In the Wake of 9/11, Israel Put Iran into “Axis of Evil”

The reaction of Israeli political leaders to the news of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001 anticipated that the American public, as well as its policymakers, would now be better able to empathize with Israel’s vulnerability to random terrorist attacks against civilians. But a spate of Israeli pronouncements also drew upon a decade of Israeli assertions of Iranian complicity in terrorist attacks, and warnings of an imminent Iranian nuclear threat. A war of civilizations had begun, in which Islamic fundamentalist forces had launched what was just their first strike on September 11. The next might be a nuclear attack by Iran. Continue Reading

The Daily Talking Points

News and Views Relevant to U.S.-Iran relations for August 26th, 2010: Reuters: John Irish reports that French President Nicolas Sarkozy has warned Iran that, “If a credible agreement [over its nuclear program] cannot be reached, Iran’s isolation would only worsen.” … Continue Reading

Humor as Propaganda (con’t): Goldberg on Colbert

I recently wrote a piece on humor as war propaganda for AlterNet. With that story in mind, I’d like to point you to an interview with Jeffrey Goldberg on yesterday’s episode of the “Colbert Report” with satirist Stephen Colbert. The… Continue Reading

Israel’s Nuclear Opacity Hurts Its Stance on Iran

In the International Herald Tribune, the global edition of the New York Times, Avner Cohen and Marvin Miller have an op-ed about the Israeli covert nuclear program. Cohen, a non-proliferation fellow at California’s Monterey Institute of International Studies is about… Continue Reading

The Daily Talking Points

News and Views Relevant to U.S.-Iran relations for August 25th, 2010: Washington Times: In an editorial, the hawkish daily chronicles what it calls, “Iran’s emergence as a regional hegemon,” based on its slowly advancing nuclear program and its unveiling of… Continue Reading