By Alison Weir
On November 12th I received a sudden visit at my home from two FBI agents. As I posted in a tweet.
FBI agents suddenly showed up at my home recently. They asked me about a person whose name I didn’t recognize. I asked to have a family member present and ascertained from the agents that one of their offices had asked them to check in with certain people in regard to something to do with Press TV.
This is an Iranian outlet that has interviewed me on various occasions over the years. (During my 20+ years writing and speaking about Palestine, I have taken as many opportunities as humanly possible to get the facts out via any traditional and alternative, domestic and international media outlets available. I don’t attempt to vet media outlets and try to reach as many audiences in the U.S. and around the world as I can with the facts about Palestine.)
I have since found out that other individuals who have a history of working for a just peace for Palestinians and Israelis have also been visited by the FBI. I understand the agency has been weaponized in the past to try to silence groups and people that some members of government oppose.
It would appear someone is now trying to set the stage to silence dissent on Israel-Palestine in the United States by trumping up “connections with Iran.”
Since my tweet, there have been several articles on the incident. These also pointed out the Palestinian connection.
(It’s important to keep in mind that this is in the context of over a year of Israel starving and slaughtering Palestinians; seventy percent of those killed have been women and children. Even a growing number of mainstream American commentators such as Ambassador Chas Freeman, Professor John Mearsheimer, Col. Douglas Macregor, Judge Andrew Napolitano, and Col. Daniel Davis have spoken out about the situation.)
Press TV published a report saying that the FBI visit to my home was “seen as part of a broader pattern of opposing voices that shed light on the Gaza genocide and US backing of Israel.”
The article stated:
The FBI’s investigation into individuals linked to Press TV has sparked alarm among advocates for Palestinian rights, highlighting a growing debate over the limits of dissent and the implications of US government oversight on those exercising their free speech rights.
As the narrative unfolds, questions arise about the implications of such investigations on freedom of expression and activism in the United States.
In September, the United States Department of the Treasury added Press TV to the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC)’s Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List.
The US government has enacted stringent sanctions against the Tehran-based news channel, which has been on air since 2007. Operating under the slogan “The Voice of the Voiceless,” Press TV aims to highlight significant regional and global issues that are often overlooked or misrepresented by mainstream media.
Observers say the US government’s move to pull the plug on Press TV is part of Washington’s attempts to silence Iranian media because they “debunk US lies.”
A website called InformationLiberation published an article that said:
The FBI now operates as the ADL’s intimidation arm.…
Attorney General Merrick Garland brazenly seized Press TV’s 14-year-old web domain PressTV.com in June, 2021 Israel lost the propaganda war over their May, 2021 bombing of Gaza.
Last month in the UK, pro-Palestine journalist Asa Winstanley had his home raided by police and his electronic devices seized under the “terrorism act” despite not being charged with any crime.
As I reported on Friday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is moving to try and silence criticism of Jews and Israel as hate speech and empower the federal government to crack down on anti-Israel protests on college campuses through the ADL-backed “Antisemitism Awareness Act.”
Activist investor Nelson Peltz laments Jews “failed” to stop antisemitism through their “nice” open borders/open society policies, demands a crackdown.
“You’ve got to come down very hard on this—you really must come down hard and obliterate it!” Peltz says to awkward silence.… pic.twitter.com/jMSxy4ivRy
— Chris Menahan 🇺🇸 (@infolibnews) November 16, 2024
There is a bipartisan effort to take away the First Amendment rights of the American people in order to silence criticism of the genocide Israel is committing in Gaza.
Mint Press News published an article that stated:
The encounter has drawn attention amid growing fears among advocates for Palestinian rights, who say federal authorities are targeting individuals critical of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. The FBI has declined to comment on the visit or clarify whether it is part of a larger investigation.
The U.S. government’s targeting of Iran’s PressTV has been ongoing since June 2021, when its website domain was seized. Despite this, the channel has continued to interview guests from the United States and maintain correspondents there. Among its guests has been Weir, who says she has been interviewed by PressTV multiple times over the years without issue—until now.
Weir, best known for her book “Against Our Better Judgment: The hidden history of how the United States was used to create Israel,” also runs the website “If Americans Knew,” which offers critical perspectives on occupied Palestine….
On November 1, pro-Palestinian TikTok influencer Guy Christensen faced a harrowing ordeal when his family’s home was encircled by police vehicles. Authorities informed him that an individual had impersonated him, making bomb threats against several synagogues. Christensen, en route to a speaking engagement with Green Party figures Jill Stein and Butch Ware, was detained at the airport for questioning and is now under FBI investigation. When he inquired about the impersonator’s identity, officials disclosed that the caller had used a VPN, obscuring the origin of the call.
I’m finally speaking out.
I was targeted by a Zionist who impersonated me to the FBI in an attempt to put me on a No Fly List.
This is the story of what happened. This is what Zionists do to people who try to help Palestinians: pic.twitter.com/e1FSh33COo
— YourFavoriteGuy (@guychristensen_) November 13, 2024
In June, U.S. human rights activist Osama Abuirshaid revealed he had been placed on an FBI watchlist without explanation. Speaking to Turkish media outlet Anadolu Agency, Abuirshaid described harassment that he believes was motivated by his advocacy for Palestinian rights.Months earlier, on March 19, an Egyptian-American woman faced a similar experience when FBI agents arrived at her home over screenshots of Facebook posts. A video of the encounter, in which she repeatedly asked the agents to leave and referred them to her attorney, went viral, garnering millions of views. Her comment, “This is America,” as she confronted the agents sparked widespread debate about federal overreach and the implications for freedom of expression.
According to the Creating Law Enforcement Accountability & Responsibility (CLEAR) project at the City University of New York, government surveillance targeting Muslims, Palestinians, and Arabs expressing support for Palestine has surged since the onset of the war in Gaza.
However, the scrutiny has not been confined to minority groups. U.S. civil rights organization Palestine Legal reported that as early as February, it received multiple accounts of FBI agents visiting activists in response to social media posts criticizing what the activists described as Israel’s “genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.”
The FBI’s discriminatory targeting of people who speak up for Palestinian rights on social media is an attempt to silence popular criticism of Israel. You have a right to speak up against genocide. You have a right to refuse to speak to FBI agents without an attorney present.
— Palestine Legal (@pal_legal) January 23, 2024
It was revealed earlier this year that, under pressure from U.S. members of Congress, the FBI began monitoring pro-Palestine student protesters who had set up encampments on college campuses. Pro-Israel groups in the United States reportedly lobbied for warrantless surveillance of these student-led demonstrations..While the FBI focused on surveilling anti-war protesters and investigating its own citizens, reports emerged that an ex-Israeli special forces agent had infiltrated a student encampment at UCLA. The former operative suggested the operation may have been conducted in coordination with the Los Angeles Police Department. Requests for comment from Middle East Eye regarding the incident went unanswered.
Going after Iran for Israel
I would like to expand on a specific aspect of the Israel-Palestine issue that I suspect played an important role in why FBI agents were sent to my home: Israel’s ongoing campaign against Iran.
For decades Israel has targeted Iran as a potential adversary to take down, and certain Israeli partisans have been driving forces in the anti-Iran campaign in the U.S. This campaign against Iran, to demonize it and to prevent Americans from learning many facts about Iran, has escalated over the past few months.
I have reported on this since at least 2005.
Targeting Iran has been discussed by Israeli leaders since at least the 1950s.
An Israeli author has described a similar campaign to propagandize the Israeli public to see Iran as an enemy to be eliminated. In 1993 Israeli author Israel Shahak reported: “Since the spring of 1992 public opinion in Israel is being prepared for the prospect of a war with Iran, to be fought to bring about Iran’s total military and political defeat.”
Shahak wrote: “In one version, Israel would attack Iran alone, in another it would ‘persuade’ the West to do the job.”
The latter effort, in particular, has ramped up in recent years. For example, I reported in 2021:
“As the US was finally in the process of trying to exit the disastrous, 20-year Afghan war in August, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett came to Washington D.C. to push Biden to increase US hostilities against Iran.
“Israeli insiders revealed ahead of Bennet’s White House visit that Israel planned to use the ‘humiliating surrender of the US to the Taliban’ to lead Biden to ‘flex US muscle toward Iran.’ Naftali Bennett’s mission in meeting with Biden was, they reported, to convince him that Iran ‘poses a tangible and significant threat to the entire world,’ and that the U.S. must take action against Iran…”
Over the past 20 years If Americans Knew has posted numerous articles and videos on the topic, some by me, most by diverse other writers from a variety of organizations. At the end of this post are some of them in reverse chronological order.
