McCain: US Withdrawal in Iraq Will Come in Time
http://www.newsmax.com/international/mccain_iraq/2008/07/08/111067.html
PITTSBURGH -- Republican presidential candidate John McCain played down reports Tuesday that Iraqi officials are increasing pressure on the United States to agree to a specific timeline to withdraw its forces.
McCain said he was confident the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki would ask American troops to leave only if the military situation there warranted such a move.
"I know for a fact that it will be dictated by the situation on the ground, as it always has been," McCain said.
"Since we are succeeding" in Iraq, he said, "then I am convinced, as I have said before, we can withdraw and withdraw with honor, not according to a set timetable. And I'm confident that is what Prime Minister Maliki is talking about, since he has told me that for the many meetings we have had."
The increased pressure from Iraq comes as time is running out for the Bush administration to reach a needed troop deal. Some type of agreement is needed to keep U.S. troops in Iraq after a U.N. mandate expires Dec. 31.
McCain opposes scheduling a troop withdrawal. Democratic candidate Barack Obama promises to remove troops within 16 months of taking office.
An Iraqi proposal for a timeline that was made public Tuesday appears to set an outer limit, requiring U.S. forces to fully withdraw five years after the Iraqis take the lead on security nationwide.
"We will not accept any memorandum of understanding that doesn't have specific dates to withdraw foreign forces from Iraq," Iraq's national security adviser, Mouwaffak al-Rubaie, said Tuesday.
Obama Losing Votes in California by Backing 'Same-Sex Marriages'
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion07369.shtml
SACRAMENTO, (christiansunite.com) -- Campaign for Children and Families, a leading California-based pro-family organization that defends marriage for one man and one woman, is predicting Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama will lose votes for his support of homosexual "marriages."
In a public letter read Sunday at the Alice B. Toklas Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Democratic Club in San Francisco, Obama wrote:
As the Democratic nominee for President, I am proud to join with and support the LGBT community in an effort to set our nation on a course that recognizes LGBT Americans with full equality under the law. That is why I support extending fully equal rights and benefits to same sex couples under both state and federal law. That is why I support repealing the Defense of Marriage Act and the "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy, and the passage of laws to protect LGBT Americans from hate crimes and employment discrimination. And that is why I oppose the divisive and discriminatory efforts to amend the California Constitution, and similar efforts to amend the U.S. Constitution or those of other states.
Obama's opposition to legal protection for natural man-woman marriage is the opposite of Republican presidential candidate John McCain, who, last Thursday, expressed his public support for Proposition 8, the California Marriage Amendment, on the November ballot:
I support the efforts of the people of California to recognize marriage as a unique institution between a man and a woman, just as we did in my home state of Arizona. I do not believe judges should be making these decisions.
"Despite his claims that he believes marriage is only for a man and a woman, Barack Obama is promising to destroy marriage protection in our nation and to oppose protecting marriage licenses for a man and a woman in California," said CCF President Randy Thomasson, a registered independent.
CAMPAIGN FOR CHILDREN AND FAMILIES (CCF) is a leading West Coast nonprofit, nonpartisan organization representing children and families in California and America. CCF stands for marriage and family, parental rights, the sanctity of human life, religious freedom, financial freedom, and back-to- basics education.
Senator Barack Obama Wants You to Pay for Abortions
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion07372.shtml
WASHINGTON, July 7 (christiansunite.com) -- Christian group launches new effort in their campaign to educate American voters on the radical and extremist abortion policies of Senator Obama.
The campaign called, "Barack Obama: The Abortion President," will focus on how Mr. Obama wants taxpayers to pay for abortions.
The Christian Defense Coalition will have a news conference on Tuesday, July 8, at 11:00 A.M. to discuss this new campaign. They will also have large color posters and fliers.
The location of the news conference will be in front of Mr. Obama's senate office in the Hart Senate Office building on the Constitution Ave. NE entrance side.
A major part of the news conference will center on the fact that Senator Obama wants people of faith, Catholics and Evangelicals, to pay for abortions through their tax dollars.
The Chicago Tribune reported last year, when Senator Obama was "asked about his proposal for expanded access to health insurance, Obama said it would cover 'reproductive health services.' Contacted afterward, an Obama spokesperson said that included 'abortions.'
Although in recent days Senator Obama has tried to downplay his extremist views on abortion, his own Presidential website says, "...he has been a consistent champion of reproductive choice and will make preserving women's rights under Roe v. Wade a priority as President."
Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, Director of the Christian Defense Coalition, states, "Senator Obama talks about bringing hope, faith and change to American politics. We now see this is all just political 'doublespeak.' One of his top priorities as President would be protecting abortion rights and even expanding them. If elected, Senator Obama would become 'The Abortion President,' with the most extremist policies on abortion of any President in history.
"Senator Obama's views on abortion are so radical that he even wants American citizens to pay for them. This would include Catholics, Evangelicals and all people of faith. He would also expand abortion rights through his passionate support of The Freedom of Choice Act.
"The Christian Defense Coalition will be working diligently over the next 5 months before the November elections to educate people of faith, especially Catholics, that Barack Obama wants them to pay for abortions. This is not a candidate who is concerned about social justice, hope and equality. Rather, this is candidate who will continue the violence and pain of abortion and refuse to end this tragic war against America's women and children."
Kaitlin Clare, Program Director for the Christian Defense Coalition, adds, "As a 23 year old woman of faith, I am appalled at the radical and extremist abortion politics of Senator Obama. This is not a progressive view on abortion or one that affirms women. As most of this emerging generation is embracing a 'culture of life' and growing less comfortable with abortion, Senator Obama wants to take us back to a radical pro-abortion posture that is both archaic and disturbing.
"Senator Obama, this generation will not go back to the violent days of abortion on demand with no restrictions. It is very confusing that you do not want tax dollars going to pay for the deaths of American solders in Iraq, yet you want each of us to pay for the killing of innocent children through abortions here in America.
"We also want to remind Senator Obama that although we may be more progressive than our parents on the environment, social justice and other cultural issues, we could never vote for a President that wants to expand and embrace abortion policies that diminish women and violate human rights."
Panel Calls for War Powers Legislation
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/405373.aspx
CBNNews.com - WASHINGTON - Former secretaries of state James Baker III and Warren Christopher say the next time the president goes to war, Congress should be required to say whether it agrees.
The co-chairmen of a bipartisan study group have proposed legislation that would require the president to consult lawmakers before initiating combat lasting longer than a week, except in cases of emergencies. In turn, Congress would have to act within 30 days, either approving or disapproving of the action.
The plan, outlined by Baker and Christopher in an essay published Tuesday in The New York Times, would not necessarily prevent future debate on the so-called "war powers" issue. Instead, it would create a new consultative process between the White House and Congress to help prevent a potential constitutional showdown.
Congress' involvement in approving combat operations became a central issue in the Iraq debate last year, when Democrats tried to force President Bush to end the war.
After taking control of Congress in January 2007, Democrats tried to cap force levels and set a timetable for withdrawals. They lacked a veto-proof majority to put the restrictions into law, and the White House argued that such legislation would have violated the Constitution by infringing upon the president's role as commander in chief to protect the nation. Democrats disagreed, contending there was ample precedent.
Baker, who served as secretary of state in the first Bush administration, and Christopher, who served under President Clinton, were to discuss their findings at a news conference Tuesday morning.
