“Memo to Secretary Clinton: Iran is neither a military dictatorship nor a police state... Yet."

In FP/ here via RFI

“Memo to Secretary Clinton: Iran is neither a military dictatorship nor a police state. Yet. There is no visible military presence at the international airport, where despite a European ban on flights to and from its capitals in mid-April when I arrived, jumbo jets discharged and loaded thousands of passengers a day arriving and leaving for points east and west. Tehran’s sleek and bustling Imam Khomeini international airport reminded one that an Icelandic volcano had temporarily managed to do to Europe what no American administration has succeeded in doing to Iran: isolating it—though not for lack of effort. There is also no visible military presence in the sprawling city of some 12 million souls and at times it seems an equal number of cars—save for the occasional hapless-looking, newly shorn, and unarmed young army conscript in fatigues, begging a ride on the back of a motorcycle or in a shared taxi, a presence that has always been visible in any city in Iran, even in days of the monarchy.” .....

“Iran is not in a revolutionary, not even pre-revolutionary state and the emperor is, unlike the shah of old (whose nakedness was revealed for all when he proclaimed in November 1978, on live national television, that he had ‘heard the people’s revolution,’), still very much clothed. ‘We can only pray for the health and life of the rahbar,’ I heard many times in Tehran; people from all walks of life (including staunch reformists) agreeing that without the supreme leader firmly in control, the stability of the country was seriously at risk, or that a small and extremist group of politicians might accomplish what Clinton warned of, a military dictatorship, back in February. A working-class acquaintance from South Tehran, one who told me last spring that Ahmadinejad would win the election even though he has boycotted every election in the Islamic Republic, was particularly dismissive of any talk of revolution or toppling the government. ‘Those on the other side of the water,’ he said, referring to Iranians in the United States, ‘exhort us to spill onto the streets and confront the system. For what? They want me to revolt on behalf of those who drive $300,000 Benzes on the streets of Tehran? Never.’”.....

“The nuclear issue looms large here in Tehran—there has never been as much talk and even anxiety over the possibility of a military assault on Iran, not even during George W. Bush’s days—but the issue seems to have become a distraction that impedes progress on all fronts, and not the weak point for the regime. My airport cab driver reminded me, as we were going around a traffic circle at an early-morning breakneck pace that he would be unable to repeat later in the day, that despite the ills of society and the political differences in Iran he recognized weren’t disappearing as fast as the anti-government street demonstrations, Iranians had one thing in common. ‘We Iranians have namoos,’ he said, ‘and if anyone even thinks of ravishing her, our gheirat will take over. Iran is our namoos.’ Namoos is a man’s wife, his woman; her chastity his responsibility to protect, and gheirat is pride and dignity—concepts both Persian and Islamic and one reason women, ‘sisters’ in the Islamic Republic, wear the hijab and many did even under the secular shah. What the driver meant was that if Iran were attacked, Iranians, and he presumably thought me as well, would defend her with their lives....

Tehran’s nuclear summit in mid-April, dubbed ‘Nuclear Energy for All; Nuclear Weapons for None’ and timed to contrast with Obama’s own summit in Washington (to which Iran was not invited), was, despite a paucity of media coverage in the West, successful in laying out Iran’s stated nuclear agenda—non-proliferation as well as complete disarmament—for a domestic audience and sympathetic listeners in the Middle East, Central Asia, and the developing world. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s opening address to the conference, read by his top foreign-policy advisor Ali Akbar Velayati, in which he emphatically proclaimed weapons of mass destruction haram, strictly forbidden in Islam, went a long way in convincing at least the pious that Iran is not developing nuclear arms…

But Iranians seem to also know that no summit, fatwa, or public proclamation by their officials will convince the United States that Iran is not hell-bent on building a nuclear bomb and then either deploying it against Israel, handing it over to terrorists, or using it to threaten the world at large (none of those scenarios appearing to be particularly plausible to the average citizen or even to citizens of the region). There are no scientific polls that can accurately gauge public support for Iran’s nuclear posture, but here in the capital it is hard to find an Iranian who doesn’t agree with at least the concept that Iran deserves to enjoy the same rights as other states when it comes to nuclear energy, even as many may find Ahmadinejad’s diplomatic tactics distasteful. In that sense, the military parade in Tehran on the second day of the nuclear summit and the Revolutionary Guards’ maneuvers in the Persian Gulf a week later were simply expressions of the national gheirat, particularly in light of escalating threats emanating from Washington and Tel Aviv.”..."

Reasons to be anxious about Afghanistan

Ignatius/ here

" ... The much-touted offensive in Marja in Helmand province in February succeeded in clearing that rural area temporarily of Taliban insurgents, at least by day. But plans for the Afghans to provide more security and better governance there are off to a shaky start, officials at the State Department and Pentagon say.

Gen. Stanley McChrystal's boast in February that "We've got a government in a box, ready to roll in" to Marja now sounds wildly over-optimistic. A senior military official concedes that this phrase "created an expectation of rapidity and efficiency that doesn't exist now."....... the senior military official cautions that 90 days after the offensive, "Marja is a mixed bag," with parts of the area still controlled by the Taliban and Afghan government performance spotty. A top State Department official agrees: "Transfer is not happening" in Marja.

Kandahar, the next big test of the U.S. strategy, will be even harder...........

But Karzai himself is a symbol of U.S. worries about the feasibility of transferring governance and security to the Afghans.... If Afghanistan's strategy for reconciliation is fuzzy, the Obama administration's is nonexistent, at least publicly. "We don't have a plan yet," worries the senior military official.... One big problem with framing a reconciliation strategy now is that U.S. officials want to bargain from a position of strength. "We aren't there yet," the senior military official says bluntly.....

The Obama administration has just over a year to make the kind of progress in Afghanistan that would provide a political rationale for staying awhile longer. The public will hear upbeat talk this week from Karzai and President Obama, but it shouldn't disguise the underlying anxiety on both sides that the feasibility of the U.S. strategy for this war has yet to be proved."

Netanyahu, like Begin ... before him, see Hitler everywhere ....

Ben-Ami in the DailyStar/here

"..... the past, especially when not handled with care, can be the enemy of the future and distort our reading of the challenges of the present. This is certainly the case with the analogy that Israeli leaders insist on drawing between the destruction of European Jewry in the Holocaust and the threat posed to the Jewish state by a nuclear-armed Iran....

Shimon Peres, who, .... spoke of the “threat of extermination” facing Israel.

Ehud Barak, ..... to alert world opinion against “Holocaust deniers, first and foremost the Iranian president, who calls for the destruction of the Jewish people.”

Netanyahu, .... To him, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is another Hitler..... The career of his political mentor, Menachem Begin, demonstrated that distorted analogies between past and present can inspire irresponsible policies. In his disastrous 1982 invasion of Lebanon, Begin perceived himself as a God-sent vindicator of the legacy of the Holocaust. He chose to portray what was a cynical alliance of convenience between Israel and the Christian Lebanese Forces as a lesson to humanity and a rebuke of that hypocritical Christian Europe which had betrayed the Jews during the Holocaust. He would show them how the Jewish state, created by Holocaust survivors and now led by one, would come to the rescue of a Christian minority threatened with destruction......

To Begin, Arafat in Beirut was Hitler in his Berlin bunker. Indeed, Abba Eban ridiculed Begin for behaving “as if Israel were a kind of disarmed Costa Rica and the PLO was Napoleon Bonaparte, Alexander the Great, and Attila the Hun all wrapped into one.”......."

Republicans block Syria envoy confirmation motion...

"Senate Republicans blocked a unanimous consent motion to confirm Obama's nominee to be ambassador to Syria this afternoon. Democrats sought to confirm the well regarded diplomat Robert S. Ford to be ambassador to Damascus by a unanimous consent motion Friday, but Sen. Tom Coburn (R.-Ok.) objected, the AFP reports. "Republicans accused Democrats of bringing up Ford and other nominations on Friday to make ' political point' about Republican holds on several Obama administration nominees, the AFP said..."

