"Nonsense, because Israel can't attack even a stray poodle!"

Via FLC

"...There's nothing even remotely earth-shaking about the report - satellite images and speculation by "diplomats" being sold as irrefutable "intelligence". If this looks like the build-up towards the war on Iraq, that's because it does. Essentially, it's regurgitation of a four-year-old farce, known as the "laptop of death"....
What does rattle the nerves not only of Israel but the powerful array of US interests who 32 years later are still in denial about losing their prized gendarme of the Gulf (the shah of Iran) is that Tehran keeps them guessing, forever.
Predictably, the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel will keep barking to deafening levels, while trying by all ruses necessary to wag the (American) dog.

The same Netanyahu that neither US President Barack Obama nor French President Nicolas Sarkozy can stand anymore has a single-minded strategy; to draw Washington and a few minions, from the Brits to the House of Saud - and this has nothing to do with "international community" - to exercise maximum pressure on Tehran. Otherwise, Israel will attack.


This is nonsense, because Israel can't attack even a stray poodle. All its crucial military hardware is American. It needs special permission to cross Saudi or Iraqi airspace. It needs a green card from Washington from A to Z. The Obama administration may be accused of everything - but it's not suicidal.

Only those non-entities at the US Congress - despised by the overwhelming majority of Americans, according to any number of polls - can possibly believe in the martial marching orders they get from Netanyahu via the powerful American Israel Public Affairs Committee lobby.  

So what's left is the possibility of even more sanctions. Four rounds of harsh UN Security Council sanctions already target Iran's imports and banking and finance. But that's the end of the line.  

Russia is not convinced by the IAEA report, and already said so explicitly. China is not impressed... So forget about Russia and China accepting another US-imposed round of sanctions at the UN - which would be literally nuclear; a de facto boycott of Iran's sales of oil and gas.  

Only a bunch of clowns can assume that China would vote against its national security interest at the UN Security Council. Iran is China's third-largest oil supplier, after Saudi Arabia and Angola. China is importing around 650,000 barrels of oil a day from Iran - 50% more compared to last year. That's over 25% of Iran's total oil exports.  

Even the Obama administration had to admit publicly that a boycott is unimaginable; it would deprive the depression-bound global economy of no less than 2.4 million barrels of oil a day, with the barrel probably hitting $300 or even $400.  

Tehran has - and will continue to find - ways to bypass financial sanctions. India has paid Iranian oil imports via a Turkish bank. Tehran is starting to use a Russian bank as well.


This also proves that Israel's mantra of the "international community" isolating Iran is a monumental bluff. Key actors such as BRICS members Russia, China and India keep close commercial relations.  

On top of it, amid all the Iranophobic hysteria, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) - China, Russia and four Central Asian "stans" - engaged in their latest summit in St Petersburg. Iran - which enjoys observer status - was there, via Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi. Sooner or later Iran will be admitted as a full member.  

If even before Iran joining the SCO China and Russia considered an attack on Iran as an attack on both of them - as well as on the idea of Asian energy integration - it will be very enlightening to watch Israel trying to convince the US to conduct an attack on Asia."

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian