Showing posts with label iran. Show all posts

Monday, February 11, 2013

SIXTH TRUMPET WATCH! Netanyahu Warns "Iran is speeding up!"

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu address the Conference Of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations in Jerusalem February 11, 2013. REUTERS-Baz Ratner

(Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that new centrifuges Iran was installing for its uranium enrichment program could cut by a third the time needed to create a nuclear bomb.

As Iran and world powers prepare to resume talks aimed at easing a dispute that has raised fears of a new Middle East war, Tehran announced late last month it planned to install the new machines at its main enrichment plant.

The move underlined Iran's defiance of international demands to scale back the uranium enrichment which Tehran says is for civilian purposes but which could also potentially be used to make material for atomic bombs.

Netanyahu touched on the subject in an address to American Jewish leaders and his words came ahead of a planned visit to Israel next month by President Barack Obama.

"Iran's ... nuclear weapons program continues unabated ... I drew a line at the U.N. last time I was there," Netanyahu said. "They haven't crossed that line but what they are doing is to shorten the time that it will take them to cross that line and the way they are (doing it) is by putting in new, faster centrifuges that cut the time by one third."

Read more http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/11/us-israel-iran-idUSBRE91A0ZF20130211

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Iran designing nuclear submarine says report

Iran has begun to design its first nuclear submarine, the Islamic Republic's semiofficial news agency Fars reported on Tuesday.

The Fars report quotes deputy navy chief in charge of technical affairs, Rear Admiral Abbas Zamini, as saying that Iran has begun "initial stages" of designing the nuclear-powered craft.

Friday, June 8, 2012

WAR DRUMS! Iranian general: Our finger is on war trigger

Iranian general: Our finger is on war trigger

Seems like the news from Syria never changes ... another massacre ... Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says Assad must go ... the military fires on protesters ...

Ah, but it is changing ... dramatically.

Iran's armed forces have formed a joint war room that includes officers from Syria, Iran's military and the Revolutionary Guard and Hezbollah. A top Iranian general warns his country has its finger on the "war trigger." And all the parties in this coalition see the coming conflict as an opportunity to put "the Zionist regime ... within range of the resistance fire."

Everything is pointing to a major, bloody regional war ... on Israel's northern border.

Click here to read the full article.

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Israel: Obama to blame for crisis in Syria

Itamar Rabinovich (photo credit: Moshe Shai/Flash90)

A distinguished former Israeli ambassador to the United States on Thursday accused the Obama administration of prime responsibility for the international community’s failure to stop the killings in Syria.

Itamar Rabinovich, who was also Israel’s chief negotiator under prime minister Yitzhak Rabin in abortive efforts at peacemaking with Syria in 1992-95, said that “it’s not Russia that’s preventing intervention. Russia is the pretext, the alibi” for the lack of substantive international action. “If someone wanted to ratchet up the pressure on Syria, they could,” he said.

Itamar Rabinovich (photo credit: Moshe Shai/Flash90)

The real block, he told Army Radio, is the US government. “The Obama administration is not looking for another major Middle East crisis before November.”

read more http://www.timesofisrael.com/us-to-blame-for-inadequate-international-response-on-syria-says-former-israeli-ambassador/

Russia teams up with modern Hitler to deal with Syria

Russia is seeking to enlist Iran in a bid to engineer a political transition in Syria, a move that drew a hostile U.S. reaction even as the Obama administration asks for more pressure on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

The Russian move comes on the heels of reports on al Jazeera television, citing activists, of new massacres by Assad's forces. The reports said at least 140 Syrians were killed, some of them women and children, including 78 in Hama. Syria's state-run SANA news agency said the reports were "baseless" and that terrorists killed nine women and children outside of the city. Assad's father, the late President Hafez al-Assad, ordered the city leveled in February 1982 to crush a Sunni Muslim uprising, killing at least 10,000 people.

The possibility of recruiting Iran, one of Assad's main backers, to assist in efforts to end the violence and ease him out of power was floated as Kofi Annan, the architect of a failed United Nations April truce, prepared to address the UN today about ways to revive his peace plan or pursue next steps.

BREAKING - Syrian security forces kill up to 100 people near Hama

The Syrian opposition claims that as many as 100 people have been killed by government forces in the Hama region. The Syrian government claims terrorists are responsible for the slayings.

Reports from the Free Syrian Army, the Local Coordination Committees, Syrian National Council and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights differ on the exact number of casualties.

The Syrian government called the Hama massacre a “monstrous crime,” and said its special forces were in the area to combat the “terrorists” behind the killings, according to Syrian State TV. Authorities reported that all of the militants have been killed, with Syrian forces seizing weapons including rocket-propelled grenades.

