Iranian soldiers killed in Lebanon

[j2k4]

It is being reported from multiple sources now that several members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard were killed assisting Hezbollah in Lebanon.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=51191

Is this significant?

Meaningful?

Indicative of anything at all?

Comments welcome-

[j2k4]

What?

12 hours down the way, and no response?

Interesting...:mellow:

[ilw]

i imagine many brits are more worried either about our planes dropping out of the sky or what civil liberties Mr Reid will snaffle from us because of this threat.
Plus bbc and guardian haven't reported this iranian soldiers story yet...

Personal opinion is that its a very nasty development, the region seems to be heading down the pan.

[BawA]

It is being reported from multiple sources now that several members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard were killed assisting Hezbollah in Lebanon.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=51191

Is this significant?

Meaningful?

Indicative of anything at all?

Comments welcome-

and how they knew they were iranian's, thier smart enough not to send thier soldier's with any tag's if they did send them.

[lynx]

J2, even though it's over a year old, I think you should be more worried about these nukes.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=45203

Strange that your various agencies haven't found them yet, what with WND being such an accurate source of information.

You said recently that you don't read blogs. Of course, why would you need to, when you can get it straight from the horses arse.

[j2k4]

J2, even though it's over a year old, I think you should be more worried about these nukes.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=45203

Strange that your various agencies haven't found them yet, what with WND being such an accurate source of information.

You said recently that you don't read blogs. Of course, why would you need to, when you can get it straight from the horses arse.

I don't read blogs, and I know you don't tot up to FOXNEWS, so I had to google up another source.

WorldNetDaily is no less innocuous-appearing than any of the others you'd object to.

Of course, I've had to do that in the past, and in the process send you off topic as well.

Will you be doing it again, then?

BawA-

The way I heard it, they were identified by proper personal ID on their persons.

I don't expect you to be convinced absent further proof, which I too await.

Ian-

I posted this before the airplane-news broke.

[lynx]

WorldNetDaily is hardly what anyone would describe as an "impartial observer", which is the point I was trying to convey.

I don't deny there's a possibility that Iranians are in Lebanon helping Hezbollah, but it seems very unlikely that they would have much in the way of identifying papers, and certainly not ones linking them to the IRGC.

Think about it, if the Israeli's had really got proof of these bodies your own government would be shouting about how this demonstrates it to be a big Iranian plot.

I've googled it too, and all I find is the usual suspects all cross-quoting and plagiarising each other, more often than not even using exactly the same words, and not a single iota of independent proof to be seen.

[j2k4]

WorldNetDaily is hardly what anyone would describe as an "impartial observer", which is the point I was trying to convey.

I don't deny there's a possibility that Iranians are in Lebanon helping Hezbollah, but it seems very unlikely that they would have much in the way of identifying papers, and certainly not ones linking them to the IRGC.

Think about it, if the Israeli's had really got proof of these bodies your own government would be shouting about how this demonstrates it to be a big Iranian plot.

I've googled it too, and all I find is the usual suspects all cross-quoting and plagiarising each other, more often than not even using exactly the same words, and not a single iota of independent proof to be seen.

WND, while it may be liable to the free-floating charge of bias (ex., FOXNEWS) can still serve ably as attendent witness to these events.

I include the info anent identification only insofar as it is what I have heard on that point-more to come, I guess.

I'm sure you can appreciate that Israel (as well as any others eager to hang this legitimately on Iran) will make sure all it's ducks are in a row before making the salient charge, which lingers, nonetheless.

Be honest, now: Given Iran's (Ahmadinajad's) reckless rhetoric to this point, do you seriously think he cares if a few of his personnel are found in Lebanon?

In any case, it all comes down to what one is disposed to believe...there are still people in this country who think Bush lost Florida in 2000.

No accounting for it, really-people can be thrashed soundly about the head and shoulders with pure, unadulterated truth, and still blame it on a masked man, you see?

[Biggles]

There may well be Iranians fighting for Hezbollah. However, I think it unlikely that it will have much significance.

If Iranian troops in Iranian uniform were fighting alongside Hezbollah then that would be significant. However, volunteers from a specific country are much less so. During the Battle of Britain in 1940 some US citizens volunteered to fly with the RAF - this did not involve the US in the war at that point.