In sum…
It seems to me that a possible, perhaps probable, motivation for FBI agents to be deployed to my home is related to this long campaign against Iran, and in pursuit of a US on attack Iran.
Many people tried to prevent the war on Iraq that Israel similarly supported and promoted, and which certain neoconservative Israel partisans pushed for. This devastating war cost the lives of at least 200,000 Iraqi men, women, and children and 4,600 Americans, not to mention the numerous Iraqis and American vets with missing arms, legs, and eyes from this war.
That war also cost the U.S. untold trillions of dollars, led to the rise of ISIS and destabilized the Middle East.
I feel it is desperately important that another such war be prevented. That can only happen if enough of us learn the facts, and share them as widely as we possibly can.
Ron Paul recently said that President-elect Donald Trump should send Elon Musk to talk to the Iranians. This is the last thing Netanyahu would wish, but it is exactly what should happen.
If we value a future for ourselves, our grandchildren, and our planet, it is extremely important that influential Americans speak to Iranians rather than escalate tensions that potentially represent an existential threat for all of us. At this moment in time, this is especially crucial for anyone with a chance of influencing which policies are enacted by the next administration.
During the campaign, Vice President-elect J.D. Vance spoke against war with Iran. Americans of all political persuasions should hold him to this.
JD Vance on Tim Dillon:
“Our interest is in not going to war with Iran.” pic.twitter.com/CTE7LURhux— 𝗔𝗠𝗘𝗥𝗜𝗖𝗔 𝗙𝗜𝗥𝗦𝗧 (@GroypGangAF) October 26, 2024
In the place of the xenophobic tarring of anyone who speaks to possible adversaries, encouraged by elite war hawks, we need openness, dialog, and rational, independent discourse.
While many are worried that they would be tarred with the kind of defamatory epithets that have been hurled at those who’ve opposed the calamitous Ukraine war and who’ve criticized Israeli dispossession and oppression of Palestinians, perhaps there are some who would dare go to Iran and speak with Iranians directly. (Fyi Some travel groups even recommend it.)
A visit from the FBI can be intimidating, which likely is sometimes an intended result. In my case, it has made me even more determined not to be deterred from speaking openly and honestly to diverse audiences in as many places as possible.
I have visited Iran in the past to speak about Palestine, including a lecture tour at several Iranian universities. I found the students friendly and excited to meet an American in person. I met a prominent supporter of the regime who had been targeted by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who turned out to be respectful of the American people. (Incidentally, in stereotype-busting contrast to prejudices among some westerners, he is a devout Muslim who also revered Jesus and made a multipart film about him that was shown at the Vatican and other places around the world.)
I’ve also spoken about Palestine in Malaysia, Iraq, Qatar, China, England, Wales, and Canada.
I plan to continue to accept invitations to speak at conferences and other venues around the world, including Iran, when I can, even if some in the U.S. government find this displeasing and send FBI agents to knock on my door.
Articles about Iran
On-the-Ground Reporting Dismantles Israeli Claim Bolstering Case for War With Iran
Israel falsely claims that Iran is smuggling weapons into occupied Palestine through Jordan, while on-the-ground reports explain that Israel is aiming to increase accusations against Iran which paves the way for possible military intervention. These claims have commonly been used to bolster Israel’s justifications in its ongoing confrontations with Iran…
Leaked documents reveal US intel cutout’s Iranian counter-revolution plans
The leaks reveal how NED leader Carl Gershman and other Israel partisans privately plotted to channel US State Department resources into the construction of an “Iran Freedom Coalition” composed of pro-Western Iranian activists and US neoconservative operatives who clamor for an American military assault on Iran…
Assassination of Haniyeh an intentional, dangerous escalation – Parsi, Macgregor
Haniyeh lived in Qatar… Israel’s choice to specifically kill him in Iran had several results: ended efforts to improve U.S.- Iran relations, closed the window for addressing Iran’s nuclear program, impeded chances of a ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza, and escalated danger of a wider regional war – that would involve Americans in another disastrous conflict…Colonel Douglas Macgregor and Judge Andrew Napolitano lay out the tactics of the Israeli government to embroil the US into its regional war: Israel’s lethal attack on Iran’s embassy complex in Syria was intended to provoke a retaliation from Iran…
Mainstream U.S. media is hiding key truths in its coverage of Iran’s retaliatory attack
The assertion that Israel is trying to provoke a wider regional conflict appeared nowhere in the mainstream media coverage of Iran’s retaliatory strike…
Top military expert Col. Douglas MacGregor warns against attack on Iran
Colonel Douglas MacGregor is a 28-year veteran of the US Army who previously served as Senior Advisor to the US Secretary of Defense. He explains that all the evidence indicates that Iran did not perpetrate the recent attack that killed three American servicemen and describes the long effort to get the US to attack Iran on behalf of Israel. Col. McGregor explains that such an attack would be disastrous on every level…
Flashback: Israeli Journalist said Israel is pushing US into war with Iran
The U.S. military establishment doesn’t want to fight in Iran, but Israel and AIPAC have been dragging them toward it with all their might. In an article today on the Israeli website +972 Mag, Blame Israel and AIPAC for a U.S. war in Iran, Derfner writes: “If America ends up bombing Iran first (unlikely), or being drawn into a war as a result of Israel’s bombing Iran first (much more likely), that American war will be stamped “Made In Israel…”
More Disinformation from Israel about Iran
Weakening Iran and possibly even replacing its government is the most compelling issue for Israel and its powerful US domestic lobby, but the Israeli plan is much broader than that: to make the United States the junior partner providing the money and weapons in Israel’s effort to militarily dominate the Middle East…
Israel wants a state of permanent war
The irony that Israel, which is a nuclear menace and major aggressor in the Middle East region, portrays itself as a victim of its neighbours cannot be overstated. To legitimise the state of permanent war, Israel sought early on to portray its citizens as actual or potential victims of wars and persecution inflicted by Palestinian resistance and Arab states, which in turn necessitated Israel’s use of permanent war and persecution as “retaliation”…
Israel escalates efforts to get US to attack Iran, as it did Iraq
Recently, Israel used the Afghan exit to promote hostile U.S. policies on behalf of Israel against Iran – policies that could escalate into another disastrous, failed war. Some analysts from across the political spectrum have exposed and opposed these dangerous efforts – including Democracy Now, CounterPunch, Tucker Carlson, Pat Buchanan… (videos below)
Israel to leverage Afghanistan exit to get US to ‘flex muscle’ against Iran
Israeli insiders say Israel plans to use the ‘humiliating surrender of the US to the Taliban’ to lead Biden to ‘flex US muscle toward Iran.’ During his upcoming meeting with Biden, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s mission will be to convince Biden that Iran ‘poses a tangible and significant threat to the entire world,’ and that the U.S. must take action against Iran…
‘Israel’s Lawyer’ et al promote US militarism, anti-Iran policies
Dennis Ross served under Presidents Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Obama. As an ardent Israel advocate, he was dubbed “Israel’s lawyer” by colleagues… And he’s just one of the many Israel-partisans promoting more US aggression…
Patrick Buchanan: A Tonkin Gulf incident in the Gulf of Oman?
