Latest news with #Ayatollahs
National Post
8 hours ago
- Politics
- National Post
Avi Benlolo: Iran's hatred of Israel must end — and so must the tyranny behind it
Article content No other country on Earth has endured the same relentless combination of verbal abuse, threats of annihilation, and actual terrorism that Israel has faced at the hands of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Since 1979, the Iranian regime — led by its Ayatollahs — has pursued an obsessive, violent campaign against the Jewish state, not only with words but with actions. There is no land disagreement between the two nations. This is hatred — pure, genocidal, and unapologetic. Article content Article content From the moment Ayatollah Khomeini seized power in the Islamic Revolution, Israel became a target not just of criticism, but of declared extermination. And while the world often dismisses rhetoric as just that — rhetoric — what followed proved otherwise: embassy and community centre bombings in Argentina, Hezbollah's reign of terror in Lebanon, suicide attacks in Bulgaria and beyond, the funding, arming and training of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, drone and missile barrages, and most recently, the horrific massacre of over 1,200 Israelis on October 7, 2023. Article content Article content Article content Behind it all, directing and enabling the violence: Tehran. Article content In April 2024, Iran made history by launching over 300 drones and missiles directly at Israel — a historic and unprecedented escalation. It marked the first time the regime attacked Israel directly from its own territory. That wasn't just a strategic military move. It was a message of hatred from Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, whose decades of speeches have called Israel a 'cancer,' a 'tumour,' and a 'rabid dog' that must be 'uprooted.' Who can forget former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's threat to 'wipe Israel off the face of the map.' In any other context, these words would be disqualifying for a world leader. But in the world of international diplomacy, Iran has been coddled, empowered, and allowed to spread its hate at the United Nations and across Europe, where this antisemitic terrorism has been tolerated and sometimes endorsed. Article content But Iran's campaign goes even deeper — it's not only aimed at Israel's destruction, but at the erasure of Jewish memory itself. In 2006 and again in 2016, the Iranian regime sponsored global Holocaust cartoon contests, inviting participants to mock the systematic murder of six million Jews. This grotesque state-sanctioned denial of history reveals the depth of Iran's antisemitism: it is not enough for the regime to threaten Israel's future — it seeks to defile the Jewish past. Article content Let us be clear: the only other time in recent history when the Jewish people were threatened with total extermination was under Adolf Hitler. Like Hitler, Ali Khameinei cloaks his genocidal aspirations in ideology — this time not in racial purity but in extreme religious fanaticism. And like Hitler, he and his predecessor has used Jews and Israel as a convenient scapegoat to validate his existence, distract from his domestic failures, and rally radicals to his cause.
LBCI
a day ago
- Politics
- LBCI
Iran's Khamenei 'will be held accountable' over hospital strike: Israeli minister
Israel's defense minister said Thursday that Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei would be "held accountable" after an Iranian strike on a hospital in Israel, adding he had ordered the army to "intensify strikes" on the Islamic republic. "These are some of the most serious war crimes -- and Khamenei will be held accountable for his actions," Israel Katz said, adding that he and the prime minister ordered the military "to intensify strikes against strategic targets in Iran and against the power infrastructure in Tehran, to eliminate the threats to the state of Israel and to shake the Ayatollahs' regime." AFP
CNN
2 days ago
- Politics
- CNN
Analysis: Trump keeps everyone guessing on whether he'll go to war in Iran — perhaps including himself
He might do it. But he might not. And you've got no idea whether he will. Then again, neither does he. Donald Trump's riffing ahead of the most wrenching national security decision in either of his presidencies is nothing like the complex war-gaming and careful tilling of public opinion that most commanders in chief require before they send Americans off to fight. Trump's vague soliloquies and ambiguous comments, on camera and online, seem glib and even negligent given the grave potential consequences of a US attack on Iran's nuclear sites. But it's how he rolls. He wants to keep friends and foes guessing. He's shown that he believes unpredictability and volatility — factors that most presidents seek to avoid in national security crises — offer him a key advantage. Trump loves to be the center of attention with the world hanging on his every word. His equivocating creates space for him to postpone the moment of decision and to avoid locking in definitive courses of action he can't reverse. His fans say it's genius. But there's not much evidence that strategy transfers from a real estate magnate's boardroom to complex geopolitical showdowns and global peacemaking. Iran's ayatollahs, Israel, US allies, members of Congress, pundits, reporters and Americans watching at home can never be certain what Trump might do next. And no modern president has ever managed the run-up to a possible war as though he is sketching a series of cliffhangers to compel viewers to watch the next episode. Trump is no JFK calmly averting nuclear war with high-pressure diplomatic chess during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Trump's critics have dreaded the moment when he'd face the kind of international crisis he largely avoided during his first term. And his style has serious drawbacks. His administration has yet to take the American people into its confidence and explain why it has suddenly changed its view that Iran was not building a nuclear weapon. Now, Trump says it's weeks away from one. There's no sign the administration intends to seek authorization from Congress for a possible new act of war against Iran — as the Constitution requires. And it's refusing to say whether it's gamed out how an attack on Iran's nuclear plant at Fordow could reverberate through a treacherous region and whether it has any kind of exit strategy. This would be troubling in isolation. But following Washington's disastrous history of plunging into quagmires caused by paltry planning for the day after shock-and-awe beginnings, it's tempting fate. And Trump's serial dishonesty and scorched-earth leadership style mean millions of Americans will need a lot more than his word to trust any decision to wage military action. The president's plans might be a mystery. But his calculation is a simple one. He must decide whether US interests are served by joining Israel's assault on Iran to try to destroy the Islamic Republic's nuclear program with unique bunker-busting capabilities that only the United States possesses. It's a tough call because of the potential consequences: Iranian attacks on US bases in the Middle East, potential terrorist attacks on US targets, and a shockwave that could destabilize the world if the regime in Tehran collapses. The latest developments are ominous. A third US aircraft carrier group is moving toward the Middle East. A fierce war of words between Trump and Iran's clerical leaders is heating up. And the president is huddling in daily Situation Room meetings with his top national security aides. CNN reported on Wednesday that the president is preoccupied with finding a way to strike key targets of Iran's nuclear program without being dragged into a full-scale war. Sources familiar with the matter said he wants to avoid the kind of open-ended conflict like those in Iraq and Afghanistan that he's vowed to avoid and that he used as a catalyst for his rise among MAGA voters skeptical of war. These revelations might offer Americans some comfort since they suggest that the president is weighing the implications of his decisions with greater diligence than his offhand patter suggests. There's some logic to his position. No one expects Trump to put US troops on the ground — they could be a sitting target in Iran or in any post-war failed state insurgency, as happened in Iraq and Afghanistan. Trump's first-term assassination raid that killed Iranian intelligence chief Qasem Soleimani didn't unleash fury against US targets that many analysts expected. And US bases in the region are heavily defended against missile attacks. There's also some question about how much Iran's degraded military can now throw at the US and Israel. But US foreign policy of the last 25 years is haunted by false assumptions about the behavior of adversaries when they are attacked. As Trump said himself last month in Saudi Arabia, US officials were often meddling in societies they didn't understand. So, it's fair to ask whether Trump has any idea what he's getting into. A watching world is no wiser after the president's public appearances Wednesday. 'I mean, you don't know that I'm going to even do it. You don't know. I may do it, I may not do it. I mean, nobody knows what I'm going to do,' Trump told reporters who asked him about his plans for Iran as he unveiled two massive flagpoles at the White House. 'Nothing's finished until it's finished. You know, war is very complex. A lot of bad things can happen. A lot of turns are made.' Later, in the Oval Office, Trump told CNN's Kaitlan Collins that he hadn't made a final decision on what to do as he's besieged by pressure for action by Israelis and warnings from his own MAGA base to stay out of foreign wars. 'I have ideas as to what to do, but I haven't made a final — I like to make the final decision one second before it's due, you know, because things change.' Trump's lack of precision worries Democrats. 'It's obviously unclear where his head is at right now. I think he was pretty indecisive on the subject of Iran, which I can understand,' California Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff said on 'The Situation Room.' 'This is a difficult call. But I don't think we got much guidance as to whether he is optimistic about talks with Iran leaning in towards a potential strike on Iran,' Schiff said, reacting to one of Trump's meandering press availabilities. 