More anti-Iran from unnamed officials

I think the war hawks learned their lesson from the Iraq affair; it's far better to have inflammatory information, true or not I don't know, piped out through anonymous "officials" that way you don't get questioned about it later. This is the exact same kind of "officials" story that Judith Miller printed over and over in the lead up to Iraq. Aluminum tubes, UAV's, the infamous mobile bio-weapons labs, all of these were front page NYTimes with a Judy Miller byline. All of them cited "military and intelligence officials", and none of them were true.

So, as the pro-Likud crazies start to try and gin up a war on Iran, you can see why I'm more than a little skeptical of stories like this.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 5 - Many of the new, more sophisticated roadside bombs used to attack American and government forces in Iraq have been designed in Iran and shipped in from there, United States military and intelligence officials said Friday, raising the prospect of increased foreign help for Iraqi insurgents.

And if anyone wants to get their nose outta joint about the pro-Likud use, I just want to say a few things. There are indeed a large number of the hawkish elements in the Bush Admin who have direct ties to the Likud government, the authors of the "Clean Break" strategy as well as a number of others who serve on JINSA or other like organizations.

Second, I strongly support the majority Israeli opinion that want peace negotiations. It is the illegal actions of the current Likud government with which I take issue. And if you don't think the actions are illegal, I can only say that, forget everything else, the settlements are illegal under UN law. The fact that this is not enforced shows the errors of the security council veto system, not innocence.