Category Archives: Middle East

Europe Refuses to Admit Iran is a Terror State with Tangible Evidence

Posted on by

When the United States collaborates with counterparts in Europe, it must be quite frustrating when European officials ignore evidence. Perhaps this is all driven by German Chancellor Merkel as she appears to only concentrate on stopping Brexit. But read on…

In Part: British intelligence in 2015 caught an alleged Hezbollah terrorist stockpiling more than three tons of ammonium nitrate, a common ingredient in homemade bombs, on the outskirts of London, but never divulged the plot, The Daily Telegraph reported Sunday.

The report said the arrest came just months after the UK joined the US and other world powers in signing the Iran nuclear deal and speculated that it was hushed up to avoid derailing the agreement with Tehran, which is the main supporter of the Lebanese Hezbollah group.

Acting on a tip from a foreign intelligence agency, MI5 and the Metropolitan Police raided four properties in North West London, discovering thousands of disposable ice packs containing ammonium nitrate, the Telegraph said.

According to the report, the plot was part of a wider Hezbollah plan to lay the groundwork for future attacks and noted foiled Hezbollah operations in Thailand, Cyprus and New York. All those plots were made public and were believed to have targeted Israeli interests around the world.

Ynetnews News - Hezbollah member jailed in Cyprus bomb ... photo

The Telegraph said the Cyprus case was strikingly similar to the one in London. In 2015 in Cyprus, confessed Hezbollah agent Hussein Bassam Abdallah was sentenced to six years in jail after he was found with 8.2 tons of ammonia nitrate in his home. He had reportedly planned to attack Israeli targets. (by the way, this Abdallah cat has dual citizenship of Lebanon and Canada.)

The Telegraph said its information came after a three-month investigation in which more than 30 current and former officials in Britain, America and Cyprus were approached and court documents were obtained. More here.

But hold on there is more. John Kerry and Barack Obama promised inspections and validations of the Iranian nuclear program, remember that? Well…..

For the first time since the signing of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, the UN’s nuclear watchdog on Monday did not explicitly report that Iran was implementing its nuclear-related commitments and said that its rate of uranium enrichment was increasing.

In each of the previous reports since the agreement, International Atomic Energy Agency director general Yukiya Amano wrote that “Iran is implementing its nuclear-related commitments,” text that was notably absent from Monday’s report.

Iran announced May 8 that it no longer considered itself bound to keep to the limits of stocks of heavy water and enriched uranium that it agreed to as part of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA),which lifted crippling economic sanctions against it. Tehran’s move came a year after US President Donald Trump pulled out of the deal. Washington has also reinforced economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

The latest IAEA report noted that “technical discussions… are ongoing” with Iran in relation to its installation of up to 33 advanced IR-6 centrifuges. But it did not specify the content of those discussions.

Iran has also said that if the other parties to the JCPOA do not speed up work on mitigating the effects of US sanctions, by early July it may stop abiding by restrictions on the level to which it can enrich uranium and on modifications to its Arak heavy water reactor.

Two weeks ago, the latest inspections report by the IAEA said that while stocks of uranium and heavy water had increased, they were still within the limits set by the JCPOA.

In Tehran on Monday, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif warned that those waging “economic war” against his country through US sanctions could not expect to “remain safe.” Read more here.

Iran is Cheating, Does Media Really Care About Truth?

Posted on by

In part from Senator Ted Cruz:

HOUSTON, Texas – U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, today issued a statement in response to reports that Iran has exceeded centrifuge limits set by the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action urging the United States to invoke the multilateral snapback in United Nations Security Council resolution 2231:

“Today’s report by the International Atomic Energy Agency confirms what I have long said: Iran is cheating on the catastrophic Obama Iran nuclear deal. In addition to secretly storing blueprints for nuclear weapons and refusing to turn over materials related to their nuclear weapons program, now they have pushed the envelope so far on centrifuges that the cheating can no longer be denied. The nuclear deal was designed to allow cheating, with the expectation that the Ayatollahs would blackmail the parties into ignoring their behavior. I have long said the nuclear deal should be ripped to shreds, and I applaud President Trump for all of the steps his administration has taken to that end. Now it is time to take the next step and invoke the multilateral snapback in United Nations Security Council resolution 2231, which the Obama administration rushed to pass in order to lock in the nuclear deal before Congress had a chance to weigh in.”

***

(This may add more context to the U.S. military deployment into the region and gotta wonder what John Kerry’s rebuttal is now…heh)

As Europe has been warned countless times by the the intelligence agencies in the United States, perhaps German intelligence will make a difference…..maybe? I received the one report but could not translate it. So, here is another version.

Iran's Weapons of Mass Destruction | Center for Strategic ... photo

The German intelligence agency for the northern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern wrote in its May report that the Islamic Republic of Iran is involved in the illicit procurement of technology for weapons of mass destruction.

In the 206-page report, that was reviewed by The Jerusalem Post, the intelligence agents wrote: “The fight against the illegal proliferation of nuclear, biological or chemical weapons of mass destruction and the materials needed for their manufacture, as well as the corresponding delivery systems [e.g. rockets], including the necessary knowledge, in cooperation with other authorities, also is the responsibility of counterintelligence.”

The intelligence report continued, “From these points of view, it is essentially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea [North Korea] and the Syrian Arab Republic that need to be mentioned. The intelligence services of these countries, in many ways, are involved in unlawful procurement activities in the field of proliferation, using globally oriented, conspiratorial business and commercial structures.”

The Mecklenburg-Vorpommern security officials noted that Iran’s regime, the Russian Federation and China are the main engines of intelligence gathering and should be viewed within a “security-related” context.

The Mecklenburg-Vorpommern report covers the year 2018 and was published just days after a damning Bavarian state intelligence report on Iran’s illicit activities.

