posted March 05, 2009 02:08 AM            

BRUSSELS – U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton swiped hard at Iran on Wednesday, accusing its hardline leaders of fomenting divisions in the Arab world, promoting terrorism, posing threats to Israel and Europe, and seeking to "intimidate as far as they think their voice can reach."

Her remarks, at the conclusion of two days of talks in Egypt, Israel and the West Bank, were notable for coming from an Obama administration that has raised the prospect of diplomatic engagement with Iran as part of a new direction in U.S. foreign policy.

In remarks to reporters aboard her plane en route from Ramallah to Brussels, Belgium, Clinton said that in her talks with Arab foreign ministers and other leaders she heard "over and over and over again" a deep-seated worry about threats posed by the Iranians.

"It is clear that Iran intends to interfere with the internal affairs of all of these people and try to continue their efforts to fund terrorism, whether it's Hezbollah or Hamas or other proxies," she said.

The sharp objections to Iranian behavior that Clinton enumerated are the same as those underlined by the Bush administration during its dealings with Tehran. The difference is that the Obama administration says it sees merit in pressing the Iranians to discuss the problems, even if talks fail or the Iranians refuse to engage.

In Tehran on Wednesday, Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, accused President Barack Obama of following the same mistaken path as the Bush administration with his "unconditional" support of Israel. Khamenei also called Israel a "cancerous tumor" that is on the verge of collapse. He said Israeli leaders should be put on trial for its military offensive in Gaza, which ended with a shaky cease-fire in mid-January.

During her visit to Ramallah, Clinton met with the top leaders of the Palestinian Authority that administers the West Bank, President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salam Fayyad. She then flew to Brussels for a NATO foreign ministers' meeting Thursday that is expected to focus on developing a new strategy for the war in Afghanistan and prospects for improving relations with Russia.

Clinton offered strong support for Abbas and for pushing hard to restart peace talks with Israel. Standing next to him, she told a news conference that the Palestinian Authority is the "only legitimate government of the Palestinian people."

Abbas has steadily lost support at home, particularly after a year of inconclusive peace talks with Israel. His Islamic militant Hamas rivals, who seized Gaza from him in 2007, are widely seen as emerging stronger from Israel's recent offensive against them.

In the in-flight interview, Clinton reiterated that Obama stands ready to engage in talks with Iran, with whom Washington severed diplomatic relations after Iran's Islamic revolution three decades ago. "But we want to make sure it's constructive," she said.

The main source of friction is Iran's nuclear program, which the United States and many in the international community believe is intended to produce weapons. The Iranians insist their program is designed solely for civilian energy production. The U.S. also is critical of Iran's efforts to spread its influence across the greater Middle East by supporting the militant Hezbollah group in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. The U.S. also has been critical of Iran's support of Shiite extremists in Iraq.

In Washington, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown echoed Clinton's remarks, again calling on Iran to suspend its nuclear program. In a formal address to Congress on Wednesday, Brown said the U.S. and Britain were ready for Tehran to rejoin the world community and to stop threatening peace.

Clinton offered perhaps her strongest criticism of Iran when asked about the administration's plans for building a missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic. The multibillion-dollar project was launched by the Bush administration and Obama is looking for ways of leveraging Russian opposition to the project to get more muscle behind efforts to halt Iran's nuclear program.

Clinton focused on the administration's assertion that the European missile defense system is not aimed at Russia but is necessary to deter Iran.

"Missiles not only with a nuclear warhead but a conventional warhead or some other chemical, biological weapon could very well be in the hands of a regime like Iran's, which we know will use whatever advantage they have to intimidate as far as they think their voice can reach, and who are actively pursuing a missile development program," she said.

On the other hand, Clinton seemed to suggest that the project in Europe is not entirely about Iran either.

"We have real potential threats, and obviously Iran is the name we put to them, but it is a kind of stand-in for the range of threats we foresee," she said.

Clinton was asked in the interview what she had heard from European officials in recent weeks about their willingness to resettle some of the Muslim detainees at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, prison for terror suspects, which Obama is planning to close this year.

posted March 05, 2009 02:13 AM            

All this time, I thought the leftist position was that there are no real terrorists. Hamas, Hezbollah and all the rest ... terrorists? Puhleez! Just misguided revolutionaries, "so-called" terrorists and nothing worse than street gangs ... that's the rhetoric I've been hearing for the past 5 or so years. Remember? How the US and Israel and our allies are the real terrorists?

Hmmm. Curiouser and curiouser.

posted March 05, 2009 10:05 AM            

Just because a person is a liberal doesn't mean he/she believes terrorism doesn't exist.

I am a Democrat that is very liberal, and I do believe that terrorism is a big problem. I believe that religious extremism of any kind (doesn't matter if it's Christian,Muslim,or any other religion) is a big problem. I know other liberals that believe terrorism is a problem.

I definitely believe that Al Quaeda and other terrorist organizations need to be hunted down and brought to justice or be killed.

I wish people would stop generalizing and making blanket statements about liberals,conservatives,and other people in general.

posted March 05, 2009 11:34 AM            

"In the in-flight interview, Clinton reiterated that Obama stands ready to engage in talks with Iran, with whom Washington severed diplomatic relations after Iran's Islamic revolution three decades ago. "But we want to make sure it's constructive," she said."