Jeffrey Feltman to 'help' with Iraq government formation

Politico/ here

"... Feltman is headed to Iraq next week to help both with Iraqi government formation and the military to civilian transition of the U.S. presence, sources tell POLITICO. It's not really an unusual trip, one source apprised of the trip said on condition of anonymity. Of course the U.S. has an interest in getting the military-to-civilian transition right, and also to talk to the Iraqis about government formation, the source said. Feltman may also travel to other countries in the region, including Jordan, although his exact itinerary isn't clear, another source said.

Athens to Beirut: "Cooking your books will come back to haunt you, no matter who your friends are"

DailyStar/ here

"... The (OVER) $50 billion in public debt is not a mirage and is not going away. Worse, that official number does not really include all the glaring red numbers in the accounting of the National Social Security Fund, the Council for the South and various other reconstruction bodies, which have debts conveniently shielded from much public view.

We need to take heed from the example of Greece. The circumstances are different, certainly, but the meltdown in Athens should sound a loud warning to this country’s government and political leadership. If those individuals do not pursue clarity in Lebanon’s finances, we will all be punished.

Lebanon might face a far worse threat than Greece, we must add, because our economy is not as Greece’s was before its fall. In addition, we do not have saviors such as the 26 other member states of the EU, whether Germany or any of the other world’s largest economies located there. We do not share a currency such as the euro for which other might feel concern.

Let’s be honest – we have not had an approved budget here in five years. We cannot count on other Arab nations to bail us out.

Some might counter that our robust financial system will save us; it is more like a shock absorber, in reality. With our wobbly economy, the finance sector is like a water reservoir looking for some promising ground to irrigate. Sure, real estate prices are growing healthily, but the money produced is leaving the country and not being reinvested.

In the end, we must get our books straight – for the Lebanese people and even for the self-preservation of our ruling elite.

The turmoil in Greece – which is going to make life worse there for years to come – is a message to Lebanon that no budget trickery can last forever.

Assad to Turkey & Medvedev to Syria & Turkey ...

Interesting waltz ... The world moves beyond Dennis Ross at ADL, Jeffrey Feltman & the sanctions & the accusations & threats of that colony inhabited by evil leprechauns

Hurriyet/ here

"... Syrian President Bashar al-Assad will visit Turkey at the weekend for talks on bilateral ties and prospects of regional peace... Al-Assad's visit coincides with tensions over Israeli accusations that Syria is supplying long-range Scud missiles to the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, a charge Damascus has strongly denied.

Meanwhile, President Dmitry Medvedev will travel to Syria on Monday to tighten ties with the Soviet-era ally on the first ever visit to the country by a Russian or Soviet head of state. With Russia promoting itself as a major power in the Middle East, Medvedev will follow up the two-day Syria visit with a Turkey stopover for talks with the Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Accompanied by a large business delegation, Medvedev was set to meet President Bashar al-Assad and possibly oversee the signing of an economic agreement, a spokesman at the Russian embassy in Damascus told AFP. "We are seeking to recover lost ground with old friends," the spokesman said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Medvedev's visit comes days after Washington renewed U.S. sanctions on Syria for a year, accusing it and Iran of supporting "terrorist" groups.

Analysts said sanctions against Iran and U.S. pressure on Syria would most certainly be a major subject of talks between Medvedev and al-Assad. "Russia will seek to reduce pressure around Syria," said Alexander Shumilin, head of the Middle East Conflicts Analysis Center at Russia's U.S. and Canada Institute.

The visit, analysts added, will be a chance for Russia to thumb its nose at the United States. "It will be one more excuse to demonstrate that we talk to whoever we want to talk," said Alexei Malashenko, an analyst with the Carnegie Moscow Center...."

"... The more Iran pursues nuclear capabilities, the more Cairo rails against Israel’s Bomb ..."

ArmsControlWonks/ here

"... The more Iran pursues nuclear capabilities, the more Cairo rails against Israel’s Bomb. In diplomacy, as in sports, this is known as a misdirection play: The nuclear threat posed to Egypt by Israel, with whom it signed a peace treaty in 1979, hasn’t changed. The big change in Egypt’s neighborhood has been attempts by Iraq, Libya, Iran and Syria to acquire capabilities to make nuclear weapons.

The Non-Proliferation Treaty review conference has now opened in New York. Cairo holds the key to its success or failure. Egypt is in a position to play the spoiler’s role because it chairs both the 118-nation Non-Aligned Movement and the New Agenda Coalition — a group of eight influential states, including Brazil and South Africa. Egypt has given notice that it seeks to mount a campaign at the month-long conference to pressure Israel, a non-party to the Treaty, to cap and reverse its nuclear program.

Cairo has a legitimate beef. When the NPT was extended indefinitely in 1995, member states endorsed a resolution championed by Egypt calling for practical, progressive steps to establish an effectively verifiable zone free of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems in the Middle East. Israel has been a free-rider to the NPT, enjoying the constraints the Treaty imposes on others while remaining an outlier. .........Iran and Venezuela will make a ruckus at the review conference, but they cannot define its success or failure. If, on the other hand, Egypt becomes a ringleader, lining up Arab states to hold the NPT hostage to the behavior of a non-member state, the conference can end poorly. A weakened NPT would then provide more latitude for Iran’s nuclear ambitions and increase hedging strategies elsewhere in the Middle East.

What game will Egypt play? Cairo has a serious security dilemma. It signed the NPT in 1968 and finally ratified the treaty in 1981. Later in the 1980s, it appeared to give up on having a civil nuclear power program. Cairo said little after the discovery of an advanced nuclear program in Iraq and boxed centrifuge parts in Libya. Egypt was part of what the Egyptian newspaper, Al-Ahram, called this the “synchronized silence of the Arab world” following Israel’s bombing of the covert Syrian nuclear facility in September, 2007. (During Nasser’s rule, Egypt and Syria forged a short-lived federation. For Syria to seek the Bomb while Egypt’s nuclear options were closed must have been especially galling to Cairo.) Egypt tellingly abstained during the November, 2009 vote on Iranian noncompliance at the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Board of Governors. Meanwhile, other neighbors, including Algeria, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates and Israel began to move forward with plans for nuclear power plants.

The more Cairo bites its tongue about troubling developments in the Muslim world, the more it amplifies its concerns about Israel’s nuclear program. Egypt is taking precautionary steps to deal with its security dilemma.....

When asked on the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on April 12th whether Egypt might feel that it must develop its own nuclear weapons, Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit replied, “We will not announce ourselves on that possibility now.” Misdirection plays can work smartly, or they can backfire badly. An ugly outcome at the NPT review conference would increase nuclear dangers in the Arab world and beyond, but blaming Israel for this state of affairs would also widen Egypt’s nuclear options.

Der Spiegel: "Experts suspect Brazil may be working on a nuclear bomb ..."

I suggest to sensatiospiegel to give the info to the 'Hariri-aka-Hezbollah tribunal' ... Here

"...... "That's my man right here," US President Barack Obama once said, in praise of his Brazilian counterpart. Lula, as he is known, can even afford to receive Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with all honors and demonstratively endorse his nuclear program, ........

It sounds harmless enough, but it isn't, because the term "nuclear-powered submarines" could in fact be a cover for a nuclear weapons program...."

(more, here)

"By all measures, Pakistan is a more serious threat to the U.S. and to the lives of American citizens than Iran ..."

The Compass/ here

"... Nearly every claim made regarding Iran can be made with respect to Pakistan, in spades:

* Supports terrorism? Check. Only Pakistan's terrorists have the demonstrated intention, and reach, to hit the American homeland.

* Developed a nuclear weapon. Check. Something Iran has yet to do.

* Proliferated nuclear technology. Check. Again, Iran has a lot of catching up to do here.

