Morning Report: January 23, 2006

Iran roundup. Arutz Sheva: 'World renowned investigative reporter and terror expert Kenneth R. Timmerman, author of the bestselling book "Countdown to Crisis: the Coming Nuclear Showdown with Iran," and Carl Limbacher, reporter for NewMax.com, reveal that the US and Israel will destroy Iran's nuclear facilities in less than 10 weeks from now.' Forbes: 'Swiss banking giant UBS AG said Sunday it has stopped doing business with Iran because of the company's economic and risk analysis of the situation in the country. UBS will no longer deal with individuals, companies or state institutions such as Iran's central bank, said company spokesman Serge Steiner. A similar policy is also being implemented in the case of Syria, he said. All existing business with customers in Iran will be canceled, but Iranians in exile are not affected by the decision, Steiner said, confirming an article in Swiss weekly SonntagsZeitung.' Via Regime Change Iran. Debka adds: 'Tehran plans a nuclear weapons test before March 20, 2006 – the Iranian New Year, moves Shahab-3 missiles within striking range of Israel. Reporting this, the dissident Foundation for Democracy in Iran, a US-based watch group, cites sources in the US and Iran. The FDI adds from Iran: on June 16, the high command of the Revolutionary Guards Air Force ordered Shahab-3 missile units to move mobile launchers every 24 hours instead of weekly. This is in view of a potential pre-emptive strike by the US or Israel. Advance Shahab-3 units have been positioned in Kermanshah and Hamad within striking distance of Israel, reserve launchers moved to Esfahan and Fars. The missile units were told to change positions “in a radius of 30-35 kilometers” and only at night. DEBKAfile’s Iranian sources add: FDI reporting has a reputation for credibility. Western and Israeli intelligence have known for more than six months that Iran’s nuclear program has reached the capability of being able to carry out a nuclear explosion, albeit underground. It would probably be staged in a desert or mountain region and activated by a distant control center. Tehran would aim at confronting the Americans, Europeans and Israelis with an irreversible situation. At the same time, an explosion of this sort would indicate that Iran is not yet able to produce a nuclear bomb that can be delivered by airplane or a warhead adapted to a missile. The stage Iran has reached is comparable to Pakistan’s when it conducted its first nuclear tests in the nineties and North Korea’s in 2001. All the same, an Iranian underground nuclear blast, which will most probably be attempted on March 22, would turn around the strategic position of all the parties concerned and the Middle East as whole. The question now is: will the United States, Israel or both deliver a pre-emptive strike ahead of the Iranian underground test - or later? Or will Washington alternatively use the event to bring the UN Security Council round to economic sanctions? Tehran is already organizing to withstand economic penalties. For Israel, the timing is getting tight in view of its general election on March 28. Acting prime minister Ehud Olmert must take into account that a ruling party which allows an Iranian nuclear explosion to take place six days before the poll would draw painful punishment from the voter.' (A7, Forbes via RCI; Debka)

ITM: Mehdi Army to defend Iran. Meanwhile, Mohammed at Iraq the Model writes: 'The leader of Mujahideen, defender of faith, future Ayatollah and higher leader of the Mehdi Army (may God keep him safe) Muqtada al-Sadr announced from Tehran during his latest visit to Iran that al-Mehdi Army will defend any neighboring or Muslim nation that comes under foreign invasion.
The statement was made during a meeting with Ali Larijani, Iran’s national security advisor who is also in charge of Iran’s nuclear program. ... Poor Iraq, the new parliament will have 30 of the soldiers of the Mujahid leader, while those who carry PhDs like Kubba, Chalabi, Dabbagh or, or, or….got nothing… I can’t blame anyone for this because this is what a great percentage of Iraqis chose and I won’t blame those Iraqis for their choice since for decades, they didn’t enjoy a healthy environment that allows objective thinking. Like on Iraqi journalist said; the defeat of the seculars is a great loss for those who won the elections.' (ITM)

Nerd? Geek? Dork?

A Nerd is someone who is passionate about learning/being smart/academia.
A Geek is someone who is passionate about some particular area or subject, often an obscure or difficult one.
A Dork is someone who has difficulty with common social expectations/interactions.

The Nerd/Geek/Dork Test

Tri-Lamb Material 69 % Nerd, 26% Geek, 52% Dork

For The Record: A Nerd is someone who is passionate about learning/being smart/academia. A Geek is someone who is passionate about some particular area or subject, often an obscure or difficult one. A Dork is someone who has difficulty with common social expectations/interactions. You scored better than half in Nerd and Dork, earning you the coveted title of: Tri-Lamb Material. THE NERD? GEEK? OR DORK? TEST

My test tracked 3 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 71% on nerdiness You scored higher than 34% on geekosity You scored higher than 87% on dork points

Link: The Nerd? Geek? or Dork? Test written by donathos on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

Hat tip: Turning Violet, via Busties

Beyond Serenity

A friend's fascination with the character of River in the movie "Serenity" got me thinking. Because River isn't really a hero through most of the movie, or a warrior; she's controlled by forces outside of herself. She spends the first part of the movie hiding from her warrior side, and in fear of it. It's only at the end - when she can confront that side of herself - that she can use her abilities to fight evil and protect the rest of the crew of Serenity.

