Iran Sends Boatload Of Fajr-5 Missiles To Gaza To Launch At Tel Aviv

*Source: Now The End Begins

Iran sends hundreds of Fajr-5 Missiles To Gaza
An Iranian 150-ton freighter departed Bandar Abbas port Sunday, Nov. 18, with a cargo of 220 short-range missiles and 50 improved long-range Fajr-5 rockets for the Gaza Strip, DEBKAfile’s intelligence sources report. The ship turned toward the Bab al-Mandeb Straits and the Red Sea.

The Iranian weapons, called Fajr-5 missiles, give Hamas the ability to strike deeper into Israel than ever before.

The new Fajr-5′s have a 200-kilo warhead, which packs a bigger punch than the 175 kilos of explosives delivered by the rockets in current use with the Palestinian terrorists in the Gaza Strip.  To extend their range to cover the 85 kilometers from Gaza to Tel Aviv, Hamas removed a part of their payloads to make them lighter.

Tehran is sending the fresh supply of disassembled rockets to replenish the stocks its allies, the Palestinian Hamas and Jihad Islami, depleted in their round-the-clock attacks on Israel since Nov. 10.

To throw Israeli surveillance off the trail, the ship started its voyage called Vali-e Asr owned by the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines, and was quickly renamed Cargo Star and hoisted the flag of Tuvalu. This South Pacific island nation, which lies between Hawaii and Australia, has a tiny population of 11,000, most of them Polynesians. Iran provides most of its revenue since earlier this year when Prime Minister Willy Telavi agreed to register Iran’s entire tanker fleet of 22 vessels to Tuvalu, to help Tehran dodge the US-EU oil embargo.

"Our intelligence sources have learned that four big Sudanese shipping boats sailed out of Port Sudan early Monday and are waiting to rendezvous with the Cargo Star and offload its missile cargo in mid-sea."

The Sudanese will then be told by Tehran whether put into Port Sudan with the missiles, or turn north and sail up the Red Sea to the Straits of Tiran to link up with Egyptian fishing boats which regularly ply this waterway in the service of Palestinian-Iranian smuggling networks. They would unload the missile cargo in a quiet inlet on the Sinai coast. From there, it would be carried to the smuggling tunnels running from Sinai under the border into the Gaza Strip.\

Palestinian teams assisted by Iranian and Hizballah technicians in the Gaza Strip would then assemble the new rockets and make them operational.

Through most of the voyage, two Iranian warships, the Khark heliicopter carrier and Shahid Naqdi destroyer, which are posted permanently in the Red Sea, escorted the arms ship until the cargo changed hands.

DEBKAfile’s Iranian sources also disclose that the Jihad Islami leader Ramadan Abdullah Shelah was sharply remanded by Tehran for meeting Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi in Cairo Sunday to discuss terms for halting Israel’s counter-missile operation in Gaza now in its sixth day.

Iran bankrolls these Palestinian extremists and has no intention of letting Shelah bow to Cairo’s wishes which run counter to Tehran’s plans and interests.

While Egypt’s new Islamist leaders are intent on carving out for themselves a responsible role in the region by restoring order, solving crises and restraining radicals, radical Iran has its own fish to fry and is bent on escalating war tensions in the Middle East. source – DEBKA

Netanyahu Plays Cartoonist, Goes Apocalyptic Over ‘Iranian Bomb’ at UN.

*Source: RT

Unable to win US support for a figurative ‘red line’ on Iran’s nuclear program, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu drew a literal one during a speech to the UN General Assembly, and offered an apocalyptic vision of a nuclear bombing of Israel.

­Netanyahu used a large diagram of a cartoonish bomb to represent Tehran’s alleged ambition to create a nuclear weapon. The drawing was divided into three sections, with marks indicating 70 percent and 90 percent of the uranium enrichment required to build an atomic bomb.

“Iran is 70 percent of the way there, and are well into the second stage. By next summer, at current enrichment rates, they will have finished the medium enrichment and move on to the final stage. From there it is only a few more weeks before they have enriched enough for a bomb,” he said.
The Israeli leader used a red marker to show the line at which he believes the world should intervene to halt the enrichment, claiming that this was the only way to peacefully resolve the issue.

“I believe that faced with a clear red line, Iran will back down – and it will give more time for sanctions and diplomacy,” he said, adding that the deadline may come as soon as next Spring.

The alternative, Netanyahu said, is a nuclear-armed Iran, which he likened to a nuclear-armed Al Qaeda. He called the Iranian leadership “apocalyptic,” and argued that they would use a nuclear weapon against Israel even if it meant the destruction of their own country.

The diagram implied that Iran is amassing enriched uranium with the intention of creating a nuclear device, and that at the 90 percent mark it would be very close to completion. Netanyahu did not offer any new evidence that Iran had overcome the numerous other scientific and technological hurdles necessary to create a nuclear weapon.

Tehran dismissed Netanyahu’s charges as “baseless and absurd.” Israel, “on a daily basis, threatens countries in the region, particularly my country with military attack,” Iran’s Deputy Ambassador to the UN Asman al-Habib Es'haq Al-e-Habib said. He warned that Iran would retaliate if Israel attempted to attack Iranian nuclear facilities.

He also said, that Israel “has ignored repeated calls by the international community to accede promptly and without any conditions to the Non-Proliferation Treaty as a non-nuclear weapons party and place all its nuclear-related facilities under the International Atomic Energy Agency verification system.”

Netanyahu is not the first politician to use props at the United Nations to call for international action against a sovereign country. In February 2003, then-US Secretary of State Collin Powell spoke before the UN Security Council holding a vial that he said could contain anthrax produced by Saddam Hussein. No anthrax or other alleged weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq after it was invaded and occupied by a US-led coalition.

Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, pauses after drawing a red line on a graphic of a bomb while discussing Iran during an address to the United Nations General Assembly.(AFP Photo / Mario Tama)

­Netanyahu has been campaigning for a “clear red line” to curb Iran’s alleged nuclear ambitions since the beginning of September. The hard pressure apparently cost him a meeting with US President Barack Obama. The American leader refused to sit down to talks with Netanyahu on the outlines of the 67th UN General Assembly after the Israeli PM lashed out at Washington’s unwillingness “to set deadlines” for Iran.
The address to global leaders may well be a final warning before Israel takes matters into its own hands. The country's leadership has been relentlessly issuing warnings that it may soon stage a unilateral attack on Iran, flouting even American wishes.

Israel considers Iran an "existential" peril, given the rhetoric coming from the Islamic Republic's leaders that Israel will be eliminited.

Nevertheless, Iran insists that its nuclear program seeks to meet energy supplies and medical needs.
The US, while trying to keep Israel away from attacking Iran, believes that Tehran is yet to make a final decision on whether to use its uranium stocks to build weapons. So far, in Washington's opinion, the Islamic Republic does not appear to possess the necessary infrascture to do so.

‘Nothing will happen until November’

Netanyahu does not need to convince the entire world of his fears, as one actor is sufficient, Shikha Dalmia, senior policy analyst at the think tank Reason Foundation told RT.

“He is trying to raise the alarm level in the world over the possibility of a nuclear Iran,” she said. “But the fact of the matter is that he does not have to convince the whole world of his case. He just has to convince one country and essentially one person, and that is President Obama. Without US support for some kind of military intervention, he can draw whatever maps and charts and other graphs that he wants. It’s not going to mean a lot.”

And no matter what the US administration opts to do, it will have to wait until November, says Dalmia.
“One can argue that Iran would not be a full-fledged war, it would be a surgical strike, but it is till quite a lot,” she said. “So whether Obama is going to be able to undertake an action like that is completely up in the air, but one thing is clear: he will not want it before November, before the elections.”

+2 (6 votes)

U.S. Will Go To War With Iran In 2013, Says Ex-U.S. Ambassador To Israel

*Source: Haaretz

Martin Indyk tells CBS there is not much time left until Iran has a nuclear weapon, but says Netanyahu's demands for 'red lines' on Iran are 'unreasonable.'

