German frigate sets sail to join EU mission in support of Israel
The Cradle | February 8, 2024
The German government on 8 February dispatched the frigate Hesse from its North Sea port of Wilhelmshaven to the Red Sea, where it will join an EU naval mission in support of Israeli commercial interests.
“Free sea trade routes are the basis of our industry and of our capability to defend ourselves,” the chief of the German navy, Vice Admiral Jan Christian Kaack, told reporters in Berlin.
The Hesse air defense frigate is equipped with radars that can detect targets at a range of up to 400 km and missiles capable of countering ballistic missiles and drones at a range of more than 160 km.
EU foreign ministers are expected to approve the mission officially, codenamed “Aspides,” in mid-February.
In addition to Germany, France, Italy, and Greece have also expressed interest in joining the planned EU mission. According to the plans established by Brussels, the mission is expected to repel attacks but not attack Yemeni targets on land.
Brussels’ entry into the US-led Operation Prosperity Guardian (OPG) became a significant point of contention among several EU states last year, particularly Spain, which vetoed the participation of EU naval forces in the coalition in December.
The Yemeni armed forces have conducted dozens of attacks on US, UK, and Israeli-linked vessels trying to transit the Bab al-Mandab Strait since mid-November. Sanaa maintains that the operations seek to pressure the west into stopping the Israeli genocide in Gaza, and have repeatedly pledged to stop the attacks once the siege of Gaza is lifted.
The US and the UK have launched over a dozen air raids across Yemen since mid-January in an attempt to deter Sanaa’s pro-Palestine actions. However, Yemeni authorities say they have no intent to scale back the campaign.
On Sunday, Ansarallah spokesman Muhammad Abdul Salam stressed that the western strategy will “not achieve any goal … but rather increase their dilemmas” in the region.
“Yemen’s decision to support Gaza is firm and honorable and will not be affected by any attack. [Our military capabilities] are not easy to destroy and have been rebuilt during years of harsh war,” the official said via social media, adding that Washington and London “should submit to international public opinion, which demands an immediate halt to the Israeli aggression [in Gaza].”
Washington inching closer to a war with Iran
By Salman Rafi Sheikh – New Eastern Outlook – 08.02.2024
An Iran-US war would be an ideal scenario for Israel. On the one hand, Israel is systematically killing and driving the Palestinians out of their homes, which is allowing it to impose the so-called one-state solution. In this context, if the US plunges into a war with Iran and can inflict a lot of military and economic damage on Israel’s biggest enemy state in the region, that is the best possible scenario for Israel’s future standing in this region. On the one hand, US military engagement in the ongoing war will increase, and on the other hand, a US war on Iran might limit the extent to which Tehran can provide support to Hamas against Israel. This war is no longer a distant possibility, especially after the recent strike in Jordan that killed three US soldiers and wounded at least 34 others. Biden, who immediately accused the Iran-backed militia known as The Islamic Resistance based in Syria and Iraq, has vowed to retaliate. The target is Iran, even though Iran has officially denied supporting this group for striking the US. Nonetheless, US counterstrikes are going to happen, especially because Washington is already striking the Houthis in Yemen to control the Red Sea.
With these upcoming strikes, the US will be involved in at least three fronts, i.e., against Hamas, against the Houthis, and the Islamic Resistance. (This is in addition to the US involvement in Ukraine against Russia.) With deepening US involvement in the Middle East and against Iran, Washington is directly stepping into a sort of quagmire that it took 20 years to get out of in Afghanistan.
A war in the Middle East will not be too much different from the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, although a direct war with Iran would also mean going against a force that is much more organized, better equipped, and bigger than Saddam Hussain’s Iraqi army or the Taliban in Afghanistan. There are more than 45,000 US troops on the ground throughout the Middle East. There are another 15,000 personnel on board two aircraft carrier groups. If the US starts a war, Iran does have the capability to hit these targets, or the so-called Iran-backed groups can do the same.
The recent attack in Jordan has after all shown that the US air defense is far from impenetrable. This war, in this sense, could inflict a lot more damage to the US military forces than did the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Still, many people in the US want Washington to tackle not just the so-called Iran-backed militias, but Iran itself. A report in the NATO-backed Atlantic Council says,
“In recent weeks, Iran has waged a shadow war against the United States and its interests in the Middle East, and now three US service personnel are dead and dozens more injured … Washington could sink the Iranian navy, like then-President Ronald Reagan did in the 1980s. It could strike Iranian naval bases. It could target the Iranian leadership, following in the footsteps of then President Donald Trump’s killing of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani. It could seize this opportunity to degrade Iran’s nuclear and missile program—which must be addressed soon regardless”.
Wesley Clark, a retired general who was once NATO’s supreme commander in Europe, wrote on X that “The US should stop saying, ‘We don’t want to escalate.’ This invites them to attack us. Stop calling our strikes ‘retaliation’. This is reactive. Take out their capabilities and strike hard at the source: Iran.” From within the US political class, Senator Tom Cotton (Republican), known for his staunch criticism of the Biden administration’s Iran policy, insisted that the deaths of the three US troops warranted a “devastating military retaliation against Iran’s terrorist forces, both in Iran and across the Middle East”.
With the Biden administration also fanning such ideas out, it means that targeting Iran will become an issue that may have bi-partisan support in the US. Within the US political system, if an issue has bi-partisan support, it tends to minimize the political risk for the given President. In other words, if the Republicans want Biden to retaliate against Iran, it means that they will not be able to criticize him for starting another war. It was the Trump administration that targeted Iran much more directly when it killed Sulemani in Iraq than the Biden administration has done in the past three years.
This is on top of the fact that a growing political opinion in the US points to the inability, or unwillingness, of Washington to hit Iran directly, i.e., inside Iran. This, some hawks have argued, encourages Iran to adopt an aggressive policy vis-à-vis the US, although it does not explain at all why Iran, a much smaller political and economic power than the US, would create such situations that might throw its country into a long turmoil.
Although the Biden administration is more likely to hit the so-called Iran-backed groups in the first round of counterstrikes, there is little gainsaying that this will add to the difficulty of managing the Middle East in a way that minimizes the possibility of war. It will only make a direct war much more possible.
The only geopolitical deterrent the US might consider seriously is whether or not it will have the support of the Middle Eastern states themselves against Iran, for a wider war in the region would jeopardize these states too in the sense that it will cause the conflict to spread and major middle eastern states, such as Saudi Arabia, are in the middle of massive modernization projects. A wider war in the region would disrupt this process, which is why they are more likely to oppose a US bid to wage a direct war. At the same time, given Israel’s position, it is likely to continue to push for, or create conditions, for a war against Iran to accomplish its key objectives, i.e., developing a Greater Israel and eliminating the main regional opposition to it.
Salman Rafi Sheikh is a research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs.
Col. Douglas MacGregor on Iran
IfAmericansKnew | February 5, 2024
Colonel Douglas MacGregor is a 28-year veteran of the US Army who previously served as Senior Advisor to the US Secretary of Defense. During this interview with Redacted’s Clayton Morris, he explains that Iran did not perpetrate the recent attack that killed three American servicemen and he describes the long effort to get the US to attack Iran on behalf of Israel. Colonel McGregor explains that such an attack would be disastrous on every level.
This excerpt is from a longer, excellent interview that can be viewed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=le-Ktsau_iM (If Americans knew added the image of the New York Times advertisement and the photos of Gaza.)
Israel and Israel partisans embedded in the US government previously pushed the US into the disastrous Iraq War. See https://israelpalestinenews.org/israel-loyalists-embedded-in-u-s-government-pushed-us-into-iraq-war/ and https://israelpalestinenews.org/pentagon-officer-described-how-israelists-manufactured-anti-iraq-disinfo-that-led-to-war/ and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjzD5zTLepc
This is not the first time the US has been used to deliver oil to Israel. See the account by Gary Vogler, a former US Army officer who served as a senior oil consultant for US Forces in Iraq. See https://israelpalestinenews.org/oil-for-israel-the-truth-about-the-iraq-war-15-years-later/ and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zK-LFOpVowg
For more information on israel-Palestine go to https://ifamericansknew.org/
Only 3 in 10 Americans Were Aware of US Troops in Syria Prior to Deadly Attack
By Kyle Anzalone | The Libertarian Institute | February 6, 2024
A recent poll of Americans found that only 30% were aware that US troops were deployed to Syria before three US soldiers were killed just across the border in Jordan. The results of the survey show Americans are generally unaware of the attacks against US forces in Syria and the reason for the deployment.
