US president George W. Bush’s appointment book for the remainder of April reflects a Middle East without Iraq. Two days after seeing Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak in Crawford on Monday, April 12, he meets Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon in Washington and Abdullah King of Jordan on Friday, April 21. No Iraqi leader joins the procession of Middle East visitors because no suitable prime minister for the new federal republic of Iraq is so far visible. Although Bush would have preferred to devote the week to the crisis besetting Iraq, he cannot cancel visits that were scheduled before the April 3 outbreak of Iraq hostilities. This seems to indicate a lack of intelligence forewarning. The White House must have been warned in general terms that a Sunni-Shiite spring offensive was in the offing – but without a date and word of the tactical coordination forged between the radical Shiite Moqtada Sadr’s Mehdi Army militia and the Al Farouk Battalions, which is made up mainly of crack troops of Saddam’s old Special Republican Guards plus some al Qaeda elements.
President Bush will therefore be too preoccupied with the more pressing Iraq crisis to give his fully attention to the problems of Egypt, Israel and Jordan, however important. He will prefer to quiz his guests closely on the knowledge and evaluations of their intelligence services on Iraq.
For this reason, DEBKAfile’s Washington sources report, Bush is looking forward most of all to a visitor from outside the Middle East, British premier Tony Blair. Their lunch date on Friday, April 16, will in fact be a counsel of war. The two will chart the next political and military moves for Iraq as well as conferring on other Middle East issues. Mubarak, Sharon and King Abdullah know this as well as anyone. Therefore, all three tried to impress the British leader with their views in advance of his conference with Bush.
Alive to European and British sensitivities, President Bush ordered US commanders to slow down their offensives in Iraq over the weekend and so stem Iraqi civilian bloodshed. He knows Blair needs time to prepare domestic opinion for the sudden rise in Iraqi civilian deaths to 800 – 600 in Fallujah alone – in the space of one week’s combat, and more than 2,000 injured.
The role Iran has played in this flare-up will no doubt figure large in the Bush-Blair parley. The president left much of the handling of the Iran issue in British hands when earlier this year he accepted Blair’s offer of a European front for handling this chestnut. Blair proposed a concerted European effort to check Iran’s advance towards nuclear weapons and halt its uranium enrichment, while at the same time laying the groundwork for a Washington-Tehran diplomatic accommodation over Iraq. However, British foreign secretary Jack Straw, who was charged with the maneuver, failed completely. Iran refused to give way on its nuclear program even though the European Union suspended a trade accord that Tehran badly wants. Instead, it marched forward defiantly in three spheres:
1. The Isfahan centrifuge plant was fully assembled and began operating in breach of a solemn Iranian undertaking to the EU and the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna.
2. Work was accelerated on the heavy water reactor in Arak, 200 km southwest of Tehran, where building begins in June. This reactor will produce enough plutonium to make one nuclear weapon per year. It will enable Iran to make up the fuel shortfall created by Russian president Vladimir Putin’s promise to Bush to withhold 8000 fuel rods from the big Bushehr reactor. Bushehr is now preparing to get its fuel from Arak.
3. Through its agents, Revolutionary Guards officers and Hizballah cells in Iraq, Tehran propelled the turbulent young Shiite cleric into staging an uprising against the US-led coalition in the Shiite centers of Baghdad and southern Iraq. At the same time, Iran-based al Qaeda operatives who move in and out of Iraq through the Iranian and Syrian borders were sent to broker tactical links between Sadr’s militia and the Sunni insurgents in Falluja and Ar Ramadi. Once the flame was kindled and Sunni and radical Shiite insurgents engaged in hostilities in the first week of April, Tehran, according to DEBKAfile’s sources, told its agents to break away and maintain a low profile lest Washington be provoked into dealing out punishment.
That was how the Iraqi spring offensive evolved into an Iranian assault, turning US Middle East political and military strategies upside down.
This is the disarray greeting the Middle East visitors to Washington. It is the scene into which Sharon hopes to fit his plan for unilateral disengagement from the Palestinians and closure of Gaza Strip settlements.
For the time being, the prime minister is far from sure he can sell his scheme at home. Monday night, April 12, before emplaning for Washington, he stood up in Maale Adumim, a West Bank Jewish town just outside Jerusalem, and vowed to hang onto the six large urban blocs Israel has built in the territory over nearly 40 years: Ariel, Givat Zeev, Gush Etzion, Kiryat Arba and the revived Jewish Quarter of Hebron, as well as Maale Adumim. His vow did not impress. Since he stated his determination to remove Gaza Strip settlements, Sharon’s credibility with his own following has plummeted. At least one member of his cabinet sees in the latest vow an attempt to swing the Likud opposition round to his plan for the April 29 party poll rather than demonstrating a resolute posture for Washington’s benefit.
