AIMING AT FORCING THE US INTO TALKS, IRAN OPENS UP THREE FRONTS
By Safa Haeri
PARIS, 10 Aug. (IPS) As American investigators are focusing on a Jordanian with ties to al-Qa’eda as the possible mastermind of the explosion of the Jordanian Embassy in Baghdad, Iranian political analysts said Tehran is using all its assets in Iraq and the region to force Washington entering negotiations with the Islamic Republic of Iran.
The last Saturday blast that killed at least 19, all Iraqis, and wounded many more, is reported to be the work of Abu Musab al Zarqawi, a noted terrorist affiliated with the Iran-backed Ansar al-Eslam.
At almost the same time, the Iran-supported and trained Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas fired shells over northern Israel, killing one person and injuring four other.
Hezbollah said the shelling was retaliation for the 2 August killing of Ali Hoseyn Saleh, one of its security official by a bomb in his car south of Beirut, blaming Israel for his death.
The Organisation’s Deputy Secretary-General Sheik Na’im Qasem said Sunday that Hezbollah "is fully prepared and ready to respond in the proper manner to any Israel aggression or threat."
British forces in the predominately Shi’ite region of Basra were not spared, as they also suffered new attacks on the same day, after irate Iraqis, waiting in the searing heat to fill up their cars with petrol, threw stones in frustration, according to a British army spokesman.
A foreign security guard and two Iraqis were killed in a second day of violence in Basra on Sunday in which British troops fired warning shots as crowds attacked vehicles and blocked streets with burning tires.
The British patrolled in tanks as hundreds of stone-throwing Iraqis rampaged in protest against fuel and power shortages. In one incident troops said they returned fire from gunmen, but a tense calm settled over Iraq's second city by evening.
The violence was some of the worst in Iraq since Saddam Hussein was toppled by U.S.-led forces on April 9 and occurred in a city at the heart of the mostly Shi'ite Muslim south, which has been relatively peaceful in the wake of his fall. Iraq's majority Shi'ites were repressed under Saddam, a Sunni Muslim, according to "Reuters" news agency.
Following the Jordan Embassy blast, the U.S. civilian Administrator of Iraq Paul Bremer on Saturday said the security is far being satisfactory in Iraq and added that he suspected that foreign fighters, Ansar al-Eslam could have been involved in the attack.
He was referring to mounting and repeated attacks by the pro-Saddam Hoseyn Iraqis as well as both the radical Shi’ites and Sunnis backed by Tehran.
Since President Bush declared the end of major combat May 1, 122 service members have died -- 56 were killed in hostile fire. Since the start of the war, 260 U.S. troops have been killed, 171 of them in hostile fire.
Iran condemned the attack on the Jordanian Embassy and at the same time, repeated that it would try on its soil those of the al-Qa’eda whose identities were not established.
Tehran has acknowledged that it holds some 500 al-Qa’eda and Taleban members, prominent among them are, besides Zarqawi, Soleyman Abu Ghaith, al-Qa’eda’s treasurer, Saif al-Adel, the network’s chief of staff alleged to have organised the 12 May explosions in Riyadh, as well as Sa’d Ben Laden, Osama’s elder son, according to US intelligence and Administration sources.
Government official spokesman Abdollah Ramezanzadeh said recently that due to security problems, Iran would not disclose the names of the senior terrorists it has arrested and repeated that anyhow, none of them would be handed over to the Americans, who have placed the Islamic Republic in their list of "rogue states" and with whom Tehran has no relations.
An associate of Osama Ben Laden, the alleged mastermind of the 11 September terrorist attacks on New York and on Washington, Zarqawi has been named by the Bush Administration as an al-Qa’eda terrorist who fled to Iraq from Afghanistan in May 2002 for medical treatment, and then stayed to organise terror plots.
"The al Qa’eda affiliate, Ansar al-Eslam, is known to still be present in Iraq", the White House paper said. "Such terrorist groups are now plotting against U.S. forces in Iraq".
On Saturday, General Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned that the infiltration of Iraq by armed fighters from neighbouring countries could raise tensions between the United States and those countries.
Though he did not name Iran, but considering the situation of relations between Iraq and its neighbours, it is clear which country he was pointing to, as, according to the Israeli intelligence website "Debkafile", Ansar members "could only have returned to Iraq with a blessing, logistical aid and funding from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards special intelligence arm which owns a strong presence on both sides of the Iranian-Iraqi border".
Actually, the Ansar had been transferred by Iran to the area to safeguard members of Ben Laden family, after "Iran Press Service" had revealed their hideout in Tehran and later in the western city of Hamedan.
Early in the Iraq War, American bombers wiped out Ansar’s main headquarters in Kurdish-controlled northeastern Iraq near the Iranian border.
"Based on the view that the Americans are at the heart of their troubles both at home and outside, Tehran has embarked on a make it or break it policy towards the United States. Either Washington buy Tehran’s bluff and in this case the regime will gain a breathing space, or it won’t and the result is open confrontation, including possible military engagement", the analyst added.
While reiterating that it is not seeking to overthrow the Islamic Republic, the State Department has advised the Bush Administration not to take side of any of the feuding wings of Iranian leadership, stating at the same time support for Iranian dissidents, as demonstrated with the recent students-led anti-regime protest movement.
At the same time, Washington, blessed by the European Union, has stepped up international pressures on the Islamic Republic with regard to its nuclear programs; its continued support for Arab and Palestinian groups opposed to peace with Israel and its black human rights records.
"By opening up at the same time three fronts against the Americans and their closest allies, Britain and Israel, the Iranian ruling clerics, sensing that their life is being counted and under mounting pressures both at home and on the international theatre, hope to be able to persuade Washington that it has no alternative but to sit and talk to them", one Iranian analyst commented.
http://www.iran-press-service.com/articles_2003/Aug-2003/iran_us_confrontation_10803.htm