Defense Priorities commissioned YouGov to poll Americans from January 8-15 about the deployment of 900 US troops in Syria. Three in ten Americans responded that they were aware US troops were deployed to Syria. The three US soldiers killed at Tower 22 in Jordan were supporting the US base in southern Syria.
US troops in Iraq and Syria have come under attack over 160 times from Shia militias that operate in the region. The YouGov poll found only a quarter of Americans were aware of the attacks that left scores of US soldiers injured.
The Shia militias say they are targeting American soldiers occupying Iraq and Syria with drones, rockets, and missiles because of US support for the ongoing genocide Israel is conducting in Gaza. The poll found that a majority of Americans are concerned about a larger war breaking out in the region because of the US troops’ presence.
The outcome may be playing out. In response to the death of three members of the Georgia National Guard in Jordan, President Joe Biden ordered a massive bombing operation in Iraq and Syria. The White House will not rule out hitting targets inside Iran and has pledged future strikes.
President Biden has refused to reverse his unconditional support for Israel even as his approval rating has dipped. An NBC News poll released on Sunday found the President’s approval rating at the lowest of his term, 37%. Weighing on his approval is likely the war in Gaza. Only 29% of Americans approve of the way Biden has handled US support for the Israeli onslaught.
New wave of US, UK strikes target Yemen
The Cradle – February 4, 2024
US and UK warships and fighter jets bombed Yemen on 4 February, in a wave of missile strikes US officials claim hit 36 targets.
The US said in a CENTCOM statement that it hit “36 targets at 13 locations,” striking “underground storage facilities, command and control, missile systems, UAV storage and operations sites, radars, and helicopters.”
According to the statement, the US, UK, Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands, and New Zealand took part in the attacks.
The strikes were in response to Yemeni efforts to target Israeli-linked commercial ships passing through the narrow Bab al-Mandab Strait in the Red Sea. The Yemeni attacks are in response to Israel’s genocidal bombing campaign in Gaza.
Rather than press its ally Israel to stop its military campaign, which has killed over 27,000 Palestinians, the majority women and children, the US has joined forces with the UK to bomb Yemen.
Saturday’s strikes were launched by US F/A-18 fighter jets from the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier, British Typhoon FGR4 fighter aircraft, and the Navy destroyers USS Gravely and the USS Carney firing Tomahawk missiles from the Red Sea, according to US officials and the UK Defense Ministry.
The Yemen Armed Forces issued a statement detailing where the attacks took place, reporting 13 raids on Sanaa, 9 on Hodeidah, 11 on Taiz, 7 on Al-Bayda, 7 on Hajjah, and one on Saada.
“These attacks will not deter us from our moral, religious, and humanitarian stance in support of the steadfast Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip, and will not go unanswered and punished,” read the statement.
The strikes come one day after the US sent B-1 bombers to target 85 locations affiliated with the Islamic Resistance of Iraq in eastern Syria and western Iraq, killing at least 16. This was in response to an operation by the Islamic Resistance in Iraq that targeted US military outpost Tower 22 in Jordan last week, killing three US soldiers.
US officials reportedly told Al-Jazeera that the strikes on Yemen are “considered a next round of retaliation for the killing of the [US] soldiers in Jordan.”
Like Ansarallah, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq coalition, formed after 7 October, has also targeted Israel, as well as US bases in Syria and Iraq. The groups say their attacks are in response to Israel’s genocide in Gaza, which the US has supported militarily and diplomatically.
Ansarallah leaders in Yemen say they have no intention of scaling back their campaign despite pressure from the US and UK bombing.
Mohammed al-Bukhaiti, an Ansarallah official, said, “military operations against Israel will continue until the crimes of genocide in Gaza are stopped and the siege on its residents is lifted, no matter the sacrifices it costs us.” He wrote on social media that the “American-British aggression against Yemen will not go unanswered, and we will meet escalation with escalation.”
Kata’ib Hezbollah: Iraq strikes stem from US statesmen’s criminal mindset
Press TV – February 4, 2024
Iraqi anti-terror group Kata’ib Hezbollah has roundly denounced the latest US military airstrikes against several sites used by resistance groups in the country, stating that the attacks emanate from the US administration’s criminal mindset and its craving for more bloodshed.
“We extend our condolences to our proud and steadfast nation for the martyrdom of several compatriots, who were targeted while protecting the homeland against the evils of American forces and the Takfiri Daesh terrorist group,” it said in a statement.