In any case, DEBKAfile’s Washington sources report, he is unlikely to bring much cheer home from his talks with Bush. Quite the reverse:
1. He is the first Israeli leader to go into a meeting with a US president without prior consultation or even knowledge of the US statement on their talks. His senor aides spent days in Washington trying for a peek at the text, to no avail. The purported US concessions flooding the media on the Palestinian refugees, the security barrier and the funding of grand Negev development schemes, have been drummed up by the prime minister’s office spin machine or simply conjecture.
2. The White House has not budged an inch from its original position that challenges Sharon to evacuate the Gaza Strip, if Israel so decides, on its own, without making claims on the United States. Nothing is being offered in exchange for this move.
3. The prime minister’s feelers to attract European support for his disengagement initiative have met with a cool response except for a flicker of interest in London. His overture had one result which he certainly did not seek. British interest in a security role in Palestinian areas, though stalled and short of attracting interest in Europe, opened a door for the Americans to walk through, out of reluctance to let the British run with this ball. Washington has accordingly resumed direct contacts with the Palestinian Authority. Yasser Arafat’s minister of information, Nabil Shaat, is invited to Washington next week to meet secretary of state Colin Powell, when only last year no Bush administration official was willing to meet any Palestinian minister.
4. The aggressiveness with which Sharon’s aides lobbied for his plan antagonized senior administration officials and even turned US ambassador to Israel Dan Kurtzer against it.
The day before Sharon landed in Washington, Israeli ambassador Danny Ayalon directly contradicted the Bush statement after his meeting with Mubarak. The diplomat said that disengagement cannot be part of the road map only an alternative since there is no partner to negotiate for the other side. This assertion points to deep rift existing between Washington and Jerusalem.
DEBKAfile’s exclusive sources reveal that, in view of his low expectations from his talks with Bush, Sharon’s advisers went in search of a breakthrough to tilt the Likud poll in favor of his plan. He asked AIPAC ex-president Steve Grossman to approach Democratic candidate John Kerry’s staff and ask him to follow the Bush communiqué at the end of their Wednesday talks with a separate statement of endorsement. Sharon then planned to report to Likud members that his disengagement plan had won bipartisan backing in the United States and was safe even if the Democratic candidate carried the November election.
Grossman has meanwhile heard nothing from Kerry’s staff. Our Washington sources strongly doubt that either of the two US presidential candidates, who are gearing up for the toughest stage of their race, have any interest in feigning assent on an issue on which they are as deeply divided as the Middle East conflict. Kerry can hardly grant Sharon a promise of support for an unknown quantity i.e. Wednesday’s presidential statement.
Oppose Islamic regime's Soccer policy on US soil
SMCCDI (Urgent Action)
Apr 18, 2004
http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3156.shtml " To sin by silence, when we should protest, makes cowards out of men. The human race has climbed on protest. Had no voice been raised against injustice, ignorance and lust, the inquisition yet would serve the law, and guillotines decide our least disputes. The few who dare, must speak and speak again, to right the wrongs of many..." - ( Ella Wheeler Wilcox )
Fellow Iranians and Americans,
Two international soccer games are scheduled to be played by Iran's National Team on the US soil. The first game is scheduled to be played against the USA's Galaxy Team in the Rose Bowl Stadium located in Pasadena, California on Wednesday April 28, 2004, from 07:30 PM PST; And the second game against Guatemala's National Team in the RFK Stadium located in Washington DC on Saturday May 1, 2004, from 08:00 PM EST.
More games on the US soil are planned for September 21st and as we will be approaching the US Presidential election...
Some among us are still, unfortunately, unaware of the political impact this type of controversial games and benefits the Islamic regime will try to derive at Iranians and Americans expense. Indeed, Living in the free American society and afar from the Motherland tend to blind, or promote ignorance amongst a few members of the Iranian Diaspora which would be not found in the Iranian population subject to mullahs' oppressive rule and demagogy.
After all, most our countrymen still remember how the very same Iranian National Team was forced to loose to Bahrain in order to put a stop to the consecutive massive protest actions made in the frame of what became famous as "Iran's Soccer Demos"...
