Israel is feeling froggy (Updated w/WH reaction)
Old Trooper sends us this brief news report of Israel’s reaction to Iranian warships passing through the Red Sea and the Suez Canal steaming towards Syria;
Israeli’s Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman says that “Israel cannot ignore these provocations,” according to ynetnews.com.
Lieberman added that the warships was “a provocation that proves Iran’s nerve and self-esteem is growing from day to day.”
Iran announced plans to deploy warships near Israel and dock at a Syrian port for a year, IsraelNationalNews.com reports.
Of course, its a provocation – Iran has trouble at home and they need a bloody shirt they can wave at the crowd to get those patriotic juices flowing. Just like Gaddafi changing the subject by encouraging Palestinians to get themselves killed by Israelis.
UPDATE: The White House is strongly neutral on the issue and fully votes “present”. Way to keep both countries in line, guys.
Category: Terror War
I think you’re right about the “bloody shirt” scenario, Jonn.
What kind of warships are they? What other ships under Iranian flag are in the area, e.g. mother-ships for Iran’s unconventional navy of Seadoos.
How is the news of these ships, and of Israel’s rather muted reaction, playing in Istanbul?
It may be a bloody shirt their looking for, but it’s likely a bloody nose they’ll get.
Iran is not going to be happy till they’ve finaly and decisively pushed the issue into a shooting match. They want ’cause’ for their cause, and are getting more and more impatient looking for it.
I say let Israel give it to em, taped to the nose cone of an Israeli Jericho-II….
I’m thinking it’s not a bloody shirt for Iranians in Iran. They’ve got protests and plenty of blood flowing there.
But for Iranian proxy/client states Turkey, Bosnia, Albania, and Lebanon: oh yeah!
Israel sits at the end of the bowling alley known as the Med. Why not fire up the Muslim and anti-Israel and anti-Semitic masses in countries on the Med with a little game of brinksmanship?
Two concerns here.
First, the Suez Canal is very narrow and constricted. If the Iranians choose to scuttle the ships at either end of the waterway, they can effectively close down the Canal for months or even years, given the unrest in Egypt and the nascient inability of the new government to deal with such a situation. (And, I might add, they could blame the Israelis, as Jonn suggests as a pretext for war.)
Second, Iran’s confederate, North Korea, has developed some very sophisticated bottom mines that are extremely difficult to detect. The Iranians could deploy such North Korean mines and activate them at a later time. The targets could be Israeli ships, U.S./NATO warships, or commercial ships that would effectively bottle up the Suez Canal as described in my first point.
Other than those trivial issues, how ’bout them Grammy Awards on Sunday?
Watch for reports of “unexplained explosions” on “unidentified” ships in the Med if the Iranian barges don’t return home soon. Of course, they could end simply breaking down and becoming non-functional in Syria.