Former U.S. ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk said on Sunday that he thinks the U.S. will go to war with Iran over its nuclear program in 2013.

Speaking during a panel on the CBS program Face the Nation, Indyk said, "I'm afraid that 2013 is going to be a year in which we're going to have a military confrontation with Iran."

The former ambassador stated that "Iran doesn't have a nuclear weapon," but added that there's not a lot of time left until it does.

Regarding the recent friction between U.S. President Barack Obama and Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over "red lines" on Iran, Indyk said that he doesn't think "the difference between Netanyahu and Obama on this is that great, in terms of the president's commitment not to allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons."

He added, however, that Netanyahu's insistence on public "red lines" was unreasonable.

"That is an unreasonable requirement. The idea of putting out a public red line - in effect issuing an ultimatum - is something that no president would do. If you noticed, Governor Romney is not putting out a red line; Senator McCain didn't, either. And neither is Bibi Netanyahu for that matter, in terms of Israel's own actions."

Indyk went on to speak about instability across the Mideast region, saying that is making Israel "very nervous."

"The turmoil we see from here, they see from a much closer perspective, and that combines with the, as the prime minster puts it, the race of Iran towards weapons capability," he said.

"The fear that the Egypt-Israel peace treaty will start to come apart, the concern that in Syria what is happening there could lead to an Islamist government taking over eventually there as well, but before that a descent into chaos on the northern border - all that makes them very nervous and that’s why I think the prime minister is coming out much more vocally than one might have expected in the midst of an election campaign here saying, you know, we need reassurances, we need red lines aginst the Iranians because from his point of view, that’s the greatest threat they face."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned on Sunday that Iran would be on the brink of nuclear weapons capability in six to seven months, adding new urgency to his demand that President Barack Obama set a clear "red line" for Tehran in what could deepen the worst U.S.-Israeli rift in decades.

Taking his case to the American public, Netanyahu said in U.S. television interviews that by mid-2013, Iran would be 90 percent of the way toward enough enriched uranium for a bomb. He urged the United States to spell out limits that Tehran must not cross or else face military action - something Obama has refused to do.

"You have to place that red line before them now, before it's too late," Netanyahu told NBC's "Meet the Press" program, saying that such a move could reduce the chances of having to attack Iran's nuclear sites.

Iran: Israel's Existence 'Insult To All Humanity'

*Source: Yahoo

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Israel's existence is an "insult to all humanity," Iran's president said Friday in one of his sharpest attacks yet against the Jewish state, as Israel openly debates whether to attack Iran over its nuclear program.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said confronting Israel is an effort to "protect the dignity of all human beings."

"The existence of the Zionist regime is an insult to all humanity," Ahmadinejad said. He was addressing worshippers at Tehran University after nationwide pro-Palestinian rallies, an annual event marking Quds (Jerusalem) Day on the last Friday of the holy month of Ramadan.

Israel considers Iran an existential threat because of its nuclear and missile programs, support for radical anti-Israel groups on its borders and repeated references by Iranian leaders to Israel's destruction. Ahmadinejad himself has repeatedly made such calls, as has Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Iran has denied allegations that it is seeking to build nuclear weapons, saying its nuclear program is peaceful and aimed at producing electricity and radioisotopes used to treat cancer patients.

Israel has been carrying on an increasingly public debate about whether to attack Iran's nuclear facilities. Israel's official position is to favor diplomatic and economic measures to persuade Iran to halt its uranium enrichment program, but Israel insists that Iran must not be allowed to obtain nuclear weapons. Israeli leaders say "all options are on the table," a clear reference to a military strike, if they determine that other measures have failed.

Iran has warned it would hit back at Israel if it is attacked, also threatening to strike at American interests in the region.

Ahmadinejad called Israel "a corrupt, anti-human organized minority group standing up to all divine values."

"Today, confronting the existence of the fabricated Zionist regime is in fact protecting the rights and dignity of all human beings," said Ahmadinejad, with a black and white scarf many Palestinians wear around his neck.

Demonstrators in Tehran set U.S. and Israeli flags on fire and chanted "Death to the U.S." and "Death to Israel" during their pro-Palestinian rally.