It added that criminality is deeply ingrained in the mindset of American politicians, and they long for relentless bloodletting as well as starvation and massacre of ordinary people in pursuit of their interests and advancement of their malicious agendas.
“US officials do not shy away from the occupation of other countries, plundering others’ national assets, influencing their decision-making and their humiliation.
“Under the American mindset, the first solution is murder. Such an attitude has historically been responsible for the extensive destruction of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is now behind the deadly attacks against sites in al-Qa’im,” Kata’ib Hezbollah pointed out.
Separately, the Yemeni Ansarullah resistance movement censured the US aggression against areas in Iraq and neighboring Syria, terming them as barbaric, in breach of international law, and a serious violation of the two countries’ sovereignty.
“The aggression falls within the context of US support for the Zionist enemy as it continues its crimes against the Palestinian population of Gaza,” it added.
Ansarullah warned that US moves will drag the entire region into a more complex conflict, and will jeopardize international peace and security.
“Washington could have compelled the Tel Aviv regime to halt its aggression on Palestinians and lift the siege on Gaza. It, however, decided to target the countries and nations of the region.
“We reiterate that Muslim nations reserve the right to defend themselves and protect their security and sovereignty against repeated US acts of aggression,” the Yemeni movement underscored.
US Central Command (CENTCOM) said its military forces struck more than 85 targets in Iraq and Syria “with numerous aircraft to include long-range bombers flown from the United States”.
“The air strikes employed more than 125 precision munitions,” it added in a statement.
US President Joe Biden said in a statement on Friday that the strikes were the first in a series of actions by Washington in response to a drone attack that killed a number of soldiers at a remote US base in Jordan.
“Our response began today,” Biden said. “It will continue at times and places of our choosing,” he stated.
Three US soldiers were killed and about 40 others injured in the assault on the military base known as Tower 22 near the Jordan-Syria border on Sunday.
The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group of anti-terror fighters, in a statement published on its Telegram channel claimed responsibility for the drone strike.
In retaliation for the flurry of US aerial assaults on several locations in Iraq and Syria, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq announced that it had conducted missile strikes against the Ain al-Asad Airbase, housing US occupation forces in the western Iraqi province of al-Anbar.
The group also said it had staged missile and drone strikes against the strategic al-Tanf military base in southeastern Syria near the border with Jordan and Iraq, as well as the al-Khadra Village in Syria’s northeastern province of al-Hasakah.
No Iranian base or advisors targeted by US strikes in Iraq, Syria: Diplomat
Press TV | February 3, 2024
Iran’s Ambassador to Damascus Hossein Akbari says no Iranian bases or military advisors have been targeted in deadly strikes by the US occupation forces on a number of sites in Iraq and Syria.
Akbari said on Saturday that contrary to claims, the attacks aimed to destroy Syria’s civil infrastructure amid the pro-Palestine actions undertaken by the resistance front.
He said the US government’s terrorist act on Friday night was carried out mainly to make up for Israel’s defeats in the Gaza Strip and strengthening armed Takfiri terrorists based on the borders of Iraq and Syria.
The US Central Command (CENTCOM) said in a statement on Friday that its forces had struck more than 85 targets “with numerous aircraft” during overnight raids on localities in Iraq and Syria.
The Syrian state media reported that the US aggression targeted positions in Syria’s eastern province of Dayr al-Zawr and the city of al-Bukamal near the Iraqi border, falling short of providing details on the extent of damage and the exact number of casualties.
Sixteen people were killed, among them civilians, and 25 injured in the US airstrikes in Iraq, Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani’s office said.
ISIS exploits US strikes to attack Iraqi forces in Anbar
The Cradle | February 3, 2024
The Iraqi army and the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMU) clashed with ISIS militants in western Anbar governorate on 3 February, an Iraqi security source told Al-Mayadeen.
The Iraqi Al-Nujaba satellite channel said that ISIS took advantage of the US bombing of targets in Iraq and Syria by launching an attack on the army and the PMU forces in the area of Kilometer 160 on the Al-Sakkar highway near the town of Rutba in Anbar.
The US has occupied the nearby Al-Tanf Base on the Syrian side of the border since 2015 and has used it to arm and train ISIS militants.
The US and allied intelligence agencies used ISIS to attack the Syrian and Iraqi armies as part of its effort to effect regime change in Damascus starting in 2011 and to depose Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki in 2014.
