by Amil Imani with Jerry Gordon (January 2010)

This comes to us from the Center For Immigration Studies:

WASHINGTON (December 29, 2009) - In contrast to many national religious leaders who are lobbying for increases in immigration, a new Zogby poll of likely voters who belong to the same religious communities finds strong support for reducing overall immigration. Moreover, members strongly disagree with their leaders’ contention that more immigrant workers need to be allowed into the country. Also, most parishioners and congregants prefer more enforcement to cause illegal workers to go home, rather than legalization of illegal immigrants, which most religious leaders prefer. The survey of Catholic, mainline Protestant, born-again Protestant, and Jewish voters used neutral language and was one of the largest polls on immigration ever done.

Among the findings:

Most members of religious denominations do not feel that illegal immigration is caused by limits on legal immigration, as many religious leaders do; instead, members feel it’s due to a lack of enforcement.

• Catholics: Just 11 percent said illegal immigration was caused by not letting in enough legal immigrants; 78 percent said it was caused by inadequate enforcement efforts.
  
• Mainline Protestants: 18 percent said not enough legal immigration; 78 percent said inadequate enforcement.
  
• Born-Again Protestants: 9 percent said not enough legal immigration; 85 percent said inadequate enforcement.
  
• Jews: 21 percent said not enough legal immigration; 60 percent said inadequate enforcement.

Unlike religious leaders who argue that more unskilled immigrant workers are needed, most members think there are plenty of Americans to do such work.

• Catholics: 12 percent said legal immigration should be increased to fill such jobs; 69 percent said there are plenty of Americans available to do such jobs, employers just need to pay more.
  
• Mainline Protestants: 10 percent said increase immigration; 73 percent said plenty of Americans are available.
  
• Born-Again Protestants: 7 percent said increase immigration; 75 percent said plenty of Americans are available.
  
• Jews: 16 percent said increase immigration; 61 percent said plenty of Americans available.

When asked to choose between enforcement that would cause illegal immigrants to go home over time or a conditional pathway to citizenship, most members choose enforcement.

• Catholics: 64 percent support enforcement to encourage illegals to go home; 23 percent support conditional legalization.
  
• Mainline Protestants: 64 percent support enforcement; 24 percent support legalization.
  
• Born-Again Protestants: 76 percent support enforcement; 12 percent support legalization.
  
• Jews: 43 percent support enforcement; 40 percent support legalization.

In contrast to many religious leaders, most members think immigration is too high.

• Catholics: 69 percent said immigration is too high; 4 percent said too low; 14 percent just right.
  
• Mainline Protestants: 72 percent said too high; 2 percent said too low; 11 percent just right.
  
• Born-Again Protestants: 78 percent too high; 3 percent said too low; 9 percent just right.
  
• Jews: 50 percent said it is too high; 5 percent said too low; 22 percent just right.

Discussion
Most major denominations agree that illegal immigrants must be treated humanely. But the leadership often goes much further and takes the position that illegal immigration is caused, at least in part, by not letting in enough legal immigrants. They then call for increases in the number of workers and family members allowed into the country. For example, early this year, the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) issued a resolution stating that, “Due to the limited number of visas, millions have entered the United States without proper documentation.” The NAE then calls for increases in the number of immigrant workers allowed in. The Catholic Church states that the law must be reformed so that more “laborers from other countries can enter the country legally.” The Episcopal Church adopted a resolution in July of this year stating that, “Immigrants are filling the jobs that go unwanted and unfilled by U.S. citizens.” The resolution makes clear more immigrant workers need to be allowed in legally. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in November 2009 adopted a document that states illegal immigrants do jobs that “citizens often will not do” and that legal immigration should be increased to meet, “the annual need for foreign workers.” A Commission of the Union for Reform Judaism argues that limits on immigration contribute to illegal immigration, and calls for legislation that “Increases the number of visas allowing unskilled laborers to work in the U.S.”

Most parishioners believe that enforcing the law and improving the wages and working conditions of unskilled workers to attract more Americans is the best way to deal with illegal immigration. The huge divide between leaders and members means that if there is a full-blown immigration debate next year it will be all the more contentious, with Jewish and Christian leaders on one side of the issue, their members on the other, and elected officials in the middle.

Methodology
Zogby International was commissioned by the Center for Immigration Studies to conduct an online survey of 42,026 adults. Zogby used its online panel, which is representative of the US population. Zogby International weighted the data slightly to more accurately reflect the U.S. population. Zogby conducted the survey from Nov 13 to 30, 2009. The margin of error for the three Christian groups is +/- 1.1 percent and +/- 2.4 percent for likely Jewish voters.

HERAT, Afghanistan (Reuters) - An Afghan soldier killed a U.S. servicemember and wounded two Italian soldiers when he opened fire on foreign troops at an army base in western Afghanistan on Tuesday, a senior Afghan army officer said.
The shooting is the latest in a string of such incidents, at a time when Western countries are pouring resources into training Afghan soldiers and police to fight the Taliban insurgency.
"The soldier opened fire on the two Italians and one American in a joint Afghan and foreign base," General Khair Mohammad Khawari, a senior officer in western Afghanistan, told Reuters.
"Two Italian soldiers were wounded, one American soldier was killed," Khawari said, adding that the Afghan soldier had been wounded when NATO forces returned fire and was now in hospital.
The assailant comes from an area north of the Afghan capital Kabul and is thought to have mental health problems, Khawari added. The Taliban have traditionally had less of a hold in northern Afghanistan but have recently been expanding their reach across the country.
Italian defense ministry officials said that the attack, which was deliberate and not a case of friendly fire, occurred during a routine supply operation.
One Italian was lightly wounded in the thigh and the other in the hand and leg but both have returned to their duties.

MEMRI:

Several days ago, on December 23, 2009, former Lebanese prime minister and Kataeb (Phalangist) party chairman Amin Gemayel announced that his faction in the Lebanese parliament intended to appeal to the Constitutional Council over Article 6 of the Ministerial Statement of Sa'd Al-Hariri's government, which grants legitimacy to Hizbullah's weapons.[1]

In response, Hizbullah secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah, in a December 27, 2009 speech marking the 'Ashura, called on Lebanon's Christians to learn from the situation of Iraq's Christians – whom "not even the mighty U.S. army there can protect." He also called on them to consider their options for the future, and to learn from past disappointments when they had pinned their hopes on Israel and/or the U.S.

Following are excerpts from Nasrallah's speech: [2]

Lebanon's Christians "Must Examine the Outcome of the Bets Some of Them Placed on the U.S. Administration"

"I say to you on this day: We [Hizbullah] are men of patience, men of sacrifice, men of steadfastness. We cannot be provoked, and we will not be ensnared by the provocation of some of the political forces in the domestic Lebanese arena.

"We understand the background and the circumstances [that led these forces to provoke us]. In the past, they wanted to attack Syria and the [Lebanese] opposition, and also attacked the resistance. [But] today they cannot attack Syria, [since,] Allah be praised, we have entered a new phase in relations [with that country]. Attacking the opposition in general is [also] somewhat difficult [today,] since the ministers of both the opposition and the coalition are in a single government. [Therefore], the [only] thing remaining for them is [to attack] the resistance and its weapons.

"All right, we understand this situation, and we say that we will not be ensnared by any provocation or [attempt] to create tension in Lebanon's political atmosphere…

"I want to address the Christians in Lebanon… I call on the Christians in Lebanon to conduct a calm discussion, far from the inflammatory speeches, inciting declarations and the like. [I call on them to conduct] a calm discussion amongst themselves regarding the options [that they will choose] for this [stage] and for the future. [I call on them] to benefit from past experience, to consider the experience of the previous decades, and [to examine] the outcome of the bets some of them placed… on Israel. Where did these bets lead Lebanon, particularly the Lebanese Christians? They must examine also the outcome of the bets some of them placed on the U.S. administration, and where these bets led Lebanon, particularly Lebanon's Christians."

There's the odd rotten pear.

I had been wondering why the once funny and down-to-earth Jeanette Winterson had lost her touch. I now learn that she is stepping out with dreary psychobabbler Susie Orbach.

This may turn out to be Winterson's banana skin. I don't trust thin people who make money writing about fat people; I don't trust "feminists" who give themselves the girlishly twee name "Susie", and I certainly don't trust shrinks. Look what happened to John Cleese when he got his head read - boring as hell.

Dull people should pair off together, but they rarely do. Instead, the dullard latches onto an interesting person, the dullness prevails and the number of dullards is doubled.

What a lemon - and not a melon between them.

Say what you like about Giles Coren, he is funny in his own right, as well as having a famously funny father. His writing shows signs of strain at times - he needs to try harder if he is to achieve the late Alan Coren's effortless brilliance.

Victoria Coren, on the other hand, has the surname and not much else. She qualifies as this week's dozy bint for claiming - in The Guardian, of course - that Muslim women should be running the country:

But what if [the cabinet] were all Muslim women? Picture the scene, and be confused to note that you can't help suspecting things would surely be better – better run, fairer, more efficient, more practical and more peaceable – even as you know that it would never, ever be allowed to happen.

It would happen if Eton were all-Muslim and all-female. An alternative universe dances before us, where somebody trod on a butterfly and everything turned out different. As we step back out of the time machine, butterfly corpse on boot, we meet the cockney royals, the female establishment, the white traffic wardens, the black Bruce Forsyth, the gay army leaders. Ah, I suppose the grass is always greener. It would still rain on bank holidays.

The funny thing is, not only are we a million years from having 10 Baroness Warsis in the cabinet, they don't even want the Muslim Eton in Lancashire. The Bishop of Burnley wants the school placed elsewhere, lest it inflame local bigots. Is that how we do things, though, Your Grace?

Miss Coren knows nothing of Islam - Muslim women are not permitted to rule under Sharia, and if they get power in Britain, it gives a false sense of security about Islam. Think of those Muslim "feminists" like Shirin Ebadi, whose campaigning for "women's rights" means nothing without a rejection of the belief system that denies them.

Besides, Muslims couldn't run a booze up in a brewery, and we know how important that is to Britain.

As predicted in  Hugh's post here.
From The Telegraph
A London mosque which hosted a speech by a hardline Muslim cleric earlier this year has said that it was “totally unaware” of whether it was used by syringe bomb suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.
Associates of the 23-year-old Nigerian said that he visited the East London Mosque, in Whitechapel.
MI5 believe that the suspect could have developed links with other extremists during three years he spent in Britain studying at University College London. They will investigate where he worshipped and whether he was radicialised in the UK or elsewhere.
The East London Mosque secretary, Ayub Khan, said that it was "appalled" by Abdulmutallab's alleged attempts to blow up a plane on its way to Detroit. But it could not confirm or deny suggestions that Abdulmutallab visited the mosque.
Earlier this year, the venue was criticised for hosting a pre-recorded talk by Anwar al-Awlaki, a radical cleric based in Yemen, who the US Department for Homeland Security said acted as a spiritual leader for three of the 9/11 hijackers.
At the time, the mosque said that it did not organise the event, and the group running it had hired out their facilities.
In a statement released yesterday Mr Khan, the secretary, said: "It goes without saying that the East London Mosque condemns in the strongest possible terms the alleged attempt to blow up a transatlantic airliner in the USA.
"The mosque has consistently spoken out against such acts, and will continue to do so.
"It is not the policy of the mosque to invite speakers who are at variance with this policy, and we try to ensure that those who hire out our facilities adhere to this principle.
"Given its community service to people of all faiths, the East London Mosque is appalled that it should be associated with such heinous acts. . . Over 20,000 people, of Muslim and other faiths, visit the mosque every week. . . We have no membership like a church and therefore cannot comment on whether this individual came to East London Mosque. . .
The Telegraph is factual. The dhimmi Independent on the other hand has a more sympathetic tone.
The radical worshippers who harm liberal mosque.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the young Nigerian accused of trying to blow up an American airliner on Christmas Day, visited East London Mosque in Whitechapel at least three times when he was a student studying at University College London – he graduated last June. He is thought to have already turned to fundamentalism during his schooling.
MI5 and Special Branch are searching through intelligence for where and when Abdulmutallab became set on his path towards violent fundamentalism. For worshippers at the mosque, the fear is that they are being judged as a community for the actions of one man.
"It's the implication that worries me," said Hussain Shefaar, a local primary school teacher and one of the mosque's trustees. "For all we know he came in a few times to pray because he was in the area at prayer time."
The mosque regularly issues statements condemning jihadism and long ago barred firebrand preachers such as Al Muhajiroun's Omar Bakri Muhammad and Anjem Choudhary. The trustees point to an £8m family centre under construction which will double the prayer spaces for women as testament to their liberal and inclusive leanings. They maintain that it is important to have an "open door" policy which allows in Muslims from all walks of life.
But it is this open door policy that has led critics to accuse the mosque of being soft on fundamentalist preachers. On New Year's Day 2009, for instance, a group unaffiliated with the mosque called Noor Pro Media hired a room inside the London Muslim Centre (the conference hall attached to the mosque) for an afternoon of lectures. One video lecture was given by an American-born, Yemen-based preacher called Anwar al-Awlaki, a rabble-rousing cleric with links to al-Qa'ida who has become a popular online sheikh for English-speaking jihadists.
East London Mosque maintained that it was not told that Noor Pro Media had invited al-Awlaki to speak and would not have allowed it. But there has been no move to forbid those who invited him from using the mosque's facilities again.
For New Year's Day, Noor Pro Media has hired a room in the London Muslim Centre and has another series of lectures planned. While there is no suggestion that al-Awlaki will appear by video (the Yemeni government claims to have killed him last week in an airstrike), those due to speak include Yassir Qadhi, a Saudi-trained preacher who has given a series of anti-Shia and anti-Semitic lectures.

