Iran threatens Israel......again.

[Hub'ite]

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's first target would be Israel in any response to a U.S. attack, a Revolutionary Guards commander said Tuesday, reinforcing the Iranian president's past call for Israel to be "wiped off the map."

"We have announced that wherever (in Iran) America does make any mischief, the first place we target will be Israel," the Iranian Student News Agency quoted Gen. Mohammad Ebrahim Dehghani as saying.

Full story here. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060503/...ea/iran_israel

So does Iran still deserve to have nuclear weapons? Or should they be stopped from having them?

[Tiwaz]

Not really surprising. Iran has limited amount of targets within it's reach which USA cares about. Israel being pretty much only one.

So for nuclear deterrant to be effective they would have to place threat on such location to make sure even the most stupid person in White house would understand results of another poorly planned invasion.

[Garbarsardar]

I won't mege this thrad with the existing one yet ( http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=49852) but please have a look there and try to avoid (if possible) the same circle of arguments.

Thanks-Garb.

[Erik]

Threatening to attack Israel is probably the only way they can defend against a US invation, so this is no surprise.

[Mr.Flint]

Threatening to attack Israel is probably the only way they can defend against a US invation, so this is no surprise.

Threatening Israel is the most definate way to prompt either a US or Israeli attack :laughing:

[Caelius]

Not really surprising. Iran has limited amount of targets within it's reach which USA cares about. Israel being pretty much only one.

So for nuclear deterrant to be effective they would have to place threat on such location to make sure even the most stupid person in White house would understand results of another poorly planned invasion.

How would that plan be any bit effective considering that Iran doesn't have nukes? Or that if they launched any sort of attack against Israel it'd give them and the US legitimate casus belli to respond as they saw fit? It's not as though any potential military action against them in the future would require an invasion in the first place. If anyone is being stupid here it's the Iranians.

[Tiwaz]

How would that plan be any bit effective considering that Iran doesn't have nukes? Or that if they launched any sort of attack against Israel it'd give them and the US legitimate casus belli to respond as they saw fit? It's not as though any potential military action against them in the future would require an invasion in the first place. If anyone is being stupid here it's the Iranians.

Read through that thing on top once more...

"We have announced that wherever (in Iran) America does make any mischief, the first place we target will be Israel,"

In effect they are telling that if USA starts to meddle in Iran there will be retaliation against Israel.
Be it invasion, be it starting to fly bombers into their airspace or any other hostile provocation. USA would not have clear casus belli since they act as provocateurs.

[Erik]

Threatening Israel is the most definate way to prompt either a US or Israeli attack :laughing:

No, having oil is.

How would that plan be any bit effective considering that Iran doesn't have nukes? Or that if they launched any sort of attack against Israel it'd give them and the US legitimate casus belli to respond as they saw fit? It's not as though any potential military action against them in the future would require an invasion in the first place. If anyone is being stupid here it's the Iranians.

They wil only launch an attack on Israel when America attackes them first.
What they say is:
Leave us alone OR we wil attack Israel.

I don't think they can do a lot of damage, but it's realy the only thing they can do against the US with their supperior weapons.

[ThiudareiksGunthigg]

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's first target would be Israel in any response to a U.S. attack, a Revolutionary Guards commander said Tuesday, reinforcing the Iranian president's past call for Israel to be "wiped off the map."

What Ahmadinejad actually said was 'The Imam (Khomeini) once said that this regime occupying Jerusalem will [vanish from] from the page of time.' How that translated into the widely-reported and far more aggressive 'I will wipe Israel off the map!' is anyone's guess.

"We have announced that wherever (in Iran) America does make any mischief, the first place we target will be Israel," the Iranian Student News Agency quoted Gen. Mohammad Ebrahim Dehghani as saying.

Iran's capacity to hit at Israel is actually fairly limited, but they could do something as a provocative blow which would up the stakes in the tension if the US acted against Iran. This is basically a bit of counter-bluff. Or rather counter-sabre rattling.

Considering the US has been flying dummy missions simulating a tactical nuclear strike on Iran, it's hardly unexpected counter-rhetoric. Even hinting that a nuclear superpower would launch the first nuclear strike since 1945 is disturbing enough. Actually wargaming such a strike against a tin-pot non-nuclear state is getting plain bizarre.

[Erik]

What Ahmadinejad actually said was 'The Imam (Khomeini) once said that this regime occupying Jerusalem will [vanish from] from the page of time.' How that translated into the widely-reported and far more aggressive 'I will wipe Israel off the map!' is anyone's guess.

Really?
So we didn't talk about "wiping Israel off the map" at all, he was simply mis-quoted?
Can somebody confirm that?

Iran's capacity to hit at Israel is actually fairly limited, but they could do something as a provocative blow which would up the stakes in the tension if the US acted against Iran. This is basically a bit of counter-bluff. Or rather counter-sabre rattling.

Even if they can't actually hit Israel they can still play the bluff game.
And that wil be pretty easy because the American government wil always claim that Iran is a huge threat with super-dangerous WMD's who can strike out in less than 45 minutes etc. etc. because if they don't say that they won't have a reason to invade them.
(I still doubt the US gov wil actually say: "our solution to high oil prices: attack Iran, they have plenty"...but maybe I'm naive)
As long as the general public beleives they can kill a lot of Israeli's then it wil be very difficult for the US government to get this war approved.

[ThiudareiksGunthigg]

Really?
So we didn't talk about "wiping Israel off the map" at all, he was simply mis-quoted?
Can somebody confirm that?