After ISIS conquered large swathes of Iraq and Syria, US forces turned against the group. With help from Kurdish forces, the US took control of much of the territory in Syria ISIS once controlled. In Iraq, the US partnered with Iraqi forces to retake Mosul.
Gulf-backed Syria researcher Charles Lister wrote in Foreign Policy on 24 January that ISIS is enjoying a resurgence and that 10,000 ISIS militants are detained within at least 20 makeshift prisons in US and Kurdish-controlled northeastern Syria, constituting an ISIS “army in waiting” and its “next generation.”
The comments raised fears the US may use ISIS militants to counter forces from the Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI), a coalition of Shia armed groups that seek to expel US forces from Syria and Iraq and end the Israeli genocide on Gaza.
Iraq summons US chargé d’affaires in protest over airstrikes
Press TV – February 3, 2024
Iraq has summoned the US chargé d’affaires in Baghdad to deliver a formal memorandum of protest over the overnight airstrikes on dozens of sites used by anti-terror resistance groups in the country.
The Iraqi Foreign Ministry announced in a Saturday statement that it is going to call in David Burger “in protest at the US aggression which targeted Iraqi civilian and military sites” due to the absence of Ambassador Alina L. Romanowski, the official Iraqi News Agency (INA) reported.
The statement said Iraqi officials will deliver an official note of protest regarding the strikes against locations in the towns of Akashat and Al-Qa’im in the western province of Anbar.
The Iraqi government said at least 16 people were killed in the US strikes. It condemned the “new aggression against” Iraq’s sovereignty. Civilians were among the fatalities, and 25 people were wounded in the bombings that targeted both civilian and security areas, a government spokesperson said.
“This aggressive strike will put security in Iraq and the region on the brink of the abyss,” the Iraqi government said, and denied Washington’s claims of coordinating the attacks with Baghdad as “false” and “aimed at misleading international public opinion.”
The presence of the US-led military coalition in the region “has become a reason for threatening security and stability in Iraq and a justification for involving Iraq in regional and international conflicts,” a statement from Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al-Sudani’s office read.
Syrian official news agency SANA also reported several casualties after the attacks in the desert region and border areas with Iraq.
US Central Command (CENTCOM) said its military forces struck more than 85 targets in the two countries “with numerous aircraft to include long-range bombers flown from the United States.”
“The airstrikes employed more than 125 precision munitions,” it added in a statement.
US President Joe Biden said in a statement on Friday that the strikes were the first in a series of actions by Washington in response to a recent drone attack that killed a number of soldiers at a remote US base in Jordan.
“Our response began today,” Biden said. “It will continue at times and places of our choosing,” he stated.
Three US soldiers were killed and about 40 others injured in the assault on the military base known as Tower 22 near the Jordan-Syria border on Sunday.
The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group of anti-terror fighters, claimed responsibility for the drone strike.
In retaliation for the latest flurry of US strikes in Iraq and Syria, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq announced it had conducted missile strikes against the Ain al-Asad Airbase, housing US occupation forces in the western Iraqi province of Anbar. The group also said it had staged missile and drone strikes against the strategic al-Tanf military base in southeastern Syria near the border with Jordan and Iraq, as well as the al-Khadra Village in Syria’s northeastern province of al-Hasakah.
Biden’s Justification For Hitting Iran ‘Would Justify Russian Attacks on NATO’
By Ian DeMartino – Sputnik – 03.02.2024
On Friday, US President Joe Biden fulfilled his promise to strike Iranian targets in Syria and Iraq, further escalating the region even as the White House insists that it does not seek war with Iran.
Michael Maloof, a former senior security policy analyst for the Office of the Secretary of Defense with nearly 30 years of experience, told Sputnik’s Fault Lines that the justification used by the White House could easily be applied by Russia to NATO countries supporting Ukraine.
“You’re hearing from congressmen and senators saying ‘but we need to hit Iran for supplying the Houthis and Hamas and Hezbollah,” Maloof explained. “Well, does Russia then have a right to hit US and NATO allies, as a result of supplying weapons to Ukraine to battle Russians?”
The United States has placed the blame on Iran for the Sunday drone attack that killed three US service members and injured dozens more on the border of Syria and Jordan. While the US admits that it has no evidence Iran helped plan the attack, the Biden administration has been clear it blames Iran because the country allegedly funds those groups and other militants.
“This afternoon, at my direction, U.S. military forces struck targets at facilities in Iraq and Syria that the IRGC and affiliated militia use to attack U.S. forces,” US President Joe Biden said in a statement released Friday by the White House.
“I think that if Biden were to follow through, then that raises a whole new specter of opening up NATO countries to potential attack,” Maloof continued, adding that the US is simply hoping Russian President Vladimir Putin “doesn’t follow through” with that justification.
Maloof argued that the US should reevaluate the situation in the Middle East but it’s difficult because the US looks “at the Middle East through the prism of Israel all the time.”
“We’ve got to somehow figure a way out of it. Instead, we’re digging that hole deeper and even though there might be some attempts to try and persuade [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu to calm down and have a ceasefire and try to resolve things, it’s doing just the opposite.
“The problem is that Biden has left the conduct of the war up to Netanyahu, and Netanyahu knows this and he’s basically dragging us along – we’re captives of Netanyahu,” Maloof explained.
“You don’t have any, there’s no leadership [the US] left it up to Netanyahu. He’s the tail wagging the dog,” he added later.
Maloof further argued that Israel has been getting the United States to do its dirty work for decades. “We always hear Netanyahu wanting the United States involved, or us to bomb the sites… This is the way we’ve been conducting ourselves since… 2003 when we invaded Iraq.”
Asked by Co-host Melik Abdul how the US should have responded to the attack, Maloof argued that the US should leave the region.
“I think we shouldn’t even be in those locations. And I think we should have gotten out some time ago.”
Otherwise, Maloof warns “This thing has unlimited possibilities of escalation very rapidly.”
US Not Prepared for War Against Iran and ‘Axis of Resistance’
By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 02.02.2024
Attacking Iran would be a catastrophic mistake for Washington, as the US is too internally weak to wage a new major in the Middle East, University of Tehran professor Seyed Mohammad Marandi told Sputnik’s New Rules podcast.
US officials have reportedly signaled that plans have been approved for a series of strikes against targets in Iraq and Syria.
That would be in response to a recent drone attack on US personnel in the Middle East — which claimed the lives of three soldiers and left 34 wounded.
In the wake of the strike Bloomberg claimed the Biden administration was considering a covert strike on Iran or Iranian officials as possible options.
But University of Tehran Professor Seyed Mohammad Marandi told Sputnik that directly targeting Iran would be a major mistake and a major miscalculation by Washington.
He suggested that scenario was very unlikely, given Iran’s missile defense and drone capabilities, as well as the vulnerability of US bases which are scattered across the Middle Eastern region.
“Let’s assume that the United States strikes Iran,” Marandi said. “The United States has bases all across the Persian Gulf. The Iranians will hit out at those bases, and then the Iranians will also punish those countries that host those bases.”
Message for Joe Biden: Don’t Mess with Iran
The professor warned the fallout from the tit-for-tat attacks would send oil and gas prices “through the roof.”
“The Red sea would no longer be safe for oil and gas. The Western economies would collapse if there was a major escalation in our region,” Marandi underlined. “The United States, its assets across Iraq would be crushed. It would be overrun and by extension Syria as well and Lebanon. The world has changed. This is not just Iran, by the way. This is the whole of West Asia.”
Given the latest US media reports, it appears far more plausible that the US would attack targets in Iraq and Syria, Marandi continued.
“[The US] will claim some sort of ‘victory over terrorists’ and that sort of nonsense which they usually say,” the professor said. “But it will be like in Yemen, they will have very little impact because the resistance to the US occupation, the illegal occupation in Iraq and Syria is very well hidden. Their assets are underground, they are spread out. And all the United States would do would be to make people angrier and make the resistance more popular, both at home and abroad. That’s exactly what we saw in Yemen.”
Marandi noted that most recently instead of pushing the Israeli regime to end the slaughter in the Palestinian Gaza Strip, the US tried to facilitate the genocide by attacking Yemen. Since early January the US and its allies conducted a series of strikes against the Ansar Allah-led government in the Yemeni capital Sana’a, also known as the Houthis after their leader.
“They launched many missiles, wasted a lot of money, but they were incapable of changing the balance of power. And Yemen continues to easily strike ships. Why?” the professor asked. “Because all of their assets are underground. Their mobile radar is well-protected underground. They are missiles and drones are well protected underground. They come out, strike the target and go back underground. So the Americans failed in Yemen. They made ‘Ansar Allah,’ or what the West likes to call the Houthis, very popular across the region and across the world, and they’ll only do the same in Iraq and Syria.”