Buchanan concludes: “Those behind this attack on the Israeli-owned vessel do not want to reduce the possibility of war between the United States and Iran. They want to make it a reality. We ought not accommodate them.”…
Israel Cracks the Whip: Netanyahu tells Biden how to deal with Iran
Will it lead to a totally unnecessary and unwinnable war with Iran? Joe Biden was president for less than a week when Israel announced he would soon be receiving IMossad’s chief Yossi Cohen to explain the correct policy when dealing with Iran…
‘NY Times’ story on Iran-Al Qaeda is dishonest — and could help justify a U.S./Israeli attack
Trump and Netanyahu could be using the same scare tactics to justify any attacks on Iran they may be planning — and the Times may have fallen into their trap…
Israel Leverages Dubious ‘Nuclear Archives’ to Re-Enlist IAEA in Campaign Against Iran
The International Atomic Energy Agency has once again lent itself to the political interests of Israel, writes Gareth Porter… The approval by the board of the International IAEA)of a resolution calling on Iran to comply fully with agency demands for cooperation marks a new stage in the long-running Israeli campaign to isolate Iran over alleged covert nuclear weapons activities…
Pro-Israel Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin censors Iranian news website
The US Treasury Department, under Secretary Steven Mnuchin, has worked to block an Iranian news website, Fars News. Mnuchin is an Israel partisan and former hedge fund owner. Mnuchin received the Dr. Miriam and Sheldon G. Adelson Award in 2018…
CENSORSHIP: Google deletes Press TV from YouTube
Press TV says the move is “part of an anti-Iran purge as the West sets its sights on regime change in Iran.” This is just the latest censorship of the Iranian news organization…
Israel’s Fingerprints Are All Over the Assassination of Qasem Soleimani
The fingerprints of Israeli intelligence, the Mossad, are unmistakably present in the assassination of Qasem Soleimani…
Former intelligence officials: US drone attack on Iran motivated by Israel
“We write with a sense of urgency suggesting you avoid doubling down on catastrophe,” Veteran Intelligence Professionals tell Donald Trump in their latest memo to the president… “It is time to call a spade a spade. The country expecting to benefit most from hostilities between Iran and the U.S. is Israel…”
The Soleimani Assassination: The US is now at war with Iran
The assassination of Iranian Quds Force Commander General Qassem Soleimani will shift the long-simmering conflict between the two nations into high gear. The blood of the Americans, Iranians and Iraqis who will die in the next few weeks is clearly on Donald Trump’s hands as this war was never inevitable and served no U.S. national interest… Israel and the neocons cheer the assassination…
Stuxnet: The Israeli-American Computer Virus That Started Cyber-Warfare
Stuxnet was one of a series of viruses developed by Israel and the United States in the early 2000s, then turned loose to destroy Iran’s nuclear research facilities – although Iran was compliant with international norms, and known to have no nuclear weapons program. As part of the US-Israel strategy, young Iranian scientists were assassinated…
The effort on behalf of Israel to destroy Iran’s ability to defend itself
U.S. war hawks are targeting Iran because Israel wants them to… Iran is the only regional power impeding Israel’s actions against Palestinians… While Israel has numerous nuclear weapons, Iran is not supposed to acquire them…
Israel-born Treasury official is at the center of U.S. policies on Iran
At the Center of U.S. Iran policies is an Israel-born Treasury official named Sigal Mandelker. The Atlantic writes that her ‘hand is on the lever’ of crippling economic sanctions meant to force Iran’s ‘capitulation or demise’…
Israel behind Pretexts for an Attack on Iran
Ray McGovern probes the step-up in U.S. belligerence towards Iran – a country posing the same non-existent strategic threat as Iraq. Thanks to “dubious intelligence” from Israel – which wants nothing more than for its neighbors to be busy for the indefinite future – Trump officials have been thinking hard about entering, or even provoking, a war with Iran…
Fake news could serve as a pretext for war against Iran on behalf of Israel
Pro-Israel foundations in DC are promoting attacks on Iran… ‘As an ex-CIA case officer who worked on the Iran target for a number of years, I was shocked when I read the Washington Times’ article—it sounded like a repeat of the fabricated intelligence that was used against Iraq…’
Trita Parsi: On Iran, Is It Trump Versus His Own Neocons?
Israel – prime mover in Trump’s Iran policy – was shocked that Trump might abandon the pressure strategy and instead seek to mend ties with Tehran. The pro-Israel Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), nervously took to twitter to warn Trump against this… A goal of the new Iran Action Group may be to escalate matters with Iran to the point in which any pivot to diplomacy by Trump may be rendered impossible…
Intelligence Experts to Trump: Intel on Iran Could be CATASTROPHIC
As drums beat again for war — this time on Iran—-the warning from veteran US intelligence experts is again being disregarded as it was before the Iraq debacle, and this time VIPS “fear the consequences will be all-caps CATASTROPHIC.” The evidence displayed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on April 30 showed blatant signs of fabrication…
Was There Ever an Iranian Nuclear Weapons Program?
