Biden Spins Fantasies, Middle East Heats Up

628x471Speaking to the Saban Forum in Washington on Saturday, Vice-President Joe Biden said that the talks with Iran, which began about a year ago and recently were extended for another seven months, had “brought significant benefits” and slowed down Iran’s nuclear program.

Biden added that the talks were providing time to “see if it’s possible to reach a comprehensive agreement that can peacefully ensure that Iran will not develop a nuclear weapon,” and that “all of this was accomplished with very modest sanctions relief.”

The speech also included very positive words about Israel and the U.S.-Israeli alliance. Israel, however, needs more than words.

On Sunday, one day later, Israeli national security adviser Yossi Cohen gave a briefing to the Israeli cabinet that contradicted Biden on every point.

In a statement that later was issued by the office of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Cohen said that Iran was continuing to pursue a nuclear weapon, that the extension of the talks was enabling it to maintain and even strengthen its nuclear capabilities, and that the sanctions are “in danger of collapse. This is something that could lead to a regional nuclear arms race in the Middle East.”

Cohen also said Israel had played an important role in ensuring that the U.S.-led P5+1 countries did not reach a “bad” agreement with Iran last month, but that meanwhile Iran was continuing a huge military buildup and masterminding terrorism all over the globe.

That was Sunday morning. On Sunday afternoon two sites near Damascus were bombed from the air. Although Israeli officials are not saying a word about the incident, reports outside of Israel, as well as statements from Syria, Iran, and Hezbollah, say Israel was responsible.

In a commentary, Israeli military analyst Ron Ben-Yishai said Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps was

continu[ing] to play with fire by equipping Hezbollah with arms that have the capability to cause widespread losses and destruction in Israel…. It is widely believed that shipments of missiles and other arms destined for Hezbollah land in Iranian cargo jets at the airport in Damascus, then [are] transferred to a Syrian military storage site, until they are sent over the border to Lebanon.

On Monday, Arab media were cited as reporting that

the airstrikes destroyed a storage facility housing anti-aircraft missiles and drones belonging to Hezbollah, and cut off the power supply from Damascus International Airport.

It was also reported that “two Hezbollah militants were killed” during the strikes, one of them a “senior military official.”

According to reports outside of Israel, never officially confirmed by Jerusalem, in 2013 Israeli planes struck at least five weapons consignments in Syria that were on their way to Hezbollah, and earlier this year struck a Hezbollah base within Lebanon.

Although in most of these cases Hezbollah and the Syrian regime, both of them embroiled in the fighting in Syria, have refrained from retaliating, accounts say that in this latest case Israeli forces have been on high alert for a possible counterstrike.

Meanwhile it was also reported on Monday that Russia was “demand[ing] an explanation” for Israel’s “aggressive action” in Syria and was “deeply worried by this dangerous development.”

And finally, a Reuters report bears out the words of the Israeli national security adviser and belies the cheerful words of Vice-President Biden:

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani will hike military spending by more than a third in the next fiscal year despite presenting a “cautious, tight” budget to parliament on Sunday in response to falling oil prices…. [D]efense expenditure will rise 33.5 percent to about 282 trillion rials, most of which will be assigned to the elite Revolutionary Guards…. Iran is stockpiling rockets, missiles and other conventional weapons…. Nuclear talks between Iran and six powers have been extended until June. In the meantime, Iran can still access $700 million per month of frozen oil revenue held abroad. 

In other words: thanks to the talks Iran can keep funding its needs.

This confluence of events gives rise to two points.

One is that a belligerent, confident Iran, a belligerent, intrusive, and threatening Russia, is how the Middle East looks at a time of feckless U.S. policy based—at best—on self-delusion.

The other is that, even though Netanyahu’s government now faces an election campaign and is in a lame-duck status, no one should think it will take its eye off the ball.

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  • http://libertyandculture.blogspot.com/ Jason P

    With a Republican dominated Congress, Obama is in a lame-duck status and Bibi can prepare to take bolder actions. Testing the waters?

  • Hard Little Machine

    Saban is a ‘Jewish’ organization that basically is a money pipeline to the White House for all things cravenly Obam-ish. Biden speaking to them is Biden speaking to Obama bundlers. No one’s sure what the point of saying anything to them is or how it has any bearing on on reality. That wasn’t the point.

  • zoomie

    ” self-delusion “. the author is too poilte to my chief buffoon. he’s yet another example of what happeens when a libscum has his head so far up a dark smelly place, he just can’t tell the difference anymore.

  • Ken Kelso

    Hamas number 1 ally is Iran.
    Iran’s founder Ayatollah Khomeini was a child abusing rapist.
    Mohammad the founder of Islam married a 6 year old girl Aisha.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60MC3bVFG6s
    Ayatollah Khomeini Sexually assaulted a crying and screaming 4 year old girl

    • UCSPanther

      Pure evil.

  • 11bravo

    Why is it betrayed as a catastrophe if the US bombs Iran or Syria – and the Israeli’s do it quite often with out much retaliation. We need to test fire 3 ICBM’s from the lower 48. One into Syria 2 into Iraq. Then fire 3 missiles from Europe to the same places (all with conventional warheads of course).
    That ought to give the principle players something to think about.

  • Ken Kelso

    http://www.jewsnews.co.il/2014/09/02/hamas-terrorists-confess-to-using-human-shields/
    Hamas Terrorists Confess to Using Human Shields
    Posted on 9/2/2014 by Eliyokim Cohen

    Throughout Operation Protective Edge, the Israel Security Agency interrogated dozens of Hamas terrorists who fought against IDF forces in Gaza. Several of these operatives admitted to using civilian buildings as cover for their military activity.

    While being interrogated by the Israel Security Agency (ISA or Shin Bet Security Service), Hamas terrorists confessed to using mosques and hospitals as hiding places during Operation Protective Edge. According to their testimony, they also built tunnels, launching sites and weapons-storage facilities near playgrounds in Gaza.

    During a recent ISA interrogation, terrorist Abd Al-Rahman Ba’aloosha said Hamas regularly gathered its fighters in the Al-Safa and Al-Abra mosques of Khan Yunis. According to Ba’aloosha, Hamas operatives repeatedly met inside of a bunker located underneath the Al-Abra mosque. Another terrorist told Israeli investigators that Hamas first recruited him during a meeting inside of Al-Abra.

    Several Hamas fighters said that the terrorist organization used mosques to train operatives and hide explosives. Mohammed Ramadan recalled that Hamas commanders taught him to fire anti-tank missiles inside the Al-Shafi’i mosque in Khan Yunis. The mosque, he said, served as a training base for the Al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’ military wing.

    Throughout Operation Protective Edge, the IDF uncovered significant evidence indicating that Hamas used mosques for terror purposes. On several occasions, Israeli forces documented rocket launches from inside mosques or nearby areas. While searching one mosque in Gaza, soldiers uncovered dozens of weapons and shafts leading into underground attack tunnels.

    Another terrorist said it was “widely known” that senior Hamas operatives had been hiding inside of Gaza’s hospitals. During his interrogation, he explained that armed bodyguards protected Hamas’ leaders in medical facilities. He also confirmed that senior terrorists were hiding inside of Shifa hospital, surrounded by guards dressed in civilian clothing.

    As IDF footage shows, Hamas uses medical centers for military purposes in order to shield itself from IDF strikes – and to draw international condemnation of Israel if the IDF is forced to respond. Hamas transformed Wafa Hospital, a civilian building in the Shuja’iya neighborhood of Gaza City, into a command center, rocket-launching site, observation point, sniper’s post, weapons storage facility, cover for tunnel infrastructure, and a general base for attacks against Israel and IDF forces. As seen in the video below, it repeatedly opened fire from hospital windows and used anti-tank missiles from the premises.

    For more click LINK