in our own interest,” said Barnett Rubin, an expert on Afghanistan at New York University.

MGH/PA

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ElBaradei: If you attack Iran, I quit

IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei says he will step down if major powers launch a military strike against Iran over its nuclear program.

According to Al Ahram, in an interview with Al Arabiya television, the International Atomic Energy Agency Director General, said, “A military invasion against Iran would pose great danger to the Middle East and the world.”

Earlier this month, in his latest IAEA report over Iran’s nuclear program, ElBaradei certified the non-diversion of declared nuclear material in the country’s nuclear activities.

“Iran has provided the Agency with access to declared nuclear material and has provided the required nuclear material accountancy reports in connection with declared nuclear material and activities,” the report read.

The report of ElBaradei’s resignation comes amid widespread speculation that US President George W. Bush is drawing up secret plans with the help of Israel to launch a military strike on Iran before the end of his term in office.

With their blatant disregard for international reports conceding the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear activities, world powers have ramped up their rhetoric against the Islamic Republic, accusing the country of running a covert nuclear weapons program.

Iran has repeatedly asserted that as a signatory to the nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT), it is entitled to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes, adding that the country does not seek nuclear bombs as such weapons have no place in its defense doctrine.

CS/HGH

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Brzezinski to Bush: Stop Israel

Former White House national security adviser has urged President Bush to dissuade Israel from attacking Iran over its nuclear program.

In an interview on the Bloomberg Television on Friday, Zbigniew Brzezinski, said that an armed conflict between Israel and Iran would widen to include the US and will lead to Iranian attacks against the US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.

He noted that any military confrontation begins between Iran and the US will put the US “into a very destructive conflict from which the US will not extricate itself for many years to come.”

Brzezinski, 80 and now a counselor at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the most effective strategy for dealing with Iran’s nuclear program would be a combination of stiffer economic sanctions and positive incentives to negotiate.

He said threats of military action against Iran are “counterproductive” because they unite the Iranian population in opposition to the US.

Brzezinski said Bush has leverage to discourage an Israeli strike because Israeli warplanes would have to fly through airspace controlled by the US in order to attack Iran, and the US could deny permission to do so.

MGH/HAR

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Merkel urges diplomacy on Iran

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, has called for a diplomatic solution to Iran’s standoff with the West over its nuclear program.

During a joint news conference with the US President George W. Bush at Schloss Meseberg–the German government guesthouse–on Wednesday, the German chancellor said that any further measures against Iran “need to be negotiated in the Security Council of the United Nations,” UPI reported.

“I very clearly pin my hopes on diplomatic efforts and I believe that diplomatic pressure actually already has taken effect (on Iran),” Merkel said.

“If you look at the situation in Iran on the ground, you see that quite clearly. These efforts can have a success, but this presupposes, obviously, that the global community is sort of unified,” she added.

“Both in the European Union and in the world (sic) Security Council we have to continue this common approach,” Merkel said.

“We cannot exclude either that there may well be a further round of sanctions, and those need to be negotiated in the Security Council of the United Nations,” she noted.

MGH/RA

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Carter: US should be talking to Iran

Former US president Jimmy Carter says the White House should begin to directly negotiate with Iran over the country’s nuclear program.

“We need to talk to Iran now,” said president Carter in a speech at a literary festival in Hay-on-Wye in Wales on Sunday.

“(We should) continue our discussions with Iran, to let Iran know the benefits, and the detrimental side of continuing with their nuclear program,” said the 83-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner.

The White House and its allies allege the Iranian nuclear program is aimed at developing a nuclear bomb. Tehran, however, maintains its drive is solely meant to acquire nuclear technology in order to produce electricity for a growing population.

The United States and its number one ally, Israel, are believed to be hoping to ratchet up pressure on Iran over the nuclear program by threatening to take military actions against the country’s nuclear facilities.

While stressing that the Islamic Republic has never initiated war against any country, Iran has made it clear that any aggression would be met with a maximum of force.

MD/HAR

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