Iran Working to Purchase New Front on Israel

 

Iran will be using some amount of their coming new found wealth which with its sales of oil and weapons will be a renewable funding starting with the billions it will receive right up front after the deal passes the Congress either outright or through inability to override Presidential veto. There have been credible reports that Hezballah has been once again actively seeking to convert members of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades into cells which Iran can control to perform shooting attacks and eventually planting IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices) which Iran will provide either through teaching these cells the methods for building their own or by providing the knowledge along with the necessary parts and leave the rest to the best trained to do the logistical planning. This recruitment drive, for lack of a better term, is being led by an operative of Hezballah known to Israeli intelligence named Qais Obeid, an Israeli-Arab and grandson of former Knesset member Diyab Obeid. These recruitment efforts by Hezballah has been an ongoing threat which of late has been more vigorous thus making it a potential new and more active terrorist front which will require additional intelligence gathering and interventions. In the past these efforts may have had some begrudging assistance from Fatah and Palestinian Authority as allowing Hezballah to become overly influential in Judea and Samaria would erode Palestinian Authority and Mahmoud Abbas’s authority. Meanwhile, this is an inroad which Iran has already set in motion to increase their threat potential against Israel and in their mind another way to place additional pressures against Israel and thus make any attack on their nuclear facilities less likely. Increasing the near threat thus making the more distant threat appear less of a pressing issue may be behind these Iranian efforts.

 

Mahmoud Abbas may be another problem that requires steps to be addressed. Abbas is preparing to make a visit to Tehran, Iran. This visit will definitely have a discussion of recruiting Fatah and potentially buying the entirety of the Palestinian Authority outright. This may be part of the reason that Abbas has distanced and may further distance himself from the being the head of certain elements within the Palestinian Authority structures, as convoluted as that structure may appear. This may be in preparation to allow Iran to have its influence over certain political and terrorist entities while allowing for the majority of the Palestinian Authority, including the authority itself, to come outside obvious Iranian control and thus remain easily supportable by their European and other Western backing and funding while turning over critical terror networks to Iranian influence or even outright control. Iran is almost desperate to open a reliable front against Israel other than Hezballah which already had too much on its plate with Syria, Iraq and even reports of some Hezballah assisting the Houthis in Yemen and now a new front with Islamic State appearing to organize and gain influence of Sunnis in Lebanon who have reached the point of desperation and a represent low hanging fruit just waiting for some supporting influence to provide them with the leadership assistance and weaponization to present a new threat to Hezballah and gain their own front against Israel.

 

This partially represents the new threats approaching from the distant horizons to place themselves right on Israel’s front porch, so to speak. On one side there are the traditional Sunni influences such as Saudi Arabia and the ‘nice’ Palestinians which wear ties and speak peace in English while unsheathing daggers and potentially IEDs when dressed in more traditional garb with their keffiyeh shaped in the form of Israel, a tradition popularized by the late Yasser Arafat which he claimed showed his intention to replace Israel, not share any of the lands as he refused to recognize any Jewish presence as long as he was able to defy the Israeli presence as the State of the Jews. There is likely to be additional pressures felt from both Gaza and Judea and Samaria as the bidding wars increase. We have outlined the potential threats coming from Iran in Judea and Samaria and the on again and currently off again relationship between Iran and Hamas can become active at any time and present an active terror front against Israel. There are likely other influences in Gaza with potential for Iranian meddling such as Islamic Jihad or simply any terror cells who desire greater prominence which a fresh influx of money and arms, especially rocket parts, with which to attack Israel would present an additional threat. Where some would point to such a threat being of minimal importance to which the reply that comes to mind is to inquire at what number of rockets striking Israeli cities and potentially only prevented through interception at the minimal price of near twenty-thousand-dollars per interceptor fired. With rockets being priced to manufacture between fifty dollars to as much as at the most a thousand dollars, how many of the midrange priced rockets at say two-hundred-dollars or less does an Iranian backed group need to fire before they become more than a menace, and this does not count those that strike and murder Israeli families, at what point are rockets over the border sufficient to trigger a greater response? How many rockets fired at your neighborhood would be considered a minor menace, an inconvenience, something that you would be capable of simply living with the minor inconvenience of hearing a siren in the middle of the night or while your children are walking to or from school, a favorite time for rocket launches into Israel by Hamas and Islamic Jihad, how many would you accept. Well, that should be the same answer for Israeli communities as Jewish and Israeli lives matter! All lives matter providing they are also living by that credo.

 

Live and let live is a nice theory to live by despite the murderous intentions of your neighbors, but after three-thousand-years of neighbors intent on murdering every single Israeli and Jew which included conquest at any price, we have seen it throughout time and will not go quietly, that can be a promise we will keep. We have had our survival instincts molded and hardened by the Egyptian Pharaohs, the Hittites, the Babylonians, the Assyrians, the Persians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Islamic invasions, the Crusaders, the near constant wars where the Jews were a primary target by both sides between of Islam against the Crusaders. These were followed by the various European and Islamic states throughout the Dark and Middle Ages, expulsions from Russian pogrom, Spanish Inquisition, Purification of France, the Religious Purges by both Catholic and Protestant Monarchs, the Protestant Reformation in the German City-States, Pogroms throughout all of Europe; the Jizyah of the Arab, Muslim and Ottoman City-States and Empires. Then was a defining slaughter known as the Shoah by the Nazis, and then pogroms and disenfranchising by the various Muslims States after the formation of Israel. Coming into the present we are targeted by Iran, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the PLO, Fatah, and the too numerous to name other assaults with the intent on conquest, wholesale conversions, eradication of Judaism and other threats be they from ancient history or about to spring at our throats tomorrow. Enough is enough and Never Again will Jews take such threats without a fight as we have no weapon against the most insidious of all threats, assimilation and the loss of Jewish identity which accompanies such. I realize that was a long sentence but we Jews have a very long history and very little of the time were we left in peace. The present is not proving to be much of an improvement. Name me one nation which has been historically and is presently under direct threat of being eradicated once again. Another exile may very well turn Judaism into a small cultish religion practiced by small pockets of religious Jews who will all still remain under threats for their annihilation through many different means and only surviving by the will of Hashem. We will not go into that dark night without a fight, a great effort to do whatever it takes to remain in the light of assurance through strength of our own lands, of Israel.

 

The power struggle in our, what almost needs to be defined as internal threats, is that of those Arabs which desire the destruction of Israel. They exist in the obvious camps in Gaza including Hamas and Islamic Jihad as well as smaller groups sworn allegiance to al-Qaeda, Islamic State, al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades and assuredly more; in Judea and Samaria including PLO, Fatah, al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, al-Qaeda, Islamic State, Hezballah and other smaller groups some only comprised of a single or couple of cells; the threats from across the border from the numerous forces in Syria from Bashir al-Assad to al-Qaeda groups, Islamic State (they have become a larger than normal terrorist run state centrally located to keep their fingers in a large number of pies), Muslim Brotherhood, Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC and an actual number of troops which are an elite corps from within the Iranian religious and fanatical organized army which is as large and well-funded as their regular army), Hezballah in Lebanon and Syria, Islamic State and Muslim Brotherhood within the Sinai Peninsula, and cells which hold Israeli identification cards and many of which who vote and run candidates for seats in the Israeli Parliament, the Knesset. Needless to say, Israel is kept busy and that is before the overt external threats being fomented on our borders with their monies or fanaticisms such as Islamic State (in addition to the terror threat they pose), and Iran with their now fully blessed and open for business arms programs and their under the radar parallel nuclear research and arms production sites which very likely include nuclear warhead development and production along with the rockets to place them upon. We can assume that after Mahmoud Abbas completes his precedent setting Tehran visit which will very likely include the agreement, signed or simply a non-gentleman’s agreement made with a deferential bow and handshake to give over to Iran control over part or an entire substructure of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades or other groups controlled by Abbas himself or by other terror masters within the political tangled web conceived in deceit with its main purpose being deception and allowing for setting up a high degree of believable deniable plausibility for any and every person in a leadership position. The entire apparatus which makes up the Palestinian Authority even currently includes Hamas and Islamic Jihad while working against them in the favor of PLO, al-Aqsa Martyrs and other cells utilized for attacks which must never be traced back to any political entity thus these groups’ names are kept secret until it is required to permit the leadership of the various disparate terror entities and political entities, forever are they attached through finances, all a jumbled mass of confusion. With Abbas having resigned as the head of the PLO planning board or some such title from amongst his numerous leadership positions granting it for the interim to Saab Erekat, actually Saab Erekat has replaced Mahmoud Abbas as Chair of the Secretary-General of PLO placing him in direct line to assume leadership of the entirety of the Palestinian Authority once Mahmoud Abbas steps down and retires from the scene.

 

Months after stepping down from all, or nearly all, of the leadership positions currently held by Abbas, he will then return becoming something even Yasser Arafat never achieved, becoming the Elder Statesman for the Palestinian Authority and in such position he will make himself available to speak to any ruling body the world over including even more frequent trips to the White House and potentially demanding and receiving the coveted position of addressing a joint session of the United States Congress within a week of two of any address so given by any Israeli official, especially any Prime Minister and particularly the current Prime Minister, Benyamin Netanyahu. We would be expecting to see Mahmoud Abbas giving bi-monthly addresses to the General Assembly of the United Nations, the United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC), and any other international organization especially those tasked with determining War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity all as part of a carefully planned and scripted series of addresses culminating each year with his address at the opening ceremonies of the United Nations General Assembly where he will open the idea for a new provision to be enacted by that body denouncing Israeli existence and fortifying the Palestinian position of claiming all the lands and having domain over all of the land as the Arab struggle has been and always will be the eradication of Israel and a wiping of the Jews from the Middle East and then the rest of the world. This has been the root of the vicious and vengeful hatreds which only allow for the complete destruction of Israel and the figuratively making Jerusalem the Capital City of the coming Caliphate instead of the Capital and Holiest of Cities to the Jewish People.

 

Within Israel there has been a political development which warrants some discussions. The recent dust-up caused by the release of a taped interview with Ehud Barak which cast aspersions on a number of political rivals which might likely stand between him and another run at being Prime Minister and the only person to defeat Bibi Netanyahu twice for Prime Minister. While Ehud Barak mostly stated that the reasons behind Israeli strikes on Iranian nuclear sites were not carried out in the entirety of his time as Minister of Defense were attributable largely to Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, the then-chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), who claimed the Israeli military he commanded had not trained sufficiently nor was it in any condition to face all of the potential consequences which might befall Israel after such an attack, and also placed a degree of blame on current Defense Minister and then Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon as well as current Minister of National Infrastructure, Energy and Water Resources and then member of the Inner Cabinet of Eight Yuval Steinitz as well as members of the Inner Cabinet Dan Meridor and Bennie Begin making it impossible to gain a five vote majority necessary to take it to the next level. Ehud Barak talked about Netanyahu’s weakness mostly due to not being capable of pressing through his plans for an attack on the known Iranian facilities and potentially other targets related to governance or military command and control.

 

 

Ehud Barak Speaks Out about Israeli failure to execute Iran strike against nuclear sites due to everybody except yours truly, Ehud Barak

 

 

Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi claimed the IDF not trained sufficiently, Defense Minister and then Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon, and Inner Cabinet of Eight Yuval Steinitz were all named by Ehud Barak as running negative interference preventing attacks on Iranian Nuclear Sites across a three year span from 2010 to 2013.

