Iran: Karroubi Letter to Rafsanjani (27 September)

UPDATED Iran: So What’s This “National Unity Plan”?
The Latest from Iran (30 September): Confusion

Receive our latest updates by email or RSS SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEED
Buy Us A Cup of Coffee? Help Enduring America Expand Its Coverage and Analysis

The invaluable Iran Wiki has posted a translation of Medhi Karroubi's second letter to Hashemi Rafsanjani, published in Persian on Sunday. Reading this, I have no doubt that Karroubi is expressing genuine frustration and anger at Rafsanjani, asking why the former President has betrayed the legimitate demands of the opposition and the cases of those abused in post-election conflict:

I see that [Assembly of] Experts convened and you not only did not bring yourself to utter a word of criticism of the conditions governing the country or make any criticisms in accordance with your duties, but more curiously yet, you were absent at the closing of the session despite the importance that it had in such perilous times. I asked myself, is this the same Akbar Hashemi with that spirit which we saw in him before and after the revolution?

In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate

Ayatollah Hashemi-Rafsanjani
Honorable President of the Assembly of Experts
Greetings

This is the second letter which I have written to you following the recent pseudo-elections to the presidency.

I wrote the first because I had heard some very unpleasant and disturbing news from among the arrestees and I saw it as my duty to look into these events in accordance with your legal position and not allow transgressions against the life and property and honor of the people to become an ordinary occurrence. Unfortunately, this letter had no effect among the officials and you saw how negligence and contempt for the people’s rights has incinerated the trust we had harvested and ruined our system’s regard. Of course, the officials know the interest of their government. And so, if that letter accomplished nothing, I said to myself that perhaps it was beyond you to look into this letter.

But now I write this second letter to you because I saw that a session of the Assembly of Experts held and what needed to have been raised in it was not and what ought to have been investigated by members of this Assembly was not investigated. In a word, the Assembly of Experts, which much be the most distinguished supervisory institution in the Islamic Republic, has been turned into an ineffective institution. The result of this session was simply a few speeches and a statement which could have been issued without convening the session and gathering the esteemed members of this Assembly and exerting so much effort.

And so I decided to write this letter to you and remind you of the courage of His Eminence Imam Khomeini and the revolutionary forces of that age of monarchist oppression and remind you of the emphasis that the Imam and his disciples, such as you and myself, put on standing up to oppression and tyranny, and remind you that the Assembly of Experts' current philosophy and its members’ responsibilities so that you yourself can judge what your responsibilities were and are in these current dangerous circumstances, and to what degree you have protected the prestige of the seat in which you sit and to what extent you have defended the revolution in the post of presidency of the Assembly of Experts, the most important aim of which is to confront injustice and the violation of the people’s rights.

Honorable Mr. Hashemi,

Imam Khomeini during difficult and dangerous conditions fought hand to hand the system which was the embodiment of foreign support, armed to the teeth, which had spilled the youth’s valuable blood, in the darkness of Pahlavi absolutism, to defend Islam and the people’s freedom from absolutism and imperialism. You, who were one of the Imam’s disciples and went into battle at his side know that if it were not for his divine belief and firm will, confronting the Shah’s absolutist power and royal tyranny and that heroism and self-sacrifice would not have been a simple matter. You surely remember there were very few comrades who were of like mind in the ranks of the clergy about struggling against tyranny and absolutism under those terrifying conditions. It was a dangerous time, a time of prison and torture and arrest and exile and moving from house to house and homelessness. There was neither a great likelihood of victory nor a plan for the division of the spoils. Faith and a heart-felt belief in Islam and justice and the people ruled our hearts, and the urge to march in the desert to the Kaaba. That courage and self-sacrifice led by His Eminence the Imam of the Islamic and anti-absolutist revolution resulted in our now being its inheritors, and its thirst for justice is not limited to the borders of Iran, but has a world goal, including the land of Palestine and Noble Qods [Jerusalem].

Honorable Mr. Hashemi.

I, as one of the disciples of the Imam’s school, consider myself indebted to him and his courageous leadership, and have promised myself to go into battle at the side of his thought and protecting that enormously valuable Islamic and anti-absolutist inheritance until the end of my life. What concern is it that my office and that of Mehdi Karoubi’s party is sealed and his newspaper is closed and even his comrades are in prison for the sake of the Islamic Republican system? What concern is it that vicious newspapers called Iran or Vatan or Zamin or Keyhan attack me and the public treasure is spent on their abuse and they are paid for this and the national media is turned into a partisan and political armory against me and even the sacred Friday prayers are used for their political ends, turned into a center to attack the late Imam’s comrades. But I consider suffering all these catastrophes sweet, recalling what fateful and consuming and terrible storms arose during those hard times before and after the revolution and how the unparalleled will of the Imam and the iron firmness of his comrades turned the cruelty of SAVAK and Pahlavi’s henchmen into the delight of blood triumphing over the sword and the victory of truth over falsehood. My lot is so sweet because of this victory that the bitterness of certain passing disasters has not and will not have an effect on me. I well know that you, too, experienced all those disasters and hardships riding into battle at the side of His Eminence the Imam and, as opposed to certain others, you know that the Islamic Republican system is based on extremely valuable capital and much courage. You served this system for thirty years and know what disasters and stages full of danger this system passed in the struggle with eclecticist and apostate groups and what a price was paid to uphold the Islamic system and establish a republican government. Alas, though, what have we accomplished with all this courage and thirst for justice and confrontation with absolutism? Where have we come?

I see that [Assembly of] Experts convened and you not only did not bring yourself to utter a word of criticism of the conditions governing the country or make any criticisms in accordance with your duties, but more curiously yet, you were absent at the closing of the session despite the importance that it had in such perilous times. I asked myself, is this the same Akbar Hashemi with that spirit which we saw in him before and after the revolution? I recall how you … courageously raised issues even in the Imam’s presence whenever you saw it as necessary, even if they went counter to the Imam’s perspective. I recall a meeting in which we were in His Eminence the Imam’s presence and he related his will and testament to us and asked our opinions and all spoke in favor of it, but you had something to say and did not hide it, but spoke out, and the Imam, too, agreed with the grandeur of your speech and acted in accord.

Honorable Mr. Hashemi.

You have been placed by the vote of the people and their representatives in the Assembly of Experts at the head of an institution which is the most sensitive and most important institution in the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Constitution. It is an institution which, according to Article 108 of the Constitution, is the architect and supervisor over the heights of power over the Iranian governmental structure and is responsible for the election and appointment of the Supreme Leader and supervising his actions and the organizations under him. No one gave this right and power to this Assembly who wants to take it back from it, nor is it a deposit which can be taken from this Assembly at will. The right of that Assembly to elect and supervise and investigate the Supreme Leadership is derived from the Constitution and embodies the Iranian nation’s will. This Assembly enjoys such prestige that no institution has the right to legislate with respect to it and its members have the right to determine for themselves the conditions under which it will work and supervise. A meeting of the [Assembly of] Experts with such a position monopolized by an individual has been convened under such current circumstances and my question to you as president of this Assembly is, has this Assembly acted in accordance with its duties during this session? Do these introductory speeches and the report and declaration which was issued truly answer to today’s Iran’s questions and doubts? If even the honorable Ayatollah Dastgheib, for all his shining past and profound popular position, had spoken out of concern for the people during that session, they would have treated him in such a fashion and there would have been talk about the need to expel and remove and punish him so that, as it were, he could say nothing in that session but flattery and exaltation, and no expert has the right to criticize the current situation in the country, and the mouth of that expert who has passed the Seven Trials of the Guardian Council and could find his way into the Assembly of Experts had to be filled with dust lest he speak with anything but flattery and praise of the existing conditions! Truly, where are we headed? And if it has been decided that the sacred goal we all treasured in the struggle against absolutism and imperialism was to arrive at such a point, where was there need for the Assembly of Experts? If it were decided that in the Assembly of Experts, no expert was to speak except in support, would it not have been better for its annual session not to be held? Truly, where was the need for spending from the public treasury and having a building and an office and staff and all these expenses? Would it not have been better to such an Assembly to have been convened if, God forbid, something were to happen to the Supreme Leader?

This session of the Assembly of Experts was held and it was hoped that the people’s representatives in that Assembly would closely examine what happened on the day of the June 12 elections and the crises which arose both before and after them. But I never expected that during this session the people’s experts would have called the crisis plaguing the country a fitna and in order to clean the problem’s appearances, hide their head in the snow. Truly Your Eminence, who saw the volcano of the people’s rage ignite before the elections and stated this publicly, went along with calling this volcano waves of fitna and so quietly overlooked the country’s perilous conditions. I am amazed about how the Constitution, that valuable heritage of the Imam, bought by the martyrs’ blood and fruit of the efforts and firmness of the revolution’s allies, and one of its most genuine bases, that very Assembly of Experts, are being treated! The grandeur of this Assembly and its position which it could have had in the protection and well-being of the Islamic Republican system and winning the people’s rights have suffered such a fate as this!

Honorable President of the Assembly of Experts.

If the Imam had thought that this Assembly would have been a means to strengthen the Supreme Leader’s position, he did not think it was only expressions of appreciation and support for the good which had been done, but criticisms and objections about acts through acting on and performing its duty to supervise. Unfortunately, though, the position of this Assembly has reached such state during these last years that its representatives in past times such as the Grand Ayatollahs (God’s mercy be upon them!) [Ayatollah Hajj Sadeq] Ehsanbakhsh,¹ [Ayatollah Gholam-Hosein] Jami,² Abayi-Khorasani,³ [Hojjat ol-Eslam Sadeq] Khalkhali, and Ayatollah Abbasifar,⁴ have been trampled and the blade of supervision has been put to their necks and no one utters a word about what sort of disaster this is which has befallen the nation’s experts of this system or what crime they have committed to deserve being ignored. It is a result of this silence that today, some dare to raise an outcry about expelling and removing any representative from whom a word which displeases them is spoken. They do not realize that such repression and harshness, and this concerning a representative of the Assembly of Experts, is inexcusable for any sensible person. How can one excuse before the people the stifling of a member of the Assembly of Experts, upon whom a serious duty has been placed, simply because he had said something which displeased some? This rooster’s tail⁵ is not something which one can easily hide. The Supreme Leader must also go into action and stand up against this disrespect shown to a representative of the Assembly of Experts and prevent it. Truly, how can an Assembly, a member of which can be so commonly and easily humiliated, make the appropriate and necessary decisions for this country and nation in such difficult times and days which may we never see?

Honorable Mr. Hashemi.

What is your answer to people who are asking about the duties of the Assembly presided over by you under such circumstances? If the Assembly of Experts had given so much as a passing glance during its meeting to what has befallen this country these past four years, could it not have found much better grounds for the origins of the crisis which afflicts the country—what you have called a fitna. You in your speeches both before and after the elections have repeatedly referred to the economic crises and the collapse of the plan in the country and the deviation from it. But should not the discussion of these crises have been raised somewhere in the Assembly of Experts? Is it not your duty in the Assembly of Experts to examine what is called privatization and the execution of Article 44 of the Constitution and the institutions under the Supreme Leader’s supervision such as the Revolutionary Guards and the Staff for the Implementation of the Imam’s Command (which was given, according to the Imam’s command, to Your Servant and Ayatollah Hasan Sane’i, and in which it was decided that in at most two years, all properties’ seizure or release or, upon careful consideration, in the event that it was illegitimate, expropriation be determined and that this Staff should complete its task; a Staff of which even the dear grandson of the Imam repeatedly complained and requested that if it not be closed down, or at least that the word “Imam” should be removed from its title) would do in a half hour in its own name the work of a ministry and create yet another epic in the name of privatization to continue and complete the epic of the recent presidential elections? Truly, how much has the unplanned foreign policy, which has led to our systems enfeeblement in the international community, been discussed in this session? Are the social problems which plague the country and the securitizing of society’s political atmosphere in society, the universities, and different centers of the country of absolutely no importance, since the members of this Assembly paid no attention to them? Truly, how much have you investigated the activity of some of the organizations under the Supreme Leader’s purview, whose higher supervision over them is your responsibility, in the Assembly of Experts? Are you unaware of what is happening in our so-called national media and the catastrophe which this media’s pundits have wrought? Was there any discussion about why three of the candidates who allegedly lost in the recent pseudo-elections were put on the shelf and their supporters were thrown into solitary confinement and that they could only contact this national media from their solitary confinement cells, and even this to broadcast confessions, and that the gates to the media are only open, therefore, for the allegedly victorious candidate and the honorable Prosecutor General for them to come and make their biased speeches against the other candidates and go? Were you not aware of this issue? You were, and if there was nothing said about it in this session, does this not mean that the spirit of the thirst for justice and revolutionary courage has vanished from our midst and evaporated? And now, truly, what is your answer to those who claim that this Assembly has forgotten its supervisory mission and has been turned into an ineffectual and propagandistic institution? Would it not have been fitting for the members of this Assembly to have invited the three candidates who protested against the results of the elections, all of whom were of the wealth and service to this system, and heard them out and after this hasten to issue their statement?

Honorable Mr. Hashemi.

I consider it my duty to recall to you and others some of His Eminence the Imam’s explanations about the Assembly of Experts’ position, when he declared, “Now you, oh religious jurists [‘’faqih’’s] of the Assembly of Experts, the elect of that nation oppressed throughout the history of the monarchy and its tyranny, kindly accept your responsibility, which is above all other responsibilities, and set to work, for the fate of Islam and the toiling and martyr-providing and suffering nation is at stake. Let history and future generations judge you and the nation and God’s great Household of the Prophet observe your votes and deeds. “May God be at your back and your aid.” [In Arabic] The slightest carelessness or lapse or the slightest selfish act or, God forbid, pursuit of ones lusts which could pervert a noble deed, will cause a catastrophe of historical proportions.” And truly, what relation is there between the current work of this Assembly and what the Imam said about its position and the control which the Constitution and its authors bestowed upon it and its representatives in accordance with the people’s will? How can it be denied that such an important Assembly has been turned into an ineffectual institution in such a perilous time. I, Mehdi Karoubi, have written this letter to you and have raised these issues with you as a reminder, acting in accordance with my conscience before the late Imam, the revolution, and the noble people of Iran and so that I might show that what has befallen this Assembly is neither in the interests of the system nor in the interests of the people, neither does it secure the republicanism and Islam for which 98% of the people voted in Farvardin 1358.

Peace be upon you and God’s mercy and blessings

Mehdi Karoubi

6 Mehr 1388 (September 28, 2009)

Notes:
¹ A student of two of the most prominent religious families, Alam ol-Hoda and Bahr ol-Olum, he also studied psychology and secular jurisprudence. During the revolution, he was arrested and sent to Tehran for his agitation. After the revolution, he became the head of the Imam’s Committee (a vigilante force which attacked the leftist and rightist opponents of the Islamic regime), but was forced to leave Gilan in early 1980 for Tehran after his home was subject to frequent attacks by the left. He was dispatched to South Asia to purge the Iranian embassies and consulates there. He then became the Imam’s representative and Friday Imam in Rasht. In the spring of 1983, he was subject to an assassination attempt, after which he needed to undergo surgery fourteen times. He was elected to the Assembly of Experts in 1989. He passed away in June 2001. http://r-dehgani.blogfa.com/post-8.aspx
² Best known for his courage in staying in Abadan as Friday Imam when it was cut off and under intense bombardment by the Iraqis, where he kept up the people’s morale by continuing to carry on his functions as Friday Imam. In the eulogy for his recent death (January 2009), he was said to have been active in the Islamic opposition to the Shah since the 1963 revolt in Qom. http://www.magiran.com/npview.asp?ID=1777514
³ A student of Ayatollah Khomeini, a representative on the Assembly of Experts during its first period from Khorasan, a representative of the Imam in the Qom Missionary Office, temporary Friday Imam of Mashhad, elected to the Majlis during its sixth session, arrested and exiled repeatedly under the Shah. http://fa.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D9%85%D8%AD%D9%85%D8%AF_%D8%B9%D8%A8%D8%A7%DB%8C%DB%8C_%D8%AE%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%B3%D8%A7%D9%86%DB%8C and http://www.tebyan.net/social/sevencontinents/touringiran/undergroundwatertanks_bathes/2007/3/4/37699.html
⁴ Participated in the elections to the Assembly of Experts elections in 2008 with the encouragement of Rafsanjani, Khatami, and Karoubi. http://mosharekateilam.blogfa.com/post-102.aspx
⁵ From a Persian folk-saying about a chicken thief who steals a rooster and is discovered when its tail protrudes from under his coat.

Video/Transcript: "Will Israel Attack Iran?"

Iran’s Nuclear Programme: Obama Backs Himself into a Corner
The Latest from Iran (30 September): Confusion

Receive our latest updates by email or RSS SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEED
Buy Us A Cup of Coffee? Help Enduring America Expand Its Coverage and Analysis

On Monday, Michael Rubin, resident scholar with the American Enterprise Institute, and Bob Baer, a former CIA officer and intelligence columnist for Time magazine, were the guests on MSNBC's Hardball. Both guests were pessimistic on the success of diplomatic engagement with Tehran, and both agreed that Israel would sooner or later attack Iran. They asserted that, while Israel can carry out the operation on its own, the US should discourage this since Washington cannot afford chaos in the region.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCic7ZL2efA[/youtube]
Unsurprisingly, Rubin and Baer portrayed Iran as a country ruled by "irrational" people who can even "commit suicide" by blocking the energy corridor through the Straits of Hormuz after an Israeli operation, just to ensure "the destruction of the Zionist regime". Iran's only motive for  obtaining a nuclear weapon is to attack rather than deter or balance Israel.

Transcript:

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Michael Rubin, is it plausible that within the next year or so, Israel will strike at those nuclear facilities in Iran?

MICHAEL RUBIN, AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE: Absolutely plausible. It is. They view Iran and the Iranian nuclear threat as an existential threat, meaning they don‘t feel that if diplomacy fails, that they can live with a nuclear Iran. Their assessment is different than ours on this.

MATTHEWS: The odds are?

RUBIN: The odds are greater than 50/50.

MATTHEWS: OK, let me go to Bob Baer. Is it plausible—same question to you—that Israel will strike at Iran?

BOB BAER, FORMER CIA OFFICER: I think it‘s 50/50 or better. I agree with Michael. They look at the—the complete picture on this. They look at Lebanon. They look at the fact that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard corps has the missiles. And they have to do something now. I don‘t think sanctions are going to work.

MATTHEWS: Do they—bigger question to you because it‘s about the United States. Does the United States have to give them its compliance, its help, its OK, or can Israel strike on its own? Do we have to be party to this, or won‘t they do it?

RUBIN: Israel can strike on its own, but they can‘t finish the job on their own. It would take over a thousand sorties to do it right. The worst possible scenario for us would be that Israel starts something, and then the region becomes so messy that we feel that we have to finish it.

MATTHEWS: So you think we should help them.

RUBIN: I think that the idea is, if you‘re—if the worst-case scenario is military action, then we‘ve really got to ratchet up the other forms of coercion right now. And we certainly have to be prepared. We‘ve got to have sanctions alongside...

MATTHEWS: OK...