This internal transformation is mirrored on a macroscopic scale by the movie's premise. It was the quest for a utopia - specifically, a world free of violence and aggression - that led to the invention of the aptly-named drug Pax. The drug caused most people to lose the will to live - while in a small minority, it had an opposite, and even worse, effect. Mal must force his crew, in the most horrifying way imaginable, to mingle with that banished, evil side.

And come to think of it, isn't it strange how River's name sounds so much like the word "Reaver"?

Aggression and conflict are part of our reality. There is conflict in our world, there is aggression in our nature. We don't get a choice in this. What we do get to choose is how to handle these things. We can run from them and drive them underground; or we can acknowledge them and work with them responsibly.

If we refuse to acknowledge the dark side of ourselves, we are only inviting it to do us harm. To embrace it is to learn true power, and humility, and wholeness.

Nadz is back!

One of my favorite Arab bloggers, Nadz is back in action after a month-long hiatus. Go check out her post on Soumaya Ghannoushi, Cheerleader of the Patriarchy.

Night Flashes

North Korean missiles may improve Iran's striking range, reports The Counterterrorism Blog ... from the Jerusalem Post, Condi Rice met with Shimon Peres in Washington, and discussed the upcoming Palestinian elections ... also from JPost, Condi condemned the IRI's decision to go ahead with its nuclear program, saying, "I think we have a good deal of coherence in the view of the major powers about the fact that Iran stepped over a line" ... and via Pajamas Media, Vik Rubenfeld reports some new-found friends from Old Europe on the Iran challenge ... meanwhile Ha'Aretz reports that frum Israelis aren't being allowed into Jordan - their tzizit and tallitot are marking them "persona non grata" - ostensibly it's for their "protection" ... if Tigerhawk didn't know better, they'd almost swear the leftist bloggers didn't support the troops ... and Registan points the way to Regostan (no relation), where you can find the best Plov, somsa, manti, lepioshka, shashlik, and even shorpa.

Iran Report

Jonathan Gurwitz of the San Antonio Express-News, coming our way via Marze Por Gohar, offers some refreshing sanity when he says the world must not ignore cries for change in Iran:

The world has come to know only one voice from Iran — that of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. In his denial of the Holocaust, his threat to wipe Israel off the map and his relentless pursuit of nuclear technology, Ahmadinejad has become to polite international relations what Howard Stern is to broadcast radio. There are other voices from Iran, however, who don't figure so prominently in the news as the Islamic Republic's firebrand leader.

There is the voice of dissident journalist Akbar Ganji. Ganji, like Ahmadinejad, is a former member of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. Unlike Ahmadinejad, he recognizes that the 1979 revolution that deposed the Shah has metastasized into a corrupt, malignant cancer on the Iranian nation.

In 2000, Ganji published a series of articles in which he implicated Iran's religious leaders in the murder of political opponents. He is now serving a six-year sentence in Tehran's dreaded Evin prison, where Ahmadinejad reportedly acted as a cruel interrogator and ruthless executioner.

Last summer, Ganji issued a letter to the world from his prison cell, rendered in English by Iranian expatriate writer and poet Roya Hakakian:

"My voice will not be silenced, for it is the voice of peaceful life, of tolerating the other, loving humanity, sacrificing for others, seeking truth and freedom, demanding democracy, welcoming different lifestyles, separating the private sphere and the public sphere, religion and state, promoting equality of all humans, rationality, federalism within a democratic Iran, and above all, a profound distaste for violence."

Go read it all, and ask yourself what you can do to help brave Iranians like Akbar Ganji.

ShrinkWrapped on Screen Memories

One feature of the ongoing psychological disintegration of the Left is the phenomenon of "screen memories", as explained by ShrinkWrapped:

Screen memories and screen perceptions are innocuous pieces of reality that people focus on when traumatized as a way to deal with the overwhelming anxiety, terror, and impotent anger that trauma provokes. By focusing on a relatively neutral aspect of the traumatic situation, the person is able to preserve an illusion of normalcy and comfort.

The behavior of much of the Media, the Democratic party, and the European elites show all the hallmarks of reliance on such screens to avoid feeling traumatized.

Consider the various dangers our country, and indeed Western Civilization, is currently facing. Much of our current discourse concerns which of two sets of dangers are most significant and most immediate.

On one side of the equation reside the risks of the Bush Administration gradually moving the country to the right, with extreme versions of this worry including creeping fascist theocracy, canceled elections in 2008, and other wild scenarios. ...

On the other side would be the dangers of Islamic fascism in all its many guises.

Go read it all and don't forget to bookmark ShrinkWrapped on your browser.

I've had my own experiences with the Left's collective mental breakdown, but we'll save those for another time.

Abu Khabab al-Masri

Who is - or was - Abu Khabab al-Masri? Here's more from the Counterterrorism Blog:

According to a growing number of media reports, a recent U.S. airstrike on a Pakistani border village has likely killed a senior Egyptian Al-Qaida commander named Midhat Mursi (a.k.a. Abu Khabab al-Masri). Since the late 1980s, Abu Khabab has served as a top military aide and deputy to Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri in Afghanistan. Mursi was responsible for co-managing Al-Qaida's notorious Derunta military training complex near Jalalabad, where he maintained his own elite terrorist graduate school aptly named the "Abu Khabab Camp."

In November 1995, Abu Khabab organized his first major terrorist plot in response to an international crackdown on the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, dispatching two suicide bombers from the Derunta training camp to target the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan. The twin car bombs killed 17 people and wounded 59 others. In later memoirs regarding Abu Khabab's 1995 operation, Ayman al-Zawahiri explained, "The basic objective was to attack the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, but if that proved difficult to do, then to strike at any other U.S. target in Pakistan. However, following intensive and detailed surveillance, we discovered that bombing the U.S. Embassy was beyond our capability."

Following his success in Islamabad, Abu Khabab teamed up with other veteran Al-Qaida commanders (including Abu Musab al-Suri, who was recently captured in Pakistan) to train a new generation of terrorist sleeper cells destined for targets in the Western world. ...

Read the rest at the link.

UPDATE: Stefania at Free Thoughts points out that this guy also trained the "Shoe Bomber". Don't miss her important, bilingual (Italian/English) blog.

Afternoon Roundup

Top al-Qaeda bombmaker reported killed in Pakistan. Conterterrorism Blog:

ABC News broke the story this afternoon that al Qaeda's master bomb maker and chemical weapons expert, Midhat Mursi, a.k.a. Midhat Mursi al-Sayyid Umar, a.k.a. Abu Khabab al-Masri, a.k.a. Abu Khabab, was killed in last week's U.S. missile attack in Pakistan. A friend in the media with excellent official sources, as well as CNN's David Ensor, report that US government officials can't confirm the killing but won't dissuade the reports either. If true, this is almost as good as killing al-Zawahri; we had a $5 million reward out for Abu Khabab for his long success in training hundreds of terrorists in Afghanistan (including Richard Reid and Zacharias Moussaoui) and for his planning for chemical WMD attacks. ...

A sweeping realignment. Daniel Holt at Publius Pundit:

The US is moving a hundred diplomatic posts from staid Western locations to Africa and the booming East. Clearly the administration recognizes the importance of the sorts of stories Publius covers.

The Financial Times says:

Condoleezza Rice, US secretary of state, yesterday called [the move] a “sweeping and difficult” transformation of US diplomacy.

“In the 21st century, emerging nations like India and China, and Brazil and Egypt, and Indonesia and South Africa are increasingly shaping the course of history,” Ms Rice said[…]

Ms Rice said the US needed bold diplomacy to achieve the mission set out by George W. Bush, president, in his second inaugural address a year ago of supporting democratic institutions worldwide with the “ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world”.

The article also specifies that "This year, 100 diplomats would be shifted to countries such as China, India, Nigeria and Lebanon, she said, with several hundred to be moved over the next few years." Rice cited "the Bush administration's shift away from focusing on what it regards as cold war structures such as Nato and the United Nations".

True Security Begins With Regime Change in Iran

As House Resolution 398 (May 06, 2004) has rightly recognized, the illegitimate government of the Islamic Republic of Iran has engaged, and continues to engage, in efforts to acquire nuclear weapons. Such weapons would pose an immediate threat not only to Iran's neigbors, but ultimately to the entire world.

The cruelty of the IRI regime is well known and abundantly documented. The regime has been implicated in assassinations throughout the Middle East, Europe, and the United States; the murder of more than 100,000 Iranians; continuing policies of rape, torture, and arbitrary imprisonment as political tools; and the kidnapping of thousands of women and girls for sale into prostitution and slavery.