 

 

These events, including secondary releases from the taped interview being released, have raised suspicions that Ehud Barak believes and has started acting on another run for the golden ring, the Office of Prime Minister. First item on that path is to retake the leadership of the Labor Party, something he is expected to be opposed by Isaac Herzog, Shelly Yachimovich and potentially former Commander of the IDF and retired Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi who is the most feared challenge facing a Ehud Barak triumphant return to politics. Should Ehud Barak actually try to make a comeback we can bet that he will use the inaction against Iran and his hawkish views and decisiveness which he will claim was a certainty in his mind despite what those around him felt. There will be little mention on Judea and Samaria plans which, if memory serves me correctly, Barak is in agreement with Isaac Herzog and Tzipi Livni that Israel would be best served by the formation of an Arab state in virtually all of the lands of Judea and Samaria as well as Eastern Jerusalem claiming that such would end the terrorist threats from that area allowing Israel to concentrate all of her resources both military and political to prevent Iran from ever developing and producing nuclear weapons. Ehud Barak’s hopes that surrendering the ancient lands which hold most of the Israeli holiest locations starting with the Temple Mount and the Old City of Jerusalem, Hevron, the Cave of Machpelah, the Tomb of Joseph, the Tomb of Rachel, near countless Synagogues, Shechem, the City of David and many others as this is just to name a few. Further, relenting control and giving such to the Arab dominion will lead to the desecration of everything Jewish which means that Israelis will be required to sneak into these places under the cover of darkness and repair and restore the tombs and other places. With some being almost totally destroyed or restructured such as placing minarets at the four corners of a Synagogue and repurposing it as a Mosque, permanently destroying any Jewish character that building may have held making it Jewish, these building could only be reclaimed by taking a meaningful act of terror traceable to within Judea and Samaria and just annex them once they have been liberated from Islamic occupation.

 

 

Isaac Herzog, Shelly Yachimovich and former Commander of the IDF retired Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi are the expected Labor Candidates Barak would need to defeat if he is to run against Netanyahu in any upcoming elections.

 

 

Such is not a new action taken by Muslims as they performed such an abomination on the Hagia Sophia Cathedral and it was transformed into the Hagia Sophia Mosque. That would be the fate of many of the Christian and Jewish holy sites and giving them the land will not bring a moment of peace but would embolden them to press even harder as terrorism got them the lands thus far, maybe the rest is almost in sight. That would be their interpretation of Israel gifting them all of Judea and Samaria that they claim as their lands as they do to the rest of Israel. Such a move would also embolden Iran as they would also view such a surrender of lands rightfully Israeli would simply reinforce that the Jewish People had no stomach for a prolonged fight thus simply by opposing them long enough and they would become weak-willed and gift to its adversaries the surrender they demand, to an Islamist such is but an invitation.

 

Third Temple placed on Temple Mount adjacent to the Dome of the Rock in space that is currently open areas leaving more than sufficient room for tourism and worshippers of all faiths to visit and enjoy every religious building. It will; however, leave far less room for youth to play soccer which many might claim is a good thing.

 

 

Even when confronted with the testimony of historic facts many refuse to see the obvious. Such would be far less of a tragedy if only they would not bring our downfall alongside those who surrender that which is rightfully Israeli by every legal code and international law known to mankind. They are flaunting these international laws and agreements simply because the Israeli governance is permitting their perfidy through its cowardice and concerns for what the world thinks. We can tell you what the world thinks, they believe the Jews will cut their own throats if given a sharp enough knife rather than to turn that knife upon their adversaries. That is what they believe and all too many Israelis, especially in high office in the government, military and security services, prove their assessment right day in and day out. This foolish idea that the dragon can be dealt with if we just make this one additional sacrifice, there will always be one more sacrifice demanded of us until we are all dead and buried. When do the Jewish People make their stand, tell me when, please make it soon.

 

 

Istanbul, Turkey pictures of Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque Montage. The Hagia Sofia Mosque was originally a cathedral built when the city was known as Constantinople.

