Iran
June 15, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
It does so in this editorial. The Post’s editorial stance informs its front page story about Iran’s attacks. The headline in the paper edition reads “Trump steps up blame of Iran.” A subheading states “Dueling accusations raise fears of military conflict.” Of course, Trump is “stepping up” the blame of Iran. He now has video evidence that Iran is responsible for attacks on ships in the Persian Gulf. That’s the
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May 17, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
If you consume the mainstream media, you might be under the impression that President Trump is about to take the U.S. into war with Iran. Even if you only watch Fox News, you might believe that John Bolton is pushing Trump to go to war. Tucker Carlson says that Bolton wants a war with Iran. This is fake news. There’s no evidence that Bolton desires a war with Iran and
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February 28, 2019 — Scott Johnson
The Foundation for Defense of Democracies has published several papers on what is to be learned from the documents included in Israel’s heist from the Iranian nuclear archive. These papers are by experts on Iran’s nuclear program; they know what they are talking about. In the most recent of these papers — “The Iranian Nuclear Archive: Implications and Recommendations” — David Albright, Olli Heinonen, and Andrea Stricker summarize what is
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February 20, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
I don’t believe we’ve written about Monica Witt, the former U.S. Air Force intelligence specialist accused of espionage for Iran. Witt, who now resides in Iran, out of our reach, is said to have caused significant damage to America. She is suspected, among other things, of revealing the names of double agents run by the United States. Why did Witt become a traitor? Douglas Wise, former deputy director of the
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February 10, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Iran has been at war with the United States since the overthrow of the Shah and the ascent of the mullahcracy in 1979. The Iranians held American hostages for 444 days in 1979-81, until President Reagan was sworn in. On Reagan’s watch, however, the mullahs upped the ante, dispatching their Hezbollah subsidiary to murder 242 Marines in Beirut in 1983. The Iranians have kept right at it, murdering and maiming
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February 7, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Our top intelligence officials presented their unclassified threat assessment at a January 29 hearing of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats testified with CIA Director Gina Haspel, Defense Intelligence Agency director Robert Ashley, National Security Agency director Paul Nakasone, and National Geospatial Agency director Robert Cardillo. According to Coats et al. (as Jeff Jacboy put it in his emailed Boston Globe Arguable column), “the
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January 29, 2019 — Steven Hayward
Venezuela has been falling apart for more than a decade, but when matters reached a seeming crisis point last week, I decided it was high time to catch up with Mark Falcoff, the longtime Latin American expert now retired from the American Enterprise Institute, to walk us through the scene (including some terrific trivia about the structure of the Venezuelan army). Then I shift focus to the other member of
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January 15, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Bret Stephens is a proud NeverTrumper; he supported Hillary Clinton for president and still wishes she had won the election. In his informative column on the war fought by the Israel Defense Forces against Iranian elements including Hezbollah and the Quds Force in “the campaign between the wars,” however, we can find a hidden message that belies his NeverTrumpism. Analyze this: By 2016, [just-retired IDF chief of staff Gadi] Eisenkot
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January 11, 2019 — Scott Johnson
In his great undoing of the “accomplishments” of the Obama administration, President Trump has withdrawn the United States from the humiliating and destructive Iran nuclear deal. The deal funded a terrorist regime that remains at war with the United States and that continues to avow its dedication to our destruction. The Trump administration has also reimposed sanctions on the Iranian regime. There was no bridge too far for Obama in
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January 1, 2019 — Scott Johnson
As we kick off the new year with our felicitations to readers, I want to recommend some reading, mostly from recent Picks. In case you missed one or the other the first time around, consider this: • Lee Smith, “How should we read the American press? In Arabic” (Tablet). • David Albright, Olli Heinonen, Frank Pabian & Andrew Stricker, “Anatomy of Iran’s Deception and How Iran Benefited” (Foundation for Defense
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December 26, 2018 — Scott Johnson
Michael Doran retweets Omri Ceren’s correction of the AP (below) with the comment: “In order to fuel its attacks on Trump, the press is actively, constantly rewriting the history of Obama’s Iran concessions. You can see it in real time below.” We are suffocating in media lies and Orwellian revision of recent history. It is exceedingly difficult to keep the facts straight. Orwell himself put it this way: “To see
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December 14, 2018 — Paul Mirengoff
Sen. Mike Lee used to be something of a conservative hero. More recently, he’s become heavy into working with Democrats. Not just any Democrats, but some of the most liberal, most stridently partisan Senate Dems. He and Sen. Dick Durbin combined to sponsor the jailbreak legislation that may well be on the verge of passing the Senate. A few years ago Lee and Durbin collaborated on a jailbreak bill that
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December 12, 2018 — Scott Johnson
I missed accounts of the White House parties and reception that were held in observance of Hanukkah last week. Eight Holocaust survivors from Brooklyn were in attendance at the first (afternoon) party. President Trump made three sets of formal remarks. Yeshiva World comprehensively documents the proceedings in “VIDEOS/PHOTOS: Trump Hosts Annual White House Chanukah Party; Joined By Holocaust Survivors & Parkland Shooting Victim’s Dad.” The family of Parkland mass shooting
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November 5, 2018 — Scott Johnson
In his great undoing of the “accomplishments” of the Obama administration, President Trump has withdrawn the United States from the humiliating and destructive Iran nuclear deal. The deal funded a terrorist regime that remains at war with the United States and that continues to avow its dedication to our destruction. There was no bridge too far for Obama in seeking to align the United States with the mullahs of Iran.
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October 30, 2018 — Scott Johnson
The Institute for Science and International Security has just released the paper Breaking Up and Reorienting Iran’s Nuclear Weapons Program: Iran’s Nuclear Archive Shows the 2003 Restructuring of its Nuclear Weapons Program, then called the AMAD Program, into Covert and Overt Parts by proliferation experts David Albright, Olli Heinonen and Andrea Stricker. I have embedded a copy of the report at the bottom of this post. Here is the introductory
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October 22, 2018 — Paul Mirengoff
Did you know that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s former president, is on Twitter? It’s true. On his Twitter account, Ahmadinejad describes himself as “Husband, Dad, Grandfather, University Professor, President, Mayor, Proud Iranian.” A better description would be “Jew hater, Holocaust denier, homophobe, serial human rights violator, and Death to America advocate.” There’s a place on Twitter for a guy like that, but not for the Gay Patriot. Is Ahmadinejad softening on
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October 19, 2018 — Paul Mirengoff
To figure how not to think about events in the Middle East, it’s often useful to consult Tom Friedman. Yesterday, Friedman appeared on PBS with Christiane Amanpour to discuss the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. Friedman looks like a fool in the wake of the murder because last year he wrote a gushing column praising Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), Saudi Arabia’s powerful crown prince, for implementing a “top-down Arab spring.” Friedman
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