Obviously Hezbollah did not buy Silk Worm missiles at their local Tescos nor did they acquire the expertise to use them via an Open University course. Iran has armed and trained the Lebanese either in Iran, Syria or in situ in the Bekha Valley. I don't think this is a great surprise to anyone though. Pergaps the only surprise is that the training seems to have been quite good.

I came across WorldNetDaily some time ago and found it slightly alarming. It was a piece on Palestine and was somewhat innovative in its approach to history.

[Rat Faced]

Quite possibly, and Lebanon would be well within its right to ask for advisors I would think... a lot of countries were in Korea that weren't "at war", or maybe they are stationed there.

I believe the US have soldiers in Israel at the moment... should we be commenting on that too?

Any comment on the Israeli assasin that was caught in Lebanon before the conflict then? Or is that different coz its Israel..

[j2k4]

Quite possibly, and Lebanon would be well within its right to ask for advisors I would think... a lot of countries were in Korea that weren't "at war", or maybe they are stationed there.

I believe the US have soldiers in Israel at the moment... should we be commenting on that too?

Any comment on the Israeli assasin that was caught in Lebanon before the conflict then? Or is that different coz its Israel..

Of course, given that we and Israel are no different than Hezbollah...fair game all-round.

Please give us chapter and verse on this assassin, Rat-sounds fascinating.

[Rat Faced]

On June 13, the Lebanese army reported that Mahmud Rafah, who had been arrested along with three others in connection with the May 26 killing of two Islamic Jihad officials, was a leading member of an Israeli “terrorist” network behind at least three other major assassinations in Lebanon.

“Investigations by military intelligence showed that the terrorist network that was discovered had links to the Israeli Mossad for several years and that its members underwent training both inside Israel and outside,” the army statement said.

“The network was tasked by this agency [Mossad] with carrying out these operations and was given secret communication and monitoring devices for this purpose, along with detailed maps of the target,” the army said, including “forged documents and bags with secret pockets.”


.....

Rafah admitted to the murder of Ali Hasan Dib, a Hezbollah official, in 1999 in the southern town of Arba, the killing of another Hezbollah official in Beirut in 2003 and the killing of Jihad Ahmad Jibril, a Palestinian, in 2002, the army said. Jibril, who was killed in a car bombing in Beirut, was the son of Ahmad Jibril, head of the Damascusbased Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command, a Palestinian resistance group opposed to the Israeli occupation of Palestine.

Rafah also confessed to planting bombs that had either been found and defused or missed their targets, the army statement said.

Source (http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/ally_backs_assassination_netwo.html)


However it was widely reported around the world in June... How come you dont know about it?

I believe it was also reported he was about to be interogated about the Assasination of Rafik Hariri (the former Lebanese Prime Minister)... a few days before Israel attacked Lebanon.

Strange.. One side assasinates someone and its terrorism, the other side does and nothing is said... and it appears isn't even reported in certain countries in case they upset their friends. :whistling

[j2k4]

On June 13, the Lebanese army reported that Mahmud Rafah, who had been arrested along with three others in connection with the May 26 killing of two Islamic Jihad officials, was a leading member of an Israeli “terrorist” network behind at least three other major assassinations in Lebanon.

“Investigations by military intelligence showed that the terrorist network that was discovered had links to the Israeli Mossad for several years and that its members underwent training both inside Israel and outside,” the army statement said.

“The network was tasked by this agency [Mossad] with carrying out these operations and was given secret communication and monitoring devices for this purpose, along with detailed maps of the target,” the army said, including “forged documents and bags with secret pockets.”


.....

Rafah admitted to the murder of Ali Hasan Dib, a Hezbollah official, in 1999 in the southern town of Arba, the killing of another Hezbollah official in Beirut in 2003 and the killing of Jihad Ahmad Jibril, a Palestinian, in 2002, the army said. Jibril, who was killed in a car bombing in Beirut, was the son of Ahmad Jibril, head of the Damascusbased Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command, a Palestinian resistance group opposed to the Israeli occupation of Palestine.

Rafah also confessed to planting bombs that had either been found and defused or missed their targets, the army statement said.

Source (http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/ally_backs_assassination_netwo.html)


However it was widely reported around the world in June... How come you dont know about it?



Possibly it may have escaped my attention as it was being reported on that incredibly-biased site you chose to get it from, Rat.

A little poking around on the same site revealed this:

BUSH INSIDER CLAIMS WTC COLLAPSE BOGUS

DEMOLITION MORE LIKELY



By Greg Szymanski

A former chief economist in the Labor Department during President Bush’s first term now believes the official story about the collapse of the WTC is “bogus,” saying it is likely that a controlled demolition destroyed the twin towers and adjacent building No. 7.

“If demolition destroyed three steel skyscrapers at the World Trade Center on 9-11, then the case for an ‘inside job’ and a government attack on America would be compelling,” said Morgan Reynolds, Ph.D., a former member of the Bush team who also served as director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis, headquartered in Dallas.

Reynolds, now a professor emeritus at Texas A&M University, also believes it’s “next to impossible” that 19 Arab terrorists alone outfoxed the mighty U.S. military, adding the scientific conclusions about the WTC collapse may hold the key to the entire mysterious plot behind 9-11.

“It is hard to exaggerate the importance of a scientific debate over the cause(s) of the collapse of the twin towers and Building 7,” said Reynolds from his offices at Texas A&M. “If the official wisdom on the collapses is wrong, as I believe it is, then policy based on such erroneous engineering analysis is not likely to be correct either. The government’s collapse theory is highly vulnerable on its own terms. Only professional demolition appears to account for the full range of facts associated with the collapse of the three buildings.

“More importantly, momentous political and social consequences would follow if impartial observers concluded that professionals imploded the WTC. Meanwhile, the job of scientists, engineers and impartial researchers everywhere is to get the scientific and engineering analysis of 9-11 right.”

However, Reynolds said “getting it right in today’s security state” remains challenging because he claims explosives and structural experts have been intimidated in their analyses of the collapses of 9-11.

HASTILY REMOVED

From the beginning, the Bush administration claimed that burning jet fuel caused the collapse of the towers. Although many independent investigators have disagreed, they have been hard pressed to disprove the government theory since most of the evidence was hastily removed by the federal government prior to independent investigation. Critics claim the Bush administration has tried to cover up the evidence. The recent 9-11 commission has failed to address the major evidence contradicting the official version of 9-11.

Some facts demonstrating the flaws in the government jet fuel theory include:

• Photos showing people walking around in the hole in the North Tower where 10,000 gallons of jet fuel supposedly was burning.

• When the South Tower was hit, most of the North Tower’s flames had already vanished, burning for only 16 minutes, making it relatively easy to contain and control without a total collapse.

• The fire did not grow over time, probably because it quickly ran out of fuel and was suffocating, indicating without added explosive devices the fires could have been easily controlled.

• FDNY firefighters still remain under a tight government gag order to not discuss the explosions they heard, felt and saw. FAA personnel are also under a similar 9-11 gag order.

• Even the flawed 9-11 commission report acknowledges that “none of the [fire] chiefs present believed that a total collapse of either tower was possible.”

• Fire had never before caused steel-frame buildings to collapse, nor has fire collapsed any steel high rise since 9-11.

• The fires, especially in the South Tower and WTC-7, were relatively small.

• WTC-7 was unharmed by any airplane and had only minor fires on the seventh and 12th floors of this 47-story steel building, yet it collapsed in less than 10 seconds.

• WTC-5 and WTC-6 had raging fires but did not collapse despite much thinner steel beams.

• It’s difficult if not impossible for hydrocarbon fires like those fed by jet fuel to raise the temperature of steel close to melting.

NUMEROUS HOLES

Despite the numerous holes in the government story, the Bush administration has ignored all critics. Mainstream experts, speaking for the administration, offer a theory essentially arguing that an airplane impact weakened each structure and an intense fire thermally weakened structural components, causing buckling failures while allowing the upper floors to pancake onto the floors below.

Hard evidence is lacking due to FEMA’s quick removal of the structural steel before it could be analyzed. The criminal code requires that crime scene evidence be kept for forensic analysis, but FEMA had it destroyed or shipped overseas before a serious investigation could take place.

And even more doubt is cast over why FEMA acted so swiftly since coincidentally officials had arrived the day before the 9-11 attacks at New York’s Pier 29 to conduct a war game exercise, named “Tripod II.”

Besides FEMA’s quick removal of the debris, authorities considered the steel quite valuable as New York City officials had every debris truck tracked on GPS and even fired one truck driver who took an unauthorized lunch break.

“The government has failed to produce significant wreckage from any of the four alleged airliners that fateful day,” said Reynolds. “The familiar photo of the Flight 93 crash site in Pennsylvania shows no fuselage, engine or anything recognizable as a plane, just a smoking hole in the ground. Photographers reportedly were not allowed near the hole. Neither the FBI nor the National Transportation Safety Board have investigated or produced any report on the alleged airliner crashes.”

Really, now...I must reiterate the value of arguing such points on your own steam, and not leave yourself open to questions as to the value of your sources...:whistling

[Rat Faced]

I tried to reply to this last night but the board was playing up..

I just went into Google and looked for the first "American" source and copied it.

Being American, you will be more in tune with its credentials than myself, however I have given you the information you need to look it up in any "reputable" source you want.

Reported in Lebanon on 13th June 2006, and from there went worldwide.


Obviously the Murdoch Empire wont touch that story, which is probably why you havent heard it..



Whats wrong with the above story by the way? They report that Professor Reynolds (a former Chief Economist) believes and have stated that it is his beliefs, and go into the Conspiracy Theory that surrounds the issue that has made Reynolds belive this...

It isnt an editorial, its a Report on someone elses beliefs, and states so plainly.

Although I'd agree the above is rather "Tabloid" for my own taste, and is plainly biased, if the News Reports you read/listen to don't report other peoples position on any issues, they really must be even more twisted and biased.

[j2k4]

I tried to reply to this last night but the board was playing up..

I just went into Google and looked for the first "American" source and copied it.

Being American, you will be more in tune with its credentials than myself, however I have given you the information you need to look it up in any "reputable" source you want.

Reported in Lebanon on 13th June 2006, and from there went worldwide.


Obviously the Murdoch Empire wont touch that story, which is probably why you havent heard it..



Whats wrong with the above story by the way? They report that Professor Reynolds (a former Chief Economist) believes and have stated that it is his beliefs, and go into the Conspiracy Theory that surrounds the issue that has made Reynolds belive this...

It isnt an editorial, its a Report on someone elses beliefs, and states so plainly.

Although I'd agree the above is rather "Tabloid" for my own taste, and is plainly biased, if the News Reports you read/listen to don't report other peoples position on any issues, they really must be even more twisted and biased.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

For the last time:

I do not read bloggage of any type or origin, except when directed to by another poster on this board.

That you've quoted an 'American' site is of no moment to me as, again, I do not read them!

As with every such site, allegiances are tangential at best, and any information contained therein is essentially useless.

That I know of no other member so convinced saddens me.

I read only a wide variety of opinion pieces (and apart from books, that is all, I promise you), and get day-to-day stuff from TV news.

I read no newspapers to speak of, as I find them a bit outmoded.

In order to arrive at the conclusion I have re: your quoted site, I had merely to cast about for 30 seconds or so to find evidence of bias, and that is precisely why I do not read such things.

I come to my own biases naturally, you see, and am averse to having them inflicted upon me by others.

I was almost looking forward to mucking about in here on-and-off all day.

As all these threads have gone so far off-topic, I think I'd rather attack my jobs-list.

[Busyman™]

In order to arrive at the conclusion I have re: your quoted site, I had merely to cast about for 30 seconds or so to find evidence of bias, and that is precisely why I do not read such things.

I come to my own biases naturally, you see, and am averse to having them inflicted upon me by others.

:glag:

Can anyone post some of j2's C&Ps?

[j2k4]

In order to arrive at the conclusion I have re: your quoted site, I had merely to cast about for 30 seconds or so to find evidence of bias, and that is precisely why I do not read such things.

I come to my own biases naturally, you see, and am averse to having them inflicted upon me by others.

:glag:

Can anyone post some of j2's C&Ps?

Better yet, find one I do not present as a POV I find interesting or thought-provoking.

Find one I've presented in support of 'facts' I have previously stated.

Apples and oranges, Busyman, and to make such a leap exposes your liberal undergarments.

[Busyman™]

:glag:

Can anyone post some of j2's C&Ps?

Better yet, find one I do not present as a POV I find interesting or thought-provoking.

Find one I've presented in support of 'facts' I have previously stated.

Apples and oranges, Busyman, and to make such a leap exposes your liberal undergarments.

Either way, your post was funny...you know, with your unbiasedreadsthatconvenientlyagreewithyourpointofview.

:glag:

Your C&Ps are biased as all get-out.

[ilw]

Israel responded to an unprovoked attack by Hizbullah, right? Wrong

The assault on Lebanon was premeditated - the soldiers' capture simply provided the excuse. It was also unnecessary

George Monbiot
Tuesday August 8, 2006
The Guardian


Whatever we think of Israel's assault on Lebanon, all of us seem to agree about one fact: that it was a response, however disproportionate, to an unprovoked attack by Hizbullah. I repeated this "fact" in my last column, when I wrote that "Hizbullah fired the first shots". This being so, the Israeli government's supporters ask peaceniks like me, what would you have done? It's an important question. But its premise, I have now discovered, is flawed.

Since Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon in May 2000, there have been hundreds of violations of the "blue line" between the two countries. The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil) reports that Israeli aircraft crossed the line "on an almost daily basis" between 2001 and 2003, and "persistently" until 2006. These incursions "caused great concern to the civilian population, particularly low-altitude flights that break the sound barrier over populated areas". On some occasions, Hizbullah tried to shoot them down with anti-aircraft guns.

In October 2000, the Israel Defence Forces shot at unarmed Palestinian demonstrators on the border, killing three and wounding 20. In response, Hizbullah crossed the line and kidnapped three Israeli soldiers. On several occasions, Hizbullah fired missiles and mortar rounds at IDF positions, and the IDF responded with heavy artillery and sometimes aerial bombardment. Incidents like this killed three Israelis and three Lebanese in 2003; one Israeli soldier and two Hizbullah fighters in 2005; and two Lebanese people and three Israeli soldiers in February 2006. Rockets were fired from Lebanon into Israel several times in 2004, 2005 and 2006, on some occasions by Hizbullah. But, the UN records, "none of the incidents resulted in a military escalation".

On May 26 this year, two officials of Islamic Jihad - Nidal and Mahmoud Majzoub - were killed by a car bomb in the Lebanese city of Sidon. This was widely assumed in Lebanon and Israel to be the work of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency. In June, a man named Mahmoud Rafeh confessed to the killings and admitted that he had been working for Mossad since 1994. Militants in southern Lebanon responded, on the day of the bombing, by launching eight rockets into Israel. One soldier was lightly wounded. There was a major bust-up on the border, during which one member of Hizbullah was killed and several wounded, and one Israeli soldier wounded. But while the border region "remained tense and volatile", Unifil says it was "generally quiet" until July 12.

There has been a heated debate on the internet about whether the two Israeli soldiers kidnapped by Hizbullah that day were captured in Israel or in Lebanon, but it now seems pretty clear that they were seized in Israel. This is what the UN says, and even Hizbullah seems to have forgotten that they were supposed to have been found sneaking around the outskirts of the Lebanese village of Aita al-Shaab. Now it simply states that "the Islamic resistance captured two Israeli soldiers at the border with occupied Palestine". Three other Israeli soldiers were killed by the militants. There is also some dispute about when, on July 12, Hizbullah first fired its rockets; but Unifil makes it clear that the firing took place at the same time as the raid - 9am. Its purpose seems to have been to create a diversion. No one was hit.

But there is no serious debate about why the two soldiers were captured: Hizbullah was seeking to exchange them for the 15 prisoners of war taken by the Israelis during the occupation of Lebanon and (in breach of article 118 of the third Geneva convention) never released. It seems clear that if Israel had handed over the prisoners, it would - without the spillage of any more blood - have retrieved its men and reduced the likelihood of further kidnappings. But the Israeli government refused to negotiate. Instead - well, we all know what happened instead. Almost 1,000 Lebanese and 33 Israeli civilians have been killed so far, and a million Lebanese displaced from their homes.