The panel has been studying the issue for more than a year and consulted more than three dozen experts. Other members of the panel include former Democratic Rep. Lee Hamilton, who in 2006 led the Iraq Study Group with Baker; former Attorney General Edwin Meese III; and Strobe Talbott, former deputy secretary of state.
Stephen Peroutka, National Pro-Life Radio: 'We Must Follow the Lead of African American Pastors in Their Call for the Defunding of the Racist Agenda of Planned Parenthood'
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion07368.shtml
WASHINGTON, (christiansunite.com) -- "It sickens me to admit that racism is very much alive in this country, but we must all face the truth" said Stephen Peroutka after viewing the YouTube video where Planned Parenthood employees were 'excited' to accept donations specifically earmarked to kill black babies.
According to the National Black Pro-Life Union, Planned Parenthood reached the billion dollar mark in earnings last year. More than 330,000 million dollars of that was money given to them by the federal government.
"Our tax dollars are helping to fund the racism of Planned Parenthood--an organization that has a willingness to accept donations for the exclusive purpose of killing black babies and has a genocidal view toward unborn children in general," said Peroutka.
"I am calling on all of the pro-life community to stand with me. We must follow the lead of the African American leaders, pastors and organizations and demand that Planned Parenthood be defunded! Black pastors and leaders are mad about it--we should all be mad! If we are serious about stamping out racism we are going to have to start at the beginning by welcoming all children into this world no matter what color their skin."
Stephen Peroutka is founder and president of National Pro-life Radio. He can be heard daily on syndicated and XM Satellite radio hosting "Face the Truth", a hard hitting, no holds barred expose of the abortion machine in America.
Women of 'Operation Outcry' Applaud Judges Requiring Abortionists to Tell Women the Truth
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion07370.shtml
MEDIA ADVISORY, (christiansunite.com) -- The United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit on June 27th upheld South Dakota's statute requiring abortionists to tell a woman that "the abortion will terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being," defined as a member of the human species (Homo sapiens).
Tracy Reynolds, of Operation Outcry, stated: "The statute simply gives a woman the biological, scientific facts that the developing organism in her womb is a human being."
The most basic question many women ask before an abortion is "Is it a baby?" One would assume that abortionists and courts would be able to answer this question. However, Planned Parenthood does not want to tell women abortion kills a human being. They consistently do not tell women that abortion is being performed on a human being, a member of the species Homo sapiens, a living organism.
The women of Operation Outcry are extremely pleased that the Courts are now listening to real women who have been hurt by abortion and beginning to protect women from abortionists, rather than listening only to Planned Parenthood, the nation's largest abortion provider. The women of Operation Outcry and other women are also extremely pleased that the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals cited the portion of the Supreme Court's recent Gonzales v. Carhart decision in which the testimony of post-abortive women of Operation Outcry was cited to show that "some women come to regret their choice to abort the infant life they once created and sustained. Severe depression and loss of esteem can follow."
The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals cited this Supreme Court passage on page 16 of its opinion.
This citation of post-abortive women's pain by the courts demonstrates again that the voices of the women of Operation Outcry are beginning to have a deep and long lasting impact on the courts of the United States.
Approximately 2,000 legally admissible testimonies collected by Operation Outcry from women who have had abortions were given to the South Dakota legislature and have become part of the legislative history of that state. The South Dakota Task Force Report on Abortion is the first government study in thirty years to exhaustively study the effects of abortion on women, listening to both pro-abortion and pro-life sides, but most importantly listening to women who actually experienced abortions and concluding that abortions do significantly damage women. See South Dakota Task Force Report at www.operationoutcry.org.
Lisa Dudley, Director of Outreach for Operation Outcry, and one who has suffered from abortion herself, said: "I am thrilled that the courts have taken an important step towards protecting women's lives. Women ought to at least be told the truth that they are killing a human being even if the law gives them the right to do so."
A copy of the opinion is available on our website, www.operationoutcry.org.
Thomas More Law Center Wins Significant Pro-Life Victory in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion07371.shtml
ANN ARBOR, MI (christiansunite.com) - In what was a surprising decision to many court observers, a unanimous 3-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a lower court decision yesterday, and affirmed the Constitutional rights of pro-life activists to display large graphic photos of aborted babies on public streets adjacent to Dodson Middle School in Rancho Palos Verdes, California. The case involved police detention for 75 minutes of two pro-life activists belonging to the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform, Inc. (CBR), a California-based, pro-life organization, who had been driving a 7-by-20 foot truck with photos of first term aborted babies on three sides.'??
School officials and the LA County Sheriff's Department claimed display of the photos were "disruptive, " in violation of a California statute. The Ninth Circuit ruled that deputy sheriffs violated the demonstrators' First Amendment right to freedom of speech and Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable police searches and seizures.
The opinion written by Judge Harry Pregerson and supported by Judges William A. Fletcher and Marsha S. Berzon, all considered liberals, stated that "he government cannot silence messages simply because they cause discomfort, fear, or even anger." Click here to read the entire opinion.
The Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, brought the case on behalf of CBR. The mobile billboard truck is part of CBR's effort to expose as many people as possible to the horrors and realities of abortion.
Robert Muise, trial counsel for the Law Center who handled the case, commented on the ruling, "This is a tremendous victory for the First Amendment and the pro-life movement. The Ninth Circuit's decision affirms that there is no double standard for pro-life speech under our Constitution. In its ruling, the Court upheld the fundamental principle of the First Amendment that government officials cannot prohibit silent, peaceful, non-obstructive, political speech on the public streets, a traditional public forum, because certain listeners or viewers find the speech offensive."
The Thomas More Law Center is widely recognized as the most aggressive pro-life public interest law firm in the nation. It has represented CBR in several lawsuits across the country, the American Life League's program to distribute pro-life t-shirts to public school students, as well as participated in several citizen initiatives to enact Human Life Amendments in state constitutions.'??
The Thomas More Law Center defends and promotes the religious freedom of Christians, time-honored family values, and the sanctity of human life through education, litigation, and related activities. It does not charge for its services. The Law Center is supported by contributions from individuals, corporations and foundations, and is recognized by the IRS as a section 501(c)(3) organization. You may reach the Thomas More Law Center at (734) 827-2001 or visit their website at www.thomasmore.org.
The Netherlands ratifies Lisbon Treaty
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/function/0,2145,12215_cid_3470455,00.html
The Netherlands has ratified the European Union's reform treaty. Parliament's upper house approved the Lisbon Treaty on Tuesday, one month after lawmakers in the lower house voted overwhelmingly in favour of ratification. The Netherlands is the 21st EU member to approve the treaty which aims to streamline decision making in the bloc. However, the treaty's future has been thrown into doubt, after Irish voters rejected it in a referendum last month. The Lisbon Treaty has to be ratified by all 27 EU member states for it to take effect. Dutch voters rejected a draft EU constitution in a referendum in 2005.
France determined to build European defence: Kouchner
http://www.eubusiness.com/news-eu/1215439381.01
(PARIS) - France will work to strengthen European defence during its six-month EU presidency despite the crisis over Ireland's rejection of a key reform treaty, Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Monday.
Kouchner told an EU-NATO meeting in Paris that France's plan called for "NATO and European defence complementing each other and the prospect of a strong renewal of our relationship with NATO."
