Russia is likely to veto the "western" UN draft resolution on Syria as it does not reflect the situation on the ground and is obviously an instrument to impose regime change if needed by war.

Unlike the draft resolution the report by the Arab League observer mission clearly tells of (pdf) brutal rebel attacks on the government and on civilian:

In Homs, Idlib and Hama, the Observer Mission witnessed acts of violence being committed against Government forces and civilians that resulted in several deaths and injuries. Examples of those acts include the bombing of a civilian bus, killing eight persons and injuring others, including women and children, and the bombing of a train carrying diesel oil. In another incident in Homs, a police bus was blown up, killing two police officers. A fuel pipeline and some small bridges were also bombed.

Any state will rightly use force to put down such armed gangs.

The Turkish president Gül is pressing for a fast solution:

“We regret this, but Syria is unfortunately on a path of no return. The important thing is that this process is not dragged out. There is no [good] end for this. The end is certain. The question is how painful it will be,” the president also said.

I see no fast way for the "west" to achieve regime change in Syria. A "no-fly zone" against a country where there are no military flights against the rebels makes little sense and a coalition of the willing is unlikely to evolve soon as everyone, the Turks, the Gulf dictatorships and the U.S., involved has a different idea of what the end game should be.

Despite ten month of attacks the Syrian state institutions and its military have held together well and there is no sign of any breakup. Without any serious forces on the ground any intervention just from the air would be insufficient. Who would be willing to declare war on Syria and to send their own ground troops? Turkey is the candidate with the most potential to do this but the risk of resistance to it in its own minority areas seems too high.

With the UN way blocked and an open war unlikely the U.S. and its followers will try different ways to get Syria under their control. Most likely they will increase in the weapon flow to the rebels and intensify their training of more rebel groups in Turkey and Jordan. The Saudis and Qatar will continue to finance their Salafi gangs on the ground.

This conflict then will continue for quite some time but with the Syrian government now seemingly more aware and able to counter the rebels.

Slowly but deliberately Assad is moving Syria's political system towards a more democratic state. That is probably something the "west" would really fear. A democratic Syria not under its control and therefor likely to continue its rather independent policies. This may explain the current rush to find a way to smash it before this happens.

News & views …

Tariq Ali on his 1970s visit to North Korea. This bit from the end of the piece is enlightening:

Over lunch I asked her about [the Bush administration] plans for North Korea. She was cogent. ‘You haven’t seen the glint in the eyes of the South Korean military,’ she said. ‘They’re desperate to get hold of the North’s nuclear arsenal. That’s unacceptable.’ Why? ‘Because if a unified Korea becomes a nuclear power, it will be impossible to stop Japan from becoming one too and if you have China, Japan and a unified Korea as nuclear states, it shifts the relationship of forces against us.’ Obama seems to agree with this way of thinking.

This weeks long must read from the New Yorker: The Caging of America – Why do we lock up so many people? My answer: Because it is incredibly profitable for some.

Richard Silverstein’s Mossad minder “confidential highly-placed Israeli source” tells him another idiotic Iran drone story which the gullible Richard swallows and then pukes out adding a hefty portion of irrational speculation and stupid innuendo. Thankfully Dimi Reider has already  trashed it. Two month ago I did the same with an earlier implausible drone story by Richard.

Is CBS’ “60 minutes” using old interviews to raise political mayhem at convenient propaganda moments? Today it will broadcast an interview with Sec Def Panetta that, besides uncovering a CIA agent, again trashes relations with Pakistan. But the Pentagon says, even before the broadcast, that the interview is several month old and does not reflect current knowledge and policy. Two weeks ago CBS broadcasted an interview with the Emir of Qatar calling for war on Syria. It made quite a media splash at a convenient time. But that interview was already two month old when it was broadcasted. What is next on CBS ? A “current” interview with Elvis?

Headlines the Pakistani paper The Nation: Syrian forces killed 7,384 children: report. The headline is very wrong.

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From the piece:

Syrian forces have killed at least 7,384 children since March last year in the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, according to a report by the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef).

Rima Salah, acting Unicef deputy executive director said as of January 7, 384 children, most were boys, had been killed. She said about 380 children, some less than 14 years old, had been detained. Assad forces in brutal crackdown against innocent people and pro-democracy workers have killed thousands of people, including women and children, since March 2011.

