How does this square with the fatwa against nuclear weapons reportedly issued by Iran's Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last year (which predictably failed to accrue any media attention in the West)? From the neo-conservative Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), Feb. 17:

Gee, we sure wish this was getting more headlines! The first paragraph is annoyingly sarcastic (the global protests he refers to, of course, have unfortunately not occurred). But the last paragraph is spot on! Why do so few on the supposed left "get it"? From Nick Cohen in The Observer of Feb. 12:

The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) carries this Jan. 25 report on Tehran's accusations that the UK was behind the previous day's bomb blast in Iran's heavily Arab western district of Ahwaz. Of course, the NCRI's armed wing, Mujahideen-e-Khalq, is itself a likely candidate for the attackers. There is also an Ahwaz Revolutionary Council, seeking self-determination for the increasingly restive region, which saw a wave of unrest last summer...

Gee, we can hardly wait for this one. From Reuters, Jan. 15:

TEHRAN - Iran is planning a conference to assess the scale of the Holocaust, which President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad rejects as a myth, Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said on Sunday.

OK, was the CIA behind this one? Pretty convenient timing, just as Iran has removed International Atomic Energy Agency seals on from three nuclear production facilities at Natanz, Pars Trash and Farayand Tec—announcing a resumption of uranium enrichment activities in defiance of the West. (IranMania, Jan. 13)

Days after Russia sparked a brief crisis in Europe by cutting off gas to Ukraine (and therefore points west), comes another sign of Moscow using petro-politics in a bid to restore its lost Great Power status. Under the five-year deal that ended the four-day crisis, Ukraine agreed to pay Russia's Gazprom $230 per 1,000 cubic meters of natural gas, as Gazprom had demanded. But Ukraine will end up paying only $95 per 1,000 cubic meters for the gas it receives in total because it will get lower priced gas from Gazprom partners in Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. (AFX, Jan. 5) This will, of course, increase the pressure on Moscow to find a new outlet for the Caspian Basin hydrocrabons bypassing both Ukraine and the new West-controlled trans-Caucasus Baku-Ceyhan pipeline. Right on cue, reports appear that Gazprom is seeking a stake in the planned Iran-India gas line, viewing it as a prelude for a new Iranian route from the Caspian to international markets. From India's Business Standard, Dec. 23:

Looks like it is back to the bad old days in Iran—the years of revolutionary fervor in the early '80s when music was banned from the public airwaves. Writes one of our readers: "Too bad the neo-cons are too stupid/sectarian/scared to realize you can't stop the rock. Give us 20 years and Metallica would take care of the Mullahs." From the BBC, Dec. 19:

The best-case scenario for the Bush administration in Iraq now is a modicum of stability under a Shi'ite-dominated regime more loyal to Tehran than Washington. In the January 2005 elections, voters trounced the US proxies, the secular Shi'ites of Iyad Allawi's CIA-groomed Iraqi National Accord, in favor of the Tehran-backed radical Shi'ites of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq. So "regime change" in Iran is now necessary for the US to maintain effective control over Iraq as well. But how, given that Bush has already got his hands more than full with an increasingly unpopular quagmire? The answer is obvious: US imperialism's regional pit-bull, Israel. From the Jerusalem Post, Nov. 30: