Believe it or not, the Mullahs are rational and so are most of the members of the Knesset. The Mullahs are just trying to keep themselves by being deposed by the Iranian people who hate their guts. Despite his face in the press the president of Iran is a powerless nut job...and he is hated as well. I have high hopes for both Iran and Israel moving beyond this confrontation that is being cooked up by outside forces. Traditionally...Jews and Persians have been closely linked. It is the only place in the middle east besides Israel where there is a Jewish population. Since you mention ethnic cleansing you should probably be aware that nearly a million Sephardic Jews were "cleansed" out of arab countries in the 1950s, though they have lived there for 2000 plus years. It is fact the Sephardic Jews that are the most conservative and hawkish, not the European Jews who are traditionally lefty. In fact, real Zionism is a lefty concept. It was about giving an oppressed minority self determination within a socialist context.  

But there is only talk and threats of attack from the US and Israel in dealing with it, although Bush has pulled back his rhetoric and has even cautioned Israel concerning a solo attempt to destroy Iran's facilities. Bush may be listening to warnings concerning 300 dollar a barrel oil if Iran is bombed.

The BBC and Israeli Propaganda
by shergald Daily Kos
Sat Nov 11, 2006 at 05:28:22 AM PST

The BBC and Israeli Propaganda is the subtitle of an article, Israel's Plan for a Military Strike on Iran, by JONATHAN COOK, a British journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. It was published in CounterPunch on October 12, 2006, but its obvious relevancy today for American foreign policy because it provides a look at how Israeli politicians of all persuasions are viewing Iran.

The last few days have seen quite a number of diaries posted on the topic of Israel's expected attack of Iran in order to stop its nuclear program, so far announced by the Iranians to be for peaceful purposes. Not widely publicized in the US, the Israeli government commissioned Israel's leading filmmaker, Noam Shalev, to execute a documentary about the Iranian threat, whose content lends further weight to the likelihood of an Israeli attack.

The Middle East, and possibly the world, stands on the brink of a terrible conflagration as Israel and the United States prepare to deal with Iran's alleged ambition to acquire nuclear weapons. Israel, it becomes clearer by the day, wants to use its air force to deliver a knockout blow against Tehran. It is not known whether it will use conventional weapons or a nuclear warhead in such a strike.

At this potentially cataclysmic moment in global politics, it is good to see that one of the world's leading broadcasters, the BBC, decided this week that it should air a documentary entitled "Will Israel bomb Iran?" It is the question on everyone's lips and doubtless, with the imprimatur of the BBC, the program will sell around the world.

Although Cook enumerates various slighted points not covered in the film, 1) that such an attack would be a gross violation of international law, 2) that Israel's own nuclear arsenal is unmonitored by the IAEA, 3) that Israel is perceived as a threat by its neighbors and may be fuelling a Middle East arms race, 4) that the consequences of an Israeli strike would cause instability and violence across the Middle East, including in Iraq, where British and American troops are stationed as an occupying force, or 5) that it is certain to provoke a steep rise in global jihad against the West, it is the words of various Israeli officials and politicians, who appear in the film, that loom ominous.

....the program dedicates 40 minutes to footage of Top Gun heroics by the Israeli air force, and the recollections of pilots who carried out a similar, "daring" attack on Iraq's nuclear reactor in the early 1980s; menacing long shots of Iran's nuclear research facilities; and interviews with three former Israeli prime ministers, a former Israeli military chief of staff, various officials in Israeli military intelligence, and a professor who designs Israel's military arsenal.

All of them speak with one voice: Israel, they claim, is about to be "wiped out" by Iranian nuclear weapons and must defend itself "whatever the consequences".

They are given plenty of airtime to repeat unchallenged well-worn propaganda Israel has been peddling through its own media, and which has been credulously amplified by the international media: that Iran is led by a fanatical anti-Semite who, like Adolf Hitler, believes he can commit genocide against the Jewish people, this time through a nuclear holocaust.

Other Israeli misinformation, none of it believed by serious analysts, is also uncritically spread by the film-makers: that Hizbullah in Lebanon is a puppet of Iran, waiting to aid its master in Israel's destruction; that Iran is only months away from creating nuclear weapons, a "point of no return", as the program warns; and that a "fragile" Israel is under constant threat of annihilation from all its Arab neighbors.

But the program's unequivocal main theme -- echoing precisely Israel's own agenda -- is that Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is hell-bent on destroying Israel. The film makers treat seriously, bordering on reverentially, preposterous comments from Israel's leaders about this threat.

Shimon Peres, the Israeli government's veteran roving ambassador, claims, for example, that Iran has made "a call for genocide" against Israel, compares an Iranian nuclear bomb to a "flying concentration camp", and warns that "no one would like to see a comeback to the times of the Nazis".
Cabinet minister Avi Dichter, a former head of the Shin Bet domestic security service, believes Israel faces "an existential threat" from Iran. And Zvi Stauber, a former senior figure in military intelligence, compares Israel's situation to a man whose neighbor "has a gun and he declares every day he is going to kill you".
But pride of place goes to Binyamin Netanyahu, a former prime minister and the current leader of the opposition. He claims repeatedly that the only possible reason Iran and its president could want a nuclear arsenal is for Israel's "extermination". "If he can get away with it, he'll do it." "Ayatollahs with atomic bombs are a powerful threat to all of us." A nuclear Iran "is a threat unlike anything we have seen before. It's beyond politics"

As to the matter of a conventional versus a nuclear attack, Ehud Barak provides abundant hints:

"Ultimately we are standing alone," he says, in apparent justification for an illegal, unilateral strike. Iran's nuclear research facilities, Barak warns, are hidden deep underground, so deep that "no conventional weapon can penetrate", leaving us to infer that in such circumstances Israel will have no choice but use a tactical nuclear strike in its "self-defense". And, getting into his stride, Barak adds that some facilities are in crowded urban areas "where any attack could end up in civilian collateral damage".

"Apart from a brief appearance by an Iranian diplomat, no countervailing opinions are entertained in the BBC program; only Israel's military and political leadership is allowed to speak." Juxtaposing the above remarks are those from a poorly translated speech by Ahmadinejad. He is quoted as saying: "The regime occupying Jerusalem should be eliminated from the page of history". This is at least an improvement on the original translation, much repeated in the program by Netanyahu and others, that "Israel must be wiped off the map". According to Cook, "the program makers infer from their more accurate translation the same diabolical intent on Ahmadinejad's part as suggested by Netanyahu's fabricated version."

The complexities of Israeli politics is irrelevant in foreign policy issues when you have all of the major parties cooperating in tandem on questions like Iran's nuclear facilities. Read Cook's original article or this one available through Daily Kos search.

You are just a typical guilty knee jerk leftist come lately.
This deal would have been a confidence builder. Hopes were high on both sides. Arafat blew it up and the Cuntisleeza and Bush walked away from doing anything at all.

Arafat was a vain arrogant little man who could never make the leap from being a mafiosa-style don to being a national leader...and he brought the Palestinian nation down with him.

Want evidence, look at the situation in 1999 and look at it now.

On the first bold...you are obviously very young or ignorant. The majority of jews in Israel came from Arab countries that they were "cleansed" from in the 1950. Not propaganda. Go to your library or a newspaper and check.

Israel gave back Sinai and Gaza...again, even a current newspaper might be of some assistance to you

Arafat walked away from nationhood in 2000. He was the roadblock. Even Saheb Erekat generally acknowledges this. But I guess you know better. You were probably there.

The land is liability not a plus. That is self evident and has been stated by every labour government.

So my question for you is, are you a native american?
If not, what is your claim to where you are presently living?