According to the Department of State report released by the Department of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor on February 25, 2004: “The Government's poor human rights record worsened, and it continued to commit numerous, serious abuses. The right of citizens to change their government was restricted significantly. Continuing serious abuses included: summary executions; disappearances; torture and other degrading treatment, reportedly including severe punishments such as beheading and flogging; poor prison conditions; arbitrary arrest and detention; lack of habeas corpus or access to counsel and prolonged and incommunicado detention. Citizens often did not receive due process or fair trials. The Government infringed on citizens' privacy rights, and restricted freedom of speech, press, assembly, association and religion.” These and other abuses clearly indicate that the regime constitutes a grave threat to the people of Iran and to free people everywhere.

It has come to our attention that Israel and/or the United States may be contemplating a pre-emptive military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities. If the United States follows a policy based exclusively on the nuclear issue, however, the results will be catastrophic both for the Iranian people and, ultimately, for the Middle East and the world. Merely striking at Iranian nuclear facilities would at best delay the regime's nuclear program, driving it deeper underground; would certainly provoke even harsher measures against the Iranian people; and would likely lure the West into a false sense of security with the mullahs of the IRI regime plotting their ultimate retribution against America, Israel, and all others who have stood in their way.

The Islamist regime continues to actively undermine American efforts to rebuild Afghanistan and Iraq. Regime-backed agents and mercenaries are killing American soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines every week. To wait until Iraq and Afghanistan are “secure” before confronting the Iranian mullahs is folly; rather, the United States must take the battle to the enemy in Tehran.
The vast majority of freedom-loving Iranian people support the right of Israel and all of Iran's Middle Eastern neighbors, as well as the United States, to live in peace and security. Therefore, it is in our common interest that:

1. President Bush must support clear and open policy calling for regime change in Iran.
2. The Administration must abandon its policy of “Afghanistan yesterday, Iraq today, Iran maybe tomorrow”, and confront the threat from the IRI regime immediately.
3. President Bush must deliver an ultimatum to the IRI's primary hidden supporters (Britain) and secondary supporters (France, Germany, EU, Japan, Canada, Russia, and China) to stop giving economic assistance, intelligence assistance, or other assistance to the regime. The EU, in particular, should not use resources stolen from the Iranian people to finance its own failed welfare state.
4. The United States must deliver an unequivocal ultimatum to the Iranian regime to step down peacefully and immediately, and transfer power to a team of Iranian, Iranian-American leaders; this team would set up a referendum under US and international supervision with military presence of US, Sweden, Denmark, and the Netherlands in Iran as the peacekeeper. If the mullahs do not agree to step down peacefully, then the US should provide all necessary financial and military support for freedom-loving Iranian opposition both inside and outside Iran to remove the regime in a short period of time.

The Bush Doctrine advocates America's active role in supporting freedom, democracy, and human rights throughout the world. We call on the Government to act in accord with this wise and noble policy, and help the Iranian people achieve their dream of a free and democratic Iran.

"Human beings are all members of one body.
They are created from the same essence.
When one member is in pain,
The others cannot rest.
If you do not care about the pain of others,
You do not deserve to be called a human being."
A Quote from Famous Persian Poet Saadi Shirazi
( 13th century Persian poet, from Shiraz the birthplace)

Please take a moment to sign the petition, if you haven't yet, here:
True Security Begins With Regime Change in Iran

ITM: Not the scale, but the fact of fraud is Maram's political lever.

Iraq the Model reports:

The international investigation team that came to Iraq to check on election results announced that they are delaying the announcement of their report until Thursday.
The interesting thing about this is that the team said they’d disclose their report after the team members leave Iraq! This suggests that the team wants to avoid upsetting any particular Iraqi party while they are still here.

Parties that opposed the preliminary results such as Maram have high hopes on this report; not because they think it can grant them more seats in the parliament as everyone knows now that final results won’t be much different from the preliminary ones but rather because those parties want something that officially proves fraud has taken place regardless of the size of this fraud. It’s just the mere idea that any proven fraud will give Maram and the like more bargaining power to face the UIA with and they think that then, the UIA will not be able to force its point of view regarding the formation of the government and thus will have to reach a compromise with the others and give them a better share. ...

Read the rest at the link. Mohammed also points out that the greatest danger in Iraq is not the increasingly fragmented and isolated al-Qaeda but "the possible interference of the neighbors in Iraq’s internal affairs to destabilize the country and impede the political process". The Syrian and Iranian regimes have an interest in making Iraq look like a quagmire because, they reason, as long as Washington perceives itself as being "bogged down" in Iraq, the regimes in Tehran and Damascus are safe.

I'm hoping they've miscalculated.

National Geographic on Iraqi Kurdistan

This just in from Michael Yon: the current National Geographic print edition (January 2006) carries a great article on the Kurdish region in Iraq. You can watch the preview here, but you have to get the print magazine to read it all. Michael Yon has only positive things to say about the article, and that's good enough for me. Don't forget to visit Michael Yon regularly.