| http://www.dawn.com/2002/02/02/int12.htm
Israeli intelligence misled Bush on Iran By Paul Michaud PARIS: Sources in the French Secret Services say they have an explanation why President George W. Bush decided at the last minute to add Iran to his "axis of evil," which originally was to include only Iraq. North Korea was apparently added "for good measure," say the sources, for Bush does not apparently want to give the impression that his crusade is waged exclusively against Islam or the Middle East. As for Iran, the French sources say that Israel, on the eve of the forthcoming visit to Washington of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, has provided intelligence to Bush according to which, firstly, Osama bin Laden is presently very much alive and well, and that he is being kept "under the heavy protection" of Iranian security forces in northwestern Iran, not far from its border with Iraq. The other "revelation" made by the Israelis to President Bush and his entourage would indicate that the other major figure on America's "wanted" list, Mulla Omar, has also made his way to Iran, and that he was exfiltrated to the northwestern part of the country, from Afghanistan, where he was until now in hiding. The operation, according to the intelligence provided to Washington by the Israelis, say the French sources, took place on Tuesday (Jan 29). Bush made his announcement of the US decision to undertake its new anti-terrorist campaign against Iran, Iraq and North Korea the following day, Wednesday, Jan 30. Both men, according to intelligence provided by the Israelis to Washington, and to certain of their contacts in France, were spirited to Iran by the special security forces of Ayatollah Khamenai, the spiritual guide of the Iranian revolution, a man who happens to be a bete noire to President Bush, just as he had been to his father, the elder George Bush. It is certainly to Israel's advantage that Iran become the target of a US anti-terrorism campaign, as not only does Iran support the Hezbollah, but also the country does possess nuclear devices, also the missiles capable of carrying the devices to Israel or, for that matter, any other country in the region. What flusters French strategists about the US decision to place Iran in its line of fire is that relations between Iran and the West, the United States and France included, had become warmer in recent months, indeed that Tehran had been one of the first countries in the world to condemn the Sept 11 attack on the World Trade Center. More recently, Washington had gone so far as to congratulate Iran on its "constructive role" in the creation of a new Afghan state, notably during preparatory meetings held in Bonn on reconstruction of Afghanistan. And, if Iran seemed so ready to involve itself in the pacification of Afghanistan, it was for a number of pressing reasons, among them the return to Afghanistan of the 2.5 million Afghan refugees present on its soil. The cost of maintaining the refugees on its territory was proving incredibly onerous to Iran, say French sources privy with the matter, specially as the West, which encouraged the action, never came through with much of the financial and technical support that had been promised. Another reason why Iran had welcomed an end to the Afghan conflict and the arrival in power of a credible government was the possibility of at last putting an end to a war which, over 20 years, had cost it the lives of some 4,000 militarymen, also the expense of the construction and maintenance of special fortifications along its joint border with Afghanistan. As the French sources put it, Iran has had absolutely no interest in continuing any of the terrorist activities cited by Bush in his "evil axis" speech of Wednesday. Indeed, they say, Iran has made a number of decisions going back to last year which it hoped would be read positively by Washington in hopes that the two countries could turn a leaf on a relationship that turned sour in 1979 with the return to Iran of Ayatollah Khomeini, who had until then been in exile in France, and above all the kidnapping the following year of diplomats at the US embassy in Tehran - an event that not only brought about the defeat, in 1980, of president Jimmy Carter, but also the arrival in power the following January of president Ronald Reagan and his new vice president, George Bush senior. |