President Nicolas Sarkozy has set a course for France's return to NATO's integrated command, which it left in 1966 when Charles de Gaulle rejected US dominance of the alliance.
Despite the crisis facing the European Union over its stalled institutional reform, Europe's military capabilities must be strengthened, said Kouchner, whose country holds the EU presidency until the end of the year.
He said the European Union should have the capacity to deploy two stabilisation forces of up to 10,000 troops over two years in any theatre.
The 27-nation European Union was thrown in disarray when Ireland rejected in a referendum last month a reform treaty designed to streamline decision-making.
The treaty must be ratified by all member states to come into force.
NATO secretary general Jaap de Hopp Scheffer called for allowing Turkey, which is a member of NATO, to be given observer status at the European Defence Agency, set up in 2004 to develop a common security policy.
Kouchner said a new high-level group would be created to promote an EU-NATO dialogue and that France would present its priorities on defence to a NATO council on July 16.
Joint police stations in tourist areas proposed
http://euobserver.com/9/26458
EU presidency France has suggested that popular tourist destinations in member states be staffed with police from all over the bloc.
The proposal was presented by French interior minister Michele Alliot-Marie as she hosted an informal meeting with her European counterparts in Cannes, France, on Monday (7 July).
"These would not be monstrous mega-police stations, but rather offices where people from a foreign country can come and be assisted when they have something nasty happen to them, if they've been attacked or had their pockets picked, and where they will be well looked after," Ms Alliot-Marie said, according to media reports.
In practice, the proposal would allow for police officers from Germany – for example - to be stationed with Czech police forces in Prague in order to assist German citizens – something that could also be applied for big sport events.
According to Euronews, France is set to launch a pilot project in the pilgrim city of Lourdes when the Pope comes to visit in September. French and Italian police will be operating in Paris, Versailles and Nice ahead of and during the papal visit.
"That's part of what Europe is about," the French minister said, reflecting Paris' efforts to revive a positive vision of the EU among French citizens.
The proposal has received a cautious welcome, with cross-border police co-operation traditionally a very sensitive issue for EU capitals.
According to Irish justice minister Dermot Ahern, it has some merit given the "horrendous problems" some Irish embassies face during holiday seasons. However, he also pointed to the type of powers visiting officers would have as something that needs to be carefully sorted out, the Irish Times reports.
Czech interior minister Ivan Langer has praised the idea, saying his country already provided ten police officers to help its citizens in Croatian resorts in the past.
"We have an excellent beer in the Czech Republic, so you drink quite a lot ... If you are French, I can imagine it's pleasant to meet a French policeman who speaks your language and who will assist you and bring you to your hotel," he was cited as saying by the Irish paper.
But William Hague, UK shadow Foreign Secretary, has expressed some doubts. "At a time when police resources are being stretched by rising violent crime, scattering officers across Europe on an EU public relations exercise can hardly be the best use of police time," he told the Daily Telegraph.
Critics suggest that temporary multi-national police stations could eventually become permanent and result in a clash over powers between foreign and national police officers.
Assuming presidency in EU, France will develop ENP
http://www.panarmenian.net/news/eng/?nid=26556
PanARMENIAN.Net -- France takes over the rotating EU Presidency with a number of challenges, specifically energy and climate change, immigration, defense and a review of the EU’s farm policy, French Ambassador to Armenia said.
“However, these are not all tasks France undertakes. It will also focus on implementation of Lisbon Treaty programs, economic growth and emergency situations,” Ambassador Serge Smessov told a news conference today.
“We will work to develop the European Neighborhood Policy and strengthen cooperation Eastern Europe to create a free trade and travel zone,” he said.
France will preside in the EU from July 1 to December 31 to be followed by Czechia and Sweden.
Scholars Downplay Tablet Debate on Messiah, Resurrection
http://www.christianpost.com/article/20080708/scholars-downplay-tablet-debate-on-messiah-resurrection.htm
An eclectic Jewish scholar is causing a media stir by claiming that Jesus and his disciples copied the idea of a messiah rising again after three days, basing his interpretation of scattered text found on a so-called ancient tablet. This idea fails to hold up when compared with the assessment of other Biblical scholars – many who say the relic is too badly preserved to even read.
The tablet is not a new find but is catching news waves because Israel Knohl, a professor of Bible studies at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, was slated to present his interpretation of the text on Tuesday at a Jerusalem conference marking the 60th anniversary of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The three-by-one foot tablet – dubbed "Gabriel's Vision" because it contains apocalyptic text ascribed to the angel – contains 87 lines of text on gray-colored stone. It is owned by a collector in Zurich who said he acquired it from an antiquities dealer in Jordan.
Knohl contends to The New York Times that his reading of the fragmented text of line 80 "should shake our basic view of Christianity" because it presents the resurrection of after three days as a motif developed before Jesus and not unique to Christianity.
The Jewish scholar takes his loose interpretation one step farther by arguing that "what happens in the New Testament was adopted by Jesus and his followers based on an earlier messiah story,” according to The Times.
But many respectable biblical scholars are rejecting Knohl's controversial reading of the text based on the fact that most of the text is missing.
Even Knohl's colleague, Moshe Bar-Asher, president of the Israeli Academy of Hebrew Language and also a professor at Hebrew University, finds his interpretation far-reaching.
"In crucial places of the text there is a lack of text. I understand Knohl's tendency to find there keys to the pre-Christian period, but in two to three crucial lines of the text there are a lot of missing words," said Bar-Asher in The Times article.
Ben Witherington, a reputable New Testament professor at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Ky., weighed in on the topic, saying on his blog that it's not clear that the text is even talking about a risen messiah. In a Time magazine article, he additionally points out that the Gospel texts don’t just rely on the observed fact of the Resurrection but on testimonies of eyewitnesses to Jesus' post-Resurrection self.
"This stone certainly does not demonstrate that the Gospel passion stories are created on the basis of this stone text," Witherington concluded on his blog. "But what it does do is make plausible that Jesus could have said some of the things credited to him in Mark 8:31, 9:31, and 10:33-34."
Ada Yardeni, a Hebrew language specialist, who published an article on the tablet over a year ago in the Hebrew-language journal Cathedra, also agreed that line 80 was illegible.
In her review, she did note that the relic, thought to be dated sometime between the late first century B.C.E. and early first century C.E., bore some resemblance to the Dead Sea Scrolls but found the text "very hard to read" and the tablet "badly preserved." While she said the text was "intriguing," she suggested that it probably "only emphasizes the variety of Jewish movements at the turn of the era."
One scholar who was expected to listen to Knohl's argument on Tuesday shared his take on the issue to UK's The Independent.
Professor Lawrence Schiffman, professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University, said the text was being restored to "say something which it may or may not say." He acknowledged that Jesus was a "victim of sensationalism all the time" since a single part of the text was being used to create a "media experience."
Media Research Institute, a media watchdog, also red-flagged the story angle many newspapers sold on the implications of Knohl's interpretation on the basic tenet of Christianity.
"Here we go again. Another relic pops up of questionable authenticity that one or two experts is saying casts doubts on the unique claims of Christian orthodoxy," Ken Shepherd wrote on the watchdog's related Web site called News Busters.