Women and children are reported to be among the dead. A spokesperson for the Syrian National Council said as many as 100 people died in the massacre, which took place in the villages of Mazraat al-Qubair and Maarzaf, the BBC reports.

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Commentary: Israel Would Be Justified in Launching a Strike Against Iran

COMMENTARY | An AFP report that Israel has equipped a flotilla of German-made submarines with nuclear-equipped missiles constitutes an ominous development in the game of nuclear brinkmanship in the Middle East.

Despite repeated denials, it has been accepted that Iran is developing a nuclear arsenal. While,according to the U.K. Guardian, the U.S. has been conducting cyberattacks against Iran's nuclear program as well as attempting to impede it via diplomacy and economic sanctions, Israel has maintained the right to stop Iran's nuclear aspirations by military means.

The Belfer Center has concluded Israel has the ability to strike at Iran's nuclear facilities, many of them underground in hardened position, using long-range F-15s armed with American supplied bunker buster bombs. But such an approach would be risky and might involve heavy casualties among Israeli pilots.

A flotilla of nuclear armed submarines, positioned in the Persian Gulf perhaps, might provide an alternative way of taking out Iran's nuclear program and, at the same time, providing a lesson in what happens when an enemy of Israel contemplates using nuclear weapons.

Sixth Trumpet Watch - U.S. sees "apparent clean-up" at Iran site

VIENNA (Reuters) - A senior U.S. official said on Tuesday that Iran was carrying out apparent clean-up efforts at a military site, Parchin, that the U.N. nuclear watchdog wants to visit as part of a probe into suspected atom bomb research in the Islamic state.

Robert Wood, acting head of the U.S. mission to the International Atomic Energy Agency, also told the IAEA's 35-nation board that Iran had produced enough low-enriched uranium for several nuclear weapons if refined further to high levels.

"Iran has actually accelerated its production of low-enriched uranium," Wood said, according to a copy of his statement.

"There appears no immediate peaceful need for such stockpiles or for such an acceleration of the program, and we would note that this quantity of low-enriched uranium is enough for several nuclear weapons if further enriched to higher levels."

Sixth Trumpet Watch: "Moscow talks on nukes will be fruitless" - Tehran

Iran, which has denied clandestinely developing nuclear weapons technology, is now bragging its nuclear achievements have brought power and prestige to the Islamic world.

Tehran also says the third round of talks with the P5+1 world powers over its illicit nuclear program, to be held in Moscow this month, will be fruitless. The P5+1 comprises U.N. Security Council permanent members the U.S., Britain, France, China and Russia, plus non-permanent member Germany.

Sunday, June 3, 2012

Sixth Trumpet Watch: Iran Threatens Israel with "Thunderous Blow"

Iran warns Israel attack would trigger a thunderous blow

Iran has warned it will strike a "thunderous blow" against Israel in retaliation for any military strikes against its nuclear programme.

In a belligerent speech to mark the death anniversary of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Islamic republic also accused accused the West of telling "lies" against Iran to divert attention from its own economic problems.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Supreme leader denied Iran is developing nuclear weapons."What Americans and Westerners do is idiotic. They magnify the nuclear issue to cover up their own problems - they are deceitfully using the term nuclear weapons," he said in a televised speech.

Suggestions of possible military strikes against Tehran reflected the increased vulnerability felt by Israel and the United States since the fall of ally Hosni Mubarak's regime in Egypt last year, but Iran is ready to retaliate if it attacked.

If Israel made "any mis-step or wrong action, it will fall on their heads like thunder," he said.

Saturday, June 2, 2012

WAR DRUMS - Iran Threatens America

[Threat: noun 1. a declaration of an intention or determination to inflict punishment, injury, etc., in retaliation for, or conditionally upon, some action or course] see here.

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran has warned the United States not to resort to military action against it, saying U.S. bases in the region were vulnerable to the Islamic Republic's missiles, state media reported on Saturday.

The comments by a senior Iranian military commander were an apparent response to U.S. officials who have said Washington was ready to use military force to stop what it suspects is Iran's goal to develop a nuclear weapons capability.

Friday, June 1, 2012

Report: Obama ordered wave of attacks on Iran

President Barack Obama ordered a secret wave of sophisticated computer attacks on Iranian nuclear enrichment facilities, according to the New York Times.

Obama decided to accelerate the program, begun under the Bush administration and code-named "Olympic Games," even after the some of the code of computer worm used in the cyberattacks was revealed on the Internet, the Times reported today.

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Report: Iran using passenger jets to smuggle weapons to Syria, Lebanon

Iran’s government has repeatedly used commercial aircraft to smuggle weapons and explosives to Syria and Lebanon, the German broadcaster ZDF reported Wednesday.

ZDF, citing Western security sources and unspecified information it said it had obtained, reported that Iran Air and Yas Air, both based in Iran, have repeatedly used aircraft designated as passenger planes to transport weapons to Damascus and Beirut. It was not clear from the report what type of weaponry was involved.

read more - http://openchannel.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/05/30/11960492-report-iran-using-passenger-jets-to-smuggle-weapons-to-syria-lebanon?lite

Iran dismantles/sweeps nuke site ahead of UN inspection

(Reuters) - U.N. nuclear inspectors displayed new satellite imagery on Wednesday indicating that some small buildings had been dismantled and other possible clean-up work undertaken at an Iranian military site they want to visit.

One image from May 25 showed signs that "ground-scraping activities" had taken place at the Parchin facility, as well as the presence of a bulldozer, according to diplomats who attended a closed-door briefing by U.N. nuclear agency officials.

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Iran target of "supervirus" much bigger than stuxnet

A Russian computer firm has discovered a new computer virus with unprecedented destructive potential that chiefly targets Iran and could be used as a "cyberweapon" by the West and Israel.

Kaspersky Lab, one of the world's biggest producers of anti-virus software, said its experts discovered the virus -- known as Flame -- during an investigation prompted by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

Iran appears to have been the main target of the attack and the announcement comes just a month after the Islamic Republic said it halted the spread of a data-deleting virus targeting computer servers in its oil sector.

read more http://news.yahoo.com/cyber-superweapon-virus-uncovered-russian-firm-073611407.html

Monday, May 28, 2012

Sixth Trumpet Watch - Israel pins Syria massacre on Iran

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday voiced "revulsion" over the bloodshed in Syria, while accusing Iran and its Lebanese militia ally Hezbollah of being accomplices.

He was "revolted was by the incessant massacres conducted bySyrian President Bashar Assad's forces against ... civilians ... which continued over the weekend in the town of Houla," the premier's office said.

"Iran and Hezbollah are an inseparable part of the Syrian atrocities, and the world needs to act against them too," Netanyahu was quoted as saying.

Sunday, May 27, 2012

WAR DRUMS - Iran's Ahmadinejad urges unity against 'evil'

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad urged the country's newly-elected parliament on Sunday to stand with him against "evil ones" who he says have encircled the nation.

The president's address to the opening session of the parliament was seen as an appeal to conservative opponents who crushed Ahmadinejad's allies in voting that ended earlier this month.

"Today, evils have been mobilized from all directions to put the Iranian nation under pressure. Removing and resisting the pressures, and cooperation, are the main priority today," Ahmadinejad told lawmakers without elaboration. State TV broadcast the speech live.

read more http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_IRAN?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-05-27-04-49-28

U.S. is Ready to Stop Iran from Creating Nuclear Weapons: Panetta

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta on Sunday indirectly confirmed recent remarks by the Ambassador to Israel that the U.S. is “ready from a military perspective’’ to stop Iran from making a nuclear weapon if international pressure fails.

The U.S. and members of the United Nations Security Council recently met in Baghdad for talks about Iran’s suspected nuclear weapon program. Iran denies it has military intentions but has called for the destruction of Israel.

Sixth Trumpet Watch - US official arrives in Israel for secret talks on Iran

The head of the US delegation to nuclear talks with Iran arrived inIsrael on Friday to brief officials after a meeting in Baghdad that achieved little other than arranging more talks.

"She has arrived," said US embassy spokesman Kurt Hoyer. "I'm not 100 percent sure what her schedule is," he added, when asked whom Sherman would be meeting while in the country.

Israeli public radio however said Sherman was to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to report on the Baghdad talks, at which world powers noted "significant differences" with Iran but agreed to meet again in Moscow next month.

Israel sees itself as Tehran's number-one target if Iran acquires the bomb and is highly sceptical that diplomacy will work.

Later on Friday, the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna was expected to circulate a report detailing Iran's latest advances in expanding its nuclear activities.

Sixth Trumpet Watch! Iran denies access to UN inspectors at nuke site

DUBAI (Reuters) - The U.N. nuclear watchdog has not yet given good enough reasons to visit an Iranian site where it suspects there may have been experiments for developing nuclear weapons, Iranian media said.

The Parchin complex is at the centre of Western suspicions thatIran is developing atom bombs despite Tehran's repeated denials of any such ambition. A report from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) last week said satellite images showed "extensive activities" at Parchin.

Iranian officials have refused access to the complex, southeast of Tehran, saying it is a military site.

Zev Porat