Posted on 03/07/2007 11:35:02 AM PST by Quilla
Edited on 03/07/2007 12:27:10 PM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
I don't remember
subtlety being a trait
Muslims are big on . . .
JERUSALEM — Israel has placed its foreign installations on alert after a newspaper reported the defection of a senior Iranian official in Turkey.
The alert was issued after Israel was blamed for the disappearance of a former Iranian deputy defense minister in Turkey. An Iranian delegation has been sent to Turkey and demanded the whereabouts of Ali Reza Asqhari, missing from an Istanbul hotel since Feb. 7.
The 63-year-old Asqhari, believed to have been a senior official in Iran's missile and nuclear weapons program, arrived in Istanbul from Damascus and had been registered in the Ceylon Hotel. But it was not clear whether he checked into the hotel.
On Tuesday, the London-based A-Sharq Al Awsat reported that Asqhari defected and was taken to the United States. The United States has not commented on the report. On Wednesday, the Saudi-owned newspaper quoted an Iranian military source as saying that Ashqhari was taken to an unidentified northern European state where he was being interrogated on Iran's nuclear weapons program.
Last week, Western intelligence sources said Asqhari, a former IRGC general, was believed to have defected as part of a CIA campaign to recruit Iranian scientists and defense officials. Asqhari was said to have been the Defense Ministry's liasion with Iran's strategic programs under Ali Shamkhani, who served as defense minister until 2006.
"It is likely that Asqhari has been abducted by the Western intelligence services," Iranian police chief Gen. Esmaeil Ahmadi Moghaddam said.
Israeli officials said the Defense Ministry and Foreign Ministry have increased security on embassies and legations throughout the world. They said the government declared an alert after Teheran accused the Jewish state of abducting a senior Iranian official.
"The prospect of an Iranian retaliation or provocation exists," an Israeli official said.
On Wednesday, Israel's National Security Council warned of the prospect of an imminent attack on Israelis in such countries as Egypt and Jordan. The council's Counter-Terrorism Division urged Israelis to leave all Arab countries immediately.
Israeli officials said Iran could retaliate by seeking to attack Israeli embassies or abducting government representatives. Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was said to operate a special unit for such attacks.
At one point, Asqhari was also the IRGC's liasion with Hizbullah and helped develop its military force, the sources said. They said Turkey has determined that Asqhari defected to the United States and possessed information on Iran's intervention in Iraq, Lebanon and Syria.
Or the Israelis think that the mullahs might use his defection/disappearance as a pretext to attack
Have enraged Muslims
started setting cars on fire?
I'm wondering if
my insurance would
buy me a new car if mine
gets torched by Muslims . . .
My thinking exactly.
Perhaps this was a walk in.
Hopefully the guy has defected and will spill the beans for the whole world to hear. Not that the MSM and the democrat party will care.
Heard his family had left Iran before he arrived in Turkey. Sounds like a defection and Iran is in panic mode because this guy obviously knows a lot of what Iran has been up to.
I bet there is a lot of noise happening in the Kremlin as well over this.
Only question is who did he defect to and why?
"I bet there is a lot of noise happening in the Kremlin as well over this."
I think you've got that right. The shadow war has been going on, but now we're getting a glimpse of it in open sources.
I hope it's Imanutjob......
Check you policy. I bet it specifically excludes acts of war and civil insurrection...
False alert is what I'm thinkin'.
This is shear speculation, but he might know what Iamanutjob is plannning and decided to get out of Dodge before the missiles start flying.
Is this the same missing soldier as on the previous dozen threads? It will be something like this, nothing, that triggers total global thermonuclear war.
bookmark
If he informs us that Iran is developing nuclear weapons, and we verify that he's telling the truth, the mullahs can kiss their collective a**es goodbye.
President Bush can leave a nice legacy to the world: an Iran no longer capable of threatening the West.
Isn't Israel always on high alert anyway?
Israel will wind up possessing Iran. Hold it for awhile and then sell it off high bidders. With a BIG agreement required to even bid.
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