Iran: Obama Administration Dampens Down War Chatter (Mazzetti/Sanger)

After weeks of whipped-up talk by commentators of an Israeli airstrike on Tehran, President Obama's have moved to dampen down thoughts --- through a message to West Jerusalem, to the American public, and possibly to the Iranian regime --- of military action. Mark Mazzetti and David Sanger of the New York Times are the channel:

The Obama administration, citing evidence of continued troubles inside Iran’s nuclear program, has persuaded Israel that it would take roughly a year — and perhaps longer — for Iran to complete what one senior official called a “dash” for a nuclear weapon, according to American officials.

Administration officials said they believe the assessment has dimmed the prospect that Israel would pre-emptively strike against the country’s nuclear facilities within the next year, as Israeli officials have suggested in thinly veiled threats.

For years, Israeli and American officials have debated whether Iran is on an inexorable drive toward a nuclear bomb and, if so, how long it would take to produce one. A critical question has been the time it would take Tehran to convert existing stocks of low-enriched uranium into weapons-grade material, a process commonly known as “breakout.”

Israeli intelligence officials had argued that Iran could complete such a race for the bomb in months, while American intelligence agencies have come to believe in the past year that the timeline is longer.

“We think that they have roughly a year dash time,” said Gary Samore, President Obama’s top adviser on nuclear issues, referring to how long it would take the Iranians to convert nuclear material into a working weapon. “A year is a very long period of time.”

American officials said the United States believed international inspectors would detect an Iranian move toward breakout within weeks, leaving a considerable amount of time for the United States and Israel to consider military strikes....

Now, American and Israeli officials believe breakout is unlikely anytime soon. For one thing, Iran, which claims it is interested in enriching uranium only for peaceful purposes, would be forced to build nuclear bombs from a limited supply of nuclear material, currently enough for two weapons. Second, such a decision would require kicking out international weapons inspectors, eliminating any ambiguity about Iran’s nuclear plans.

Even if Iran were to choose this path, American officials said it would probably take Iran some time to reconfigure its nuclear facilities to produce weapons-grade uranium and ramp up work on designing a nuclear warhead....

Several officials said they believed the mounting cost of the economic sanctions, especially those affecting Iran’s ability to import gasoline and develop its oil fields, has created fissures among Iran’s political elite and forced a debate about the costs of developing nuclear weapons....

Read full article....

The Latest from Iran (19 August): Freedom & Detention

2015 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Families of detainees who recently ended their hunger strike have still not received visit permits.

2010 GMT: Divorce Shocker! Ayatollah Safaei Bushehri, Friday Prayer leader and the Supreme Leader's representative in Bushehr, has revealed that 50% of marriage break-ups are caused by bad hijab.

2000 GMT: Parliament v. President. "Hardline" MP Hossein Nejabat has declared that Parliament's problems with the President did not exist during the administration of the reformist Mohammad Khatami (1997-2005). He said Ahmadinejad has to abide to the laws, otherwise he will be called before the Majlis.

In a more cautious statement, MP Hossein Sobhani-Nia sad that he hoped the Supreme Leader's words will induce the Government to implement the laws of Majlis and on the judiciary to remove possible problems with those laws.

NEW Rewriting Iran’s History: The 1953 Coup, the CIA, the Clerics, and “Democracy” (Emery)
NEW Iran Cartoon of the Day: 1953 Speaks to 2010
Iran Document: Nourizad’s Last Letter to Supreme Leader “The 10 Grievances”
Iran Feature: Sanctions, Iranians, and YouTube’s “Life in a Day” (Esfandiary)
UPDATED Iran Special: Have Fars (& Revolutionary Guard) Faked a Reformist “Confession” on Election?
The Latest from Iran (18 August): A Letter and A Call for Bombing

1945 GMT: Khamenei to US "Have I Made Myself Clear?". The Supreme Leader's office wants to be sure that Washington (and the rest of the world) gets Khamenei's point, made in his speech to senior Iranian officials --- Ahmadinejad, Rafsanjani, and Seyed Hassan Khomeini were in the audience --- that Tehran will not enter discussions over uranium enrichment unless Washington pulls back sanctions. Not only did they put out the lines on Twitter even before the speech had hit the Iranian media; they have now put out an English version of the statement: "Ayatollah Khamenei further reiterated that the Islamic Republic of Iran is ready to start negotiations provided that the US abandons its domineering attitude, puts an end to threats and sanctions and does not impose its goals on the negotiations."

Given the timing of mid-term Congressional elections in the US, it's a safe bet that there will not be a word breathed in Washington about a possible relaxation of sanctions. And that means there is no chance of public talks on Iran's nuclear programme before mid-November.

1700 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Golnaz Esfandiari has more on the case of detained women's rights activist Shiva Nazar Ahari, including this comment from Zahra Rahnavard: "We are worried for Shiva Nazar Ahari, her trial, and its result because we are all Shiva Nazar Ahari. We, women, who make up half of Iran’s population, we are all Shiva Nazar Ahari."

1420 GMT: Iran MediaWatch. Radio Farda has more on the ban on the newspaper Asia, which specialises in economic matters.

Asia has been critical of the economic policy of the Government, but the official reasons for its closure, according to Deputy Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance Mohammad Ali Ramin, are "publishing pictures against public chastity", “promoting wastefulness and extravagance", and "persistence in carrying out the aforementioned violations".

1405 GMT: Sanctions Watch. Peyke Iran claims that, after the Swiss Government's adoption of additional sanctions against Tehran, the assets of 40 Iranian companies have been blocked.

According to Fars News, Venezuela has said it will continue to supply Iran with gasoline despite sanctions.

David Velasquez, Venezuela's ambassador to Tehran, said, "We are at the service of Iran, and whenever Iran needs, we will supply it with gasoline."

1400 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch (Nourizad Edition). Back to our opening story today....

Video from RASA TV of Mohammad Nourizad's celebration with well-wishers before his return to prison has now been posted.

0910 GMT: I will be in meetings today about the Journal of American Studies, so updates will be limited until mid-afternoon.

0855 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch (Nokia Siemens Lawsuit Edition). Golnaz Esfandiari interviews Edward Moawad, the lawyer for detained journalist Isa Saharkhiz, who has filed a motion in US Federal Court against Nokia Siemens for provision of equipment to Iran assisting in surveillance. Moawad claims, "njuries to the main plaintiff here, Isa Saharkhiz, and to [his son] Mehdi and multiple others were inflicted as a result of the actions of Nokia Siemens network."

0850 GMT: The Battle Within. The latest journalist to consider the escalating tension within the Iranian political system is Robert Tait of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, who sees the root cause as President Ahmadinejad's "religious-nationalist" approach.

0840 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Gozaar offers a detailed profile of human rights activist Shiva Nazar Ahari, detained since July 2009. Her lawyer says a trial date is set for 4 September on charges of "mohareb" (war on God), which carries a death sentence.

Academic and Mir Hossein Mousavi advisor Ali Arab Mazar has been released from detention on $200,000 bail. He was arrested on 28 December and was in solitary confinement for three months.

0735 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. The Pro-Vice Chancellor of Britain's Durham University, Anthony Forster, has expressed concern over the health and situation of Ehsan Abdoh-Tabrizi, a Ph.D. student imprisoned in mid-January after travelling to Tehran to visit his family.

Forster said Durham, in agreement with Abdoh-Tabrizi's father, had taken a low-profile approach after the arrest, conducting discussions with the Iranian Embassy in London; however, Durham's most recent letter had not been acknowledged by the embassy.

0730 GMT: We have published two features linking the 19 August 1953 coup that overthrew the Mossadegh Government and today's events in Iran. In Nikahang Kowsar's cartoon, Mohammad Mossadegh offers advice to Mir Hossein Mousavi, and Chris Emery has serious issues with a Washington Post article which claims to revise the history of the coup.

0625 GMT: Execution (Ashtiani) Watch. Britain's Foreign Office minister Alistair Burt summoned the Iranian ambassador, Rasoul Movahedian, on Wednesday to raise the case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the woman sentenced to death for adultery. Burt also brought up the situation of seven members of the Baha'i faith, each sentenced to 20 years on charges of spying for Israel. and of Ebrahim Hamidi, who faces execution for sodomy.

Turkish officials have told Zaman that Ankara has also brought up Ashtiani's case in discussions with Iranian counterparts.
0605 GMT: Wednesday was marked by a series of statements: from the rhetoric of the Supreme Leader (don't mention internal matters, focus on relations with the US) to the declarations of opposition figures like Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi (this Government is discredited; the Iranian people will emerge and prevail) to the letter from journalist and filmmaker Mohammad Nourizad, now returned to Evin Prison, to Ayatollah Khamenei (here are the grievances against you and the system that you have led into disrepute).

But, at the end of the day, we noted this item, sent from an EA correspondent: Oxford University student Mohammad Reza Jalaeipour, seized by Iranian forces earlier this year after he was told to collect his passport, has been released from detention after 66 days in solitary confinement. The news was confirmed by his wife Fatemeh Shams, also a student at Oxford, who spoke to him by phone.

In total, Jalaeipour has spent 111 days in solitary confinement since the 2009 Presidential elections. It is unknown how much bail was posted for his release, and it is unclear whether he will get back his passport in time for the new academic year.

And we also saw the photograph, one of a set, that we are using for this post: Mohammad Nourizad, having written his 6th letter to the Supreme Leader in the knowledge that it would bring a summons from the authorities, is surrounded by well-wishers as he prepares for his return to prison.

Rewriting Iran's History: The 1953 Coup, the CIA, the Clerics, and "Democracy" (Emery)

On Wednesday, The Washington Post published a re-presentation of the 19 August 1953 coup in Iran by Ray Takeyh, fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations and former State Department Official, "Clerics Responsible for Iran's Failed Attempts at Democracy". (The opening paragraphs of the article are at the bottom of this entry.)

Much has been written about the US involvement, notably through the Central Intelligence Agency in the overthrow of Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh and the support for renewed power of the Shah, but Takeyh writes, "The CIA's role in Mossadeq's demise was largely inconsequential. The institution most responsible for aborting Iran's democratic interlude was the clerical estate, and the Islamic Republic should not be able to whitewash the clerics' culpability."

Iran Cartoon of the Day: 1953 Speaks to 2010

EA's Chris Emery, a specialist on US-Iran relations, is not so sure that Takeyh's revision is accurate. Indeed, he is not even convinced that the primary aim is historical accuracy:

1. This opinion piece seems needlessly insensitive at a time when many ordinary Iranians would take heart from a note of contrition from US-based observers --- which is reasonable, even according to the version of events presented by Takeyh. In timing and in tone, this is an extremely provocative (but not intellectually rigourous) attempt to re-frame a genuine area for historical debate. I would expect it from a professional polemicist, but not one with an academic pedigree. It reads like scholarly sabre rattling, which in my mind compliments much of the other kind we have seen recently.

2. Are ordinary Americans being told they shouldn't apologise for trying to remove democratically elected leaders as long as their removal is reliant on other factors as well? Is intent irrelevant?

3. Is Takeyh consciously trying to establish a wider historical context for the belief that Iran's suffering is entirely self-inflicted by the "Mullahs"? Clearly this will resonate well with many opposed to engagement between the US and Iran.

4. Considering the provocative headline, would it not have been better to devote more space to actually proving the allegation? Takeyh does not even direct the reader to recent scholarship that might support his conclusion. Instead we get precisely one sentence outlining how "the clerics" ousted Mossadegh: "Through their connections with the bazaar and their ability to galvanize the populace, they were instrumental in orchestrating the demonstrations that engulfed Tehran." He then seems to suggest that further proof lies in the hyperbole of Kermit Roosevelt, the CIA officer overseeing US covert operations, written more than 25 years after the events.

In other words Takeyh cannot find a US source acknowledging the pivotal role supposedly played by the clergy. He does not even acknowledge that the CIA possibly bribed Ayatollah Kashani, the former Speaker of the Majlis, with a large sum of money.

5. The final sentence of the piece --- "Responsibility for the suffocation of the Iranian peoples' democratic aspirations in the summer of 1953 lies primarily with those who went on to squash another democratic movement in the summer of 2009: the mullahs" --- is deliberately disingenuous, suggesting a link between the clerical elite then and now that Takeyh knows is false or at least far more complex (politically, doctrinally, and historically) than presented here.

Has Takeyh really failed to notice "mullahs" such as Mohammad Khatami, Grand Ayatollah Montazeri, Grand Ayatollah Sane'i, Mohammad Ali Abtahi, and Ayatollah Dastgheib who have protested the suppression of rights and denial of justice since June 2009?

Clerics Responsible for Iran's Failed Attempts at Democracy
Ray Takeyh

Thursday marks the anniversary of one of the most mythologized events in history, the 1953 coup in Iran that ousted Prime Minister Muhammad Mossadeq. CIA complicity in that event has long provoked apologies from American politicians and denunciations from the theocratic regime. The problem with the prevailing narrative? The CIA's role in Mossadeq's demise was largely inconsequential. The institution most responsible for aborting Iran's democratic interlude was the clerical estate, and the Islamic Republic should not be able to whitewash the clerics' culpability.

The dramatic tale of malevolent Americans plotting a coup against Mossadeq, the famed Operation Ajax, has been breathlessly told so much that it has become a verity. To be fair, the cast of characters is bewildering: Kermit Roosevelt, the scion of America's foremost political family, paying thugs to agitate against the hapless Mossadeq; American operatives shoring up an indecisive monarch to return from exile and reclaim his throne; Communist firebrands and nationalist agitators participating in demonstrations financed by the United States. As Iran veered from crisis to crisis, the story goes, Roosevelt pressed a reluctant officer corps to end Mossadeq's brief but momentous democratic tenure.

Yet this fable conceals much about the actual course of events. In 1953 Iran was in the midst of an economic crisis. An oil embargo had been imposed after Tehran nationalized the Anglo-Iranian Oil Co., and by that summer, the situation had fractured Mossadeq's ruling coalition. Middle-class Iranians concerned about their finances gradually began to abandon Mossadeq. The merchant class was similarly anguished about the financial consequences of Mossadeq's stubborn unwillingness to resolve the stalemate with the British. The intelligentsia and the professional classes were wary of the prime minister's increasingly autocratic tendencies. Rumors of military coups began circulating as members of the armed forces grew vocal in their frustrations with the prime minister and began participating in political intrigues.

Not just the stars but an array of Iranian society was aligning against Mossadeq.

Now, the CIA was indeed actively seeking to topple Mossadeq. It had made contact that spring with the perennially indecisive shah and Iranian officers, including Gen. Fazollah Zahedi, an opportunistic officer who sought the premiership himself. Roosevelt had laid out a plan in which the shah would issue a monarchical decree dismissing Mossadeq; it was to be served to him on Aug. 15. But the commander who was to deliver the message was arrested, and the plot quickly unraveled.

This is where the story takes a twist. As word of the attempted coup spread, the shah fled Iran and Zahedi went into hiding. Amazingly, U.S. records declassified over the past decade indicate, the United States had no backup plan. Washington was largely prepared to concede. State Department and CIA cables acknowledge the collapse of their subversive efforts.

But while crestfallen Americans may have been prepared to forfeit their mission, the Iranian armed forces and the clergy went on to unseat Mossadeq....

Read rest of article....

Iran Cartoon of the Day: 1953 Speaks to 2010

Nikohang Kowsar's cartoon, published in Rooz Online, links the 19 August 1953 coup that overthrew the Government of Mohammad Mossadegh to today's events in Iran: "Mosadegh to Mir Hossein Mousavi: Don't Let the Coup Gang Knock You Down"

The Latest from Iran (18 August): A Letter and A Call for Bombing

2055 GMT: Sports Section. Football star Ali Karimi, who was released by his club Steel Azin this week, apparently for drinking water during training and thus breaking the daylight fast of Ramadan, was in the stadium tonight for Steel Azin's match with Kerman Copper. He was applauded by the crowd.