It seems that some folks at The Nation somehow made up the number killed by adding the "as of January 7" date times thousand and the number 384 the UN got from somewhere. Then they put that into the headline and the opening graph thus reporting a fantasy number some of their readers may well believe.

Lets take a look at the MSNBC version of the story about those children in Syria which at least got the number right which the UNICEF's Rima Salah used:

At least 384 children have been killed and virtually the same number have been jailed, the United Nations Children's Fund said. UNICEF spokeswoman Marixie Mercado told Reuters the figures were based on reports by human rights organizations which it judged to be credible.

What are "children" in this context? Which "credible" human right organization did the UNICEF spokeswomen talk about? The UN's own human right official Navi Pillay who back in December just made up the number of people killed?

Or does Rima Saleh trust that shady Syrian Observatory for Human Rights organization in London of which actually two feuding ones exist:

The moving force behind the rival group (www.syriahr.org) who issued a letter attacking Abdulrahman’s group (www.syriahr.com) is a London-based Syrian exile and medical doctor named Mousab Azzawi.
…
While both Abdulrahman and Azzawi stress their work is not influenced by political allegiances, their respective political positions correlate with a greater dispute between Syria's opposition groups on the question of foreign intervention and the military option.

The campaign led by Azzawi to discredit Abdulrahman seems to come on the heels of a major fallout between the Syrian National Council (SNC) and the National Coordination Body for Democratic Change in Syria (NCB).

Which of the two sides did UNICEF judge to be credible? The one that has neocons write their policy papers? Or the other one which takes fake videos as proof:

Kako [of Abdulrahman's organization] also said that a single person with a video proving the claim would be accepted: “we don’t put it out [from a single source] unless he got maybe a video of it, for example, because a video cannot be denied if it is shown that it is a genuine video.”

When asked about the process for verifying the authenticity of such videos, and the circumstances in which victims were killed, Kako said: “When we get the video from our activists, we don’t take anything from any other sources.”

So who of these two provided UNICEF with that very exact number of 7,384 children killed when at the same time even the UN's human right boss Navi Pillay finally found some sense and stopped the false counting and making up of nonsense numbers:

On Wednesday, the UN said it had stopped compiling a death toll for Syria because it is too difficult to get information. "Some areas are totally closed, such as parts of Homs, so we are unable to update that figure. But in my view 5,000 and more is a huge figure and should really shock the international community into taking action," AFP reported Pillay as telling reporters.

As the above quoted must-read Al-Akhbar report closes:

The lack of transparency regarding sources of casualty reports may have its roots in the difficult conditions activists are working under inside Syria. But short of a serious push to protect these sources and to insist on accountability by all sides, propaganda will continue to prevail over reality.

Adding sloppy news editors like at The Nation to that and one can only disregarded any number of Syrian death quoted in any news or UN report as certain to be a false one. My best guess is that the numbers on both sides, the government forces and the rebel forces, are both in the low thousands and about the same.

The U.S. military in Afghanistan uses about 110 liters (30 gal) fuel per soldier per day. About half of that was coming through Pakistan until its border with Afghanistan was closed. For two month now the military lives off in-country reserves but it has now also started to purchase gasoline on the local Afghan market. But much of the fuel available on the Afghan market is actually coming from Iran. The military is thereby indirectly breaking U.S. sanctions against oil purchases from Iran.

Early 2011 Iran shut down all official fuel exports to Afghanistan. Fuel in Iran was at that time subsidized and often smuggled across the border. This close down was rumored to also be a response to sanctions the U.S. had put up against Iran. There was suspicion in Iran that exports to Afghanistan were used by the U.S. military.

During 2011 Iran abolished fuel subsidies and in December 2011 Iran signed a new agreement with Afghanistan to provide it with a million ton per year of gasoil, gasoline and jet fuel.

After the U.S. military killed 26 Pakistani troops in a border incident on November 26 the Afghan-Pakistani border is closed to all traffic. The fuel supply the U.S. military in Afghanistan received from and through Pakistan is cut off. Since the in-country reserves are limited and supply through the Northern Distribution Network is much more expensive as well as congested the military started to acquire petroleum products on the local market.

US officials say 85 per cent of the fuel for the military now come from the north.

