Iran officials encourage pre-emptive attack against Israel

Senior Tehran officials are recommending a preemptive strike against Israel to prevent an Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear reactors, a senior Islamic Republic official told foreign diplomats two weeks ago in London.

The official, Dr. Seyed G. Safavi, said recent threats by Israeli authorities strengthened this position, but that as of yet, a preemptive strike has not been integrated into Iranian policy.

Safavi is head of the Research Institute of Strategic Studies in Tehran, and an adviser to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. The institute is directly affiliated with Khamenei's office and with the Revolutionary Guards, and advises both on foreign policy issues.

Safavi is also the brother of Yahya Rahim Safavi, who was the head of the Revolutionary Guards until a year ago and now is an adviser to Khamenei, and holds significant influence on security matters in the Iranian government.

An Israeli political official said senior Jerusalem officials were shown Safavi's remarks, which are considered highly sensitive. The source said the briefing in London dealt with a number of issues, primarily a potential Israeli attack on an Iranian reactor.

Safavi said a small, experienced group of officials is lobbying for a preemptive strike against Israel. "The recent Israeli declarations and harsh rhetoric on a strike against Iran put ammunition in these individuals' hands," he said.

Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz said in June that Israel would be forced to strike the Iranian nuclear reactor if Tehran continues to pursue its uranium enrichment program.

Safavi said Tehran recently drafted a new policy for responding to an Israeli or American attack on its nuclear facilities. While the previous policy called for attacks against Israel and American interests in the Middle East and beyond, the new policy is to target Israel alone.

He added that many Revolutionary Guard leaders want to respond to a U.S. attack on Iranian soil by striking Israel, as they believe Israel would be partner to any U.S. action.

Safavi said that Iran's nuclear program is intended for peaceful purposes only, and that Khamenei recently released a fatwa against the use of weapons of mass destruction, though the contents of that religious ruling have not yet been publicized.

Regarding dialogue with the United States and the West, Safavi said Iran's decision would be influenced by the results of the U.S. presidential elections next month, as well as by the Iranian presidential elections in June and the economic situation in the Islamic Republic.

Safavi also said that a victory by U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama would pave the way for dialogue with Washington, while a John McCain presidency would bolster Iran's extreme right, which opposes dialogue. If conditions are favorable following the U.S. election, he said, Iran could draw back from President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's declaration that "the nuclear case is closed," and put it back on the agenda.

Safavi said he believed that U.S. sanctions on Iran have run their course, and that there would be no point in strengthening them. Tehran would therefore demand "firm and significant" U.S. measures in return for stopping uranium enrichment. He also said Ahmadinejad is not guaranteed victory in the June 2009 elections, particularly given the dire economic situation in Iran. Still, Iranian experts believe his only real competition is former president Mohammad Khatami, who has not yet joined the race.

Safavi said the inflation rate in Iran is similar to that before the 1979 Islamic Revolution, but that unrest among civilians today is not as strong. This is because the current government uses oil revenues to help the poor, he said. Written by Barak Ravid in Ha Aretz

CBS' 60 Minutes on Israel Air Force preparations vs Iran: garner support FOR or against Israel military preemption of nuclear armed Iran?

Preview: The IAF. The Israeli Air Force has to prepare for anything says one of its officers, because if Israel loses just one war, it will cease to exist. Bob Simon's report airs Sunday, April 27, at 7 p.m. ET/PT


Air Force Chief On Iran Threat: The head of Israel's Air Force, Maj. Gen. Eliezer Shkedy, tells Bob Simon the threat from Iran is real and that it can't be ignored.


Bob Simon's Notebook: Israel's Air Force has been its first line of defense for 60 years. Bob Simon reports that they are prepared for any threat.

Society's responsibility to pre-empt various walking-time-bomb mentalities

Jonathan Kay's editorial in Canada's National Post "A fine line between jihad and insanity," he argues that radical-Islamism (evidenced as the motivating theology behind the murder of 3,000 New Yorkers in 2001, and many acts of domestic Islamist violence since, including the current, Seattle Jewish Federation Massacre defendant, 32-year-old, Mr. Naveed Haq, (watch dramatic trial testimony here) who wounded 5 people and murdered Ms. Pamela Waechter, 58, a Lutheran-born, community leader) has given society enough reason to pre-emptively separate its existing acolytes from the public in the interest of public safety and ban its practice among us.

"Jihadi terrorists aren't WWII-style soldiers, who could be trusted to return to civilian life once their war ended. At the same time, they aren't like normal murderers -- not only because their crimes are more monstrous, but because they aren't animated by the usual criminal motivations of greed and lust. The threat of jail -- or even the gallows -- has no relevance to a jihadi. He wants to become a martyr. His crimes are motivated by the quasi-psychotic delusion that God delights in the random killing of innocent civilians."

Of course, the line between religion and psychosis has always been blurry. Let a man mutter that he hears other-worldly voices in his head, and we back away, avoiding eye contact. But let the man then specify that the whisperings he hears are God's, and we instead nod politely, and perhaps even take one of his pamphlets. It's only because of our culturally rooted respect for organized religion that we've traditionally ignored the similarities between psychosis and divine revelation.

That should have changed in 2001. Though the 9/11 killers were not technically psychotic in a medical sense, that should now be seen as a distinction without a difference.

By their own admission, sworn jihadis believe that mysterious forces beyond human control require God's servants to engage in indiscriminate slaughter. How is this different from the violent schizoid who gets locked away in an asylum for the rest of his life (with nary a protest from NGOs or the left-wing media, it might be added) for exactly the same reason, minus Allah?

(...) The United States has laws that keep dangerous lunatics behind bars indefinitely. Which is to say that Haq would be treated as a man who is neither criminal nor "unlawful combatant," but rather as a damaged human specimen who, by reason of deadly mental infection, cannot be trusted to mingle freely among his fellow humans without trying to kill them.

Bipolar or not, is this not the very definition of just about every jihadi terrorist?

Read original here.