From Juan Cole's 'Informed Comment' blog:

He made an analogy to Khomeini's determination and success in getting rid of the Shah's government, which Khomeini had said "must go" (az bain bayad berad). Then Ahmadinejad defined Zionism not as an Arabi-Israeli national struggle but as a Western plot to divide the world of Islam with Israel as the pivot of this plan.

The phrase he then used as I read it is "The Imam said that this regime occupying Jerusalem (een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods) must [vanish from] from the page of time (bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad)."

Ahmadinejad was not making a threat, he was quoting a saying of Khomeini and urging that pro-Palestinian activists in Iran not give up hope-- that the occupation of Jerusalem was no more a continued inevitability than had been the hegemony of the Shah's government.

Whatever this quotation from a decades-old speech of Khomeini may have meant, Ahmadinejad did not say that "Israel must be wiped off the map" with the implication that phrase has of Nazi-style extermination of a people. He said that the occupation regime over Jerusalem must be erased from the page of time.

Again, Ariel Sharon erased the occupation regime over Gaza from the page of time.

I should again underline that I personally despise everything Ahmadinejad stands for, not to mention the odious Khomeini, who had personal friends of mine killed so thoroughly that we have never recovered their bodies. Nor do I agree that the Israelis have no legitimate claim on any part of Jerusalem. And, I am not exactly a pacifist but have a strong preference for peaceful social activism over violence, so needless to say I condemn the sort of terror attacks against innocent civilians (including Arab Israelis) that we saw last week. I have not seen any credible evidence, however, that such attacks are the doing of Ahmadinejad, and in my view they are mainly the result of the expropriation and displacement of the long-suffering Palestinian people.
(Informed Comment, May 3, 2006)

[Hub'ite]

The phrase he then used as I read it is "The Imam said that this regime occupying Jerusalem (een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods) must [vanish from] from the page of time (bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad)."

Errr isn't that the same thing as wiping them off the map? Just worded a little differently. Vanish from the page of time......... that doesn't sound too nice to me.

[Erik]

Errr isn't that the same thing as wiping them off the map? Just worded a little differently. Vanish from the page of time......... that doesn't sound too nice to me.

No, I think he ment that Israel wil eventually disappear like all other nations that came before them, and then they should just forget about that piece of history (or something like that).

The difference is between a passive beleive of how history wil go (Israel wil eventually disappear) and a call for action (make Israel disappear)
It's like saying: "The Alpes wil eventually erode into a small hill" but getting translated into "we must bomb the Alpes into a small hill"

Very soon he's going to push too far with his big words and reckless nuclear program and the B2 and F117/F22 squadrons are gonna come in and decimate the Ayatollahs' tinpot regime.

Developing nuclear weapons is probably the only way Iran can prevent that.

Don't forget who the agressor is here.
If Iran did nothing America would invade them as soon as they have the manpower to spare.

[Aemilianus]

Rather stupid comment if you ask me by the Iranians.

That will change the dynamic from an American "destroy your nuclear plants" surgical strike to a total war with the US and Israel. Of course, I can't really see what else they could possibly do, but in the case of Israel they really don't want to get attacked by a country that defeated half the Middle East at the same time once....

[Tiwaz]

Rather stupid comment if you ask me by the Iranians.

That will change the dynamic from an American "destroy your nuclear plants" surgical strike to a total war with the US and Israel. Of course, I can't really see what else they could possibly do, but in the case of Israel they really don't want to get attacked by a country that defeated half the Middle East at the same time once....

Well, like you said they have no alternatives. And if they have to go they will make sure they take as much others with them as possible. It is called deterrance. It keeps others from interfering because price they would have to pay is too high. But for deterrance you need to destroy something which is valuable for opposing side and thanks to strong israeli lobby in USA causing as much destruction there as possible would be natural choice.

[Keresztes]

Rather stupid comment if you ask me by the Iranians.

That will change the dynamic from an American "destroy your nuclear plants" surgical strike to a total war with the US and Israel. Of course, I can't really see what else they could possibly do, but in the case of Israel they really don't want to get attacked by a country that defeated half the Middle East at the same time once....

I would worry more about the U.S. army if I were Iran. True, the IDF is a match for most mid-eastern countries. But then again, Jordan and Iraq seperate them from the Iranians. The moment the Israeli army left home ground, the Egyptians, Syrians, Palestinians, Lebanese, and anyone else who has any sort of grudge would be racing for Jerusalem like there's no tomorrow.

[Shadow_Imperator]

I would worry more about the U.S. army if I were Iran. True, the IDF is a match for most mid-eastern countries. But then again, Jordan and Iraq seperate them from the Iranians. The moment the Israeli army left home ground, the Egyptians, Syrians, Palestinians, Lebanese, and anyone else who has any sort of grudge would be racing for Jerusalem like there's no tomorrow.

Independance of Israel, Six Day War, Yom Kipper. Bring it on Arabs!
I hope they'd have to war on a betting scheme, Id put my money on Israel to prevail... Once again....

[Mikelus Trento]

Rather stupid comment if you ask me by the Iranians.

That will change the dynamic from an American "destroy your nuclear plants" surgical strike to a total war with the US and Israel. Of course, I can't really see what else they could possibly do, but in the case of Israel they really don't want to get attacked by a country that defeated half the Middle East at the same time once....

Four times actually....at their birth in '48, and then in '56, 67, and '73.

[Carach]

So does Iran still deserve to have nuclear weapons?

No.

In other news - china are planning to veto any action america makes on iran.

america will proceed as planned

[Freddie]

Who holds the power in Iran these days? Do the Iamans still hold all the aces or does that little nut job with the big mouth who calls himself the president say what’s goes on and where?