(CROSSTALK)

MATTHEWS: I‘m just trying to get to a question. Does Israel need our help to do the job?

RUBIN: No.

MATTHEWS: OK. Let me go to Bob Baer. Do they need our OK to give them, for example, to push Iraq to give them airspace and that sort of thing, to get to the target in Iran?

BAER: If you‘re sitting on the ground in Iraq and you‘re an American air controller and you see Israeli airplanes coming your way, how many minutes is the White House going to say yes or no? And the chances of saying no are zero. I don‘t think they need our help, but we will be drawn into a war, as a consequence.

MATTHEWS: So you both say that, technically, they could carry out the mission.

BAER: They could certainly start the mission.

MATTHEWS: OK, let‘s go to the question, Should we help them? If they decide—if Bibi Netanyahu makes the decision as prime minister of Israel, facing what you—what you believe he sees as an existential threat to the future of Israel and he decides to make the attack, should we help him?

RUBIN: The calculation has got to be on our interests. If the region is going to get messy, we‘ve got to do what we need to do to protect the United States‘ interests once Iran retaliates and should Iran retaliate.

MATTHEWS: If you were asked right now by the president, Should we help them, would you say yes or no?

RUBIN: I don‘t think now is yet the time.

MATTHEWS: OK. You wouldn‘t say yes now.

RUBIN: No.

MATTHEWS: OK. What do you think, Bob? should we say yes to the Israeli attack and say we‘ll help them?

BAER: We‘d say absolutely not.

MATTHEWS: Because I understand it‘s much more difficult for them to do it by themselves. But your thought is not to help them.

BAER: Not—we can‘t help them. We don‘t have enough troops. We‘d need a million troops in the Gulf. We would have to do something about the oil facilities in Saudi Arabia, to protect them.

MATTHEWS: OK.

BAER: Right now, we can‘t. Can we afford oil at $400 a barrel? Can we afford the mischief-making they would do in Iraq? And the answer is no.

MATTHEWS: OK, let‘s get to that point now. You both agree that Israel might do it. You both agree that it‘s more difficult for them to do it without us, but they could do it, right?

RUBIN: Yes.

MATTHEWS: And third question is, both of you think right now, the answer is we shouldn‘t encourage them to do it.

BAER: We should not.

MATTHEWS: OK, now the fourth question. If they attack the Israeli (SIC) nuclear facilities, as Netanyahu threatens to do, by the way, sometime next year at this point, because he‘s only giving our government up to the end of this year, what would be the consequences in order of importance, the consequences of an attack, because I‘m going to get the consequences of not attacking later. What are the consequences of an attack by Israel on the Iranian facilities?

RUBIN: The most important consequence of an attack would be that it would delay Iran‘s nuclear program, and it could delay it enough. That‘s what Israel‘s calculation is.

MATTHEWS: “Enough” meaning?

RUBIN: Enough to outlast the Iranian regime.

MATTHEWS: So the first instance, it would have a good effect.

RUBIN: The first instance, it would have a good effect.

MATTHEWS: What are the bad effects?

RUBIN: The bad effect is nothing like a military strike would rally the Iranian people around the flag more. The best thing that ever happened to...

MATTHEWS: I just talked to an Iranian emigre today, lives in this country. He‘s an American now. He believes it would give a 20-year life span to that faction running the country, the Ahmadinejad crowd.

RUBIN: I think that‘s possible, yes.

MATTHEWS: If Israel attacks.

RUBIN: People rally around the flag.

MATTHEWS: OK, so the first thing is good. It gets rid of—it puts them off maybe for a long time. Number two, they rally behind Ahmadinejad. The first two worst—or scenarios that you see, Bob, if they attack the facilities?

BAER: I think, again, it‘s the Gulf. It‘s the security of our oil.

I harp on this, but that‘s what the Iranians have said they‘re going to do. If they‘re attacked, no matter how minor the attack is, they‘re going to respond against oil. There‘s nothing we can do about it, and that‘s what worries me. In Iraq, as well.

MATTHEWS: The Straits of Hormuz. They shut off all oil shipments through the Straits, right?

BAER: They hit—they hit up (ph) cake (ph). It takes six million barrels off instantaneously, and we can‘t defend it. You know, secondly...

MATTHEWS: But doesn‘t that—doesn‘t that—doesn‘t that—that stranglehold, that chokehold, have a life span of itself? Can they keep doing that without committing suicide economically?

BAER: They‘re prepared...

MATTHEWS: I mean, how long can they...

BAER: ... to commit suicide.

MATTHEWS: ... raise the price that high?

RUBIN: They are.

BAER: They can. And they‘re ready to.

RUBIN: I absolutely agree. Iran‘s not a democracy. It doesn‘t matter what the ordinary people think, in the government‘s calculation. They will look at it—this—the leadership of Iran is the leadership that grew up in the Iran/Iraq war. They look at this and say, The vegetables are expensive? Well, when I was your age, I was fighting mustard gas on the front with Iraq.