We do remember? Don't we?...
Yes we do... Most of us do!!!
But, those few of us that will still be excited to go to these new games just for the pleasure of enjoying and revitalizing their "National feelings", need to remember that this is the 2nd time that the Rose Bowl stadium is to be used as a political platform by the Mullahs. It is mostly anoher desperate attempt by the Mullahs and a few misguided American officials and legislators to promote "soccer policy" between the U.S. and a collapsing tyrannical and terrorist sponsoring regime that is already dead on arrival (DOA).
Just as a reminder, the first U.S.-Iran soccer game was played on Sunday January 29, 2000, and opened the way for several pro-regime oriented organizations to orchestrate meetings by so-called Iranian-American or American-Iranian councils and their political action committees (PACs). Regime officials used these illegitimate entities to claim wide support within the Iranian Diaspora and to justify visits to the U.S. by the Islamic foreign minister and president, and to solicit "political" donations. Many of you remember the meetings held at: The Dana Point Ritz Carlton (on September 9, 2000 with the regime's FM Kamal Kharazi as official guest and leading to a massive protest action in Orange County); Seton Hall University (on November 9, 2001 with Mohamad Khatami as guest speaker); The illegal Islamic presidential election ballot boxes on U.S. soil in June 2001; New York's New School University (on May 9, 2002 with Kamal Kharazi as guest speaker); San Francisco Ritz Carlton (on June 1, 2002 with John Kerry present along controversial Iranians and talking about "success of reforms in Iran" and "need to cancel sanctions law and establish formal ties with the regime"); Various other objectionable actions, such as, fund raising for Senator Joseph Biden (D-DE) at the Los Angeles based IMAN Islamic center in year 2002); "Apology" offered by the Clinton Administration to the Islamic regime by the voice of Madeleine Albright; US legislators and Mehdi Karoubi talks on the US soil; US-Islamic regime negociations in Turkey and Cyprus; And various gatherings claimed to be supported by Iranians living in the US.
These were just few "results" following the first episode of "Soccer Policy"..... Few results giving "more Time to a tyrannical and terrorist regime"... More time to repress, kill and plan future misdeeds...
Fellow People of Conscience,
This is not a request for boycotting these games. In contrary, it's an invitation for a massive and lucid participation. It's an invitation to participate, enjoy, support the National Team but above all to respond to part of our moral duties...
The new game scheduled to be played in California has been planned for a "Wednesday" (4/28/04 till further notice). Still till this time, issuing moment of this Urgent Action, the Galaxy's management has not reconfirmed the game but ticket's are being sold... Most likely the game will take place as scheduled as it's especially confirmed on the US Soccer Association's official website...
This Hush Hush policy seems to be just a desperate tactic intending to avoid a massive Iranian presence and an adversarial crowd that will protest the brutal Islamic republic regime as it did on January 2000.
They fear, the Mullahs' regime and their controversial counterparts in America, that the big number of Iranian freedom lovers residing in California and many Americans will expose them to the world while they attempt to manipulate the media during this U.S. election year.
The Mullahs and their US based counterparts recognize that, in these times of public awareness, it will be impossible for anyone to invite regime officials without expecting wide scale protest from millions of Iranians and Americans. The regime is returning to it's first "reforms" step and is organizing this game which will most likely be "blacked-out" but a preview of future events the despots will promote to secure ties with America. Times and strategies force the Mullahs to change staged future events that will surely include controversial internationally recognized figures that will attempt to promote the regime's agenda with "new types of reforms from within". Controversial figures, like Ebrahim Yazdi and his National-Religious gang, and the so-called Nobel Peace Prize Winner Shirin Ebadi will continue to be exploited by the mullahs.
Keep in mind that millions of Iranians and freedom lovers' displeasure over Iran's first Nobel Peace Prize winner who till very recently defended the Islamic terrorists being held in Guantanamo prison. Yes, sadly, Iran's first Nobel Peace Prize winner is now defending the terrorists' 9/11 genocidal atrocity in America and their barbarian rule in Afghanistan. Compounding her complicity, Shirin Ebadi, refused till last week to utter a word against the inhumane treatment of our fellow students and freedom lovers and the fate of those being held, or killed in the theocratic regime's prisons. She, Shirin Ebadi, was too busy protesting against France's decision to ban the veil from secular public schools than defending Iranian women forced and beaten, for a quarter of a century, to wear the mandatory veil. Since last week, she has started, FINALLY, to speak.... Most likely in order to calm the Iranian Diaspora as she has been planned to make speeches in Canada and in the US...