2035 GMT: Speech Round-Up (Opposition Edition). Rah-e-Sabz has more on Mir Hossein Mousavi's latest statement that 30 years of the Islamic Republic are being challenged to "save the cobwebs of tyrants". And the website summarises Mehdi Karroubi's on-line chat with readers: he will participate in a Qods Day rally in September, for which planning is under way. He said that the current Government is not religious nor a republic, and the Iranian people will have decide about a a religious or secular government in the future.

The Facebook page supporting Mousavi has an English translation of his statement.

NEW Iran Document: Nourizad’s Last Letter to Supreme Leader “The 10 Grievances”
NEW Iran Feature: Sanctions, Iranians, and YouTube’s “Life in a Day” (Esfandiary)
UPDATED Iran Special: Have Fars (& Revolutionary Guard) Faked a Reformist “Confession” on Election?
Iran Video: “His Excellency” Ahmadinejad Interviewed by George Galloway (15 August)
UPDATED Iran Analysis: What Has Green Movement Achieved? (Sahimi)
The Latest from Iran (17 August): The Green Movement, Ahmadinejad, and a “Confession”

2030 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. The Revolutionary Court has confiscated the house belonging to the parents of student activist Abed Tavanche.

2025 GMT: Speech Round-Up (Khamenei Edition). The Supreme Leader's focus --- despite all the tensions within the Iranian system, including the challenges to the President --- was beyond Tehran today. It was all about the US and Iran's nuclear programme: "What they say, our president and others are saying, that we will negotiate -- yes we will, but not with America because America is not negotiating honestly and like a normal negotiator. Put away the threats and put away the sanctions."

So the line is drawn: unless Washington pulls back both unilateral and United Nations sanctions (or gives private assurances to Tehran that they will be withdrawn if progress is made on an uranium enrichment deal), there will be no post-Ramadan negotiations: "On one hand they threaten us and impose sanctions and show an iron hand, and on the other hand they want us at the negotiating table. We do not consider this as negotiations. Experience has shown that when they cannot answer logic, they bully... we will not budge under pressures and we will respond to these pressures in our own way."

2005 GMT: Controlling the Net. Global Voices Advocacy documents the Iranian regime's crackdown on bloggers and social media.

2000 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Mohammad Reza Jalaeipour, a postgraduate student at Oxford University, has been released from detention after 60 days in solitary confinement.

1910 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Almost as soon as his latest letter to the Supreme Leader --- published in EA today --- appeared, journalist and filmmaker Mohammad Nourizad has been summoned back to Evin Prison.

Nourizad was on temporary leave from his 3 1/2-year sentence for the letters to Ayatollah Khamenei and the head of the judiciary, Sadegh Larijani.

Women's rights activist Mahboubeh Karami has been released on $50,000 bail.

1805 GMT: Khamenei Speaks. The Supreme Leader is currently setting out Iran's foreign policy in a speech. Meanwhile, the Islamic Republic News Agency has summarised his line --- denouncing the "stupidity" of the "military threat" to Iran --- in a meeting earlier today with the heads of Iran's three branches of Government.

More later....

1745 GMT: US-Iran Front. Has the Supreme Leader just thrown cold water on discussions over Tehran's uranium enrichment? This just in from his office's Twitter feed: "Iran's Leader emphasized that negotiation with USA under threat and pressure is not possible. We won't negotiate with anybody in this way."

1735 GMT: Nokia Siemens and Iran. An interesting twist on the claim, highlighted in a lawsuit by detained journalist Isa Saharkhiz (see 0830 GMT), that Nokia Siemens sold and provided to Iran "surveillance technology and equipment for monitoring of wireless networks and the internet".

Fars News claims that the malicious Stuxnet worm has been introduced onto Iranian computer systems via Siemens software.

1715 GMT: Parliament v. President. MP Heshmatollah Fallahatpisheh, a member of the Majlis National Security Commission, has linked the 1953 coup --- whose anniversary is tomorrow --- to today's events. Fallahatpisheh claims Iran's main problem is mismanagement and that the overthrow of the Mossadegh Government almost 60 years ago "shows that the biggest harms were inflicted upon the country when Parliament was weak". The Majlis, he asserted, must be at the head of affairs.

From the reformist side, Nasrullah Torabi has stated, "A sand fog of sedition and flattering prevents the truth from being revealed," and maintained, "Patience and victory are old friends."

But Ahmadinejad's camp has struck back. MP Hamidreza Taraghi of the Motalefeh party has criticised "some conservatives want to pass over the President and many senior officials". And the President's spokesman Ali Akbar Javanfekr declared, "During the 9th Presidential elections [of 2005], people didn't vote for conservatives, but for Ahmadinejad." (An EA correspondent asks, "But what about the 10th elections of 2009?")

1710 GMT: Women's Rights and the Green Movement. A challenge to leading activist Zahra Rahnavard from a blogger, who claims that Rahnavard has distorted "feminism" by saying that hijab can be imposed by the system like traffic laws, but women should accept it "with love" and not by force.

1705 GMT: Economy Watch. Deutsche Welle follows up the latest news from Iranian media on unemployment by noting that the jobless rate has doubled since President Ahmadinejad took office in 2005.

1635 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Daneshjoo News claims that intelligence officials are behind the transfer of student activist Majid Tavakoli from Evin Prison, where he was seen as the leader of the "riot" of the 17 hunger strikers, to Rajai Shahr Prison.

1620 GMT: Breaking (and Significant?) News. Fars News is reporting that the heads of the three branches of Government --- President Ahmadinejad, Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani, head of judiciary Sadegh Larijani --- have met with the Supreme Leader. And it appears that Hashemi Rafsanjani, as head of the Expediency Council, was also there.

No details of the discussion are posted.

1505 GMT: Opposition Remarks. Green Correspondents features comments by Mehdi Karroubi in an on-line conversation with readers, and Kalemeh carries a statement by Mir Hossein Mousavi --- with a clear eye on the furour surrounding Ahmadinejad top aide Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai --- on Iran and Islam.

1445 GMT: War Chatter. The US talking-shop on a possible Israel attack on Tehran continues, though --- apart from the Bomb Iran editorial in The Washington Times (see 0700 GMT) --- the fever seems to have lessened today.

Gary Sick makes an incisive intervention on the Command Central set up at The Atlantic magazine --- "[This] is so transparently pushing the 'threat' of an Israeli attack in order to get the US to do something utterly foolish, that I have a very hard time even writing about it" --- before handing over to Joshua Pollack's commentary, "Some Straight Talk About Iran".

1300 GMT: Iran's Ramadan Music Ban. For days, we have been following the story that an Islamic prayer called "Rabbana,” sung by musical legend Mohammad Reza Shajarian and traditionally aired on Iranian state television and radio during the holy month, has yet to be broadcast during Ramadan.

This year, another version of the prayer, sung by a different singer, is reportedly being aired, leading to speculation that Shajarian has been "blacked out" because of his post-election criticism of the Government.

Now a twist: an Iranian state television official in charge of religious programming, Parviz Farsijani, said Shajarian's version has not been banned and that it could be aired in the coming days. However, Fars News is devoting its headling story to a lengthy denunciation of Shajarian's views on politics and religion and his association with the "Great Satan".

1255 GMT: Economy Watch. The Iranian Labor News Agency reports that unemployment of workers aged 15 to 29 has reached 26.1%.

1245 GMT: Sanctions Watch. Switzerland has imposed new economic restrictions against Iran.

1225 GMT: Parliament v. President. Key member of Parliament Ali Motahari says that the initiative by some conservative MPs to summon the President to the Majlis, to answer questions on his refusal to implement laws and on other subjects, is proceeding.

At least 1/4 of the Parliament --- 73 members --- have to join the initiative for Ahmadinejad to be compelled to appear.

According to MP Vali Esmaili, a protest letter against Presdiential chief of staff Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai, written by the reformist Mohajedin of Islamic Revolution party and signed by 183 MPs, will be sent to Ahmadinejad's office tomorrow. The letter was written and circulated after a discussion between 20 MPs and the President failed to find a resolution.

1220 GMT: The University Crisis. Former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, after a meeting with the head of Iran's judiciary, Sadegh Larijani, has said --- contrary to reports in outlets like Fars News --- the status of Islamic Azad University has not been decided and must be resolved by the Supreme Leader.

Control of the University system, which has 1.2 million students, is between disputed between Rafsanjani, the Parliament, and President Ahmadinejad.

1214 GMT: The Hunger Strike. Kayvan Samimi, Abdollah Momeni, and Bahman Ahmadi Amoui --- three of the 17 political prisoners who were on hunger strike --- have been moved out of solitary confinement. Thirteen other detainees (one was recently released) were put back into the ward for political prisoners a few days ago.

1210 GMT: Tough Talk This Week. The head of the operations department of Iran’s armed forces, Ali Shadmani, says Tehran has three contingency plans to confront “any possible aggression”, “undoubtedly” bringing an enemy to its knees: 1) closing the Strait of Hormuz and controlling it; 2) dealing with US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan; 3) "Israel is the U.S.A.'s backyard. Therefore, we will destroy the peace at that backyard."

1205 GMT: Bank Squeeze? Rah-e-Sabz offers an overview of what it claims is a crisis in Iran's banking sector.

1155 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Rah-e-Sabz reports that the latest session in the trial of journalist Emad Baghi was held yesterday.

0920 GMT: Rafsanjani Watch. Press TV, from Iranian Students News Agency, reports on an address by former President Hashemi Rafsanjani to academics and students at Tehran University on Tuesday: “People, parties and statesmen should be prudent in maintaining unity against foreign meddling and mischief so as to disappoint enemies in fulfilling their vicious objectives....Unity and trust prevents the arrogant powers from taking advantage of their psychological warfare and safeguards the Islamic Republic ensuring the future of the country."

0830 GMT: Lawsuit. Radio Zamaneh has further information on the lawsuit filed in a US federal court by detained journalist Isa Saharkhiz and his son Mehdi against Nokia Siemens and its subsidiaries for the “sale and provision of surveillance technology and equipment for monitoring of wireless networks and the internet to Iran”.

0730 GMT: "Blogfather" on Trial. The sister of Hossein Derakhshan, journalist and one of the first prominent Iranian bloggers, writes that the third session of his trial was held in late July.

Derakhshan was arrested in November 2008 after he returned to Iran from Canada, where he had been living for eight years.

Some Iranian media have stoked up pressure for a heavy sentence on Derakhshan by claiming he is part of a UK intelligence network. An article in Mashreq, quoted by outlets such as the Revolutionary Guard-linked Javan, claims that the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London trains British diplomats and intelligence operatives, with funding from UK intelligence agencies. The report alleges 13 "escaped" Iranian journalists have applied for scholarships to take courses in the SOAS Centre for Media Studies --- Derakhshan is listed as one of the alumni of the programme.

0715 GMT: Iran MediaWatch. Asia newspaper has been banned and Sepidar and Parastou have lost their licences to publish.

0700 GMT: We begin this morning with two features. We have posted the "sixth and last" letter from Mohammad Nourizad, the journalist and filmmaker detained and now sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison, to the Supreme Leader. And we have a story by Negar Esfandiary on Iranians, YouTube, and US sanctions.

Meanwhile....

Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran

The statement of John Bolton, former Assistant Secretary of State and Ambassador to the UN, about the start-up of Iran's Bushehr nuclear reactor (see yesterday's updates) may have been wildly inaccurate --- it has nothing to do with any pursuit of a military nuclear programme --- but his call for an Israeli airstrike on Iran by 21 August has had an effect.

This morning, the editors of The Washington Times pronounce, "Bombs Away in Three Days: It's Time to Strike Iran's Nuclear Program", concluding, "The time has come to demonstrate resolve in face of an imminent threat from Iran. The Free World depends on Israeli power."