In Washington, National Security Council Spokesman Tommy Vietor strongly condemned the Iranian leaders comments.

"If Iranian officials are truly concerned about protecting the rights and dignity of all human beings, then Iran should stop supporting Assad's brutal assault on the Syrian people. Iran and Syria's blatant disregard for basic human rights is the real insult to humanity," Vietor said.

Iran and Israel have been bitter enemies for decades. Khamenei has called Israel a "cancerous tumor" that must be wiped out.

Tensions between Iran and Israel have intensified since 2005, when Ahmadinejad said in a speech that Israel will one day be "wiped off the map." The Iranian president has also described the Holocaust, when 6 million Jews were killed by German Nazis and their collaborators during World War II, as a "myth."

"Israel... Will Turn Into Ashes Within Seconds".

*Source: WND

By Reza Kahlili

A senior Iranian cleric is warning Israel that if it attacks the Islamic state’s nuclear facilities, it will be burned to the ground.

“The followers of the Imam have one thing in common, and that is a love for martyrdom and complete submission to their leader,” Khatami said. “The heartbeat of the nuclear issue is in the hands of the supreme leader (Ayatollah Ali Khamenei), and the decision of what to do with America is only upon him.”

As revealed in the Iranian documentary “The Coming Is Upon Us,” centuries-old hadiths have predicted the current climate in the Middle East – the fall of Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, and the events in Afghanistan and other parts of the region – which has Iran’s radical leaders excited the time for Mahdi’s reappearance is ever closer.

More importantly, the hadiths cited in the documentary said the two most important events that would trigger the coming would be the death of Saudi King Abdullah (who is currently very ill) and then the destruction of Israel.

An editorial in the Iranian Keyhan newspaper on Wednesday laid out the plans for the coming and said Iran’s influence has spread throughout the world and this “earthquake” is the beginning of Islam taking power. The Keyhan newspaper is directly under the supervision of Iran’s supreme leader.

“For the Zionists and the Christians, who know the miserable destiny of the Jews, they themselves are followers of evil and are damned in the kingdom of Allah,” the editorial said, calling Khamenei the deputy of the last Islamic messiah on earth and Hassan Nasrollah, the leader of the Lebanon terrorist group Hezbollah, his commander. “There is clarity in the words of Allah in regards to the Jews – ‘they broke their oath, therefore we damned them and made their hearts out of stone’ – so that they cannot be forgiven.”

The followers of the “Hidden Imam,” the editorial says, are those whose “hearts are of steel; they have no doubt about God, they are solid as a rock, their victorious flag will free every city… they will embrace their Imam and will sacrifice their lives under his command.”

Meanwhile, other Iranian reports indicate the regime is planning a serious and unexpected response to recent European and U.S. sanctions on Iran’s oil and central bank.

The head of the Revolutionary Guards aerospace division, Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, Wednesday told Fars News Agency that, “All of occupied territories (Israel) and all U.S. bases in the region are within our (missile) range and, in case of war, within the first minutes all will be destroyed.”

The statement followed a recent military drill in which the Revolutionary Guards fired ballistic missiles at mock targets across Iran even as their nuclear program continued unabated despite U.N. sanctions.

Opposition leaders inside and outside Iran worry the West is vacillating and allowing Iran to pursue its destructive goals. They wonder why it is not helping the Iranians, a majority of whom despise the mullahs’ leadership, with regime change.

Reza Kahlili is a pseudonym for a former CIA operative in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and the author of the award winning book, A Time to Betray. He is a senior Fellow with EMPact America, a member of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security and teaches at the U.S. Department of Defense’s Joint Counterintelligence Training Academy (JCITA).

Iran Threatens Israel; New EU Sanctions Take Force.

*Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - Iran announced missile tests on Sunday and threatened to wipe Israel "off the face of the earth" if the Jewish state attacked it, brandishing some of its starkest threats on the day Europe began enforcing an oil embargo and harsh new sanctions.

The European sanctions - including a ban on imports of Iranian oil by EU states and measures that make it difficult for other countries to trade with Iran - were enacted earlier this year but mainly came into effect on July 1.