Yes, be assured, the Mullahs next charade will be to invite their "second generation of reformists," like Shirin Ebadi who has also shamefully stated "she is kissing the hands of the Islamic Majiles (Parliament) members and thanking President Khatami for what he has done."
Outrageously shameful! Yes, just more despotic Islamic masquerading and manipulation!!!!
When will these acts of demagoguery written with Iranian blood cease?
Fellow Good Men and Good Women of Integrity and Principles,
The Islamic regime can no longer suggest, or claim gradual democratization is occurring, or report any "progress of reforms" to anybody with a brain. Do not, therefore, allow their agents of deceit lull you, or your friends, into thinking that the Mullahs have changed.
The Mullahs' new game uses U.S. based lobbyist groups, especially those associated with the questionable actions of John Kerry's presidential election bid. Promising to "repair the damage done by the Bush Administration," U.S. Senator John Kerry has already taken campaign donations from these sources headed by controversial individuals of Iranian origin. The very same John Kerry who supported the theory of sham Regime reforms to Americans and helped to bought time for the Islamic regime, will benefit from their support and donations. For the record, Senator Kerry also considers the Islamic regime a "democratic entity" and has qualified a fanatic, such as, Moghtada Al-Sadr as a "legitimate leader" during an interview with NPR. Intent upon winning The White House, the American Democratic Party leadership cares not what happens to, or the sacrifices made by Iranians and Americans' sons and daughters in the region. It is obvious that Senator Kerry is following the same self-deluding and destructive path that the previous Democrat administration advocated. That Clinton administration actually apologized to the regime and accepted responsibility for past rights abuses and terrorism.
This is wrong and contrary to all ethics!!!! We must not allow such things to ever happen again! We must seize the occasion and expose this regime's autocratic and evil nature!
Iranians living in the despotic hell the Mullahs have created have paid heavy prices to expose the despotic Mullahs' fascism and backward mentality. Opposing the Mullahs, near helpless Iranians resist the despots with their bare hands at times to the death. The U.S. Iranian Diaspora and American freedom lovers must reiterate that the Mullahs' despotic actions will not be tolerated.'
Fellow Freedom Lovers,
Many of you still remember the SMCCDI's Urgent Call To Action of January 12, 2000, (see: (
http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_54.shtml) and the dramatic effect of the demonstration that took place at the first Rose Bowl soccer game. Recall, please, how the collaboration of a few Islamic regime's opponents succeeded in turning the regime's agenda against its' promoters and organizers. Thousands of our fellow compatriots and Americans, responding to their moral duty, seized the occasion to bow the regime's official anthem and were able to focus attention on the plight of Iranians struggling for freedom, secularity and democracy.
Yes, due to awareness, the game played out against the regime itself!!!
This is to be done again!!!
The time has come again, along with our countrymen who are fighting openly in Iran, to remind yourselves that the Iranian soccer team is not our enemy, the mullahs and their regime are.
Remind yourselves on your way to the Rose Bowl Stadium and while there, that the Iranian athletes and team are different from the Islamic regime, and how the game might be of benefit to the tyrants and terrorists if you are passive. You must understand that while you can enjoy the game and be proud of your players, you have a moral duty to protest against the Islamic regime, promoters and lobbyists.
Remember, the promoters and lobbyist are the ones intent upon using the soccer game as a platform to praise the existence of a nightmare called the "Islamic Republic."
Also, you must not allow Americans to forget how the Islamic republic is illegitimate, tyrannical and that it poses grave dangers to their sons and daughters, to its neighbors and to the World's stability and peace!!!
In light of these facts, please remember:
SUPPORT THE TEAM BUT NOT THE REGIME..........
This is how:
1- Try to participate in each game you can. If you are unable to obtain tickets, as tickets will be selectively sold, or already massively "bought out," you're invited to take the day off and join the demonstration in front of the stadium.
2- Do not accept or wave the Islamic Republic flag which is usually distributed at the entries of such organized gatherings. Our national flag is without the Islamic Republic emblem.
The regime has on several occasions exploited young, or naive people in the U.S. and European countries by placing the Islamic Republic flag in their innocent hands. Innocent young, or naive people will wave any flag that has been given to them not knowing the political ramifications of the regime's intentions. Such false images of regime support are shown then by governmental TV and press to our enchained countrymen. The mullahs use naivety and irresponsibility as propaganda tools while simultaneously taking the lives of Iranian children....