Afghan businessmen say the international force is topping this up with purchases inside the country. This is affecting the market, forcing up prices and making petrol and public transport more expensive for the locals.

Farid Alokozay, head of the government agency responsible for petroleum products, said NATO was increasingly buying in fuel from domestic firms.

Mohammad Qorban Haqjo, chief executive of the Afghan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, confirmed that 20 local firms had signed a lucrative fuel supply deal with NATO.

“The contract was signed recently and is worth one billion dollars,” he said, adding that some of the firms belonged to relatives of senior Afghan officials.

The additional purchase from the Afghan market leaves the local people short of fuel:

“Since NATO forces started buying on the domestic market, not only have prices increased, but fuel is no longer available consistently,” Hajji Sayed Ahmad, who owns a petrol station in the city’s Deh Mazang district.

The shortage has prompted him to raise his prices, much to the annoyance of his customers.

“We have fights with dozens of people every day,” Ahmad said. “They think it’s our choice to increase fuel prices…. The general public don’t realise that fuel isn’t widely available and that the foreigners are buying it up.”

Kabul taxi drivers have increased their fares, leaving people queuing in the freezing cold for hours as they wait for cheaper but more erratic bus services. Once on the buses, they find that ticket prices have also increased.

As the military can only get 85% of it needs from the north supply from there is obviously limited. The border with Pakistan to the east and south is closed. The only source for additional fuel imports is thereby from Iran.

While it buys through Afghan middlemen the U.S. military will surely know where the fuel actually comes from. One wonders how long Iran will allow this to continue.

A succinct and appropriate warning by Georg Soros which fits with my own estimates:

As he sees it, the world faces one of the most dangerous periods of modern history—a period of “evil.” Europe is confronting a descent into chaos and conflict. In America he predicts riots on the streets that will lead to a brutal clampdown that will dramatically curtail civil liberties. The global economic system could even collapse altogether.
…
“We are facing an extremely difficult time, comparable in many ways to the 1930s, the Great Depression. We are facing now a general retrenchment in the developed world, which threatens to put us in a decade of more stagnation, or worse. The best-case scenario is a deflationary environment. The worst-case scenario is a collapse of the financial system.”

Soros also expresses my fear for Europe. Unfortunately the signs of this happening are piling up:

He’s now convinced that “if you have a disorderly collapse of the euro, you have the danger of a revival of the political conflicts that have torn Europe apart over the centuries—an extreme form of nationalism, which manifests itself in xenophobia, the exclusion of foreigners and ethnic groups. …"

Soros is not alone in predicting this.

The Global Risk 2012 (pdf) report for the World Economic Forum in Davos is seeing "severe income disparity" and "chronic fiscal imbalances" as the most likely risk factors in the coming 10 years.

But there is still little momentum anywhere to increase taxes on the rich which would help to curtail fiscal imbalances and income disparity. Instead we get talk about more and evermore austerity which will predictably fail to solve any economic problem.

There will be riots and suppression of riots and riots against the suppression. Only after those set up enough pressure genuine reforms will be thought of that will resolve the disparities and imbalances. Throughout the most important issue is to avoid wars which ruling classes traditionally like in such times as they help to divert the attention from their failures.

Back in November Uri Averny wrote:

Everybody knows the scene from school: a small boy quarrels with a bigger boy. “Hold me back!” he shouts to his comrades, “Before I break his bones!”

Our [Israeli] government seems to be behaving in this way.

He is right that this is the strategy Netanyahoo and Barak are using to push more sanctions against Iran and eventually for the U.S. to attack it. An op-ed in Ynet-news today claims that the strategy works:

It certainly looks as though the Israeli campaign launched during the previous fall, where rumors of an imminent Israeli strike on Iran were disseminated, secured its objectives. Western statesmen clung to this campaign and utilized it in order to impose on Iran the devastating sanctions that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu demanded two years ago already.

As long as it works the Israelis will continue with their campaign:

Israel's defence minister, Ehud Barak, has warned that tougher sanctions need to be imposed on Iran despite the unprecedented oil embargo agreed by the European Union earlier this week.
…
Speculation over Israel's military intentions has intensified over recent weeks, with the US urging the political and military establishment to hold back.

A new long Israeli written NY Times Magazine piece asking Will Israel Attack Iran? -while having some interesting details- is in the end just another part of this campaign.