* Trafficked nuclear know-how to terrorist groups. Check. For all the hysteria about Iran's potential to pass nuclear know-how to terrorists groups, Pakistani nuclear scientists have met with bin Laden, who is clearly more of a threat to the U.S. than Hezbollah or Hamas. True, Pakistan is not run by "mullahs" but it has been a bona fide military dictatorship shot through with Islamist sympathizers, when not under the weak and often corrupt rule of civilians. Unlike Iran, Pakistan has repeatedly engaged in open, conventional war with its neighbor. Iran fought one major war - which it did not start.

Iran's leaders may be openly hostile to the U.S., whereas Pakistan's are more than happy to pocket taxpayer dollars in return for uneven cooperation. But if opinion polls are to be trusted, Pakistanis have deeply unfavorable views of the U.S. Perhaps this explains why Pakistanis - not Iranians - are frequently implicated in anti-American terror plots.

If you had to wager which terrorist group was going to get its hand on a nuclear weapon (and from which country they'd procure it), I'd say the safe money, by far, would be a Sunni jihadist group based in Pakistan and not a Shiite terror group in Iran. And yet, each day brings thunderous cries to bomb Iran or scathing blasts against the Obama administration for fecklessness regarding Iran's nuclear program. And very, very little about Pakistan. Why? (more/ here)

Aah voila! "... one exception: Americans are allowed to serve in the Israel Defense Forces without losing their citizenship..."

"Bow to your corner, bow to your own.

Three hands up and 'round you go,

Break it up with a dosey-do...."

Politico:

"...There is one exception to the existing law: Americans are allowed to serve in the Israel Defense Forces without losing their citizenship...."

"... the Muslims have Mecca, & we have Jerusalem...”

"...Elie Wiesel says that in his private lunch meeting with President Obama at the White House on Tuesday, the president “wanted me to understand” his commitment to Israel. ..... how important Israel, and particularly Jerusalem, is to the Jewish people.

“I had a good feeling” about the long lunch, Wiesel, 81, told The Jewish Week the next day in the first one-on-one interview he granted since the lunch. “There was no small talk; it was all substance,” he said of the meeting, with just the two men in the room. “I spoke about what Jerusalem means to me. I said the Muslims have Mecca, and we have Jerusalem.” .... “I am a free man,” he said several times, adding at one point: “I don’t like to be used.”.....He repeated his assertion that Iranian President Ahmadinejad, who threatens to annihilate Israel, should be arrested and tried at The Hague for crimes against humanity..."

WINEP: "Damascus & Tehran engineered the Scud crisis to divert US-led efforts to sanction Iran for its nuclear endeavors..."

WINEP's Schenker, here

".... Despite the fact that no authoritative evidence has been presented showing that the transfer actually occurred, in many ways the reports appear credible. First, the Israeli accusations were tabled by two unlikely officials -- President Shimon Peres and Minister of Defense Ehud Barak -- who are well-known supporters of Israeli-Syrian peace (Whoa...) negotiations. Likewise, ..... Dianne Feinstein and another off-the-record statement by a senior administration official to the Wall Street Journal -- have lent weight to the allegations. (basically two Zionist criminals & two staunchly pro-Israel Americans, objectivity maketh!)

..... the transfer of Scuds to Hizballah would be entirely consistent with the reckless and provocative policies pursued by Syrian President Bashar Assad in recent years. Despite the risks, for example, Damascus for years openly facilitated the movement of insurgents into Iraq to kill Americans and destabilize its neighbor. And Syria -- which proclaims that its "foreign policy depends on supporting the resistance" -- has a track record of providing top-shelf weapons to Hizballah, including the Russian-made Kornet anti-tank system and its own indigenously-produced 220mm anti-personnel rockets. In this regard, the Scuds -- if transferred -- would represent a change of magnitude but not of kind.

Not surprisingly, Damascus and Beirut -- which increasingly is parroting the Syrian line -- have denied the Scud reports. Indeed, in a recent interview with the Italian daily La Stampa, Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri derisively likened the Scud claims to faulty US intelligence on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMD).....