Author Gareth Porter and Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity report that Trump recently cancelled the Iran Deal based on documents obtained via Israeli intelligence. “The evidence presented by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on April 30 alleging a covert Iranian nuclear weapons program shows blatant signs of fabrication. That evidence is linked to documents presented by the Bush Administration more a decade earlier as proof of a covert Iran nuclear weapons program. Those documents were clearly fabricated as well…
GOP Hostility Toward Iran Secured After Adelson Gives $30 Million To Top Super PAC
Though Adelson has successfully used his donations to obtain policy decisions he has long desired, his work is still not done. Adelson, like many of the government officials he has put into power, is an advocate of a U.S./Israel war with Iran. With the U.S. out of JCPOA and now set to promote regime change as part of its official Iran policy, the foundation is quickly being laid for a military confrontation with Iran…
Pompeo Rocks the Middle East: Lessons from a Former CIA Officer for the Sec’y of State
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo recently visited Saudi Arabia, Israel and Jordan, where he repeated mistruths about the region. Former CIA counterterrorism expert Phil Giraldi sets the record straight…
Israelis who aided Harvey Weinstein collected info on Obama’s former administration
News has come out of an undercover campaign by an Israeli private-intelligence firm, with the aim of discrediting Obama officials who had been leading proponents of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. Several of Obama’s former staff were contacted by undercover agents for Black Cube – the firm that Harvey Weinstein hired for damage control, and that offers clients access to assistance from “Israel’s élite military and governmental intelligence units,” including the Mossad…
Clean Break II: Iran Hawks Decide to Burn it All Down
Michael Makovsky of the pro-Israel Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA) has a plan for countering Iranian influence in the Middle East: he wants the US to redraw borders all over the region, creating “loose confederations or new countries…
Is Iran really a nuclear threat?
Investigative journalist Gareth Porter dispels some of the myths surrounding Iran’s nuclear programme: Netanyahu and others have been crying wolf about Iran and nukes since the 1980s (including likely forging documents), while the IAEA has been declaring Tehran’s compliance; the Ayatollah has maintained that WMDs are “unIslamic,” and hasn’t used them yet (even against Iraq’s WMDs)…
Great Show, Glaring Flaw: 3 Takeaways From Netanyahu’s ‘Iran Lied’ Speech
Netanyahu’s dog-and-pony show Monday disregarded the pronouncement by the IDF’s Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot that the Iran deal is working and will keep nukes out of Iranian hands for at least ten years…
Netanyahu: Don’t look here where we’re shooting children, look over there at Iran
Why is Netanyahu in a panic about Iran’s potential to develop a weapons program? – it’s old news, and all evidence points to Iran’s compliance. But a nice, juicy war would distract the world from Israel’s ethnic cleansing of Palestinians as they peacefully demonstrate against the occupation and blockade, and wait for their 1948 right of return…
Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, spoke with great frankness last week about the damage that Israel’s (and AIPAC’s) plans in the Middle East and beyond may cause, if Israel gets its way. American allies (read “lemmings”) have been groomed and prepped. Bottom line, Israel could defend itself against Iran, but needs the power of the US to go into attack mode – to spread out the scorn, lest Israel alone take on all the world’s derision for assaulting a relatively weak, harmless nation, just because it allegedly poses the proverbial existential threat to Israel…
Iraq, Syria, Iran…Are We To Destroy Iran Next?
Utley examines possible neoconservative approaches to Iran and concludes that these would not be in the interest of peace in the region or security for the US – they would only be attractive to the pro-Israel lobby in its fundraising efforts…
Cherry-picking Toward War with Iran
In trying to rally American hostility toward Iran, CIA Director Pompeo and other U.S. officials are engaging in the same kind of distorted intelligence that led to the catastrophic Iraq invasion, writes ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar…
Trump’s Anti-Iranian Policy Not Enough for Neocons and Other Israelophiles
American neocons and Israelophiles look not only to block Iran’s nuclear capabilities but to disable its economy completely. The goal: The U.S. must keep Iran militarily and economically weak, so that it cannot challenge Israeli dominance of the region. A free Kurdistan in Iraq is also considered in Israel’s interests, as it weakens Iran’s potential in the region…
False claims against Syria lay the groundwork to destroy more Israeli targets
n 2007 the IAEA promoted false information about Israel’s bombing of a supposed nuclear reactor in Syria, burying clear evidence that the site was in fact not a reactor. Claims that a sarin gas attack last April was carried out by the Assad regime are similarly dubious. Just as the false claims of “weapons of mass destruction” against Iraq were used to initiate a war that destroyed Iraq, these claims seem aimed at taking down two more of Israel’s perceived enemies, Syria and Iran…
Israel’s false claim that it bombed a Syrian “nuke” site was used to get US intervention in Syria
Gareth Porter reports that in 2007, Israel sold the CIA on a dubious claim about a North Korean nuclear reactor in the Syrian desert. In joining Israel and the White House in selling military intervention in Syria – long a target of Israel – the CIA and international inspectors hid key evidence that would undermine the case…
Iran is not the bully – Israel is
While Iran talks tough at times, in over 200 years, it has attacked nobody…. America should ignore Netanyahu’s call to war and pay attention to history and context…
Israel’s behind-the-scenes support for Saudi efforts to destabilize Lebanon
A leaked cable indicates that Israel is working behind the scenes to support Saudi actions against Lebanon, Iran, Hezbollah, and Yemen. (Israel has long favored regional fragmentation.) An analyst says, “Israel is becoming the unlikely leader of the Sunni world.” Meanwhile, the recent resignation of Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri seems to have been scripted…
Elie Wiesel spoke out eloquently against violence and injustice… except when he endorsed them…
Netanyahu & Israel lobby lead Trump to war with Iran on behalf of Israel
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Presidents of the 52 Major Jewish American Organizations are leading President Trump, like a puppy on a leash, into a major war with Iran. The hysterical ’52 Presidents’ and ‘Bibi’ Netanyahu are busy manufacturing Holocaust-level predictions that a non-nuclear Iran is preparing to ‘vaporize’ Israel, the most powerful, nuclear-armed state in the Middle East…
Israeli ambassador pushes potential war to elite U.S. powerbrokers
At an invitation-only Rosh Hashanah event, the Israeli ambassador told D.C. heavy hitters – top journalists, White House insiders, Congress people, NGO heads, etc – what Israel wanted of them… “Israel hopes that the coming weeks will bring about a dramatic change in the trajectory of [the Iran] deal that will ultimately either fix it or cancel it,” Dermer said, making clear what was required of Americans…
The Crazy Imbalance of Russia-gate: What about Israel?
If the U.S. government and mainstream media are really concerned about foreign influence in American politics, they might look at Israel and other nations with much more clout than Russia…
Israel advocate Richard Goldberg writes memo pushing Trump to destabilize Iran
Neoconservatives are lobbying the president to decertify Iran’s compliance with the deal, and launch a new era of sanctions against Iran. A leader of this effort is a young operative from the heart of the Israel lobby, Richard Goldberg, who has worked with Stand With Us and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and is now pushing “regime instability” in an influential confidential document…
Netanyahu Pushes Trump Toward Wider Wars
A weakened, even desperate President Donald Trump must decide whether to stand up to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or to repudiate the Syrian partial ceasefire, which Trump hammered out with Russian President Vladimir Putin on July 7. Whether intentionally or not, this crossroads is where the months of Russia-gate hysteria have led the US, making Trump even more vulnerable to Israeli and neoconservative pressure and making any cooperation with Russia more dangerous for him politically…
Senate passes Israel lobby bill to impose new sanctions on Iran
Both AIPAC and J Street lauded the passage, by 98-2, of a Senate bill to impose new sanctions on Iran… AIPAC had announced at its annual policy conference in March that it would push for legislation against Iran…
Consortium News: Neocons Point Housebroken Trump at Iran
The Trump administration’s growing use of military force in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen has neoconservative hawks rooting for armed confrontation with what they view as the root of all evil in the Middle East: Iran… Iran is now at the center of neocon crosshairs. Kristol linked his recent tweet to a Washington Post column by two stalwart advocates of ousting the mullahs in Tehran: Reuel Gerecht and Ray Takeyh… Gerecht is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a neocon think tank dedicated to waging war against “militant Islam,” with a focus on Iran. Heavily funded by gambling magnate Sheldon Adelson, the Foundation was originally created to promote the agenda of hardline Israeli hawks…
The neocon regime-change strategy had been laid out in a 1996 document called “A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm.” It was written for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by a study group led by Richard Perle. Although Perle and the other authors were American citizens, the “realm” in question was Israel… The report recommended that Israel go beyond a strategy just focused on Israel-Palestine, and address the larger region – that it “shape its strategic environment.” It called for “weakening, containing, and even rolling back Syria” and “removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.” The paper also listed Iran and Lebanon as countries to be dealt with (and Turkey and Jordan as nations to be used in the strategy)…
A document called “A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties,” proposed by Israeli analyst Oded Yinon, was published by the World Zionist Organization in 1982. The document called for the dissolution of existing Arab states into smaller states which would, in effect, become Israel’s satellites.