 

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

War Against Israel Renewed on Northern Border

 

Syrian Military forces, presumably responding to orders from Tehran with the return of Syrian Defense Minister General Fahd al-Freij, who was carrying the instructions from the Iranian leadership for the Syrian army and Hezballah forces to open a front upon the IDF in the Golan Heights and across the northern border. Their response to this directive was swift and immediate as there were four rockets fired onto the heights. The four rockets struck in the Upper Galilee region in the north near the Lebanese border after “code red” warning sirens were sounded in the area sending residents into their respective shelters for the duration of the rocket attacks. These assaults came at the same time that Iron Dome batteries placing one near Ashdod and later in the afternoon placed another near the southern city of Be’er Sheva. These precautions were taken expecting violence from Hamas or Islamic Jihad in response to feeding the hunger striking prisoner controversy who has been hospitalized after over two months of carrying out his prevocational hunger strike demanding he not be force fed and permitted to go free or die a martyr and be idolized in the Arab society. The Arab security prisoner already had six Israeli citizens which he murdered. He claims he should not be held as he has not committed any additional crime beyond the original murder of six Israelis for which he never finished serving the full life sentence. He was among the Arabs released during the exchange for Schalit deal and was supposed to not come back into Israeli controlled areas, which he obviously had done, leading to his confinement.

 

But the front which was lit up by the four rockets was an equally severe threat to the safety of all Israel. Any threat coming from the al-Assad regime or the Hezballah threat has as its potential the complete range of Hezballah rockets in addition to the somewhat destroyed system from Syria which pose the potential of carrying chemical warheads which al-Assad did not completely rid himself of all his specialty rocket warheads as he had promised as a part of his deal to avoid being incarcerated. Threats from either al-Assad or Hezballah are of such a huge potential problem, especially as their numbers of rockets they are capable of throwing into such a barrage overwhelming the Iron Dome systems that they would be incapable of intercepting the quantity which they would be capable of launching simultaneously. Additionally, with al-Assad assisting these rockets could have warheads using virtually any kind of chemical composition. This becomes even more likely as the al-Assad regime keeps being pushed into an ever smaller region that al-Assad may consider his situation so dire as to be unwinnable. This could present al-Assad with a use them or lose them to his enemies such as the Islamic State or al-Qaeda that he might consider himself better off drawing Israel into the fray in the hope of forcing those attacking his positions to now also be facing advancing IDF troops.

 

Bashir al-Assad would most definitely desire to have his family captured by the Israelis over either al-Qaeda or the Islamic State as he knows all too well what such an inevitability that might present. As insane as it might sound, al-Assad would want to avoid at all costs capture by the Islamic State, and secondarily al-Qaeda though at least his family might not suffer as badly with them, but most favorably would be capture by the IDF as they would not torture anyone of his family and he would likely face a civilized trial and more than likely not face a death sentence and torture would be out of the question in any case. Given a choice between being captured by a Western style state or an Islamic, be they Sunni or Shiite, the Western style state is always preferable. Thus even if the Iranians had not instructed al-Assad to attack and draw Israel into the fighting he would be better off having Israel sweep across all of Syria and remove all terror entities. This would leave Syria populated by his Alawites, and the refugees returning who would be a mix of Muslims, Christians, Druze, Kurds and other smaller groups but at least there would be no Islamic State or al-Qaeda forces which were bent on his capture if only for the pleasure of repaying on Bashir al-Assad himself some of the atrocities he had meted out on his enemies which included many of their own members.

 

 

 

Al-Assad may not have been quite to the level of a Saddam Hussein when it comes to torturing people, though he did so to gain information, simply as a punishment and as a warning to others not to test him or oppose him in any way or they may not only lose their life but be tortured inhumanly before their execution. Additionally, al-Assad included chemical weapons, barrel bombs and other ruthless and horrific attacks on both the al-Qaeda and Islamic State forces and in some instances on the families of these groups which would only serve as a further instance for vengeance being taken out on him and his family members. One must remember that some of those who may eventually be his captors have had their families tortured simply by he and his father’s rule. That leaves a lot of time for grievances to accumulate leading to an ever deeper hatred for the man. Add in the religious backdrop and you have a potential which would be difficult to even get your arms around, let alone explain in civil terminology. Torture would be a weak and insufficient term with acts on the level of the Marquis de Sade or the Inquisition in its later stages brings to mind. This would be a very driving factor to try and bring Israel into the fray even if only to have an alternative out for al-Assad to place his family; such a plan still would likely leave Bashir al-Assad behind to his enemies and their merciless plans for him and those closest to him.