But it is not all Israel's work and its not for sole Israeli interest. I have yet to see any step or concession from the U.S. side that would lead to serious negotiations with Iran. Trita Parsi is wrong when he claims that both sides are guilty of not coming to the table. Obama did some propaganda moves to make it seem that he would like to negotiate with Iran but there never was a serious attempt by him to actually do so.

Cont. reading: Israel’s Anti-Iran Campaign – A Favor To The U.S.

"The opera ain't over till the fat lady sings" relates to Wagner's Götterdämerung. In Libya the twilight of the gods of war has yet to come.

October 17, 2011: Gaddafi stronghold Bani Walid falls

NTC troops raise flags of Libya's new government after six-week siege, leaving only parts of Sirte defended by loyalists.

January 23, 2012: Qaddafi loyalists seize Bani Walid, clash with NTC forces

Diehard supporters of slain Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi seized control Monday of “the entire city of Bani Walid,” a local official said, prompting the deployment of National Transitional Council forces to regain the town.

Afghan soldier 'killed French troops over US video'

KABUL — An Afghan soldier who shot dead four French troops has said he did it because of a recent video showing US Marines urinating on the dead bodies of Taliban insurgents, security sources told AFP.

The attack on the soldiers, who were unarmed, came on Friday at a base in eastern Afghanistan and left 15 other French troops wounded, eight of them seriously.

"During the initial interrogations by French soldiers, he told them he did it because of the video in which American soldiers were urinating on bodies," an Afghan army officer said.
…
The Afghan soldier had also referred to a video showing British soldiers allegedly abusing Afghan children, the source with access to Ministry of Defence information said.

Less than a week after news of the US Marines video broke, British military police arrested two servicemen over allegations that they abused an Afghan boy and a girl, both aged about 10, and filmed the incidents.

The French will not be amused about this. Getting tarred with the same brush than those uncultured Americans and the perverts from the perfidious Albion is below their self perceived dignity. Add some freedom fries to that. (In their real behaviour in wars, the French are of course not much different the the Americans or the British.)

Sarkozy is facing a contested presidential election that may well kick him out. The French public is widely against the colonial adventure in Afghanistan. The French troops in Kapisa have had little success in their attempts to root out the Taliban there. Even before the motive of the Afghan soldier was known Sarkozy had threatened to pull the French troops out. Give today's news he will be under even more pressure to do so. I expect the French troops to leave Afghanistan by the end of the year.

With some 4,000 soldiers the French contingent is the fourth biggest after the U.S., British and German one. It is responsible for the province of Kapisa which is described as the Taliban's gateway to Kabul. The French leaving there will leave a quite big hole in the eastern front. Them leaving will be a serious loss for the U.S. effort there.

The U.S. military once had the idea of the strategic corporal. Low level leaders that win counterinsurgency wars by doing the right things and not doing the wrong stuff. Essentially German Auftragstaktik at its best. But in reality there is little incentive in the U.S. military to do the right thing and there is lack of enforcement of discipline, beginning at the very top, against doing wrong.

When the policy at the very top is to torture the living terrorists, without ever going after the perpetrators, it is difficult to explain to the soldiers on the ground not to piss on the dead ones.

Various wars have shown that losing the moral ground at the top filters through the chain of command and loses the war on the ground. One wonders why that lesson has to be relearned so often.

Isabel Kershner, an Israeli reporter working for the New York Times, is introducing a new propaganda term about Iran's nuclear program. She writes:

Though Iran continues to insist that its nuclear program is only for civilian purposes, Israel, the United States and much of the West are convinced that Iran is working to develop a weapons program.

"Working to develop a weapons program"? What is that supposed to mean?

Since the NYT ombudsman has admonished the paper for being to casual with references to the non existing Iranian nuclear weapon program, Kersher can no longer refer to it directly.

Instead she now comes up with "is working to develop a weapons program." This phrase has, to my best knowledge, never been used in any official language and I have never seen this accusation before. What is the factual base for Kershner's assertion?

U.S. and Israeli officials have loud and openly said that Iran does not have a nuclear weapons program. They have never said that it is "working to develop a weapons program." They say flat out that Iran has not taken any decision towards a nuclear weapon program.