The Scud crisis is to some extent a tempest in a teapot. An antiquated system, the Scud is more a psychological than strategic threat to Israel. While the missile is capable of carrying WMD warheads or a heavy payload in excess of 1,000 pounds, it does little to expand the already impressive arsenal that Syria has helped Hizballah to acquire. Likewise, this heavy weapon would seem an anathema to the successful highly mobile insurgency tactics employed by the organization .....does not consider the Scud to be a significant upgrade to its armory......... Hizballah already possesses the Iranian-made (Syria-provided) Fatah-110, which takes "less than four minutes for an experienced hand" to launch and is accurate to within 5-10 meters. Of course, the payload capacity and range are less, but 250 kilometers, the Hizballahi says, "is the distance required for precise strikes in all the land of occupied Palestine". The Fatah-110 is also WMD capable.

Given the negligible strategic benefit ......why have the reports emerged now? ......More likely, Damascus and Tehran engineered the Scud crisis to divert US-led efforts to build an international coalition to sanction Iran for its nuclear endeavors. Indeed, the timing of the reports is eerily reminiscent of Hizballah's cross-border operation on July 12, 2006, which occurred the same day the P-5+1 meeting in Paris was slated to refer the Iranian nuclear issue to the UN Security Council. The kidnapping/killing of Israeli soldiers sparked a war that effectively purchased Tehran nearly another year of unfettered enrichment activity. (While it's impossible to know with any certainty, the new diversion initiative might have been what was discussed at the February 2010 meeting in Damascus between Assad, Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinezhad).

Today, though tensions remain high, both Israel and Hizballah do not appear interested in an escalation. And until the next war, it will likely not be known whether Hizballah in fact obtained the Scuds from Syria. Nevertheless, for Washington the crisis is a useful reminder that Damascus, whether innocent or guilty of this particular transfer, continues to provide the Shi'ite militia with increasingly advanced capabilities that will make the next war even costlier for Lebanon and Israel. But for Washington, the Scud issue should prompt more than just a temporary refocusing on the well-intentioned but poorly implemented United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701, which calls for Syria to end weapons transfers to its Iranian-backed allies in Lebanon.

That the Assad regime is upping the ante with Israel via Hizballah at the very moment Washington is working to deepen its diplomatic engagement with Damascus should give the Obama administration pause. If this unhelpful Syrian behavior continues, the Obama administration will likely arrive at the same conclusion the Bush administration reached in 2004: that Damascus actually is -- as it so vociferously claims to be -- a regime dedicated to supporting "the resistance." One year into President Barack Obama's tenure, it may be too early to declare the Syria policy a failure. But the administration's decision earlier this month to renew sanctions against Damascus just might suggest a growing appreciation in the White House as to the nature of the Syrian regime and perhaps for the limits of diplomatic engagement with this self-defined resistance state."

Charlie Rose: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, President of Iran

Interview on NPT/ here, via Race For Iran/ here

Throughout his nearly hour-long interview with Charlie, Ahmadinejad emphasized the extent to which the Islamic Republic, and he personally have gone to engage the United States since Barack Obama was elected President. Ahmadinejad cites his own personal letter of congratulations to President-elect Obama (which has never been answered), Iran’s willingness to cooperate with the United States in Afghanistan, Iraq, and even Palestine, and Tehran’s continuing interest in working with the United States and other countries to refuel the Tehran Research Reactor as a confidence-building measure that could pave the way for additional cooperation.

Furthermore, Ahmadinejad stated categorically that Iran does not want nuclear weapons and that they would violate not only the Iranian people’s religious beliefs but also their culture. Against this backdrop, he underscored several times the profoundly negative impact of the Obama Administration’s recently released Nuclear Posture Review, with its implicit threat of nuclear first use against the Islamic Republic. Ahmadinejad was dismissive about the impact of prospective new sanctions against Iran, but noted that the Obama Administration’s push for new sanctions “dirties the atmosphere”. Taken together, these threats and “radical positions” on the part of the Obama Administration will lead to “irreversible” damage to America’s strategic position, and America’s biggest opportunity to restore its standing in international affairs after the George W. Bush years will have been lost.

STATE would conclude -- on its own -- that you are conspiring with "terror groups" & should be stripped of your US citizenship....