In the aftermath of the strikes the Biden administrations came under criticism from both Republicans and Democrats. A bipartisan group of House representatives, comprising such strange bedfellows as Republican Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Green and New York Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, argued that the US’ “unauthorized strikes in Yemen” violate the Constitution and US statute.
They called on Biden “to seek authorization from Congress before involving the US in another conflict in the Middle East,” and warned the White House against provoking Iran and Iran-backed militia in the region which could swiftly spiral out of control and lead to a broader regional conflict.
US legislators’ concerns are justified as the US cannot afford to wage wars on multiple fronts, the academic pointed out.
“The United States cannot win another war,” said Marandi. “I have no doubt that if the Republicans were in charge, they would be… Whoever is in the white House, the people around him would be saying these things in private, and the Democrats in public would be denouncing the president for holding back. But the truth is that the United States is not the United States of the past. They can launch an attack on Iran. But the price would be extremely high and the United States wouldn’t win.”
Marandi questioned when the US had last won an overseas war.
“As the United States ‘won’ in Iraq as it won in Afghanistan. Did it win in Libya? Did it win in the genocide that it supported in Yemen? Did it win in Ukraine? The United States has a very poor record when it comes to launching wars and destroying nations and countries,” the acdemic said.
“They are capable of ruining lives and murdering millions and they don’t care. We see that in Gaza every day, but they simply don’t have the power to win. And Iran is not Iraq. Iran is not Libya. Iran is not Yemen. Iran is not Vietnam,” Marandi stressed. “Attacking Iran would be a catastrophic mistake for the United States, and something that I don’t think those decision makers in Washington would ever seriously contemplate.”
“The Americans may be foolish enough to do so, but if they do so, then I think you’ll see the demise of the American empire take place much more rapidly than we’re seeing right now,” he concluded.
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NATO Sanctions and the Coming Global Diesel Fuel Disaster
By F. William Engdahl – New Eastern Outlook – 11.04.2022
Amid the ongoing global inflation crisis, NATO heads of state and mainstream media repeat a mantra that high energy prices are a direct result of Putin’s actions in Ukraine since end of February. The reality is that it is the western sanctions that are responsible. Those sanctions including cutting SWIFT interbank access for key Russian banks and some of the most severe sanctions ever imposed, are hardly having an impact on the military actions in Ukraine. What many overlook is the fact that they are increasingly impacting the economies of the West, especially the EU and USA. A closer look at the state of the global supply of diesel fuel is alarming. But Western sanctions planners at the US Treasury and the EU know fully well what they are doing. And it bodes ill for the world economy.
While most of us rarely think about diesel fuel as anything other than a pollutant, in fact it is essential to the entire world economy in a way few energy sources are. The director general of Fuels Europe, part of the European Petroleum Refiners Association, stated recently, “… there is a clear link between diesel and GDP, because almost everything that goes into and out of a factory goes using diesel.” … continue
Blog Roll
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- Sanctions are collective punishment: immoral and self-defeating
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- Israeli Attacks in Gaza Kill at Least Seven Palestinians Over Three Days, including Woman and Child
- Trump’s militarization of Washington DC as he pursues Israel’s war against Iran
- No Tricks Zone
- New Study: Earth And Venus Surface Warmth Largely Explained By Convection And Lapse Rate, Not CO2 Or Radiation
- 2025 Nature Paper Claiming Worsening Global Drought Gets RETRACTED …Heavily Flawed
- New Study: ‘Global Drought Shows No Detectable Recent Acceleration Under Climate Warming’
- Economic Masterminds: German Socialists Suggest Taxing Productivity Gains Stemming From Using AI
- The South China Sea Has Not Been Cooperating With The Climate Change Narrative
- Energy Crisis: Germany Enters Heating Season With Historically Low Gas Reserve Fill Levels
- New Study: The Antarctic Ice Sheet Gained Mass From 2020-2024 Due To Staggering Snow And Ice Accumulation
- Study: Ocean Heating Rates From Thousands Of Years Ago ‘Dwarf’ Modern Ocean Heating Rates
- Climate Extremists Target, Attack Large-Scale Power Grid Infrastructure In Germany!
- New Study: Antarctic Ice Melt Has Contributed Less Than 1 Centimeter To Sea Level Rise In The Last 30 Years