In an analysis of the plan, Shahak pointed out: “[W]hile lip service is paid to the idea of the ‘defense of the West’ from Soviet power, the real aim of the author, and of the present Israeli establishment is clear: To make an Imperial Israel into a world power.”
Shahak wrote that reshaping the Middle East on behalf of Israel had been discussed since the 1950s: “This is not a new idea, nor does it surface for the first time in Zionist strategic thinking. Indeed, fragmenting all Arab states into smaller units has been a recurrent theme.” This strategy was documented in a book called Israel’s Sacred Terrorism (1980), by Livia Rokach.
Just as the Iraq war was fought to advance Israel’s interests, not America’s, the next war – yes, I mean the looming conflict with Iran – will be fought for the same reason. American foreign policy has long since ceased pursuing the genuine national interests of this country, and instead is being held hostage by a coalition of neoconservative ideologues and foreign lobbyists, who have no compunctions about leading us into an abyss as long as their no-longer-quite-so-hidden agenda is served…
Unlike its two nemeses, the US and Israel, Iran has attacked no other countries. It last went to war in 1980 when invaded by Saddam Hussein, who was backed and equipped by the US, which supplied chemical and biological weapons produced at a factory in Maryland. Unlike Israel, the world’s fifth military power – with its thermo nuclear weapons aimed at Middle East targets and an unmatched record of defying UN resolutions, as the enforcer of the world’s longest illegal occupation – Iran has a history of obeying international law and occupies no territory other than its own. The “threat” from Iran is entirely manufactured, aided and abetted by familiar, compliant media language that refers to Iran’s “nuclear ambitions”, just as the vocabulary of Saddam’s non-existent WMD arsenal became common usage…
At this moment, people in Washington and in Jerusalem are thinking about a war in Iran. Not if it should be started, but when and how. If this is to be an American war, its consequences will be many times more grievous than the war in Iraq…. Bush is already preparing the war.
Israel’s Plan for a Military Strike on Iran: The BBC and Israeli Propaganda
Other Israeli misinformation, none of it believed by serious analysts, is also uncritically spread by the film-makers….Is the Israeli government using Shalev, wittingly or not, and is he in turn using the BBC, to spread Israeli propaganda? Propaganda that may soon propel us towards the “clash of civilisations” so longed for by Israel’s leadership…
Tomgram: McGovern on the Iranian and Israeli nuclear programs
In 2001, the new President Bush brought the neocons back and put them in top policymaking positions. Even former Assistant Secretary of State Elliot Abrams, convicted in October 1991 of lying to Congress and then pardoned by George H. W. Bush, was called back and put in charge of Middle East policy in the White House… Israeli Prime Minister Sharon has for some time appeared eager to enlist Washington’s support for an early “pre-emptive” strike on Iran… several of the leading neocons – Richard Perle, chair of the Defense Policy Board (2001-03); Douglas Feith, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy; and David Wurmser, Middle East adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney – actually wrote policy papers for the Israeli government during the 1990s. They have consistently had great difficulty distinguishing between the strategic interests of Israel and those of the US – at least as they imagine them….
President Bush’s second inauguration on Thursday will provide the signal for an intense and urgent debate in Washington over whether or when to extend the “global war on terror” to Iran, according to officials and foreign policy analysts in Washington. That debate is being driven by “neo-conservatives” at the Pentagon who emerged from the post-election Bush reshuffle unscathed, despite their involvement in collecting misleading intelligence on Iraq’s weapons in the run-up to the 2003 invasion…
On to Iran: Won’t Get Fooled Again?
For a decade or longer, the neocons who control the Bush administration’s foreign and military policies have been writing papers advocating a US-Israeli conquest of the Middle East. A moronic president has given them their chance…. Thus, before the Iraqi war is finished, the neocon propaganda machine is at work creating fear that the US is in danger from Iranian nukes unless America preemptively attacks Iran…
Alison Weir is executive director of If Americans Knew, president of the Council for the National Interest, and author of Against Our Better Judgment: The Hidden History of How the U.S. Was Used to Create Israel. See a presentation on the issue here.