On July 12, in other words, Hizbullah fired the first shots. But that act of aggression was simply one instance in a long sequence of small incursions and attacks over the past six years by both sides. So why was the Israeli response so different from all that preceded it? The answer is that it was not a reaction to the events of that day. The assault had been planned for months.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports that "more than a year ago, a senior Israeli army officer began giving PowerPoint presentations, on an off-the-record basis, to US and other diplomats, journalists and thinktanks, setting out the plan for the current operation in revealing detail". The attack, he said, would last for three weeks. It would begin with bombing and culminate in a ground invasion. Gerald Steinberg, professor of political science at Bar-Ilan University, told the paper that "of all of Israel's wars since 1948, this was the one for which Israel was most prepared ... By 2004, the military campaign scheduled to last about three weeks that we're seeing now had already been blocked out and, in the last year or two, it's been simulated and rehearsed across the board".

A "senior Israeli official" told the Washington Post that the raid by Hizbullah provided Israel with a "unique moment" for wiping out the organisation. The New Statesman's editor, John Kampfner, says he was told by more than one official source that the US government knew in advance of Israel's intention to take military action in Lebanon. The Bush administration told the British government.

Israel's assault, then, was premeditated: it was simply waiting for an appropriate excuse. It was also unnecessary. It is true that Hizbullah had been building up munitions close to the border, as its current rocket attacks show. But so had Israel. Just as Israel could assert that it was seeking to deter incursions by Hizbullah, Hizbullah could claim - also with justification - that it was trying to deter incursions by Israel. The Lebanese army is certainly incapable of doing so. Yes, Hizbullah should have been pulled back from the Israeli border by the Lebanese government and disarmed. Yes, the raid and the rocket attack on July 12 were unjustified, stupid and provocative, like just about everything that has taken place around the border for the past six years. But the suggestion that Hizbullah could launch an invasion of Israel or that it constitutes an existential threat to the state is preposterous. Since the occupation ended, all its acts of war have been minor ones, and nearly all of them reactive.

So it is not hard to answer the question of what we would have done. First, stop recruiting enemies, by withdrawing from the occupied territories in Palestine and Syria. Second, stop provoking the armed groups in Lebanon with violations of the blue line - in particular the persistent flights across the border. Third, release the prisoners of war who remain unlawfully incarcerated in Israel. Fourth, continue to defend the border, while maintaining the diplomatic pressure on Lebanon to disarm Hizbullah (as anyone can see, this would be much more feasible if the occupations were to end). Here then is my challenge to the supporters of the Israeli government: do you dare to contend that this programme would have caused more death and destruction than the current adventure has done?


Just food for thought, source = guardian

[Busyman™]

Thanks for that. Good read.;)

[Rat Faced]

The US government was closely involved in planning the Israeli campaign in Lebanon, even before Hizbullah seized two Israeli soldiers in a cross border raids in July. American and Israeli officials met in the spring, discussing plans on how to tackle Hizbullah, according to a report published yesterday.
The veteran investigative journalist Seymour Hersh writes in the current issue of the New Yorker magazine that Israeli government officials travelled to the US in May to share plans for attacking Hizbullah.

Quoting a US government consultant, Hersh said: "Earlier this summer ... several Israeli officials visited Washington, separately, 'to get a green light for the bombing operation and to find out how much the United States would bear'."

The Israeli action, current and former government officials told Hersh, chimed with the Bush administration's desire to reduce the threat of possible Hizbullah retaliation against Israel should the US launch a military strike against Iran.

"A successful Israeli Air Force bombing campaign ... could ease Israel's security concerns and also serve as a prelude to a potential American pre-emptive attack to destroy Iran's nuclear installations," sources told Hersh.

Yesterday Mr Hersh told CNN: "July was a pretext for a major offensive that had been in the works for a long time. Israel's attack was going to be a model for the attack they really want to do. They really want to go after Iran."

An unnamed Pentagon consultant told Hersh: "It was our intention to have Hizbullah diminished and now we have someone else doing it."

Officials from the state department and the Pentagon denied the report. A spokesman for the National Security Council told Hersh that "The Israeli government gave no official in Washington any reason to believe that Israel was planning to attack."