 

As far as Israel is concerned, it would be really nice to have a complete summer and fall go by and not result in another war, especially against Hezballah if solely because of the suffering and ravages such a war would bring on relatively innocent Lebanese living anywhere near or amongst Hezballah positions, or worse those whose residences have been turned by Hezballah into a fortified emplacement from which to launch rockets or set an ambush because such would necessarily entail the destruction of that residence. Should the end of summer bring on a conflict with Hezballah and Syria as a coordinated attack, one can only hope that Hezballah would fight largely out of positions in Syria and leave Lebanon as few and clear of Hezballah that the Lebanese are left uninjured by the conflict. A war with Hezballah would entail on the Israeli side heavy bombing and indirect fire on known positions south of the Litani River, the Bekaa Valley, southern Beirut and any other known Hezballah infrastructure. Israeli military leaders have warned Lebanon’s population and leaders other than Hezballah that should another war be fought against Hezballah that Lebanon would be facing a rebuilding effort beyond imagination as such a campaign would rain down ruination on their country.

 

Similarly, should Bashir al-Assad decide that his situation is so dire that Israel becomes a more favorable foe, he had best rethink starting a conflict with Israel even if he does have Hezballah assisting with the fight as Israel would have little choice knowing the extent of his weapons than to simply level everything in the areas still under his control such that those armaments would not be capable of being used against the Israeli public. The Israeli public is fed up with the constant slow bleeding from Fatah inspired terrorism, Hamas biannual wars and Hezballah or Syria deciding Israel is the more civil foe. Let’s gain support for our regimes by having a civilized war with Israel to bring the people back behind us as we are still the one’s fighting the evil ones thus everybody need assist al-Assad as he is their salvation. Boy, are these people confused and misled to believe such drivel as that but still a war against Israel would blunt much of the fire in the forces against him for as long as the war with Israel was waged. Should al-Assad lose to Israel it is entirely possible that Israel, in turn could destroy the terror groups including the Islamic State and then return control over Syria to a very unworthy but the least of all evils, Bashir al-Assad. A very muted and largely disarmed Syria would remain, warned by Israel against accepting gifts from Iran or others which might be viewed as rearming his military.

 

If the time is not now, trust that the time is very close where the leadership of Israel will be put upon by the people to end all these wars and terrorist strikes once and for all. When this becomes the domain of over two-thirds of the population the leadership will have no alternative but to instigate a no nonsense approach to terrorism and any overt act which takes Israeli lives will be answered with an unleashed violence aimed at only one thing, eradication of the sources of such vile terrorism. Should the Palestinian Authority allow its forces or those of Fatah or Hamas in Judea and Samaria to attack Israel they would be met with overwhelming force and a definitively disproportionate response leaving them with little or no claim to lands within Israel from the River to the Sea. As far as Gaza, an overt act out of Gaza might result in the majority of the people being driven into Egypt where they can sort things out with President Sisi, the same Sisi who was the driving force and commander of the Armies when the Muslim Brotherhood was driven from power in Egypt, I severely doubt that President Sisi will show much patience with any terrorists in the northern Sinai Peninsula which would bode poorly for Hamas, Islamic Brigades, al-Qaeda, ISIS and any other criminal or terror entity. Eventually, in every conflict there are only two potential outcomes, either the stronger but less prone to war easily finds the situation unbearable and they fight one defining campaign and destroy most of their less civilized or even barbarous enemies or the barbarians tear down the civilization and it takes centuries to work one’s way back to the technological level for the society.

