Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Iran May Be Pulling The Strings

The White House today announced that it held Iran and Syria responsible for the abduction of two Israeli soldiers in an assault that left seven other Israeli soldiers dead:

Hizballah's actions are not in the interest of the Lebanese people, whose welfare should not be held hostage to the interests of the Syrian and Iranian regimes. We reiterate the international community's insistence that all parties in the region fulfill their obligations under UN Security Council resolutions 1559 and 1680, and cease all support for Hizballah.

The indispensable MEMRI has compiled a report that shows that in recent weeks Iran has argued for an escalation of violence against Israel:
In statements published over the last few weeks, senior Iranian officials advocated an escalation of the violent activity against Israel and against "Zionists" around the world.

Additionally, in mid-June 2006, Syria and Iran signed a military cooperation agreement. The Syrian defense minister stated on that occasion that the two countries "are establishing a joint front against Israel... [since] Iran regards Syria's security as its own."

[...]

According to a May 11, 2006 Al-Sharq Al-Awsat report, a high-level Iranian official who held a closed meeting with a small group of Western diplomats in London emphasized Hizbullah's importance to Iran: "Hizbullah is one of the pillars of our security strategy, and forms Iran's first line of defense against Israel. We reject [the claim] that it must be disarmed..."

Keep in mind that Iran defines "security strategy" not in terms of secure borders or economic health, but in terms of the non-existence of Israel. Also keep in mind that Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a devotee of the cult of the Twelfth Imam, an apocalyptic worldview that asks Muslims to hasten a great conflagration which will bring the return of an Islamic messiah. Suddenly, the rabid belligerence of Iranian-backed terrorists starts to look like part of a calculated Iranian strategy.

Iran was recently offered a set of incentives to halt their nuclear program, and in response claimed that they required until August 22 to formulate their response. More recently, Iran postponed for a week a meeting to discuss the incentives; only a vague explanation for the delay was offered. The resurgence of violence on Israel's northern border may explain the mullahcracy's dilatory tactics.

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