Diplomatic relations were severed with Iran... because Iran invaded the US Sovereignty of our Embassy in Iran, violated International law by doing so, took American diplomats hostage and held them for 444 days..all in violation of International law. Apparently, that's all down the black memory hole.

Now, let's not get started on the con perpetuated by so called Liberals that terrorists are not terrorists...but are rather, "freedom fighters", "insurgents" "militants" and other designations for those who are clearly making war on civilians, deliberately and intentionally by bombing civilians and opening up on civilians with automatic weapons.

Apparently, calling terrorists, terrorists is unproductive and might hurt their widdle feelings...so say so called "liberals".

I could fill up pages and pages of examples from both so called reporters and so called "liberals" in the Congress of the United States. Those who are jello in the face of crime and terrorism. Those who have sided with terrorists, swallowed and reported terrorist propaganda as truth, sang the terrorist anthem and given aid and comfort to terrorist enemies and called US military forces in Iraq...terrorists. Eleanore

posted March 05, 2009 12:26 PM            

The Iran hostage crisis was a diplomatic crisis between Iran and the United States where 52 U.S. diplomats were held hostage for 444 days from November 4, 1979 to January 20, 1981, after a group of Islamist students took over the American embassy in support of the Iranian revolution.

The crisis has been described as an entanglement of "vengeance and mutual incomprehension". In Iran, the incident was seen by many as a blow against the U.S., its influence in Iran, its perceived attempts to undermine the Iranian Revolution, and its long standing support of the recently overthrown Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. The Shah had been restored to power in a 1953 coup with some assistance from the CIA and had recently been allowed into the United States for cancer treatment. In the United States, the hostage-taking was seen as an outrage violating a centuries-old principle of international law granting diplomats immunity from arrest and diplomatic compounds sovereignty in their embassies.

The ordeal reached a climax when after failed attempts to negotiate a release, the United States military attempted a rescue operation, Operation Eagle Claw, on April 24, 1980, which resulted in an aborted mission, the crash of two aircraft and the deaths of eight American military men and one Iranian civilian. The crisis ended with the signing of the Algiers Accords in Algeria on January 19, 1981. The hostages were formally released into United States custody the following day, just minutes after the new American president Ronald Reagan was sworn in.

The crisis has been described as the "pivotal episode" in the history of U.S.-Iranian relations. In America, it is thought by some political analysts to be the primary reason for U.S. President Jimmy Carter's defeat in the November 1980 presidential election. In Iran, the crisis strengthened the prestige of the Ayatollah Khomeini and the political power of forces who supported theocracy and opposed any reconciliation with the West. The crisis also marked the beginning of American legal action, or economic sanctions against Iran, that weakened economic ties between Iran and America.

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What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world is immortal"~

posted March 05, 2009 08:09 PM            

quote:

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Please don't generalize......ok?
Just because a person is a liberal doesn't mean he/she believes terrorism doesn't exist

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Hello, Glaucus

I said leftists not liberals. Ime, liberals are not the same has hard left leaning leftists. Helen Thomas recently referred to terrorists as "so-called terrorists" and Roseanne Barr stated that Israel is a Nazi state and that Hamas is just a "street gang". Those are the kinds of leftists I was referring to and I thought that the references to their outrageous comments would have been clear enough as they are relatively recent and reported examples of such.

To reiterate, I don't think all or even most liberals are leftists. Here is one example that makes a similar point.

quote:

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"Leftist" vs. "liberal"
I have been guilty of misusing the world "liberal" by saying "liberal" where I really meant to say "leftist."

What is leftism? Most importantly, leftists believe in distributive justice over procedural justice, and they value equality of outcomes over equality of opportunity or equality of process.

Secondarily, leftists are hostile to nationalism, which is another way of saying that they are unpatriotic to whatever country they live in.

It's a rare leftist in the United States who will ever call himself a leftist or admit to being one. He will call himself "liberal," which is why it's easy to mix up the two words. And out of politeness, I tend to call people what they prefer to be called.

The problem here is that the meaning of "lefist" is quite clear, while the meaning of "liberal" is actually quite fuzzy. There are people who may call themselves "liberal" because they oppose populist pro-Christianity laws and care about the environment, or even because they like to go to art museums, but they are patriotic Americnas who aren't especially concerned with promoting egalitarianism.

There are even Republicans who call themselves "liberal." Because the Democrats are the party of the left, if "liberal" were completely synomymous with "leftist" then "liberal Republican" would be an oxymoron.

Leftists have been able to obscure their true intentions by getting everyone to call them "liberals." From now on, I will use the word "leftist" when that's what I mean, and I will be cautious when using the world "liberal" because it's a word that means different things to different people.

I would urge other bloggers to do the same.

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In other words, it is hard to relate particular ideas if the definitions are not clear to everyone. However, I would have said liberal if I had meant liberal. As far as I know from my experience discussing politics, the fact that differences exist between the two terms is clear.

So please don't assume that I mean to say one thing when I very clearly said something else. Or at least ask for clarification before you assume that I'm using an umbrella term for a broad group when I'm actually using a specific term for a small group, please.

posted March 07, 2009 06:08 AM            

If anyone thinks these politicians actually give a damn about your safety or have any sense of diplomacy, think again.