MATTHEWS: OK, the way—the look of you right now—and I know you‘re emotional—passionate on this, not emotional. Is it possible, Michael, that the attack by Israel, which Bibi Netanyahu has threatened to carry out if we don‘t do something in stopping this weapons program by Iran, could be the beginning of a horrendous amount of action in the world, not just the end, but the beginning of spiking prices for oil, of Hezbollah attacks all over the place, not just Israel? What do you see happening?

RUBIN: Absolutely. And you‘ve got to balance that with, if Iran does go nuclear, you‘re going to have an end of the nuclear nonproliferation regime and a cascade of proliferation throughout the world. That‘s the choice.

MATTHEWS: OK. Let me ask you the final question tonight, and then I want to get to some of these quotes by people here. Bob Baer, what happens if we let Israel—we discourage Israel successfully and even (INAUDIBLE) maybe Netanyahu with a right-wing faction running the country there, with Lieberman, he decides not to move because we say, We don‘t want you to move?

If he doesn‘t move, what happens to the world if Israel is faced with a neighbor that hates it, wants to destroy it? Does that basically kill the notion of Israel as a safe haven for world Jewry in the long run? In other words, young people in their young 20s, young engineers, biotechnicians and all, would no longer want to live in that country because it‘s under a nuclear threat? Don‘t you—do you think that‘s a real prospect?

BAER: I think it‘s—Israel is under existential threat. I think if that Iran continues to grow, is a superpower or is a hegemon in the Gulf, that it ultimately it will affect Israel‘s survivability. There‘s no question about it. The Israelis have a point.

MATTHEWS: Michael? And that point is strong enough that it means their life. Do you buy that argument, that their life‘s at stake? And not over the year or two, but eventually, you cannot have an Israeli Jewish state, if you will, succeed if it‘s under the nuclear threat of a country that hates it.

RUBIN: There is a psychological threat, and with Iran‘s nuclear program...

MATTHEWS: By the way, it‘s a real psychological threat.

RUBIN: Yes.

MATTHEWS: It‘s not in the head.

RUBIN: But just as important is the uncertainty over who would control a nuclear bomb should Iran achieve that capability. Ordinary...

MATTHEWS: Who‘s got the button?

RUBIN: Who has the button, and under what circumstances would it be used? And that‘s what...

MATTHEWS: Who do you think is in charge in Iran right now? I want to get back to you. Who is making the decision to fire off these rockets? Who‘s making the decision to proceed in a way that looks like they‘re going towards weaponization? Who‘s calling that shot? Is it Khamenei, the boss, the supreme leader? Is it Ahmadinejad? Is a faction in the back room of old men, religious people? Who‘s making the call, Bob Baer, to go to war with us, basically, on this?

BAER: The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. And the new defense minister‘s from the IRGC. And don‘t forget that he blew up the Israeli embassy in Argentina. These guys have blood on their hands, and we really can‘t predict what they‘re going to do.

MATTHEWS: Michael?

RUBIN: Absolutely correct. The supreme leader still has ultimate control with the Revolutionary Guard. But the problem is, no one really knows about the factions inside the Revolutionary Guard Corps. It‘s still relatively a black box. Politics—we talk about reformers, we talk about hard liners, but the real decision making is inside that Islamic Revolutionary Guard.

MATTHEWS: OK. A fellow I know out in Hollywood, a guy who‘s pretty smart otherwise, said to me that the only smart Israeli action is to not just to go in and blow up the facilities, but to take out the leadership. Is that a feasible Israeli Entebbe-style possibility? Bob Baer, you first. Could they go in and take out the leadership faction, kill them? Could they do that?

BAER: No, the country...

MATTHEWS: Decapitate this government?

BAER: The country‘s too big. Israel‘s air force is too small. It‘s too big. You can‘t do it. It‘s 71 million people. We‘re talking about—the result would be a conventional war. It would look like World War III.

RUBIN: I would agree with that. You go after the leadership if it can prevent a war. In this case, it can‘t...

MATTHEWS: But you see it written along those lines in terms of knocking out, like, say, one person, killing one person, like, a really bad guy out there. But is it feasible for Israel to do an Entebbe-style assault, where they go in and find six or seven guys in this faction behind Ahmadinejad and kill them?

RUBIN: What‘s much more feasible...

MATTHEWS: Because they‘ve done stuff like this on the West Bank.

RUBIN: Yes. What‘s much more feasible, if Iran has buried nuclear facilities under mountains, they don‘t have to destroy the facilities, they just need to destroy the entrances to them.

MATTHEWS: And how long do they keep those sealed by blowing them up?

RUBIN: They set the program back a year or two and hope that the international community actually—actually becomes active.

MATTHEWS: Yes, the trouble is, the international community, from an Israeli point of view, goes the other way.

RUBIN: Yes.

MATTHEWS: What‘s your thought, Bob...

(CROSSTALK)

BAER: ... the intelligence isn‘t good enough.

MATTHEWS: Yes. Yes. What I‘ve heard as a scenario is they blow up, in the short run. They do the best they can and say, More coming if you keep going. Have you heard that argument?

RUBIN: I have heard that argument. And what‘s interesting, it‘s the same argument that was made when the Israelis went over after the Iraqi reactor in 1981. Critics said...

MATTHEWS: OK. How much longer do we both have—you both have, not me. I‘m watching you guys. You‘re the experts. How longer (ph), Michael, and how longer, Bob, do we have to keep Netanyahu from acting?

RUBIN: I‘d say it‘s in weeks—months, if not weeks.

MATTHEWS: Bob, how long has the United States got leverage over Netanyahu, the head of Israel, not to attack Iran?

BAER: I think Netanyahu...

MATTHEWS: Have we got a year?

BAER: He‘s given three months. He‘s got to see something happening in three months or he‘s going to start his planning. They‘ve already started their planning.

MATTHEWS: I think we‘re all on the same page on this. It‘s pretty scary. Thank you Michael Rubin from AEI, and thank you, Bob Baer, who knows his stuff.

Israel: US Urges Investigation of War Crimes Allegations

Israel: Defense Minister Barak Escapes British Arrest for War Crimes

Receive our latest updates by email or RSS SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEED
Buy Us A Cup of Coffee? Help Enduring America Expand Its Coverage and Analysis

On Tuesday, Washington urged Tel Aviv to conduct credible investigations into allegations of war crimes conducted during the offensive operation in Gaza. Michael Posner, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State, said:

We encourage Israel to utilise appropriate domestic (judicial) review and meaningful accountability mechanisms to investigate and follow up on credible allegations. If undertaken properly and fairly, these reviews can serve as important confidence-building measures that will support the larger essential objective which is a shared quest for justice and lasting peace.

The U.N. Human Rights Council held a one-day debate on the Goldstone report and reiterated the charges of war crimes both by Hamas and Israel.

After Washington's statement, Richard Goldstone responded: "United States has called for acceptable investigations of the allegations by both sides. I think that's important support." As for the possiblity of bringing Israeli officials in justice, Goldstone said: "International courts are courts of last resort, not first resort."

Goldstone's report urges the U.N. Security Council to refer the allegations to the International Criminal Court in the Hague if either Israeli or Palestinian authorities fail to investigate and prosecute those suspect of such crimes within six months.

Israel: Defense Minister Barak Escapes British Arrest for War Crimes

Israel: US Urges Investigation of War Crimes Allegations

Receive our latest updates by email or RSS SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEED
Buy Us A Cup of Coffee? Help Enduring America Expand Its Coverage and Analysis

A bit of a tricky consideration for Anglo-Israeli talks: British lawyers for 16 Palestinians are seeking an international arrest warrant for Israel's defence minister.

Still, Ehud Barak, followed by reporters and demonstrators, met British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Foreign Minister David Miliband at the Labour Party conference in Brighton.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJFuRb-qdX4[/youtube]

Amidst the Goldstone Report's conclusion that Israel had been responsible for war crimes during its offensive in Gaza, solicitors asked a district judge at the City of Westminster Magistrates Court to issue a warrant for Barak's arrest under the 1988 Criminal Justice Act, alleging that Barak had committed offences against the 1957 Geneva Conventions.

The Israeli Ministry of Defense responded that Barak enjoyed diplomatic immunity "due to his being a minister in the government" (although media reports said Barak had been warned about the impending legal action and urged to leave the UK for France by Israeli officials).

The Guardian reports that, despite the official Israeli statement, lawyers from two London law firms believe the warrant that the International Criminal Court issued in May 2008 for the arrest of Omar al-Bashir, the President of Sudan accused of committing war crimes in Darfur, offers a precedent. However, the British court rejected the appeal, accepting the arguments of the British Foreign Office that Barak was a state guest and not subject to such lawsuits.

Freed from the prospect of a jail term, Barak praised Israel's offensive strategy:

We do not intend to let terror win.. We will not apologize in any way for our just struggle against terrorism. We will do everything possible so that the representatives of Israel, security officials and soldiers of the IDF will continue to freely travel the world. The theater of the absurd whereby those who defend their citizens need to be on the defensive has to end. Otherwise, the world is likely not only to give a prize to terrorism, but to encourage it.

Iran's Nuclear Programme: Obama Backs Himself into a Corner

Iran’s Nuclear Programme: Scott Lucas in La Stampa (English Text)
The Latest from Iran (29 September): The Forthcoming Test?

Receive our latest updates by email or RSS SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEED
Buy Us A Cup of Coffee? Help Enduring America Expand Its Coverage and Analysis

Last week's high tide of politics over the Iranian "secret nuclear plant" still has some unpleasant backwash today, 48 hours before the US and other "5+1" powers meet Iran in Geneva. Bret Stephens of The Wall Street Journal takes the prize for meaningless swagger with his declaration of a neo-conservative resurgence: "A view of the world that understands that American power still furnishes the margin between freedom and tyranny, and between prosperity and chaos, is starting to look better all the time. Even in France."

