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Israeli TV Report Shows Air Force Gearing Up For Iran Attack: Moment Of Truth Is Near

A major Israel TV station on Sunday night broadcast a detailed report on how Israel will go about attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities in the event that diplomacy and sanctions fail and Israel decides to carry out a military strike.

The report, screened on the main evening news of Channel 10, was remarkable both in terms of the access granted to the reporter, who said he had spent weeks with the pilots and other personnel he interviewed, and in the fact that his assessments on a strike were cleared by the military censor.

No order to strike is likely to be given before the P5+1 talks with Iran resume in May, the reporter, Alon Ben-David, said. “But the coming summer will not only be hot but tense.”

Ben-David said that if negotiations break down, and Iran moves key parts of its nuclear program underground to its Qom facility, the IAF “is likely to get the order and to set out on the long journey to Iran.”

“Years of preparations are likely to come to realization,” he said, adding that “the moment of truth is near.”

The attack, the report said, would presumably trigger a war in northern Israel, with missile attacks (presumably from the Iranian-proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon). “There will be no tranquility and peace anywhere in Israel,” Ben-David said.

This could be the first full-scale war the IAF has fought in nearly 30 years, the report stated.

Pilots had already been told where their families would be moved, away from their bases, for safety, the report said.

Iranian Nuclear Scientists Were Present At Failed North Korean Missile Launch

A dozen Iranian nuclear experts, visited North Korea last week to observe its failed rocket launch, South Korean state news agency Yonhap's Washington correspondent reported on Sunday.

"On March 31, 12 Iranians of the Shahid Hemmat Industrial Group (SHIG) arrived in North Korea. The Iranians undoubtedly were there to observe the missile launch and receive test data from North Korea," the correspondent quoted anonymous diplomatic sources as saying.

Pyongyang has claimed that the launch was meant to place a communications satellite in space, but the U.S., Japan, South Korea and other nations view it as part of North Korea's attempt to advance its military ballistic missile capacity.

"Jordan Will Regain Jerusalem From Killers Of Prophets"

Jordan’s army will destroy Israel and regain Jerusalem from the “killers of prophets” – that was the message a Jordanian cleric delivered in a Friday sermon on state TV, according to recently released video footage.

“The [Jordanian] army is invincible. Its units are filled with people who pray, with imams, and with people who memorized the Koran. This army will never be defeated, Allah willing,” Imam Ghaleb Rabab’a said in footage translated and released late last week by the Middle East Media Research Institute.

“Jerusalem will be regained, Allah willing, by these modest and pure hands, which hold the Koran high and recite it day and night,” Rabab’a said in the March 23 sermon. “This is an army that bows before none but Allah. Today, we must take pride in our country and its army, which descends from the Prophet Muhammad.”

It remained unclear whether the sermon was delivered from a state-run or private mosque.

“The arrogance of the Jews will be defeated, Allah willing,” Rabab’a said. “This army, my brothers in faith, will shatter the might of Israel, Allah willing, just as the might of the Crusaders and the Byzantines was shattered at Hittin, at Yarmouk, Al-Qadisiyya [and] ‘Ain Jalut.”

In January the media monitoring group Palestinian Media Watch released a video of Grand Mutfi of Jerusalem Mohammed Hussein reciting a hadith (saying attributed to Islam’s prophet Mohammed) calling for the killing of Jews.

“The day of judgment will not come until you fight the Jews,” Hussein said in the clip.

Syrian Expert: Russia Is Protecting Syria To Save Iran

A prominent expert on Syria has warned that Russia's protection of Syria is built on Russia's close alliance with Iran, saying, “The [most important] reason for Russia to support Syria is its alliance with Iran. If Syria falls, Iran will be the next target.”

Russian Warships Off Syria

Moscow, meanwhile, announced Friday, April 13, “A decision has been made to deploy Russian warships near the Syrian shores on a permanent basis.”

The communiqué did not say who made the decision, but it may be assumed that the decision-maker is at the top level of the Kremlin, President-elect Vladimir Putin.

It is the first time that Moscow has officially announced the permanent deployment of naval vessels in the eastern Mediterranean and off Syria in particular. They extend a protective shield over Bashar Assad and the continuation of his regime against outside military intervention.

They also guarantee that the UN observer team, due in Damascus by Monday, April 16, never becomes the nucleus of a broader international expedition for Assad’s removal under the UN aegis, which is what happened in Libya.

Western and Israeli military circles therefore find it hard to understand the rationale of the US and Turkish push for international monitors in Syria, unless the initiative was nothing more than a device to save them having to intervene militarily in the conflict.

In the final reckoning, the presence of a couple of hundred UN monitors in Syria will if anything prolong the violence: the rebels will regard the observers as the vanguard of a major international intervention force to champion their cause, while Assad and Moscow will clip their wings so as to give the Syrian army a free hand to finish the job of wiping out the anti-Assad revolt. Between the two, the UN team will be rendered useless like the Arab League monitors before them.

Seeing Russia and China solidly behind him, the Syria ruler expects them also to put their hands in their pockets to help him survive.

UN Cease Fire Monitors Arrive In Syria

An advance team of six UN observers arrived in Damascus on Monday to monitor Syria's 4-day-old cease-fire, according to a spokesman for international envoy Kofi Annan, as heavy clashes reportedly broke out on the Syria-Turkey border between the Syrian army and opposition forces.

Spokesman Ahmad Fawzi said the remaining 25 observers are expected to arrive days from now. He said in a statement on Monday that the mission "will start with setting up operating headquarters, and reaching out to the Syrian government and the opposition forces so that both sides fully understand the role of the UN observers."

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Suleiman Warns Against War With Israel If Brotherhood Wins

Handy Tech: ATMs That Read Palms To Be Introduced By Japanese Bank - No Card Needed

Following Japan's devastating quake and tsunami last year, many survivors were unable to access their funds because their bank cards and books had been washed away. The problem gave one bank in the country the idea to develop ATMs using palm-scanning biometric technology, doing away with the need for cards and books.

A Japanese banking group has announced it will soon be offering its customers the opportunity to make ATM cash withdrawals using palm-scanning biometric technology, doing away with the need for bank cards and books.

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