On September 4, Shiva Nazar Ahari, a young female human rights activist incarcerated in Evin since last December, will enter a Revolutionary Court to face fabricated charges that carry the death penalty. Ahari, a leading activist with the Committee of Human Rights Reporters (CHRR), stands accused of “anti-regime propaganda” and “acts contrary to national security.” She faces an additional charge in a category of criminality plausible only in societies run along totalitarian lines; what the ayatollahs deem mohareb, or “rebellion against God.” It would require the most blinkered apologist for the Iranian regime to suggest that someone charged in this way can expect a fair trial.
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) representatives visited Sudan this week to discuss the African nation’s plans to build at least one nuclear reactor by 2020. The ambitious scheme, which oil-producing Sudan claims would be purely for civil use to produce electricity, is the latest in Arab nuclear initiatives, paralleling Iran’s highly controversial program.
Noam Sheizaf and Larry Derfner are worried about the possibility that Israel might attack Iran’s nuclear facilities. No surprise there. What sensible person could contemplate such an idea with equanimity? However, both of them fall into the trap of assuming that all the risks are stacked on the side of attacking and none on the side of not taking military action.
Many readers will have already come across Jeffrey Goldberg’s piece in The Atlantic about the possibility of Israel resorting to force against Iran. Though it’s received a lot of attention, I don’t think it’s that interesting; it’s long on personal anecdote (by the way, for a seriously unflattering view of the Netanyahu family you ought to read Chapter 12 of this book) and the views of unnamed sources and short on analysis. People seriously interested in this matter still need to read Tira.
To those of you who can read Spanish I recommend following Luis D’Elía on Twitter. Why should he be of interest? Well, the rotund social activist is a prominent supporter of the government of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and on more than one occasion he and his followers have provided the street muscle to keep opponents of the government from holding demonstrations at sensitive locations.
I think this is what psychoanalysts call “projection.” After being decisively rejected by voters in east London at the recent British General Election, George Galloway is now prostrating himself before a man for whom voters are an irritant, to be beaten, tortured and imprisoned until they realize that the right to vote should be understood as the right to vote for him alone.
For those readers who have forgotten how George behaves in the company of genocidal tyrants, here’s a reminder. Somehow, this footage never loses its nauseating quality no matter how many times you see it, but since a) it’s the weekend and b) Saddam’s regime is no more, you may choose to laugh rather than grit your teeth.
I have no special skills when it comes to predicting the future but I thought I might as well title this post as I have when it occurred to me that many, cough, anti-Zionists, would see three posts in four days about Iran as being a sure sign that something is up. After all, this blog is sponsored by the AJC and hey, come on, we all know what that means….
If you want to read some really good analysis of the prospects for an Israeli attack on Iran - much better than the paper I critiqued here - then read this paper by Ron Tira. It’s a model of clear reasoning and strategic understanding and is by far the best thing I’ve read on the matter.
If you take a look here you’ll find a report by the Oxford Research Group about the possibility of an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. The report opposes any such action on Israel’s part but I, like you, knew that before reading it. It’s well worth a read though, in spite of its adherence to the bien pensant received wisdom on the matter in question. There are, however, a couple of questions about it that I’d like to bring up:
The final and most important factor behind the Uncle Napoleon complex is Iran’s failure to reconcile itself with its own history. That history-viewed broadly and with a few exceptions here and there -amounts to 2,500 years or so of gradual imperial decline. Iranians have yet to forgive themselves for this decline. Take, for example, their view of the political geography of Central Asia, the Middle East, and North Africa. Like Greeks and Italians, Iranians are heirs to an ancient tradition of imperial conquest. Yet only modern-day Persians seriously lament the passing of the glorious days when far more territory and many more peoples were subjected to their beneficent imperium. In the Uncle Napoleon complex, then, they seek a way to relinquish their historical agency and avoid taking responsibility for the present.
Read the rest from Sohrab Ahmari, an occasional contributor to this blog, on Commentary.
Remember how, on the eve of the Iraq war, thousands upon thousands of protestors chanted - in addition to “Free Palestine” - that no blood should be shed for oil, or any other commercial transaction?
I wonder how the “anti-war” movement feels now about the resistance of certain banks and corporations to the implementation of sanctions against Iran. Here’s a disturbing example from Benny Weinthal:
Periodically, I’ve written about the loathsome Holocaust denial outfit Press TV (see here and here and here, for example,) a mouthpiece for the Iranian regime that masquerades as a legitimate broadcaster.
In the Jerusalem Post, Benny Weinthal reports the following:
Executives from two public TV channels last week hosted Ezzatollah Zarghami, the president of Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting, who allegedly has ties to the Revolutionary Guards, prompting criticism on Monday.
One of the tell-tale signs of a regime in distress is that its top officials begin sounding off on subjects quite removed from their remit. So it is with Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, who claims to have discovered the reason behind the exit of France, England and the United States from the World Cup.
Was it the seething discord in the French camp spilling onto the field? Was it England’s defensive failures compounded by the nasty habit of engaging in “kick and rush?” Was it the US tendency to play catch-up by, more often than not, conceding early goals?