That is what U.S. defense secretary Panetta said on January 8 at CBS's "Face The Nation":

Are they trying to develop a nuclear weapon? No. But we know that they're trying to develop a nuclear capability. And that's what concerns us. And our red line to Iran is do not develop a nuclear weapon. That's a red line for us.
…
But the responsible thing to do right now is to keep putting diplomatic and economic pressure on them to force them to do the right thing. And to make sure that they do not make the decision to proceed with the development of a nuclear weapon.

Paneta thereby confirms the reported judgement of the U.S. intelligence community expressed in the National Intelligence Estimates in 2007 (pdf) and 2011 that Iran ended an alleged rudimentary nuclear weapons program in 2003 after its immediate enemy, Saddam Hussein's Iraq, was removed. It was reported just days ago that Israel's own intelligence services concurs with the U.S. intelligence assessment:

Cont. reading: On Iran NYT Introduces New False Propaganda Line

News & views …

Just when the New York Times today published a background piece on fratricide between Afghan and international soldiers, an Afghan soldier killed four French soldiers and wounded another eighteen:

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Friday that France is suspending its training programs for Afghan troops after the killings, which he announced in a speech after the U.S.-led coalition said an Afghan soldier shot and killed four NATO troops.

Sarkozy said it was "unacceptable" that Afghan troops would attack French soldiers.

Stopping all personal cooperation will be, of course, not a solution to the "unacceptable" problem.

The real number of such green on blue incidents is kept secret:

Military commanders in Afghanistan have stopped making public the number of allied troops killed by Afghan soldiers and police, a measure of the trustworthiness of a force that is to take over security from U.S.-led forces.
…
Since 2005, more than 50 troops had been killed and 48 wounded by Afghan troops, according to data released before the policy changed and USA Today research. In 2011, Afghan troops killed at least 13 ISAF troops.

The Times quotes from an unpublished report which says:

“Lethal altercations are clearly not rare or isolated; they reflect a rapidly growing systemic homicide threat (a magnitude of which may be unprecedented between ‘allies’ in modern military history).”

The superficial reasons why this happening:

“The sense of hatred is growing rapidly,” said an Afghan Army colonel. He described his troops as “thieves, liars and drug addicts,” but also said that the Americans were “rude, arrogant bullies who use foul language.”

The real reason will be deeper. While there is certainly also racism and jealousy involved, I would expect that the sheer value put on a soldier, the money that is spend on their quarters, their equipment and their pay is so vastly different that it creates deep animosities. With an Afghan soldier objectively valued less than a foreigner the foreign soldiers will perceive them as lower class and behave with arrogance towards them while the Afghan soldier will see the situation as degrading. This is thereby a class problem.

According to the Times report special operation soldiers have less green on blue incidents. The Times ascribes that to their culture and language training. That may partly be the reason but what is probably more important is that special operations soldiers tend to live a less pampered life than the regular ones and are willing and often will live with the native soldiers they are cooperating with under the same condition than those have.

Sarkozy's solution is to stop all cooperation. A real solution, besides of course leaving, might be to do away with the luxuries the foreign soldiers enjoy and make them live their time in Afghanistan just as the Afghans live.

The proposed new negotiations with Iran about its nuclear program seem to be just a sham. The likely goal behind them is still regime change. The negotion position the U.S. wants to set are unacceptable for Iran. Laura Rozen reports on the “expectations” the U.S. is said to have for these talks:

American non-proliferation officials and diplomats have prepared a so-called “confidence building measure” for Iran to accept as an outcome of the next round of talks. Western governments see Iran’s reception of the measure as a key test of whether further negotiations would be productive–or if Iran is even capable of making a decision.

Two Washington Iran analysts described the draft U.S. confidence building measure to Yahoo News last week, as they understood it from conversations earlier this month with its principal author, State Department non-proliferation expert and Iran sanctions czar Robert Einhorn. Under the proposed measure, which the U.S. has been presenting to its P5+1 partners, Iran would agree to halt enriching uranium to 20 percent, and turn over its existing stockpile of 20 percent enriched uranium. In exchange, western countries would agree not to pass another UN Security Council Resolution sanctioning Iran.

Western diplomats and analysts stress the importance Washington and its allies have placed on Iran’s acceptance of the trust-building measure.

If trues and these “two Washington Iran analysts” are not simply lying this position is ludicrous. There is likely no way the U.S. could get another UN security council resolution on Iran. After its “western” members broke the resolution on Libya neither Russia nor China are in any mood to allow for another conflict.