Do not give the impression that we approve of the Mullahs' repression of students, imprisonment of teachers, journalists and other freedom lovers!
3- Conceal under your clothing the banned "Lion and Sun" flag or get one from freedom lovers who will try to distribute them at the entry door areas of the Stadium. Show your support of your historical heritage by displaying and actively waving the "Lion and Sun flag". The Lion and Sun Flag has become a symbol of rejection of the Islamic regime by millions of Iranians.
4- Write on long white paper sheets (e.g. butcher paper) in very thick and bold RED or BLACK "English" and "Persian" letters these slogans: "Free Political Prisoners in Iran" (Zendani e Siassi Azad bayad gardad), "Down with Islamic Republic" (Marg bar Jomhoori e Eslami), "No to Theocracy (in Red) Yes to Democracy (in black)", (Hokoomat e Mazhabi NA, Mardomsalari ARI), "Down with Tyranny" (Marg bar Estebdad), "Freedom for Iran" (Azadi baraye Iran), "Referundum for Iran", (Referundum baraye Iran) "Down with the Mullah regime" (Nabood bad Regime e Mollayan), "Down with Terrorsists" (Marg bar Terrorist), "Kerry, Iran is NO Democracy" (Kerry, Iran Democracy nist), "Kerry don't talk to the terrorists" (Kerry ba terrorist goftegoo na).
Roll, or fold the long sheets of paper and conceal them under your clothing to get it inside the stadium. If discovered, somebody will take your banner from you. Once inside the stadium and after the start of the game wait for an appropriate moment to vigorously display your sign.
Live television images sent from the stadium for Americans must resonate your message of regime rejection and support for Iranians seeking freedom. Do not in any way allow it to appear that you support the regime and its' lobbyists.
5- When the American national anthem is played, please rise and pay respect.
6- When the Islamic Republic anthem is played, sit down, or turn your back and bow low in a sign of protest. Cut out eye and mouth holes (so you can breath) in plastic grocery bags, if you wish not to be identified.
7- Bring black gloves, if you have them. Point your fists to the sky while the Islamic republic anthem is played. This protest action was first demonstrated by members of the American Black community during the 1960 Olympic games in Mexico; to protest against discrimination and is well known to all freedom lovers...
8- At the end of the regime's anthem, everybody rise and together sing "EY IRAN EY MARZ-E-POR GOHAR." (Oh. Iran). This song was sung by the students during the July 1999 protest movement and has since been considered by the absolute majority of Iranians as their legitimate National Anthem.
9- In the event this song, O Iran, is played by the Stadium Band rise and sing it. If the Stadium band does not play our anthem do not forget to follow the guidance of number 7 (above).
10- Send faxes and e-mails to John Kerry and declare your dismay at his statements and actions, in reference to the Islamic regime. 202-224-8525; 323-935-3579; 617-523-2033; 212-213-9230;
info@johnkerry.com 11- Send e-mails and faxes to US officials, lawmakers and also to California's Governor (CG) state representatives of your rejection of the regime and any action promoted by controversial entities claiming to act on behalf of Iranians and Iranian-Americans while pushing for "dialogue" and "establishment of ties with the repressive and terrorist regime."
President Bush: 202-456-246 ,
president@whitehouse.gov CG: 916-445-4633 ,
governor@governor.ca.gov 12- Send a copy the following message to all American media sources (FOX, ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC.
13- Send copies of your messages to SMCCDI's fax and e.mail. 972-491-0866;
smccdi@daneshjoo.org Fellow Men and Women of Good Will,
Show the world and especially the US Presidential candidates that you have not forgotten your homeland, and have not forgiven the regime for its' tyranny. Show the world that while some of you may be too young and do not have personal memories of the revolution you care and compassionately know that years of tyranny cannot be whitewashed away with a soccer game. More importantly, show that you are politically aware and care for your Iranian brothers and sisters.
The time for another fight for TRUTH, PRINCIPLES, FREEDOM, and an END TO TYRANNY AND TERROR has come once again. Together we stand, divided we fall. Never more true. It is time to stand together and support our team - NOT the regime!
Remember you can accelerate the Iranian freedom process and save lives by showing your support...Thousands of innocent eyes are looking for your responsible actions...
God bless you all...
The "Student Movement Coordination Committee for Democracy in Iran" (SMCCDI)