Please convince me that Lieberman & Schumer are not targeting Arab Americans! OK, the bit about serving in a foreign army would cost many Zionist colonials their citizenship, if STATE should decide that "on its own"...

WaPo/ here

".... a new law that could potentially strip Americans of their citizenship if they're involved with foreign terrorist organizations...... it isn't just some paranoid liberal nightmare. It's actually moving forward. Lieberman is going to hold a presser tomorrow to introduce the bill, I'm told, along with Rep.Jason Altmire of Pennsylvania. Sen. Schumer has already signaled he could support this.

Second, Lieberman's office has clarified to me how the law would work: It would empower the State Department to conclude -- on its own -- that Americans are conspiring with terror groups and should be stripped of their citizenship.

Lieberman's law would amend an earlier statute that details other things that can cost you citizenship: Serving in the army of a foreign state, pledging allegiance to a foreign state, and so on. In those cases the State Department decides whether your disloyalty merits loss of citizen status. Lieberman's law would add involvement with a foreign terror organization -- as opposed to a foreign state -- to this list.

Who would determine whether you're involved with a foreign terror group? The State Department. It already decides what is and isn't designated as a terror organization. Lieberman's law would also empower State to determine whether you are in league with one of these groups. (Whatever that means...)

... Lieberman is introducing this tomorrow. So at a minimum there could be a national debate about it. My bet is more Dems than you might think will be afraid to oppose this."

Syrian M-600s are the true threat Hezbollah poses to Israel... while, Israel's missile defense systems are far from adequate

"Fateh, M600, ... Tomato, tomaatow ..."

Haaretz/ here

"... aside from the new Scud-D variant, the missiles are not very accurate. But this is not what's most important: Hezbollah's very possession of Scuds attests to its murderous intentions...

That same day, the military censor, after months of delay, finally permitted publication of the fact that Hezbollah now has Syrian M-600 rockets - which carry smaller warheads than Scuds, but are much more accurate. With enough M-600s, Hezbollah could systematically bombard Israel's most strategic sites.

Moreover, unlike the Scuds, M-600s can be launched quickly, and Hezbollah has undoubtedly concealed them in urban neighborhoods to make them harder to locate. Thus M-600s are the true threat Hezbollah poses to Israel.

Israel's missile defense systems, meanwhile, are far from adequate. The army has ordered only two experimental Iron Dome systems against short-range rockets..... Israel's enemies have massively increased their missile stockpiles. And it is far from clear that the IDF has a good answer for a situation in which massive, accurate rocket fire shuts down ports and airports, impedes the operation of air force bases and forces the reserves to convene under heavy fire - or whether the home front, and the politicians, will have the stamina to hold out until an offensive produces substantive military gains. Therefore, unless the IDF starts bolstering its defensive capabilities - and not just its offensive ones - it risks being prepared for the most convenient scenario, rather than one that is actually likely to happen."

Obama is "giving Evil Islam a pass"

PoliticsDaily/ here

"... The Pentagon canceled Graham's appearance at Thursday's event (Graham will still take part in a Capitol Hill service) because his previous criticisms of Islam as an "evil" religion were "not appropriate" to a prayer service for armed services personnel of all faiths. After his conversation with the president, Franklin Graham said Obama told him he "was going to look into it."

Apparently, the president has not moved quickly enough or in the right direction, and with the National Day of Prayer set for tomorrow -- and with the nation riveted on last weekend's near-miss Times Square bombing by a Pakistani-born Muslim -- Graham has been ramping up his public criticism of Obama with language that is as politically explosive as anything his father ever said.

On Monday, for example, Graham accused Obama of "giving Islam a pass" and said the revoking of his invitation to the prayer service was "a slap at all evangelical Christians."

The younger evangelist told the conservative media outlet Newsmax that while Obama may not have been directly responsible for the Pentagon snub, White House aides surely gave the go-ahead to uninvite him.

"I'm certain that some of the men around him are very much opposed to what we stand for and what we believe," Graham said. He said the pattern of hostility dated to the Clinton years, and that after the evangelical-friendly Bush administration, the federal government has returned to a pattern of "hostility" toward Christians that he said foretells a coming persecution.