So the U.S. is telling Iran to hand over its 20% enriched Uranium for what? Continued unilateral sanctions against its oil-exports and more killing of its scientist?

How could any Iranian politician explain such a deal to his people? Iran and its people have endured sanctions for making the 20% Uranium for the production of medicine. No one suggesting to give that up for nothing would have a chance for political survival.

These “conditions” are just an arrogant demand that Iran should surrender. It will of course not do so which will then increase the more and more fashionable demands in Washington for unilateral “regime change” by force.

Nov 19 2011 – Barak: Iran less than a year away from producing nuclear weapon

Iran is less than a year away from being unstoppable in its goal of producing a nuclear weapon, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said in an interview with CNN released on Saturday.

—

Jan 18 2012 – Barak: Israel 'very far off' from decision on Iran attack

Defense Minister Ehud Barak said on Wednesday that Israel was "very far off" from a decision about an attack on Iran over its nuclear program.
…
The intelligence assessment Israeli officials will present later this week to Dempsey indicates that Iran has not yet decided whether to make a nuclear bomb.

I have yet to understand what has led to this change of mind. Any ideas?

Yesterday – Hackers shut down Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, El Al websites

Hackers shut down both the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) and El Al’s respective websites on Monday, one day after a hacker network threatened to carry out attacks on both sites.

The network, which goes by the name “nightmare group,” was able to cause severe problems for both sites. By 10 A.M., TASE's website was only partially functioning, while El Al’s website did not function at all.

Today – Israeli hackers bring down Saudi, UAE stock exchange websites

Israeli hackers brought down the websites of both the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul) and the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange (ADX) Monday, in the latest episode of a continuing cyber war between hackers in the two countries.

The Israeli hackers, who go by the name IDF-Team, were able to paralyze the Tadawul website, while causing significant delays to the ADX exchange site.

In the immediate future we will see more such reports.

This is not cyberwarefare but amateur stuff. Just simple syn flooding with freeware tools. Simple denial of service (DoS) attacks which can be defended against by syn cookies and various other measures any system administrator worth a good pay will know.

Despite the headlines it is usually technically impossible to say where the attacks are coming from. A lot of "false flag" action is used in such incidents.

The Internet is designed as a error tolerant but collaborative system. Partisan amateur attempts can't really hurt it. But when collaboration between the professionals running it breaks down and the domain name system or the big router traffic protocols like BGP get messed with, the Internet and those depending on its usage, will be in real trouble.

It is quite interesting that within the global war the U.S. now wages the side more dependent on the Internet and thereby more vulnerable is the "western" one. Given that there are serious asymmetric warfare possibilities in messing with the net the "west" should be careful to not set precedences in that realm.

The above includes four Wikipedia links. Wikipedia will shut down tomorrow to protest against the pending SOPA/PIPA regulation in Congress which would mess up the collaborative professional Internet management you depend on to read this. If you "want the Internet to remain free and open, everywhere, for everyone" you need to take action against such legislative measures.

The Guardian's frontpage layout today is a bit awkward.

source

Or is this the famous British humour?

NATO denies military intervention plans in Syria, January 13 2012
"At present, there is no discussion at all of a NATO role with respect to Syria," NATO spokeswoman Carmen Romero told Xinhua by phone.

Haven't we seen such before? Oh, yeah:

NATO has no plans to intervene in Libya: Rasmussen, February 24 2011
"I would like to stress that NATO has no plans to intervene and we have not received any request," Rasmussen said after talks with Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych.

We documented the Rassmussen/NATO headlines which followed after the one above.

But there is another more curious headline that ran yesterday: Emir of Qatar calls for Arab troops in Syria

The Emir of Qatar says that Arab troops should be sent to Syria to stop a deadly crackdown that has claimed the lives of thousands of people in the past ten month.

Sheik Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani's comments to CBS "60 Minutes", which will be aired Sunday, are the first statements by an Arab leader calling for the deployment of troops inside Syria.

That dictator emir was also the one who pressed arranged for the Arab League to invite NATO to attack Libya.