Meaningless because, unless Mr Stephens is ready to lead the bombers over Iran, there's precious little he can do to back up the bluster. Far more importantly, the Obama Administration may be finding that it has talked itself into a high-profile corner.

The clue is the latest White House spin to the front-line newspapers. Yesterday's New York Times gives the game away. On the surface, it proclaims, "U.S. Is Seeking a Range of Sanctions Against Iran", but the more you read, the narrower that range becomes. Officials admitted, "The United States was not likely to win support for an embargo on shipments of gasoline or other refined fuel to Iran. The European allies...view this as a 'blunt instrument' that could hurt ordinary Iranians, inflame public opinion and unite the country behind the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad."

The initial flourish, offered after President Obama's statement last week, that even Moscow was in line with a tough approach has sagged limply: "Administration officials acknowledge it will be difficult to persuade Russia to agree to harsh, long-term sanctions against Iran, whatever the assurances that the Russian president, Dmitri A. Medvedev, gave last week to Mr. Obama. China, these officials say, is even less dependable, given its reliance on Iranian oil and its swelling trade ties with Iran."

So all that's really left in "the range" is the suggestion of barriers to investment in Iran's gas and petroleum industry and more restrictions on Iranian financial institutions, covered by the assurance, "The administration also is seeking to build a broader coalition of partners for sanctions so that it may still be able to act against Iran even if China and Russia were to veto harsher measures proposed in the United Nations Security Council."

And even then promise of multilateral action is further constricted today. The Wall Street Journal reports that the White House will still face numerous challenges matching its rhetoric on sanctions with real international action, said U.S. and European officials involved in the process. That makes "the U.S. Treasury -- and not the United Nations -- the main focus of the West's financial campaign against Iran for now...The Treasury has pursued dozens of unilateral sanctions against Iranian banks, government officials and defense companies in recent years in an attempt to pressure Tehran."

The US Treasury? As far as I can tell, the American effort has gone from a united international front against Iran's threat to a "coalition of one".

There's still some blowing of smokes in places like Tuesday's Washington Post with the declaration, "The Obama administration is laying plans to cut Iran's economic links to the rest of the world if talks this week over the country's nuclear ambitions founder." Once again, however, it only takes a few paragraphs to see through Sanctions' New Clothes: "The administration has limited options in unilaterally targeting Iran, largely because it wants to avoid measures so severe that they would undermine consensus among countries pressing the Iranian government."

When rhetoric finally arrives at the obstacle of action, steps mentioned include making it more difficult for foreign firms to get adequate insurance for investments in Iran. But, surprise, surprise, the US has been pursuing that effort for years, so there is nothing new in the measure. Nor is it clear how much more punishment can be meted out by the suggestion of tightening restrictions on Iranian financial institutions.

And none of this can obscure the inconvenience that, as noted in The New York Times, major investors like Russia and China are likely to keep investing and trading. Credit to Simon Tisdall of The Guardian for stating the blunt facts:

Iran provided 10% of China's crude oil needs last year; its market share is expected to grow. Chinese companies and middlemen are supplying one third of Iran's refined petroleum requirements as western companies back off. Earlier this year the China National Petroleum Corporation signed a $1.7bn investment deal with the National Iranian Oil Company. The overall Chinese energy stake in Iran is said to be worth $100bn.

Speaking before crucial nuclear talks in Geneva, Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu urged the US, Britain and other UN security council members to eschew confrontation. "We believe that all sides should take more steps to ease tensions and resolve problems, not the opposite," she said. Beijing's meaning was plain. Even if it supported sanctions in principle (which it does not), it was not disposed to support measures that would harm its national economic self-interest.

It appears that the US plan was to show up at the Geneva talks with a loaded gun. An article in Sunday's Washington Times revealed:

President Obama's decision to confront Iran with evidence of a secret nuclear production site Friday was the culmination of a deliberate strategy over the past nine months to gain maximum impact from the disclosure by building up to it with other steps on the world stage.

A high-ranking administration official [said] that while the White House knew about Iran's construction of a second uranium enrichment plant before Mr. Obama took office in January, it waited to drop the bombshell until U.S. officials had conducted extensive diplomatic advance work.

Even when Iran disrupted the plan by telling the International Atomic Energy Agency of its second enrichment plant, the Administration kept a grip on the holster; indeed, by the time Obama made his statement, he was waving a pair of six-shooters.

Only one thing. If you're going to bring a gun to the table, you best make sure you've got enough bullets. And the Administration is beginning to discover, very late in the day, that it may not have even one in the chamber.

No amount of bluster, not even of Stephens-esque proportion, does not remove that difficulty. Indeed, it only bears out the ill-judged strategy of speaking loudly and carrying a very small stick.