"I'm being restricted from my religious rights and from what I believe," Graham said of his dismissal from the Pentagon service.

Even more galling, he added, is that at the same time that Christians are being repressed, Islam is being given special treatment.

"I just don't understand why the president would be giving Islam a pass," Graham told Newsmax. "We certainly love the Muslim people. But that is not the faith of this country. And that is not the religion that built this nation. The people of the Christian faith and the Jewish faith are the ones who built America, and it is not Islam."

Medvedev to visit Syria

"Iskander Missile System ...'game changing' whatever?"

VOR/ here

"President Medvedev’s visit to Syria, due to take place on May 10th and 11th, should add more impetus to the rapidly developing bilateral ties. A statement to that effect was made by a Syrian government official in Damascus. President Medvedev will meet with his Syrian counterpart Bashar al-Assad to discuss prospects for bilateral relations and the situation in the Middle East. Syria’s Economy and Trade Minister Amer Lotfi praised the growing ties with Russia. As instances of successful bilateral cooperation he cited Russia’s participation in the construction of gas-processing plants near Hims and near Deir ez-Zor... "

UNIFIL: "No Scuds in Lebanon"

Xinhua/ here

"UN Interim Forces in Lebanon (UNIFIL) Commander General Alberto Asarta Cuevas stressed in remarks published on Wednesday that there was no proof that Syria had transferred Scud missiles to Hezbollah. "We have around 12,000 soldiers and three Lebanese army brigades in a small area. We haven't seen a thing, .....Scud missiles are big. I'm sure there are no Scuds because it is very difficult to hide them," he added....

Asked about the possibility of the eruption of a new war, the UNIFIL commander said no one intends to cause war. ... The United Nations special coordinator for Lebanon Michael Williams also said in April that he did not believe there will be a war in the region despite rising tensions over the Scud missiles allegation."

“Those words ‘threat to national security’ are very important ... "

"The IDF is busy fighting 'this hard war'..."

Unfounded fears if you ask me ...The National/Here

".... Another Syrian political analyst, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the wording appeared to be a prelude to war. “When the Americans attacked Iraq, they did so after saying that Saddam Hussein posed a threat to US national security. Now they are saying the same thing about Syria.

“Those words ‘threat to national security’ are very important, it means the Americans are preparing to strike or that they will give the green light to Israel to strike.”....

Economically the sanctions are of limited importance..... “We know the economy can cope under US sanctions, it is the political meaning that matters,” Mr Bilal said. “There is a significance to this. The US has been unable to shift any of the fundamental Syrian positions regarding Lebanon or Palestine, so this is probably a result of Obama feeling they have not achieved as much as he wanted with his policy of dialogue.”....

While there is concern here about Mr Obama’s firm language – even a feeling that it might have put yet another nail in the coffin of any incipient peace process – Tharbet Salim, an independent Syrian political commentator said it might, perversely, be a positive development.

“I see this as part of Obama’s balancing act with Israel,” he said. “Obama is trying to be hard on the Israelis over settlement expansion and by renewing these sanctions in this way, he can say to his critics, ‘Look, I’ve not gone soft on Syria, I’m not just hard on you.’ This gives him some cover to keep up the pressure on Israel.”...."

"I am going to catch the first flight to Tehran,"

Nukes & Spooks/ here

"... A key part of the story is more aggressive U.S. interdiction measures, which include sting operations; luring suspected weapons traffickers to friendly third countries for arrest and extradition; and request for allies to arrest suspects who cross their borders. A major player in our story was Majid Kakavand, whom the United States alleges was the orchestrator of a wide-ranging procurement network aimed at illegally exporting U.S. military-related technology to Iran. Kakavand was arrested at U.S. request when he stepped off a plane in Paris last year. But a French court turned down the U.S. government's request to extradite Kakavand, leaving him free to return to Tehran. The court apparently disputed the U.S. argument that the technology Kakavand allegedly trafficked in had military applications...."