But what is really curious here (and what only Qatar's AlJazeera(!) reports) is that the CBS interview is old:

In an interview due to be aired on Sunday with US broadcaster CBS for the news programme 60 Minutes, Sheikh Hamad was asked if he was in favour of Arab nations intervening, to which he replied: "For such a situation to stop the killing … some troops should go to stop the killing."

The interview was recorded in mid-November.

Why and on who's request did CBS hold back this interview for two month?

Were the preparations not yet finished for the NATO intervention in Syria? Was some additional time needed to make the Arab League observer mission fail to convince other Arab states to agree to the next war phase?

The interview was given after Syria in early November agreed to an Arab league cease fire plan which the rebels immediately rejected. "Western" news by now is always forgetting that last point. Despite continuing attacks from the opposition the Syrian government has largely followed the agreement, pulled back tanks, released prisoners and is implementing reforms. The observer mission was agreed to on December 19. Unless renewed it will run out in five days.

But it seems that all along the plan was not to allow for a peaceful solution for Syria. Why else would the Emir of Qatar, in an interview for the U.S. public, call for troops to attack Syria back in mid November?

Russia now anticipates an imminent wider war in the Middle East and is preparing its options.

The Mark Perry story False Flag – A series of CIA memos describes how Israeli Mossad agents posed as American spies to recruit members of the terrorist organization Jundallah to fight their covert war against Iran. is a bit weird.

My first questions were:

Why is this whitewash of the CIA coming out right now, just two days after the assassination of another Iranian engineer?

Why is there no mention at all of JSOC, the U.S. military Joint Special Operations Command forces who are, according to Sy Hersh, operating in Iran? What is their relation to the Israelis?

Why is the U.S. now doing so much to say it has nothing to do with the assassination? Notice that this changed. State Department spokesperson Nuland when asked on January 11 immediately after the event issued no denial at all:

QUESTION: The Iranians have accused Israel and the United States of carrying out this killing. Any truth to that?
MS. NULAND: I don't have any information to share one way or the other on that.
QUESTION: You don’t want to deny killing him?
MS. NULAND: Obviously, we – as I said, we condemn the loss of innocent life.
QUESTION: That’s not a denial as such.
MS. NULAND: I’m not prepared to speak one way or the other. I, frankly —
QUESTION: You didn’t want to deny it.
QUESTION: Would the scientist come under innocent life?
MS. NULAND: Say again?
QUESTION: Would the scientist come under your definition of innocent life?
MS. NULAND: Again, I don't think I have anything further to say on this, that we condemn violence of any kind.

Only later did Hillary Clinton issue a strong direct denial:

Cont. reading: Is The “False Flag” Piece A False Flag?

Just to show a typical type of lie in U.S. reporting on Iran. Iran is always shown as irrational or as reacting to pressure when that is only very, very rarely the case – if at all.

Jay Salomon writes in today's Wall Street Journal: Iran to Let In U.N. Atomic Inspectors

WASHINGTON—Iran agreed to host a high-level team of United Nation's nuclear inspectors later this month, Western diplomats said, a surprise development that could help to curb building tensions with the West.

The diplomats on Thursday said Iran had tentatively agreed to receive a delegation from the United Nation's International Atomic Energy Agency headed by the agency's chief weapons inspector, Herman Nackaerts. The diplomats, who are based in Vienna, said the visit was tentatively set for Jan. 28.

Now compare those bold sections to the reality published three weeks ago:

Iran invites IAEA inspectors to visit its nuclear establishments

TEHRAN, Dec. 21 (Xinhua) — Iran's permanent representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Ali-Asghar Soltanieh said that the Islamic Republic has invited IAEA inspectors to visit the country's nuclear establishments, the local satellite Press TV reported on Wednesday.

Oh, you do not like Xinhua quoting PressTV? How about AFP on Dec 20:

Iran invites UN nuclear inspectors: diplomats

Iran has invited the UN atomic watchdog to visit the country, but it is unclear whether inspectors would have access to sites where covert nuclear weapons activity is suspected, Western diplomats said Tuesday.
…
The United States welcomed the fact that the IAEA had been invited back, …

So this three weeks old news is certainly not a "surprise development" nor is it just "tentatively agreed". It was an official invitation by Iran that was, as it should be, accepted by the IAEA. Salomon is trying to spread propaganda by peddling old news as "surprise". Typically – liberal interventionists, like Paul Woodward, fall for it.

News & views …