Why didn't we think of that?
Some of you may recall that I reported last summer that it was believed that Hezbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah was hiding out in the Iranian embassy in Beirut.Israel hasn't tried to kill Hezbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah since the massive bombardment of South Beirut ten days ago. If this Washington Times article from Friday is right, we now know why. He's hiding in the Iranian embassy in Beirut. Yes, the same embassy where kidnapped IDF soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev are being held.While a belief that Goldwasser and Regev were in the Iranian embassy might have prevented a bombing, why should it have prevented a raid of the type that the coalition forces carried out on the Iranian diplomatic mission in Irbil last night?
Iraqi officials said Thursday that multinational forces detained five Iranians in an overnight raid on Teheran's diplomatic mission in the northern city of Irbil.The answer to my (rhetorical) question is quite simple. George Bush doesn't take orders from his wife. Ehud K. Olmert takes orders from his wife. Ehud K. Olmert's wife is a leftist.
The forces stormed the building at about 3 a.m., detaining the five staffers and confiscating computers and documents, two senior local Kurdish officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information. Irbil is a city in the Kurdish-controlled north, 350 kilometers from Baghdad.
A resident living near the mission said the foreign force used stun bombs in the raid and brought down an Iranian flag that was on the roof of the two-story yellow house. As the operation went on, two helicopters flew overhead, said the resident on condition of anonymity because he feared retribution.
"They took five Iranians with them and at about 7 in the morning they handed over the house to Kurdish peshmergas," he said.
And you all thought I was going to say something about testoserone....
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posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:15 PM
3 Comments:
Interesting...
I'm no lawyer but I'd guess the consulate seizure is illegal under international law...as was the Iranian seizure and hostage-taking of the US Embassy in Tehran in 1979.
But this is war and legal niceties must take a secondary place to dealing with the fact that Iran is the chief aggressor in the Middle East. And the Iranian Mullah dictatorship declared war on the US and the West in 1979.
No doubt, that consulate was in reality the Iranian terrorist HQ for that region of Iraq. The JPost story noted that five Iranian staffers were arrested and computers and documents were seized. It'll be interesting reading to find out what information is obtained from the staffers AND what was on those computers and docs.
And perhaps the most important point: approval for seizure of the consulate had to come from very senior levels of the Iraqi government and US. Hopefully, this means we're finally taking off the gloves, abandoning the Marquis of Queensbury Rules and getting totally serious about defeating the enemy in Iraq.
Dave,
Last summer I did a post where I argued that the Iranian embassy holding Regev and Goldwasser and giving shelter to Nasrallah constituted an act of war.
I just read your old post. You're right...and with my own previous hawkish comment below it!
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