Shadow of war looms as Israel flexes its muscle.

When reports surface, stating that Ehud Olmert is having supposedly secret meetings with Aviam Sela, then we really should all be paying attention.

Aviam Sela was the architect of Operation Opera in 1981, when Israel launched a long-range strike against Iraq's Osirak nuclear reactor. If Olmert is entertaining him at home then Israel is seriously thinking of launching an attack on Iran.

Sela, according to sources close to the meeting, had been called in so that Olmert could ask his opinion on the likely effectiveness of a similar raid to Opera on the nuclear installations of Iran.

Peace in the Middle East depends on Sela's and Israel's answer. Yesterday, responding to the Israel's increasingly bellicose language, Iran's top Revolutionary Guards Commander, General Mohammad Ali Jafari, warned that it would respond to any attack by hitting Israel with missiles and threatened to control the oil shipping passage through the Straits of Hormuz.

If Israel were to attack it would have to overcome considerable practical problems. There is no one who believes that an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities would be anything like Opera, when eight F-16s and a similar number of F-15s crept into Iraq. For one thing, in pursuing its nuclear ambitions, Iran took note of the Osirak lessons. Its facilities, including a light water reactor at Bushehr and the controversial uranium enrichment process at Natanz, are dispersed and, in the case of Natanz, protected by up to 23 metres of hardened concrete.

To destroy the uranium centrifuge halls at Natanz alone, analysts have argued, might require up to 80 5,000lb penetrating bombs dropped in almost simultaneous pairs to allow the second bomb to burrow through the crater of the first. Opera required just a handful of bombs.

Leaving aside the blatant illegality of Israel's proposed actions, there is also the small matter that no nuclear experts think that such an attack would remove Iran's nuclear ability, and that's before we get into the immorality of Israel attacking another nation for attempting to obtain weapons which she herself possesses but refrains from publicly admitting to owning.

Would it be acceptable for the Iranians to launch such an attack on Israeli nuclear sites? Would the same people who argue that Israel is within her rights to self defence allow such rights to the Iranians if they chose to remove Israel's nuclear threat to the Middle East?

You bet your bottom dollar they wouldn't.

And there is no-one who has ever proven that Iran even has any plans to build a nuclear weapon. Indeed the IAEA continue to monitor Iranian nuclear facilities and, on May 26th this year, they issued their latest report. (PDF)

It states:

The results of the environmental samples taken at FEP and PFEP indicate that the plants have been operated as declared. The samples showed low enriched uranium (with up to 4.0% U-235), natural uranium and depleted uranium (down to 0.4% U-235) particles. Iran declared enrichment levels in FEP of up to 4.7% U-235. Since March 2007, fourteen unannounced inspections have been connducted.

So, the IAEA have conducted fourteen unannounced inspections and have found that the Iranians are operating their plants exactly as they have said they are doing. The uranium they are enriching is about 4.7% U-235, which is significantly below the 90% needed to make a weapon.

ElBaradei, the IAEA Director General, has gone as far as to say that he would resign if Israel attacks Iran as such an attack would turn the Middle East "into a fireball".

"I don't believe that what I see in Iran today is a current, grave and urgent danger. If a military strike is carried out against Iran at this time ... it would make me unable to continue my work," said the IAEA chief.

ElBaradei, repeatedly stressing that a military strike would be the worst result for the region, added that an attack would give Iran more motivation to obtain nuclear power, Reuters reported.

In Israel the case for war is being loudly made by such intellectual pygmies as John Bolton, who is telling any Israeli TV station that will listen that Israel should attack Iran.

The end of an immoral regime, steeped in illegality, like the Bush one is always bound to be it's most dangerous phase. There are people like Bolton who realise that their extremism is likely to have alienated the general public and who are anxious to do what they can to push their extremist agenda before they are booted out of office.

It has even been stated by Kristol that Bush is considering attacking Iran if Obama wins the election in November. The neo-cons accept that their brand of "attack first and never negotiate" politics is not going to be policy if a Democrat wins the White House and the danger here is that they are going to goad Olmert into taking action before a Democratic victory in November.

There are noises that the military in the US are pushing back strongly against Bush and Cheney's wish to see an attack on Iran:

However, there are also those in strong positions, such as Defence Secretary Robert Gates and some senior military chiefs, who are thought to be privately opposed to such a move. 'If it were up to Bush and Cheney they would want to see this thing done,' said Larry Johnson, a former top CIA analyst. 'But they are now up against a lot of fundamental military realities that make it hard. The military has been pushing back against this.'

All of which increases the possibility that Bush might just give Olmert the nod to do what he wants to do. And they are considering it now for the simple reason that they know Obama would not approve and that their window of opportunity is closing.

Only with a radical neo-con regime in the White House would such an insane proposal even be considered and, as it comes to the end of it's diabolical time in office, it is actually more dangerous rather than less. Time is running out and they know it.

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Tags: Olmert, Israel, Ahmadinejad, Iran, Bush, Cheney, neo-cons