Hersh has a track record in breaking major stories. He was the first to write about the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and has written extensively about the build-up to the war in Iraq. He made his name when he uncovered the massacre at My Lai during the Vietnam war. Most recently he has written about US plans for Iran, alleging that US special forces had already been active inside the country.

Source (http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1844021,00.html)

More in the same vain..

[j2k4]

The US government was closely involved in planning the Israeli campaign in Lebanon, even before Hizbullah seized two Israeli soldiers in a cross border raids in July. American and Israeli officials met in the spring, discussing plans on how to tackle Hizbullah, according to a report published yesterday.
The veteran investigative journalist Seymour Hersh writes in the current issue of the New Yorker magazine that Israeli government officials travelled to the US in May to share plans for attacking Hizbullah.

Quoting a US government consultant, Hersh said: "Earlier this summer ... several Israeli officials visited Washington, separately, 'to get a green light for the bombing operation and to find out how much the United States would bear'."

The Israeli action, current and former government officials told Hersh, chimed with the Bush administration's desire to reduce the threat of possible Hizbullah retaliation against Israel should the US launch a military strike against Iran.

"A successful Israeli Air Force bombing campaign ... could ease Israel's security concerns and also serve as a prelude to a potential American pre-emptive attack to destroy Iran's nuclear installations," sources told Hersh.

Yesterday Mr Hersh told CNN: "July was a pretext for a major offensive that had been in the works for a long time. Israel's attack was going to be a model for the attack they really want to do. They really want to go after Iran."

An unnamed Pentagon consultant told Hersh: "It was our intention to have Hizbullah diminished and now we have someone else doing it."

Officials from the state department and the Pentagon denied the report. A spokesman for the National Security Council told Hersh that "The Israeli government gave no official in Washington any reason to believe that Israel was planning to attack."

Hersh has a track record in breaking major stories. He was the first to write about the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and has written extensively about the build-up to the war in Iraq. He made his name when he uncovered the massacre at My Lai during the Vietnam war. Most recently he has written about US plans for Iran, alleging that US special forces had already been active inside the country.

Source (http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1844021,00.html)

More in the same vain..

I think the key word here would be 'hood-winked'.

Seymour Hersh, the greatest living journalist; indeed, the Dan Rather of print. :whistling

Egad.

Would that he focused his dazzling talents on the United Nations, eh?

EDIT:

I forgot to accord this the requisite ridicule due all cut-and-paste posting.

I hereby heckle the poster, and offer several soft, wet raspberries (Yankee Stadium specie) as well.

[Ava Estelle]

I forgot to accord this the requisite ridicule due all cut-and-paste posting. Including your own?

[j2k4]

I forgot to accord this the requisite ridicule due all cut-and-paste posting. Including your own?

In the interest of fairness?

Yes.

Funny, no one had a problem with it until I did it, and no one seems to have a problem with it unless I do it.

[limesqueezer]

All a big hunt for oil: the biggest oil reserves are where the wars are, all growing on bush like it was with hitler. Dogs are more respected than other people. U kick a dog and u pay 1000 dollars and u rape & kill some not christian human and u are a patriot, but i doubt that bush belives in anything, he just knows what people wana hear.

[j2k4]

...u rape & kill some not christian human and u are a patriot...

I have never heard anyone refer to U.N. personnel as patriots. :huh:

[limesqueezer]

America supplies weapons for one and putin for other side, its all just a testing ground or to say it more clearly a nice way to let others fight and than they can later walk in as helping ppl and steal the oil which was the plan at start and of course to put in charge a president later on that sticks with USA. Like in Korea its all about stealing oil and not some nuclear bombs. Nuclear power has nothing to do with building bomb. USA trys to find many different ways to start a war everywhere where is oil cause they want to control it. Who has the most atomic bombs and makes wars all the time since the time i was born, USA is the answer. Those people in iraq live in stone age, just watch a documentary and not some stupid news chanel that says what bush wants em to say, they can't build atomic bombs, they couldn't even defend emself when usa attacked. Who trained Osama, CIA did and i wouldn't go too far saying that bush planed to attack world trade center cause this was the only way to attack iraq and steal the oil. Nowdays are the terrorists only the people that have no money and lots of oil, only the countries that have the biggest oil reserves and are poor enough that USA can attack. It was like that always from world war 2 to vietnam to now.