"What's more, it's laughable on its face that one obscure, questionably-interpreted transcript of an alleged angelic annunciation has anything on the public witness of the early church, which based its arguments for the resurrection of Christ from first-hand eyewitness accounts of some 500 people of the risen Jesus and Hebrew scriptures on the person and work of the Messiah," he added.
And even though Time magazine ran its story under a sensational headline "Was Jesus' Resurrection a Sequel?" the writers admit that "such a contentious reading of the 87-line tablet depends on creative interpretation of a smudged passage, making it the latest entry in the woulda/coulda/shoulda category of possible New Testament artifacts; they are useful to prove less-spectacular points and to stir discussion on the big ones, but probably not to settle them nor shake anyone's faith."
In what may not come as a surprise, Knohl is the same professor who thought the caves surrounding the site of the "Jesus family tomb" should be excavated for more research when most experts had already dismissed and rejected that the ossuaries had anything to do with the historical Jesus.
Ultra-Orthdox prohibition on entering Temple Mount splinters
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1000050.html
The ultra-Orthodox rabbinical consensus on banning the entry of Jews to the Temple Mount is showing cracks. This comes in the wake of a decision by religious Zionist rabbis to lift the ban and the increase of religious Zionist visitors to the site.
Rabbi Moshe Tendler, son-in-law of the ultra-Orthodox Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, visited the Temple Mount last Thursday with Temple Institute officials for the first time. Feinstein was one of the greatest Haredi adjudicators in the United States in the previous generation. Tendler, a bioethics expert and Talmud instructor at Yeshiva University, New York, is known mainly for his rulings on transplants and genetics.
Recently several ultra-Orthodox rabbis visited the Temple Mount but unlike Tendler, none would have his name released, due to sensitivity to this issue. Some two years ago, kabbalist Rabbi Dov Kook, who is married to Rabbi Yosef Elyashiv's granddaughter, also covertly visited the mount.
Both the ultra-Orthodox and religious Zionist rabbis accepted the ban on Jews entering Temple Mount after the Six-Day War. The decision stemmed from the inability to determine the exact location of the temple and sanctuary, which worshippers could only enter after being purified.
The Chief Rabbinate put up a sign warning Jews not to enter Temple Mount, saying the penalty of doing so was divine punishment by untimely death or eternal excommunication. This position has not changed over the years.
However, an increasing number of religious Zionist rabbis have recently permitted Jews to enter Temple Mount. This followed an intensification of the struggle between Jewish and Muslim establishments over the Temple Mount and damage to Jewish areas.
Well-known religious Zionist adjudicators who have changed their approach include Kiryat Shmona Rabbi Zfania Drori, the chairman of the West Bank settlers rabbis committee, Rabbi Dov Lior, head of the hesder yeshiva in Ma'ale Adumim, Rabbi Nahum Rabinovitch and dozens of others.
Some of these rabbis said Jews must be permitted to enter the Temple Mount to liberate it from the Muslim occupation, which is denying any Jewish affiliation - historic, religious and national - to the site and its past.
Fayyad wants foreign troops in Gaza
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3565208,00.html
Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said on Monday he was proposing ideas that include the temporary deployment of Arab security forces in Gaza to help reunite Hamas-run Gaza with the West Bank.
Fayyad said his ideas, proposed in meetings with foreign Arab and Western officials, complemented an initiative by President Mahmoud Abbas last month to offer a national dialogue to end the rift between the secular factions of the Palestine Liberation Organization and their Islamist rival Hamas.
Fayyad said restoring Palestinian Authority control over the Gaza Strip, run by Hamas since violence a year ago and separated from Abbas' Fatah-run West Bank "is a key objective of policy and has to be pursued vigorously at all times".
"The separation has to end. I'm deeply worried that over the past year, the separation has been reinforced. This situation has to be reversed quickly," he told Reuters in an interview.
"What I've been talking about are ideas aimed at providing practical solutions to issues of concern that have been cited as impediments to the achievement of unity," Fayyad said.
"The ideas include seeking Arab security support to help with the security situation in Gaza and deal with the obvious need for help that we have in restructuring our security capabilities and provide security services in a manner that is reassuring and effective to all during a transitional period."
Arab diplomats said Egypt, which has mediated a fragile, truce between Hamas and Israel, was ready to host a dialogue between the Palestinian factions but was not eager to deploy its troops in Gaza. Other Arab states, however, said they were willing to consider the proposal, diplomats said.
Israel skeptical
Israel has in the past two years softened its opposition to having foreign troops in the Palestinian territories but remains skeptical that many states would be willing to contribute.
Abbas dismissed a Hamas-led government last June following its seizure of the Gaza Strip and appointed a Western-backed government headed by Fayyad in the West Bank.
Hamas, backed by Syria and Iran, has consolidated its power in Gaza despite sanctions imposed by Israel and its Western allies and much of the Arab world for refusing to recognize Israel and past peace agreements with Israel.
Abbas has sought the help of Arab states to convince Hamas to end what he says is its coup in Gaza and end the rift that has undermined his peace talks with Israel aimed at establishing a Palestinian state
in the West Bank and Gaza.
Hamas has said it wants to confine reconciliation talks to Abbas' Fatah movement and insists talks should be without any preconditions.
Hamas regards its own Ismail Haniyeh, who headed an elected government from 2006, as still being prime minister and rarely responds to comments by Fayyad, a former World Bank economist who is not a member of Fatah.
Abbas Meets with Terror Chiefs in Syria
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/405442.aspx
CBNNews.com - DAMASCUS, Syria - Palestinian Authority (PA ) President Mahmoud Abbas met with Ramadan Abdullah Shalah, head of the Islamic Jihad terror organization, in Damascus Monday.
Former PA Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia (Abu Ala), who leads the Palestinian negotiating team, participated in the meeting, along with senior Islamic Jihad members Ziad al-Nakhaleh and Muhammed al-Hindi.
The leaders discussed reconciliation between rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas, with Islamic Jihad offering to mediate between the two groups.
Islamic Jihad was one of the terror groups that refused to sign the Egyptian-brokered tahadyeh (temporary calm) with Israel.
"The Islamic Jihad leaders made it clear that the talks with Israel are ineffective and a waste of time," a representative of the group told Jerusalem Post Palestinian Affairs correspondent Khaled Abu Toameh.
Abbas also briefed leaders of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) on his efforts to end the rift with Hamas and all Palestinian "factions."
Meanwhile, senior Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar said Hamas would not cede control of the Gaza Strip until the PA ceased cooperating with Israel.
Syria sees no Israel peace before Bush quits
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080707/wl_nm/syria_israel_assad_dc
PARIS (Reuters) - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has told a newspaper his country is unlikely to make peace with Israel while President George W. Bush remains in office.
However, in an interview published on the website of Le Figaro daily on Monday, Assad said he was betting that the next U.S. leader would get more involved in the peace process.
Assad said Syria and Israel were looking for common ground to start face-to-face negotiations, adding that it was vital to find the right country to mediate such talks.
"The most important thing in direct negotiations is who sponsors them," Assad told Le Figaro, saying that the United States had an essential role to play.
"Frankly, we do not think that the current American administration is capable of making peace. It doesn't have either the will or the vision and it only has a few months left," he said.
"When we have established a common foundation (for negotiations) at indirect talks with Israel, perhaps we could give some trump cards to the new administration to make it get more involved," he added.
"We are betting on the next president and his administration. We hope that it will be rather an advantage to have a change of president in the United States," he said.
The next U.S. president will take office next January.
Long-time foes Syria and Israel held a third round of indirect talks in Turkey last week and agreed to hold a fourth round in late July, a Turkish government source told Reuters.
OPENING
In a sign of improving international relations for Syria, Assad is due in Paris this weekend for a summit of European and Mediterranean countries, which will also be attended by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
France's own relations with Syria have been troubled by accusations Damascus has fuelled tensions in Lebanon, but Assad said his trip to Paris showed the mood was changing.
"France has an important international position. This (meeting) is opening a major door on the international stage for us," Assad said. "This is an historic visit for me, an opening towards France and towards Europe."
He said there were plans for him to meet the newly sworn-in Lebanese president, Michel Suleiman, in Paris.
Suleiman was elected in May after Syria helped reach a deal mediated by Qatar to end months of political stalemate between Lebanon's ruling coalition and an opposition alliance led by Hezbollah -- a group backed by Syria and Iran.
Tensions are still high in Lebanon, but Assad indicated he would do nothing to convince Hezbollah to disarm, saying this would only come when there was a broad Middle East peace deal.
He also backed Iran in its stand-off with major powers over its nuclear ambitions, saying he did not think Tehran wanted to build an atomic bomb.
"We are convinced Iran does not have a military nuclear project. We are against the acquisition of nuclear weapons, be it by Iran or any other country in the region, especially Israel," he added.
"It is unacceptable for Israel to have 200 nuclear warheads," Assad said. Israel has never publicly confirmed it has atomic weapons, but is widely assumed to be a nuclear power.
Sarkozy says EU's Solana to head to Iran
http://www.eubusiness.com/news-eu/1215521236.11
(TOYAKO) - EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana will make a new trip to Iran to try to pin down where the regime stands in a tense nuclear standoff, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Tuesday.
Shortly after Sarkozy spoke at the Group of Eight summit in Japan, his foreign ministry said Tehran had not undertaken to suspend sensitive nuclear activities under the terms of a deal offered to it by six nations.
"The group of six nations plan to send Mr Solana (to Iran) for in-depth discussions on the differences between their latest proposals and the ones that were already on the table," Sarkozy said in Toyako in northern Japan.
"When we have the results, each country will try through its own channels to find out more about the intentions of the Iranian regime," he said.
The group of six nations -- Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States -- last month offered Tehran a package of technological and economic incentives in return for Iran suspending its uranium enrichment activities that the West fears could be used to make an atomic bomb.
Iran had in May proposed a deal to the six nations, which resulted in last month's counter-offer aimed at easing fears over Iran's nuclear ambitions.
Tehran responded to that offer Friday in a letter that has not been made public, but President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has repeatedly insisted that Iran will not give up its right to a nuclear programme.
Solana's new mission to Iran is aimed at reconciling Iran's two submissions to the group of six, which it has said are aimed at settling the tensions of what it insists is the use of nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.
But Solana's spokeswoman Cristina Gallac told AFP that his office was "in the process of preparing a possible meeting with (Iranian negotiator) Said Jalili in the coming weeks".
"We have not yet set a date or a time," she said
Shortly after Sarkozy announced Solana's mission, France's foreign ministry revealed that the Islamic state had not undertaken to suspend sensitive nuclear activities.
"The fact that there is no mention of suspending sensitive activities is clearly an issue," foreign ministry spokesman Eric Chevallier said in Paris.
G8 leaders were expected to discuss the Iranian nuclear standoff during their summit in Japan that ends Wednesday.
Solana says he'll respond to Iran soon
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2008/07/07/Solana_says_hell_respond_to_Iran_soon/UPI-43871215480461/
PARIS, July 7 (UPI) -- A senior European diplomat says he hopes to reply soon to Iran's recent letter spelling out its reaction to an international proposal for its nuclear program.
European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana said he planned to respond to the letter to after consulting with other leaders, CNN reported Monday.
"We have not responded yet. We are still talking among ourselves," Solana said at an EU-NATO meeting in Paris. "But I hope we'll have a response soon."
Last month, world powers offered economic and other incentives if Iran suspended its uranium enrichment program.
On Friday, the Islamic republic replied to the proposal hammered out by the foreign ministers of the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council -- the United States, Britain, China, Russia and France; Germany, which has been involved in nuclear talks; and Solana.
As for meeting with top Iranian nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, Solana said such a meeting "is not impossible" for now.
Iran Conducts War Games
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/405419.aspx
CBNNews.com - PERSIAN GULF - Iran's Revolutionary Guards conducted a large-scale military exercise in the Persian Gulf Tuesday.
The exercise involved the group's navy, air force and ballistic missiles.
The Islamic State's Revolutionary Guards have ground, air and naval forces that supplement Iran's regular military forces.
According to the group's Web site, the drill was meant to improve the "combat capability of the missile and naval units."
Ali Shirazi, a Revolutionary Guard official, said if Iran were attacked, Tel Aviv and the US fleet in the Gulf would be targeted first.
"The Zionist regime is pushing the White House to prepare for a military strike on Iran," Shirazi said in a statement posted on the group's Web site.
"If attacked, we will overwhelm the enemy with our firepower," he said.
"If such stupidity is done by them, Tel Aviv and the US naval fleet in the Persian Gulf will be the first targets that will be set on fire in Iran's crushing response," the statement read.
According to Mahmoud Caharbagi, commander of the Revolutionary Guards' missile unit, "the long-range Fajer 3, Fajer 5 and Zizal, with ranges up to 150 kilometers [98 miles], are among the new instruments at the disposal of the Revolutionary Guards."
In June, the Revolutionary Guards threatened to close the Straits of Hormuz if the country were attacked.
Ahmadinejad: There Won't Be War
Meanwhile, during a visit to Malaysia Tuesday to attend a summit on developing Muslim nations, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said there won't be war between his country and Israel or the United States.
"I assure you that there won't be any war in the future," Ahmadinejad told reporters.
"[Israelis] are a complex political group, but you should know this regime will be eventually destroyed, and there is no need of any measure by the Iranian people," he said.
Addressing the United States, the Iranian president said the next US administration "would need at least 30 years in order to compensate, renovate and innovate the damages done by Mr. Bush."
"The greatest threat to the Middle East and the whole world…is the United States' intervention in other countries," he said, urging Washington to repair its reputation by "relying on [the] basis of justice, humanitarian acts and respect for human beings."
US Forces Drill in the Gulf
US forces in the Persian Gulf have been conducting their own drill, which began last week and will end Monday.
The Combined Task Force (CTG) 152, which includes ships from the US, United Kingdom and Bahrain, are participating in the exercise.
"The aim of the exercise is to protect the maritime infrastructure, such as gas and oil terminals, which are vital to the world's economy and get out through the Straits of Hormuz," Lt. Nathan Christensen, spokesman for the US Fifth Fleet in Bahrain, told The Media Line.
Responding to threats to close the Straits of Hormuz, Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen said he would not allow Iran to close the straits, which is used to transport most of the oil produced in the area.
Iran Has ‘Resumed’ A-Bomb Project
http://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/Iran_nukes/2008/07/08/110902.html
Intelligence information received by Western diplomats reports that Iran has resumed building equipment used for constructing atomic weapons.