They are designed to break Iran's economy and force it to curb nuclear work that Western countries say is aimed at producing an atomic weapon. Reporting by Reuters has shown in recent months that the sanctions have already had a significant effect on Iran's economy.

Israel says it could attack Iran if diplomacy fails to force Tehran to abandon its nuclear aims. The United States also says military force is on the table as a last resort, but U.S. officials have repeatedly encouraged the Israelis to be patient while new sanctions take effect.

Washington said the EU's oil ban might force Tehran to give ground at the next round of nuclear talks, scheduled for this week in Istanbul.

Announcing three days of missile tests in the coming week, Revolutionary Guards General Amir Ali Hajizadeh said the exercises should be seen as a message "that the Islamic Republic of Iran is resolute in standing up to ... bullying, and will respond to any possible evil decisively and strongly."

Any attack on Iran by Israel would be answered resolutely: "If they take any action, they will hand us an excuse to wipe them off the face of the earth," said Hajizadeh, head of the Guards' airborne division, according to state news agency IRNA.

The missile tests will target mock-ups of air bases in the region, Hajizadeh said, adding that its ability to strike U.S. bases in the Gulf protects Iran from U.S. support for Israel.

"U.S. bases in the region are within range of our missiles and weapons, and therefore they certainly will not cooperate with the regime (Israel)," he told IRNA.

Iran has repeatedly unnerved oil markets by threatening reprisals if it were to be attacked or its trade disrupted.

The threat against the Jewish state echoed words President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad spoke in 2005, saying Israel "must be wiped off the page of time" - a phrase often translated as "wiped off the map" and cited by Israel to show how allowing Iran to get nuclear arms would be a threat to its existence.

The EU ban on Iranian oil imports directly deprives Iran of a market that bought 18 percent of its exports a year ago. The sanctions also bar EU companies from transporting Iranian crude or insuring shipments, hurting its trade worldwide.

"They signal our clear determination to intensify the peaceful diplomatic pressure," British Foreign Secretary William Hague said in a statement.

The EU sanctions come alongside stringent new measures imposed by Washington this year on third countries doing business with Iran. The United States welcomed the EU sanctions as an "essential part" of diplomatic efforts "to seek a peaceful resolution that addresses the international community's concerns about Iran's nuclear program."

White House spokesman Jay Carney said he hoped the sanctions would force Tehran to make concessions in technical-level talks with six world powers later this week.

MALICIOUS POLICIES

"Iran has an opportunity to pursue substantive negotiations, beginning with expert level talks this week in Istanbul, and must take concrete steps toward a comprehensive resolution of the international community's concerns with Iran's nuclear activities," Carney said in a statement.

The United Arab Emirates and Bahrain - foes of Iran which face it across the oil-rich Gulf - announced their own joint air force exercises on Sunday which they said would take "several days," their state news agencies reported.

In three rounds of talks between Iran and the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany, the Western powers have demanded Tehran halt high-grade uranium enrichment, ship out all high-grade uranium and close a key enrichment facility.

The talks lost steam at the last meeting in Moscow last month and there was not enough common ground for negotiators to agree whether to meet again. Officials - but not political decision-makers - meet in Turkey on Tuesday.

Washington sees the sanctions and talks as a potential way out of the standoff to avert the need for military action, but has not said it would block Israel from attacking Iran.

Tehran says it has a right to peaceful nuclear technologies and is not seeking the bomb. It accuses nuclear-armed states of hypocrisy. Officials said they were taking steps to reduce the economic impact of the new sanctions.

"We are implementing programs to counter sanctions and we will confront these malicious policies," Mehr news agency quoted Iranian central bank governor Mahmoud Bahmani as saying.

Bahmani has struggled to prevent a plunge in the value of the rial currency and steadily rising inflation as the sanctions have taken effect. He said the effects of the sanctions were tough but that Iran had built up $150 billion in foreign reserves to protect its economy.

Oil Minister Rostam Qasemi said oil importing countries would be the losers if the sanctions lead to price rises.