 

Should Israel lose to the terrorist enemies surrounding her, the world will lose one of the technological productive society which could have assisted the entire region to strive for a better life but an Israeli defeat would be the destruction of that engine and it would be completely forgotten within three generations. That is the point which is racing towards the Middle East in the areas surrounding Israel and even those somewhat further away as Israel knows who and what are the enemies and where their major weapons are stored or readied for use such as fueling rockets, a very volatile location if attacked when expecting a launch. Israel knows something which will drive her to fight with the vengeance of a wounded mother protecting her children to the bitter end and those children will be protected and nurtured no matter what it will take. Israel knows that should Israel fail then the eternal people will be reduced to small little pockets whose numbers would be an insignificant anomaly rather than being capable of being that light onto the peoples of the world which is presumably their destiny. For the Jewish people being capable of providing an example of what kind of a society mankind can aspire to and to produce miracles in science, medicine, and all other fields including agriculture, animal husbandry and such sciences not usually thought about in a high tech environment, but an area where Israel has made some important strides such as drip irrigations and selectively breeding both animals and plants as an answer to naturally produced crops and animals with the benefits of genetically altered examples as by selective breeding one can gain many of those advantages without the dangers of forcing nature unnaturally. Israel knows deep inside that there is no other manner of salvation of the Jewish People should Israel fall ever again and the end of Judaism would have some disastrous affects and effects on mankind going forward, some very unseen and unpredictable deplorable and dehumanizing consequences which would severely undermine humanity as a whole, a place nobody should desire to test. That is the price and the choice mankind will make in the next couple of decades, please for all mankind’s sake, choose wisely.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Iran Deal Still a Step Away

 

Apparently everybody who is paying even the slightest attention has figured out the Iranian ploy at the talks which presumably began with the premise of reining in the Iranian nuclear weapons research and imminent production along with reducing stockpiles of uranium and the nuclear related equipment starting with the centrifuges. There was also the necessity of forcing the Iranian leaders to come forth with all information of any military research had been done and experiments or development of related issues such as work on the nuclear trigger, compression sequencing which controls how the detonations are timed to maximize or control yield, and any work on making devices such as using a nuclear weapon for maximizing the EMP feasibility which makes a device which has a maximum Gama ray yield which results in a much lesser explosion but gives a yield of Gama radiation which can destroy all electronic devices for hundreds of miles, or neutron bomb which kills people and other living things but causes minimal damage to buildings and structures, the hydrogen bomb also called a thermonuclear bomb which uses an atomic bomb to trigger a fusion reaction which vastly increases the energy yield making the bomb many magnitudes more destructive and other specialty weapon based on the atomic bomb. Thus far the Iranians have walked back every proposal though initially it appeared that the Iranians were being overly cautious about their pushing and applying pressure to arrive at a better deal but as time approached the deadline for a deal the Iranians began to increase their demands for items to be weakened, removed or severely watered down. When they were still pressing for a number of such alterations to the agreement the United States gave the Iranians the greatest gift with still weeks left before the set deadline for an agreement, they proposed the deadline be pushed six months further into the future, a change in the rules even the Iranians had not pressed believing that the much vaunted and threatened military option was removable from the table and put into use, an action which likely troubled Tehran but after the first extension the Iranians realized there was never going to be anything beyond endless negotiations and they could relax and run the clock out repeatedly with last minute demands which also garnered them the most results and then the extension to a new date. With President Obama desperate for a deal, any deal, the Iranians assumed their position in the catbird seat and began to drive the agreement over the cliff, through the woods and so far beyond reasonable it could only be phrased as they took things beyond the cusp into a place where only the strangest of things occur.

 

Deliberations continued and the six month extensions were coming along just fine and the Iranians had mastered their technique of not even bothering to negotiate for five of the months and then being impossible arrogant demanding several rewrites of entire sections of the agreement when President Obama and team made their next present to the Iranians as they feared an agreement might not be reached before President Obama leaves office, a consideration too horrific for President Obama to contemplate. The extension went from half a year to months to half a month to weeks and on to days and now it appears the deadline is reaching being extended the few hours or even less as team Obama are turning frantic. The deadline is now a permanently flowing target which remains just out of reach just as the end of Iranian demands also never quite ends. It is like an inside joke a friend and I have which fits so I guess this will introduce a new phrase which now fits the negations to a tee, we call it the “one more door” situation which came from playing one of those computer adventure games where there is always that next door or level to reach and it was getting late but one of us, not me, insisted on continuing through the next door thus the phrase, “one more door” syndrome. This is where the negotiations have reached as even when the news gets to the media that an agreement has been completed, then the Iranians bring the next “one more door” alteration, refinement or outright demand. The latest of these was yesterday when an agreement was presumably reached and then the Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told reporters from his hotel balcony, according to the Reuters news agency, “We still have got work to do tomorrow. No deal today.” So the deadline pushing continued and on to the next door.

 

This time the demand is another big one; it will push President Obama into that position where he is all but guaranteed to fail, crossing a red line he promised would never be crossed without grave and serious consequences and possibly a deal breaker resulting in the possible use of the military option which, as we have been told ad-nauseum, is still on the table. Yes, we know it is still on the table and are suspecting it is irremovable from said table. We have also heard that the deal they are working on is over a hundred pages in length, probably so Nancy Pelosi will run around screaming that the agreement must be ratified so they can find out what is in it. You have to love politicians of both parties as they make their actions so easy to ridicule just as George H. W. Bush claimed during his campaign a promise that likely guaranteed he would not be reelected when he crossed that red line and caved in after pledging, “No new taxes.” His only defense was to obfuscate the issue claiming he did not allow a “new” tax by just a necessary raising of already existing taxes in order to get his budget passed. That dog did not walk and he lost the election to Bill Clinton and the rest is a confusing mass of Hillary later on.

 

Back on track here. The latest demand from the Iranian side is for the agreement to abrogate and nullify not just the United Nation economic sanctions which were levied for offences having nothing to do with the Iranian nuclear issue but stemmed from Iranian interferences in Lebanon and Syria and against others using proxies such as Hezballah that Iran necessarily needed to be refrained and have her fangs dulled. This brought economic sanctions which Iran has already been given relief from in the agreement but also had imposed weapons sanctions on Iran which was done in part to prevent Russia from selling Iran the S-300 series (NATO names SA-10 Grumble) anti-aircraft and anti-missile systems, considered one of the preeminent anti-missile systems at the time especially effective against cruise missiles and one of the main reasons the United States pressed to prevent the sale by going to the United Nations and forcing the arms embargo onto the Iranians. Now the Iranians are insisting that the arms embargo also be lifted and annulled. The fear now is by lifting the arms embargo which also technically forbid Iran from providing weapons to other entities such as in Yemen currently not to mention Syria and Hezballah, both of which Iran has simply ignored any restrictions and often got around them by paying for weapons ordered presumably by other entities. Now Iran is insisting the arms embargo also be lifted. The way these negotiations are going one might conclude that by the time there is an agreement it will be approaching a thousand pages and the last six or seven hundred pages will constitute items that the United States and Europe give to Iran simply because we all desire to be friends and Iran could be so much more friendly with ‘X,’ ‘Y,’ and ‘Z.’ With the deadlines now so fluid that they simple fold under each suggestion that Iran needs a few more hours, nay, minutes to think up their next insignificant concession and surrender that I would not be surprised if by the time the deal is sealed and signed the United States will have surrendered Guam, Midway and the Hawaiian Islands to Iran in exchange for their good intentions and possibly the Bikini Atolls for testing purposes, why stop at reasonable and even absurd on this agreement and not go to completely ludicrous, after all, you are now entering the Beyond the Cusp Zone, or at least Secretary of State Kerry and his team of folding negotiators have gone there and unfortunately will come out the other side proclaiming while raising a very heavy multi-thousand page agreement overhead, I hold here a small book with President ‘Smiling Cheshire Man’* Rouhani’s signature on it bringing us “Peace in our time.” Can this entire boondoggle get any more ridiculously, incredulously ludicrous? I believe it can though exactly how is beyond my ability to reason or divine, can you? Make your prediction, if you like, as to what may end up being the last demand the Iranians will make that President Obama will grant as when it comes to Iran the President just cannot say no. Perhaps the Americans can restart with a twist the Nancy Regan War on Drugs campaign and start demanding of the White House, “Just say ‘No!’”

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

* See yesterday’s article for definition and picture representing the ‘Smiling Cheshire Man’ reference.