A Hot Autumn

Three weeks ago, former FBI and CIA officials sent a memorandum to President Barack Obama, warning him that Israel might launch an air attack on Iranian nuclear plants in August.

Ray McGovern, a former CIA analyst, expressed his concern that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, after his visit to the White House, might have left with the impression that Barack Obama did not dare ask Israel not to attack Iran. Following the diplomatic exchanges in Washington, D.C., Netanyahu may have informed the Israeli government that 80 percent of Americans supported Israel.

Afterward, Gary Samore, the U.S. president’s assistant on nuclear problems, stated that Israel had been persuaded that Iran would need a year in order to meet the necessary technical requirements for producing a nuclear weapon, thus diminishing the likelihood of an airstrike.

However, Mossad experts have noted — and their colleagues in the infamous German counterintelligence agency BND have confirmed — that Iran is capable of building the weapon in only six months.

This is the reason why former United States Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton urged Israel to bomb the Bushehr power plant, located in southern Iran, before its reactor could be loaded with nuclear fuel.

Unintentionally, the Iranian press revealed the divergent opinions of Tehran leaders. Thus, Brigadier Yadollah Javani, the head of the political bureau of the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution, said on Monday, August 23, that the direct negotiations requested by the U.S. cannot be carried out under political, economic and military pressure which would allow the White House to impose its own interests on the Iranian people.

A different statement came from the leader of Iranian justice, Ayatollah Sadegh Larijani, who said the previous day that only the supreme leader, Ayatollahul Seyyed Ali Khamene’i, would decide the conditions under which the requested dialogue with the U.S. could begin.

Why will this be a hot autumn? One hint is the message issued by Moscow, according to which the S-300 missiles in Abkhazia mark the red line that Israeli battle planes cannot cross. Another is the decision taken by the Israeli minister of defense: that of naming, before February 2011, a successor for the Chief of General Staff Gabi Ashkenazi, a harsh opponent of the air attack against Iran…