"All possible options have been planned in government to counter sanctions," Qasemi said on the ministry's website.

Last Friday, another Revolutionary Guards commander, Ali Fadavi, said Iran would equip its ships in the Strait of Hormuz - the neck of the Gulf and a vital oil transit point - with shorter-range missiles.

(Additional reporting by Marcus George and Isabel Coles in Dubai and by Jeff Mason in Washington; Writing by Robin Pomeroy; Editing by Peter Graff)

Defense Minister Warns About Iran's 'Secret Weapons'

*Source: World Net Daily

In an interview with the Fars News Agency today, Iranian Defense Minister Ahmad Vahidi claimed that Iran is in possession of secret weapons along with top secret capabilities that could be used to confront the United States.

“The Islamic Republic of Iran has many hidden capabilities, which are kept for rainy days,” Vahidi said in the interview. “We have not yet revealed all our capabilities.”

Referring to the U.S. assets positioned in the Persian Gulf, Vahidi stated: “These days Americans badly fear that an incident happens in the region and they can’t stand against the Islamic Republic’s firm positions vis-à-vis that given event.”

Vahidi then, in an ominous warning to America, said, “Undoubtedly, since our defense is an independent and defensive one based on our own defensive policies, special defense doctrines and internal capabilities, the U.S. will face a completely new environment when [it] gets involved with the new issues that Iran is pursuing and it will be obliged to think of this new environment.”

The Iranian defense minister went on to say that the American armed forces’ passivity in a possible confrontation with the Islamic regime’s forces will be due to the fact that Iran has not shown all weapons in its arsenal.

Get “A Time to Betray” and read the warnings about Iran.

Vahidi is wanted by Interpol for the 1994 Jewish community center bombing in Buenos Aires, Argentina, that killed more than 80 people and injured 100.

Vahidi also, as the chief commander of the Guards’ intelligence unit, directed the Marine barracks bombing killing 241 U.S. servicemen. He has been involved in many other terror attacks that collaborated with Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and al-Qaida.

Today, Vahidi oversees the Islamic regime’s missile and nuclear program along with proliferation of arms to al-Qaida, Taliban, Hezbollah and other terrorist groups.

As revealed recently, Iran’s supreme leader has issued an order to activate all terror cells under his command, including the Quds forces and Hezbollah, to attack U.S. and Israeli interests in America and around the world. The Guards also have been ordered to prepare for missile attacks against U.S. military bases in the region and Israel and for the closing down of the Strait of Hormuz.

In a recent speech to students at a Tehran military college, the Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, stated, “Iran is not a nation to sit still and just observe threats from fragile materialist powers which are being eaten by worms from inside.”

He continued, “Anyone who harbors any thought of invading the Islamic Republic of Iran – or even if the thought crosses their mind – should be prepared to receive strong blows and the steel fists of the military, the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps, and the Basij…”

Ali Akbar Velayati, ex-Iranian foreign minister and current special adviser on foreign affairs to the Iranian supreme leader, openly acknowledged that the Iranian Quds forces have been involved with the Arab uprisings and are managing the events in the region, including in Iraq and Lebanon. It was the first time an Iranian official acknowledged the activities of Iran’s Quds forces, designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S.

Velayati is also wanted by courts in Argentina for his involvement in the Jewish community center bombing of 1994.

The secret weapon Vahidi cites could be that Iran already has a nuclear bomb.

As revealed in October, the Iranians actively approached the former Soviet republics after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and managed to get the bomb. Sources within the U.S. State Department have confirmed the acquisition, though it is unknown if the Iranians got the code.

One thing is clear, the radical leaders of the Islamic regime in Iran have crossed every red line in their pursuit of the nuclear bomb and currently have enough enriched uranium for six nuclear bombs.

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Reza Kahlili is a pseudonym for a former CIA operative in Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and author of the award-winning book “A Time to Betray.” He is a senior fellow with EMPact America, a member of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security, an advisory board member of the Foundation for Democracy in Iran and teaches at the U.S. Department of Defense’s Joint Counterintelligence Training Academy (JCITA).