According to the London-based Daily Telegraph, the latest intelligence indicates that the work is aimed at developing a bomb according to a blueprint provided by Pakistani scientist Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan, father of the Pakistanian nuclear program who sold information on building atom bombs to Iran in the early 1990s.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, along with senior officials from its Atomic Energy Agency, is reportedly directing the clandestine project that has been concealed from United Nation’s inspection teams.
Iran, the world's fourth-biggest oil exporter, says its nuclear activities are peaceful. The United States and its Western allies suspect they are a cover to build atomic bombs.
“If Iran’s nuclear intentions were peaceful there would be no need for it to undertake this work in secret,” says an official familiar with the intelligence reports.
Construction of the highly sophisticated atomic weapons is being done on the outskirts of Tehran, The Telegraph reports, and includes the advanced P-2 gas centrifuge for uranium enrichment.
Tehran last week announced to the world media that it has no intention of halting its uranium enrichment program.
European Union Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana tells The Jerusalem Post he hopes to hold talks with the Iranian nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili, before the end of the month to diffuse tensions in the region.
“There’s been no response yet. We are still talking among ourselves, but we hope to have a response soon… hopefully by the end of the month,” Solana says.
Shabtai Shavit, adviser to the Israeli parliament's defense and foreign affairs committee, tells The Sunday Telegraph that time is running out to prevent Iran from creating an atomic bomb, predicting that Iran is less than 12 months from achieving its nuclear ambitions.
Shavit, who retired from the Israeli intelligence agency in 1996, warns that he has no doubt Iran intends to use a nuclear weapon once it has the capability.
"The time that is left to be ready is getting shorter all the time," he says in an interview with The Sunday Telegraph.
"As an intelligence officer working with the worst-case scenario, I can tell you we should be prepared,” Shavit says.
“We should do whatever necessary on the defensive side, on the offensive side, on the public opinion side for the West, in case sanctions don't work. What's left is a military action."
An Iranian official speaking on behalf the republic was quoted by Reuters Tuesday as saying Iran will hit Tel Aviv, U.S. shipping in the Gulf and American interests around the world if it is attacked over its nuclear activities.
"The first bullet fired by America at Iran will be followed by Iran burning down its vital interests around the globe," the students news agency ISNA quotes Ali Shirazi, an aide to Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as saying in a speech to Revolutionary Guards.
More than 40 percent of all globally traded oil passes through the 35-mile-wide Strait of Hormuz, putting tankers entering or leaving the Gulf at risk from Iranian attacks, which Iran intends to use as leverage in the nuclear dispute.
Secret US-Iranian Dialogue Brings Oil Prices down, Shakes up Mid East Alliances
http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=1356
Oil prices suddenly slumped Tuesday, July 8, as predicted by DEBKA-Net-Weekly on June 27, under the impact of the secret American-Iranian talks embarked on last month to solve burning issues by diplomatic engagement.
These talks between the US and Iranian delegations, representing President George W. Bush and Iranian supreme ruler Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, have yielded ad hoc understandings on controversial issues. One is an agreement not to allow the price of oil to rocket past $150 the barrel.
DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s exclusive Gulf and Iranian sources disclosed that the bilateral negotiations were deliberately masked by the war fever engineered by Washington in the form of a stream of leaks indicating that a US or Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear installations was imminent.
At the same time, neither nation has sheathed its military option. Those understandings are ad hoc and could well break down in the volatile climate generated by hard-line elements of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, which are dead against deals with Washington.
The last in a string of belligerent statements issued by IRGC chiefs came from Ali Shirazy, senior Navy cleric, who said Tuesday, July 8: If the US attacks Iran, “we will immediately strike back at Tel Aviv. Our first target is Tel Aviv and only then will we attack US shipping in the Persian Gulf; their destruction will represent Iran’s crushing reprisal.”
Behind the saber-rattling, however, DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s sources reported common ground was covered for three key objectives:
1. The American side was willing to refrain from military action against Iran before the end of the Bush presidency in January 2009, but could not promise Israel would not act unilaterally. In a bid to hold Israel’s hand, sources in Washington have been putting out semi-official comments that Israel is short of the intelligence and military capability for striking Iran without help.
2. Iran undertook to open the way for the US military to continue to go from strength to strength in fighting al Qaeda and the Sunni guerrilla insurgents in Iraq, to allow President Bush to claim his Iraq campaign had ended successfully before leaving the White House. DEBKAfile’s military sources report that Tehran ordered Iranian intelligence officers working undercover in Iraq to halt attacks on US troops by pro-Iranian militias, including Moqtada Sadr’s Mehdi Army. This has left US and Iraqi government force with free hands for large-scale operations against al Qaeda.
Iranian officers are also sharing useful intelligence on conditions in the field with American commanders.
3. In the background of the secret dialogue is the Bush administration’s ambition to help fellow-Republican Senator John McCain get elected to the White House.
DEBKAfile’s Iran experts comment that the revolutionary regime in Tehran has traditionally preferred a Republican over a Democrat in the White House since the days when its founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, helped Ronald Reagan defeat Jimmy Carter.
Some of these understandings are still work in progress, but the oil price ceiling of $150 was definitely agreed and resulted in the sharp fall in prices Tuesday, July 6 by $3.92 a barrel. Some traders attributed it to an ease in geopolitical tensions related to Iran’s nuclear program and a strengthening US dollar.
DEBKAfile’s sources question the first part of this assessment, finding no real ease in tensions around Iran’s nuclear program.
Monday, July 8, the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet announced American, British and Bahraini vessels were to launch a new exercise in the Gulf called “Stake Net,” to practice tactics and procedures for protecting maritime infrastructure such as gas and oil installations.
The exercise was launched in response to threats by more than one Iranian military chief to control shipping in the Gulf and Strait of Hormuz if Iran was attacked or its regional interests jeopardized.
The ball was picked up by the Revolutionary Guards which launched a retaliatory naval maneuver the next day.
Tuesday, too, the New York Times ran an article called “Nearer to the Bomb” by nuclear physicist Peter D. Zimmerman, former chief scientist of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He wrote that all of Iran’s activities, especially in uranium enrichment, are evidence that its “near-term ability to make nuclear weapons is gathering strength.”
He further warned that once Iran begins enriching uranium to weapons grade on an assembly-line basis, “it could transfer this material to groups such as Hizballah and Hamas.” They could then “fabricate low-technology nuclear explosives with yields nearly as high as the bomb which destroyed Hiroshima.”
The understandings unfolding between Washington and Tehran have clearly impacted on Syria and Lebanon. One result was last month’s Doha accord for the election of Lebanese president Michel Sleiman, which has produced a new government in Beirut headed by the pro-Western Fouad Siniora with veto power for Hizballah ministers.
Washington has for the moment lowered the heat of political, economic and intelligence pressure on Iran’s close ally, Syrian president Bashar Assad and even Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah, permitting them to assume a role in political processes in Lebanon and the Middle East at large.
The bilateral understandings on Iraq have strengthened its Shiite prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, but even more dramatically revalued the Syrian president’s international legitimacy, although some aspects of his position are still under discussion between Washington and Tehran.
All the same, a senior Saudi official conversant with Lebanese and Syrian affairs put it this way: “On the face of it nothing has changed in Washington’s attitude towards Damascus, but in reality, it has undergone a transformation.”
The threats to the Assad regime have receded, notably the international tribunal for prosecuting the assassins of the former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri, and Washington has withdrawn its support for Syrian opposition factions.”
The Saudi official further commented: “A US-Iranian earthquake is rumbling under the surface of the Middle East, especially in Syria.”
Buying Time with Empty Rhetoric
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,378124,00.html
The absence of any substance in Tehran’s official response last week to the package of incentives offered by the world’s six major powers was all but lost in the hype and speculation about a possible breakthrough in the nuclear standoff. Again, we saw the ayatollahs’ now familiar ploy of trying to buy time by poking holes in the determination of the international community with promises of negotiations (maybe). But this time around, western capitals also witnessed signs of the mounting political discord within the inner circles of the theocratic regime. If they look closely, they may see very important clues about what positive measures the West might take to exploit these weaknesses.
First, there was a flurry of headlines about a “tonal shift” and “conciliatory remarks” from Tehran. The British ambassador to the United Nations even asserted that he had detected a “new language.” Then, late Friday afternoon, Iran’s official response to the group of 5+1 incentive package was delivered in Brussels, and with it the faint — albeit misplaced — hope for a breakthrough faded; Tehran had failed to address the central issue of suspending its uranium enrichment.
This core demand of the international community, embodied in four U.N. Security Council resolutions, was all but absent from Tehran’s response. Instead, the ayatollahs elaborated at great length about their desire for negotiations on “common points” between the incentive package and Tehran’s counteroffer. Kayhan newspaper, the mouthpiece of the establishment circle affiliated with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, stressed in its editorial that "Since the suspension of uranium was not a common point of the two packages, naturally it could not be regarded as one of the points of negotiation."
The reactions by Western diplomats were telling. Although the European Union’s foreign policy chief Javier Solana is known for putting the best possible spin on Tehran’s ploys, he told Agence France Presse on Monday that he was not too optimistic about prospects for a breakthrough. "There is no give on the substance whatsoever," said another Western diplomat familiar with Iran’s response.
The Iranian regime officials were even less diplomatic. Gholam Hossein Elham, the regime’s spokesman, told reporters that Tehran’s nuclear policy had not changed, confirming that “Iran would not comply with Security Council resolutions requiring it to stop enriching uranium,” according to the New York Times. Indeed, many top officials, from Khamene'i to his president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the new speaker of the parliament, Ali Larijani, have all emphatically declared that suspending enrichment is the regime’s “red line.” One wonders why western capitals cannot take no for an answer and insist on adding more incentives to the already incentive-rich package.
The source of the fanciful optimism about Tehran’s “new language” and “tonal shift” was apparently remarks by Ali Akbar Velayati, a top foreign policy adviser to the mullahs’ supreme leader Ali Khamenei. He told the hard-line daily Jomhouri Eslami that the group of 5+1 package of incentives could be acceptable "in principle" and that it was "expedient" for Iran to resume negotiations so as not to appear "isolated". His statements gave rise to expectations that Tehran might agree to suspension. So to clarify any misunderstanding, Velayati was sent out to “correct” his comments a few days later. Khamene'i had to make sure nobody would entertain the idea that his regime was retreating, even an inch.
In the meantime, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp (IRGC) warned that Israel and U.S. naval forces in the Persian Gulf would be among Tehran's first targets if it comes under attack, as the air and naval forces of the IRGC began a military exercise.
The Web site of the elite force posted a statement on May 7, quoting cleric Ali Shirazi, Supreme Leader's representative in the IRGC's naval forces, as saying that Tehran would retaliate against any military strike by targeting Tel Aviv and U.S. warships in the Gulf.
These are added signs that Tehran has chosen the confrontational path as opposed to reconciliation.
Although apparently contradictory, all these remarks on the nuclear issue come from different wings of the same ruling faction, whose backbone is the IRGC and is led by Ali Khamene'i. Faced with mounting political dissent and protests at home and growing isolation abroad, this “security-military” faction, as it is known inside Iran, is scrambling for a way out.
Once unified around a coherent policy (the nuclear drive, meddling in Iraq and other regional mischief) and its implementation, now groupings within this camp, while sharing the same strategic goals, are clashing about the best way to achieve them. This discord at the heart of the clerical regime is reducing its political and diplomatic maneuverability, while increasing its tendencies for belligerence inside Iran, Iraq and the region. The array of sanctions imposed by the United Nations, the United States, and the European Union - while still punitively mild - are exacting a toll, and the cracks are spreading within the regime.
According to the British daily Guardian, in addition to “Iran's domestic problems including high unemployment, inflation, and corruption,” the regime is also being adversely impacted by the domino effect of “moves in Britain and elsewhere to legitimize” the People’s Mojahedin (PMOI/MEK), Iran’s main opposition group which was recently removed from the UK’s blacklist.
Negotiation for the sake of negotiation is reckless, particularly in the case of the terrorist Tehran regime, which hopes to use the prolonged talks to run out the clock. This is no time for complacency, or for wishful thinking that some “tonal shift” from Tehran might amount to a real policy shift. Now is the time to increase the pressure. As Lord Waddington, former UK Home Secretary, told a gathering of more than 70,000 Iranians in Paris on June 28, 2008, the next task in dealing with Iran is to get the MEK "also delisted in Europe." And when that is done, "let’s hope we’ll influence those in America to delist the MEK in the United States of America." Waddington's plan would be a “new language,” and one that Tehran would understand.
Iraq official demands specific dates for US military withdrawal
http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=5416
Tough talk from Iraqi national security adviser Mouwaffak al-Rubaie
Iraq's national security adviser, Mouwaffak al-Rubaie, said Tuesday, July 8, his government will not accept the security accord under negotiation with the United States unless it contains specific dates for the withdrawal of U.S.-led forces.
DEBKAfile reports: President George W. Bush has consistently opposed any such timetable, as has the Republican presidential nominee John McCain. His Democratic rival, Barack Obama, once pledged withdrawal within 14 months if he were elected to the White House, but has since changed his position on the Iraq War and the US military role there.
DEBKAfile’s Gulf sources stress that al Rubaie’s demand is consistent with Tehran’s position that the sooner US troops quit Iraq the faster its problems will be solved. Iran’s leaders will undoubtedly view the Iraqi official’s demand as major achievement.
Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki’s statement a day earlier was less specific than the security adviser’s: He said he expects the pending troop deal with the United States to have “some type of timetable for withdrawal.”
The White House responded that Maliki did not appear to be proposing a “rigid timetable.”
In the light of the ongoing secret dialogue between Washington and Tehran, revealed by DEBKAfile, which dates from their covert cooperation over the Iraqi government operation against rogue militias in Basra five months ago, the White House may well accept a compromise, whereby Washington will consider withdrawing its forces from Iraq according to an agreed timeline, given the right conditions on the ground.
U.S. and Czechs sign missile defence deal
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/us.and.czechs.sign.missile.defence.deal/20276.htm
The United States and the Czech Republic signed a treaty on Tuesday allowing Washington to build part of a missile defence shield in the central European state despite opposition from its former Cold War master Russia.
The deal to create a radar station southwest of Prague was marred by a failure to seal a corresponding pact with Poland, where Washington wants to put 10 interceptor rockets that would be guided by the Czech site.
Washington says the shield would defend it and its European allies against missile attacks from a foe such as Iran, and points to intelligence suggesting Tehran could develop a long-range missile capable of striking its soil by 2015.
"We face with the Iranians, and so do our allies and friends, a growing missile threat that is getting ever longer and ever deeper, and where the Iranian appetite for nuclear technology . is still unchecked," U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in Prague.
Rice, who signed the treaty with Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, all but ruled out going to neighbouring Poland after meeting its foreign minister on Monday.
Talks with Warsaw have run into a snag over Warsaw's demands for billions of dollars to modernise its army and air defences.
Rice said Monday's negotiations had been constructive but she would not predict whether the two sides would reach a deal.
"I believe strongly that we are at a place where these negotiations need to come to a conclusion," Rice told reporters. "We are going to have to see if we can close the remaining gap."
Under the proposed $3.5 billion (1.8 billion pound) system, an sensors and radar would be used to detect an enemy missile in flight and guide a ground-based interceptor to destroy it without using explosives.
BASES NEAR RUSSIA
Russia says the shield is a threat and has threatened to aim nuclear missiles at central Europe if it is deployed. Washington says the 10 rockets are no match for Russia's atomic arsenal.
The United States was willing to make arrangements to make the system transparent to Moscow, but Russia would also have to discuss this directly with the Czech Republic, Rice said.
Political analysts say the bases in the former Soviet bloc would raise U.S. security interests in the region at a time when Russia grows more assertive about its role on the global stage.
"Moscow, of course, sees the move as a provocation and as a long-term security threat, and will seek to extract a hefty geopolitical or strategic price for going along," said Alexandr Kliment, an analyst at political risk consultancy Eurasia Group.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said after meeting U.S. President George W. Bush on Monday the two sides should keep talking despite failing to overcome differences on the shield.
But Russian media quoted a Russian foreign ministry source as saying the deal complicated European security and cancelled out consultations with Moscow on the shield.
"A step has been taken . which in our view has not added to security on the European continent. More than that, it has complicated problems of security," Interfax news agency quoted a senior foreign ministry source as saying.
Rice and Schwarzenberg faced questions both about whether the system would ultimately be able to stop missiles and whether Bush's successor would follow through with the plan. Critics of the system say more tests are needed to prove it works.
"It's hard for me to believe that an American president is not going to want to have the capability to defend our territory, the territory of our allies . against that kind of missile threat," said Rice.
HURDLES
The shield still faces hurdles, including heavy opposition in the Czech Republic, a country of 10.4 million that the Soviets occupied for two decades after invading in 1968.
It also faces obstacles to ratification in the Czech parliament, where the government has just 100 seats in the 200-seat chamber. Some deputies say they will oppose it along with the Social-Democrat opposition in a vote that could come after a new U.S. administration takes over in January.
An opinion poll last month showed 68 percent of Czechs were against the shield, while only 24 percent supported it.
"We believe that this could start another arms race, and we believe this will not raise the security of the Czech Republic," said Frantisek Smrcka, who along with other protesters unfurled a huge banner shaped like a target in the Czech capital.
Rice will also travel to Bulgaria and Georgia on her European trip this week.
Russia Threatens Military Action Over U.S. Missile Defense
http://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/us_russia_missile_defense/2008/07/08/111001.html
PRAGUE, Czech Republic — The United States and leaders of the Czech Republic agreed Tuesday to place a radar system in this former Soviet satellite that would warn of long-range missiles coming to Europe from the Middle East.
Russia is bitterly opposed, but Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice turned old Cold War rhetoric away from Moscow and toward Tehran as she signed the first solid treaty in what have been difficult negotiations.
Iran looms as an ever-larger threat and the next U.S. president is unlikely to walk away from the missile defense system the Bush administration is trying to establish in Eastern Europe, Rice said.
"We face with the Iranians, and so do our allies and friends, a growing missile threat that is growing ever longer and ever deeper and where the Iranian appetite for nuclear technology to this point is still unchecked," Rice said after signing the Czech agreement. "It's hard for me to believe that an American president is not going to want to have the capability to defend our territory (and) the territory of our allies."
The proposed U.S. missile defense system calls for a tracking radar in the Czech Republic and 10 interceptor missiles in Poland. Moscow has threatened to aim its own missiles at any eventual base in Poland or the Czech Republic.
Largely untested, expensive and unpopular among large majorities of the former East Bloc nations where it would be based, the theoretical missile shield also represents a potential foreign policy success that the Bush administration could pocket in its waning months.
The Bush administration is trying to arrange deals before President Bush leaves office in January.
Talks with Poland had bogged down recently over Polish demands for billions of dollars worth of U.S. military aid, in part to deter a possible strike from a peeved Russia. On Tuesday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said it would be forced to initiate a military response if the U.S.-Czech agreement is ratified. In February, then-President Vladimir Putin said Russia could aim missiles toward prospective missile defense sites and deploy missiles in the Baltic Sea region, which borders Poland, if the plan advances.
"Ballistic missile proliferation is not an imaginary threat," Rice said after meeting Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek. She said Iran continues to perfect the tools it might one day use to build a bomb, along with long-range missiles that could carry a warhead.
Fielding the system will take years and the winner of this fall's U.S. presidential election will have to decide whether to go ahead with the project. Republican John McCain is a supporter; Democrat Barack Obama has been more circumspect.
"I'm not going to get involved in the politics, but here's the case for missile defense," Rice said in preface to a lengthy discussion of what she claimed are the project's early successes and ultimate worth as a deterrent to a bellicose and unpredictable Iran. Rice said that similar anti-missile technology was deployed when North Korea test-fired long-range missiles two years ago and she cited the successful U.S. destruction of an errant satellite this year.
Rice said the shield is a good deal for the Czech Republic and for Poland, where the United States hopes to place another part of the system, although Warsaw hasn't yet agreed. The deal is far from done even in Prague, where the treaty signed Tuesday must be put to a vote in Parliament and where a second pact is still under negotiation.
Rice lobbied members of the Czech parliament directly Tuesday.
"This treaty will not only increase security of the Czech Republic but also of Europe," and beyond, Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg.
"I believe there will be enough members of Parliament who are aware of their responsibility and will vote for the agreement," Schwarzenberg said.
Only about a third of Czechs say they support the deal. Hundreds gathered in a Prague downtown square to protest the agreement, waving banners with slogans such as "It's not over yet," and "Condoleezza is not welcome!"
"The agreement between the Czech and the U.S. government is consistent with the attitude of Czech government which completely ignores the will of about 70 percent of Czech population," said Jan Tamas, an organizer of the rally.
"We believe it's not right for a democratic society when the government goes clearly against the will of the majority of people and that's why we're here today to protest against that."
Rice had hoped to make the week's visit in Eastern Europe a clean sweep for defense system, but said earlier Tuesday the Poles are not ready to sign a similar agreement now and there was little point in visiting Warsaw until the government there makes a move.
The United States has answered Polish demands for military hardware and the final agreement rests with Polish authorities, Rice said.
That marks a setback from last week when U.S. negotiators thought they had the outline of a deal. Warsaw rebuffed that tentative deal Friday, in strong language that U.S. diplomats said came as a surprise.
U.S. and Polish officials said talks would continue.
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