According to the Bavarian report, Iran’s regime is “making efforts to expand its conventional arsenal of weapons with weapons of mass destruction.” The Bavarian agents define weapons of mass destruction as “the spread of atomic, biological, chemical weapons of mass destruction.”

Iran was termed a “risk country” in the 335-page Bavarian document outlining serious threats to the security and democracy of the state of Bavaria.

German domestic intelligence agencies are situated in each of the country’s 16 states and are roughly equivalent to the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency).

The Bavarian report noted that the country’s criminal customs police prevented an electronic beam-welding machine from being sold to Iran.

“The machine can be used for the production of [missile] launch vehicles,” said the document.

According to the report, extensive attempts were made “to disguise the actual customer in Iran” with respect to the machine. The real end-user was in Iran but the illicit activity said the end-user company was in Malaysia. The efforts to illegally bypass German export control regulations resulted in a criminal conviction of the director of the Bavarian-based company that sought to sell the welding machine to Iran.

The Bavarian agency said it will continue “to monitor whether Iran consistently and consequently complies with the agreement signed in July 2015.”

 

Oil Tankers Sabotage Using Limpets (UAE)

Posted on by

So far we know: We know it’s 4 Vessels, one Norwegian, and 2 Saudi. So, we are waiting on the EOD teams’ reports. Limpets are not really meant to sink a ship but rather interrupt maritime traffic either by causing leaks or destroying the rudder system(s).

• US Aiding w Investigation • Coast Guard: Exercise Caution • State Dept & UAE gov tight-lipped •Fmr US Amb.: Extremely Worrisome • : Could beef up US presence in region.

Iran?

The landing platform dock amphibious ship USS Arlington has also been dispatched to the region along with at least one Patriot missile battery. F-15Cs from RAF Lakenheath also showed up in the area late last week, although we still don’t know if their arrival was long-planned. Then again, it seems most of this was already scheduled to some degree, but portions of it were pushed forward due to the intelligence about potential pending Iranian aggression which remains nebulous at best, at least in terms of what the public has been told.

As for the attacks on the tankers, the New York Times states that Saudi Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih said the two tankers suffered “significant damage” from the incidents, but they did not result in a major release of oil into the sea. One of the ships was supposedly on its way to pick up oil from Saudi Arabia and deliver it to the United States. The attacks occurred off of UAE’s Fujairah Emirate, one of the biggest bunkering locales for ships in the entire region.

Video Emerges of ISIS Leader al Baghdadi

Posted on by

He released a speech about the end of the ISIS caliphate as he sat beside 3 other ISIS members. He praised the attack in Sri Lanka. He has not been seen in an estimated 5 years. He urged his members to persevere and continue fighting everywhere. The authenticity of the video remains unclear, which is the same for his whereabouts.

Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was pictured in a new video for the first time since July 2014, SITE Intelligence Group said Monday.

The video was released by ISIS’s propaganda arm al-Furqan.

Rumors of al-Baghdadi’s death have persisted as ISIS militants who have surrendered to U.S.-backed coalition forces, believed their ideological leader abandoned their cause.

Baghdadi also suffers from diabetes, high blood pressure and injuries sustained during an airstrike years ago.

*

The United States is offering up to $25 million for any credible information that leads to his capture.

Zarif/Iran Making War Noise, Pentagon Ready

Posted on by

Iran of course is angry the United States declared the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp a terror organization. Well, it is. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif is making the media rounds and he is throwing out words like war, military intervention and conflict. Reinforcing Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s stance, Zarif warned: “If the United States takes the crazy measure of trying to prevent us from doing that, then it should be prepared for the consequences.” He did not give specifics.

Kerry, Zarif named candidates for 2016 Nobel Peace Prize

Zarif is even making noise about prisoner swaps as this shows some desperation including blocking the Strait of Hormuz from maritime oil tanker traffic. Stop the oil sanctions and we can pursue a prisoner swap..hummm. Zarif has also suggested possible cooperation with the United States to bring stability to Iraq and Afghanistan, a priority for both Tehran and Washington, but did not mention Syria.

US Central Command Chief General Kenneth McKenzie said on Saturday that the United States would deploy the necessary resources to counter any dangerous actions by Iran, Sky News Arabia reported.

“We’re gonna continue to reach out to our partners and friends in the region to ensure that we make common cause against the threat of Iran,” McKenzie, on an official visit to the Gulf region, was quoted as saying by Sky News Arabia.

“I believe we’ll have the resources necessary to deter Iran from taking actions that will be dangerous,” he said, according to a transcript released by the Abu Dhabi-based channel.

He said: “We will be able to respond effectively.”

Tensions between Tehran and Washington have risen since the Trump administration last year withdrew from an international nuclear deal with Iran and began ratcheting up sanctions.

Earlier this month, the United States blacklisted Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

Washington on Monday demanded buyers of Iranian oil stop purchases by May or face sanctions, ending six months of waivers which allowed Iran’s eight biggest buyers, most of them in Asia, to continue importing limited volumes.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and some senior military commanders have threatened to disrupt oil shipments from Gulf countries if Washington tries to strangle Tehran oil exports.

McKenzie also said a reduction of US troops in Syria would be done cautiously.

“On the long term, we’re gonna reduce our forces in Syria, we recognize that, that’s the guidance in which we are operating.”

“That will be something that we will look at very carefully as we go forward,” the general said.

President Donald Trump had ordered the withdrawal of US troops Syria in December after he said they had defeated ISIS extremist group in Syria.

In February, a senior administration official said the United States will leave about 400 US troops split between two different regions of Syria.

McKenzie also said he was confident that the US is going to have “a long term presence in Iraq, focused on the counter-terror mission.”