'It was pretty nebulous, the kind of usual stream-of-consciousness.' There's confusion about conflicting intelligence assessments in the US and Israel about Iran's nuclear progress. Virginia Democratic Sen. Mark Warner is part of a group of senior lawmakers who are given access to the most sensitive classified information. But he's as much in the dark as anyone about what's next. 'I'm a member … of the Gang of Eight. We're supposed to know,' Warner told CNN's Kasie Hunt. 'I have no foggy idea what this administration's plans are or what the foreign policy is vis-a-vis Iran.' The question of the administration's contingency planning is also coming into focus. But don't expect any details. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was confronted by Michigan Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin during a hearing on Wednesday. Slotkin speaks from experience: She was a CIA officer who completed combat tours in Baghdad after the George W. Bush administration's disastrous lack of forethought for how to win peace in Iraq. 'Have you commissioned any day-after planning?' Slotkin asked. 'Any force protection, any use of ground troops, in Iran; any cost assessments, because I don't think we doubt what we can do as a country, and in the attack. It's the day after with Iraq and Afghanistan that so many of us have learned to be so deeply concerned about. Hegseth reacted with disdain. 'We have plans for everything, Senator,' he said. Trump showed similar hubris. 'I have a plan for everything, but we'll see what happens,' he told reporters on the Oval Office. The president also says he's open to diplomacy. But there's no sign of a James Baker-style peace shuttle. Far from offering his adversary a face-saving off-ramp. Trump is demanding total surrender at the outset. While this may match Israel's goals, it's a nonstarter for Iran's revolutionary corps of leaders in Tehran, who've founded their regime on more than 45 years of defying successive American presidents. Trump often seems to be operating in a parallel universe. He for instance insists Iranian leaders wanted to meet and 'to come to the White House.' Iran strongly denied any such aspirations. 'We are not begging for anything,' Deputy Foreign Minister Majid Takht-Ravanchi told CNN's Christiane Amanpour. 'As long as the aggression continues, as long as this brutality continues, we cannot think of engaging.' This points to one of the liabilities of Trump's diplomacy, which also helps explained his failed Ukraine peace drive. His administration shows little skill in creating openings and multilayered negotiating scenarios that can loosen entrenched positions. Trump makes maximalist demands. When interlocutors demur, the process grinds to a halt. So, for now, the country seems on a path to another venture in the Middle East, with uncertain consequences. But Trump had one more cliffhanger. 'Anything could happen,' he said, when asked if the regime in Iran could fall in a response which exemplifies his entire presidency.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Taking on Israel's greatest foe has banished Netanyahu's political troubles in an instant
Benjamin Netanyahu is once again firmly in control of Israeli politics. The country's longest-serving prime minister has pulled himself back from the abyss with what appears to be a wildly successful opening to a military campaign against Iran. 'Bibi had his Churchill moment,' said one Israeli official from within the coalition, using the prime minister's nickname. One day before launching what Israel dubbed Operation Rising Lion, Netanyahu's government had faced a confidence vote from the opposition. Two of the ultra-Orthodox parties threatened to vote against the government in what would have put major pressure on Netanyahu. But he survived the vote – with quite some margin. Twenty-four hours later, Israel began attacking Iran. In one instant, Netanyahu's political problems were swept away. No more ultra-Orthodox parties complaining about the military draft or far-right parties shouting about praying in the al-Aqsa compound. 'The cards are in his hands. If they weren't a week ago, they are now,' said the official. The weekly political protests – first over the judicial reform, then over the war in Gaza – that have dogged Netanyahu for much of his current term quickly vanished, with orders from Israel's Homefront Command forbidding large gatherings of people. Netanyahu's testimony in his trial on charges of corruption is on hold and out of the headlines. The stories of the hostages still held in Gaza for more than 600 days of war are no longer front-page news. Netanyahu is well aware of the political consequences of such a successful military operation, according to an Israeli source in the prime minister's orbit, though the source insists it's not his focus right now 'If we are doing something good for Israel, it's good to us,' the source said. 'It's good for you electorally, it's good for you with the voters … He will harvest this in the future.' The source also pointed out the complete reversal of the political opposition from attacking Netanyahu to supporting him. 'This time, we have unity almost all over the Knesset, except from the Arab parties, and we have unity in the people,' said the source. Iran has been at the center of Netanyahu's identity for nearly his entire political career. His time as Israel's longest-serving leader is replete with warnings about Iran. Some have been borderline cartoonish, like when he held up a drawing of a bomb to warn of Tehran's advancing nuclear program at the United Nations General Assembly in 2012. He has since returned to the same podium – and many others – to lecture the world repeatedly about the intent of the Ayatollahs. Israel's existential fear wasn't a single one of its adversaries. It was all of them combined: an overwhelming attack from Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran and the Shiite proxies in Syria and Iraq. This was Israel's nightmare scenario that Hamas tried to instigate with its attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. It quickly became evident that each entity had its own interests. Hezbollah began launching attacks against Israel on October 8, but it was far from the massive barrages which worried the military's leadership. Iran launched two retaliatory attacks against Israel last year in April and October. The Houthis began firing drones and ballistic missiles at Israel from Yemen, but never more than one or two at a time. Over 20 months of war, Israel was able to defang each of its adversaries. Hamas is a shell of its former self, Hezbollah has been shattered, and the Houthis don't have the arsenal to pose a major threat. 'They've kind of broken down the axis into the more manageable parts,' former US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro told CNN. That allowed Israel to turn its focus to Iran without fear of massive retaliation from another front. From Netanyahu's political perspective, the risk was far lower, especially since Israel's spy agency has treated Iran like its playground for years. 'At his age, he has much less of a political career left to lose,' Shapiro said. 'So it's easier to throw the caution that held him back in the past to the wind, especially to reach for a career-defining goal.' But whether the military campaign against Iran buoys Netanyahu's long-sinking polling numbers is not a foregone conclusion, according to Yohanan Plesner, president of the Israeli Democracy Institute. unknown content item - Polling in recent months has repeatedly shown Netanyahu far behind political rival Naftali Bennett. Crucially, it has indicated he would fall far short of being able to build a coalition with his current political partners, ousting him from leadership. The Iran operation may not ultimately deliver the political salvation Netanyahu wants, Plesner said, because it is an issue with broad agreement from the left and the right. 'It's a tremendous consensus around the need for Israel to do the utmost to prevent Iran from becoming nuclear,' Plesner told CNN. 'It's not an issue that there was an ideological debate about.' Israel is also mired in the ongoing war in Gaza with no clear exit and lacking a comprehensive day-after plan. A second war, even with far more tangible accomplishments, presents another risk to Netanyahu if it drags on. 'The ability of the government to translate the military successes into an advantageous diplomatic outcome is yet to be determined,' said Plesner.
Newsweek
4 days ago
- Politics
- Newsweek
Lindsey Graham Wants Trump to Go 'All In' on Iran as Security Council Meets
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina has called for a regime change in Iran, saying President Donald Trump should go "all in" to help Israel combat Iran's nuclear threat. Why It Matters Israel on Friday launched attacks against Iran's capital city of Tehran in what it called a "preemptive strike" and warned its citizens of retaliatory bombings from Iran. While attending the Group of Seven summit on Monday, Trump announced plans to cut his trip short, telling reporters, "I have to be back early — for obvious reasons." Multiple media outlets including Fox News and CNN have reported that Trump has asked for a National Security Council meeting to convene in the Situation Room upon his return to Washington, D.C. Newsweek reached out to the White House Monday night for comment. Tensions in the Middle East have escalated as Iranian Defense Minister General Aziz Nasirzadeh previously warned that Iran could attack U.S. bases if nuclear talks break down with Trump's administration or if hostilities continue mounting. What To Know While speaking with Fox News' Sean Hannity Monday night on the strikes, Graham said, in part, "So here is the task at hand. Be all in, President Trump, in helping Israel eliminate the nuclear threat. If we need to provide bombs to Israel, provide bombs. If we need to fly planes with Israel, do joint operations. But here's the bigger question, wouldn't the world be better off if the Ayatollahs went away and replaced by something better? Wouldn't Iran be better off?" Taking to X, formerly Twitter, Graham also said, "No one can say that President @realDonaldTrump has not tried to seek peace regarding Ukraine-Russia and Israel-Iran. He has gone the extra mile and I appreciate that. However, you have to have willing partners to make peace. Iran played the same old game with the wrong guy. God bless Israel, God bless the United States and God bless President Trump." This is a developing story that will be updated with additional information.
