ATTACK IRAN DRUMBEAT

The recent warning by an Israeli Cabinet Minister that an attack on Iran may be unavoidable sent the price of oil skywards but it may also have been a signal that Israel and the US are contemplating an attack on Iran before the end of the Bush presidency.
The threat of an attack was made by Israeli Transport Minister, Saul Mofaz, who is in line to succeed Ehud Olmert as Israeli prime minister. Mofaz was formerly Chief of the General Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces and is presently a member of his government’s security team that regularly holds classified talks with the US on Middle East strategy. In that role, he has been privy to classified US military thinking about Iran. Therefore, any statement he makes about Iran should be taken seriously. His warning was blunt: “If Iran continues with its program for nuclear weapons development, we will attack it.” He added that such attack would be coordinated with Washington.
The moment he made his remarks the price of oil spiked on global markets, sending shivers through an already weakened US economy. The Israeli government, no doubt under pressure from the White House, played down the threat, coming as it did in the middle of a US presidential campaign in which oil prices remain at the center of the debate between John Mc Cain and Barack Obama. However, the fact Mofaz spoke out at a time of intense Israeli pressure on the US to take tougher action against Iran cannot be easily dismissed. At the same time, Ehud Olmert was meeting President Bush in Washington and the powerful pro-Israel lobby group, AIPAC – American Israel Public Affairs Committee - was holding its annual conference in the capitol. Prominent among those who singled out Iran at the AIPAC get-together was Dick Cheney’s daughter, Elizabeth, who has done just as much saber rattling about Iran as her father in the past year. It is rumored she is now his public voice on the issue. Condoleezza Rice, who is no longer a close friend of the Cheney’s, also called for tougher measures against Iran.
AIPAC linked its anti-Iran policy with a plea to members of Congress, many of whom attended the group’s conference, to support a White House promise to award Israel $2.5 billion in security assistance in the 2009 fiscal year. That tax-payer gift would represent part of a ten-year, $30 billion award, which Israel claims it needs and will receive from the US in order to face potential threats from Iran, as well as Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Aside from the fact that the perceived threat from Iran will bring billions in aid to Israel, there has been an ongoing Israeli strategy to encourage the US to use launch military strikes against Iran. It has also been a pet project of AIPAC. In 2006, two AIPAC executives were charged with passing classified Pentagon documents concerning America’s Iran policy to a member of the Israeli intelligence service, Mossad, at the Israeli embassy in Washington. Israel had planned to exploit the documents to influence elements of the US media in a plan to bring US public opinion into line with Israel’s claim that Iran is the major threat to world peace.
Israel’s greatest supporter of launching military strikes against Iran is none other than Vice-President, Dick Cheney, who is doing more than just using surrogates like his daughter to do his saber rattling. He is one of the pro-Israel neocons, who brought us the Iraq war. Privately, he has never wavered in the assertion that Iran is unfinished business. For Israel, Iran is the only country left in the region that might in years to come be able to stand up to it now that Saddam Hussein’s regime is gone and the Iraqi strongman is in an early grave.
Cheney’s proposal last year to strike at Iran’s Revolutionary Guard bases was put on ice because the US Joint Chiefs argued it would open up a new front that the US military would have difficulty handling. There was also the real risk Iran would strike back in a way that would be disastrous for US interests in the region. In particular, the Joint Chiefs envisaged Iran using Hezbollah and Shiite militias to broaden the battle against the US military within Iraq. Cheney was told Iran had probably planned well for strikes against US targets and from a US perspective there was no guarantee strikes against the Revolutionary Guard or nuclear facilities would be successful.
In March 2007, Admiral William Fallon, head of Centcom - Central Command - made it clear to the White House he was opposed to the Cheney plan, which the vice-president continues to advocate behind the scenes. In March this year, Fallon, whose job gave him control of Afghanistan and the Middle East, abruptly resigned. His departure after a year in the post was seen as a move by Dick Cheney to get rid of the most powerful critic of his Iran policy. Cheney already had a new Centcom chief in mind – General David Petraeus, who will replace Fallon later this year. Petraeus is seen as a Cheney-Bush creation and he has voiced many of the sentiments about Iran as Dick Cheney.
On June 6, the same day the Israeli Transport Minister, Saul Mofaz made his threat, Dick Cheney and Israeli president, Ehud Olmert had a private dinner in Washington to discuss what they described as “operational subjects.”
At the same time, Elizabeth Cheney, the vice-president’s daughter, formerly deputy assistant secretary for Near East Affairs ran around the AIPAC conference issuing dire warnings about Iran and calling for immediate action. In her opinion, talking to Iran was a waste of time. The Iranians had to be made to realize they faced military action if they didn’t toe the line on the nuclear issue. She added that “we do not have the luxury of time” to sit back and wait for Iran to comply.
The Israeli, AIPAC and Cheney family scheming, as well as the threat from Saul Mofaz, has raised serious concerns in the corridors of power in Europe where there is no appetite for another war, given that Afghanistan is not going well and Iraq is only relatively stable with the presence of 150,000 US troops and just as many contractors. European nations are also tired of Israel’s tendency to talk about democracy and international law while it continues to defy UN mandates and flouts international court rulings related to its harsh treatment of the Palestinians. It has also ignored pleas from the US and the EU to stop building settlements on Palestinian land. There is a fear within Europe that neocons of the Cheney variety might seek to attack Iran as part of their legacy. One of the outcomes would not only be an expanded Middle East conflict, with oil rising above $200 a barrel, but a more unstable world.