The Telegraph View - Hat tip Apostate Islam
Telegraph View: Jihadist Islamism is comparable to Nazism in many respects. The British public realises this; so do the intelligence services.
Is it time for a fundamental rethink of Britain's attitude towards domestic Islamism? Consider this analogy. Suppose that, in several London universities, Right?wing student societies were allowed to invite neo-Nazi speakers to address teenagers. Meanwhile, churches in poor white neighbourhoods handed over their pulpits to Jew-hating admirers of Adolf Hitler, called for the execution of homosexuals, preached the intellectual inferiority of women, and blessed the murder of civilians. What would the Government do? It would bring the full might of the criminal law against activists indoctrinating young Britons with an inhuman Nazi ideology – and the authorities that let them. Any public servants complicit in this evil would be hounded from their jobs.
Jihadist Islamism is also a murderous ideology, comparable to Nazism in many respects. The British public realises this; so do the intelligence services. Yet because it arises out of a worldwide religion – most of whose followers are peaceful – politicians and the public sector shrink from treating its ideologues as criminal supporters of violence.
Radical Islamist leaders are not stupid: they know how to play this system. The indoctrination of students carries on under the noses of public servants who are terrified of being labelled Islamophobic or racist. Therefore they fail to do their duty, which is to protect Muslims and non-Muslims alike from a terrorist ideology. If providing that protection requires fewer "consultations" with "community leaders" and more arrests, then so be it.

Paul Virilio is a manly kind of name. Here he is on speed, as it were (my emphasis). Read it as fast as you can:

Paul Virilio's treatise The Aesthetics of Disappearance -- more virtuosic meditation than traditional scholarship -- considers the motivations and repercussions of a contemporary society fascinated by speed. Speed, or velocity, is understood literally as space (distance) mapped against time (duration), reaching its absolute limit in light, which collapses both space and time.

Speed and velocity aren't the same thing, but moving swiftly on:

Indeed, Virilio is attuned precisely to the culturally correlated obsession with moving (driving, flying, riding) at high speeds and viewing (watching) moving (light) images. At this limit, light (absolute speed) dissolves the implicit dualism suspended between these phenomena, that of embodied motion and that of disembodied stimulus, anticipating a neuro-psychological event effectuated by the simultaneous or synchronic discharge of neurons to the brain resulting in an epileptic, or, in Virilio's terms, picnoleptic, seizure. Such lapses are quite common in maturing children whose developing psychic mechanisms are often momentarily incapable of assimilating the prevailing contingency of outside experience, and in adults during their waking moments -- Virilio's example, which opens the book, is of dropping one's morning coffee, a lapse in consciousness for which one is fundamentally unaccountable. Crucial to these two moments, each operating synecdochly, is their structural place at the point of passage between radical binaries: unconscious sleep and conscious awareness; unconscious infancy and conscious adulthood. Speed, then, by inducing such sensory overload, supplants the project of reason (mature consciousness) by eliding observable difference, situating the observer in a perch between things -- between binaries -- the observer himself marked, en passant, as indifferent. Indeed, the world sped up (or the world from the vantage of speed) is experienced as multiplicitous variety irreducible to diachronic singularity or topographical proximity, history, discourse, context, obfuscated for the experience of pure, undifferentiated surface: light.

I was speed-reading with no trouble, until I stumbled over "synecdochly". I can only say part of it, but not all of it - will that do?

The Five Bells Brandon, Suffolk.
Brandon is a pleasant country town with an industrial past. The flint mines at Grimes Graves which provided flint from pre Roman times through to the flintlock muskets of the 18th Century are nearby, as is the USAAF base at RAF Lakenheath.
I can't find out whether the Parish church of St Peters has, or had, 5 bells but pubs named Bell something are frequently named for an ecclesiastical connection.

Victor Morton writes in the Washington Times:

The Nigerian accused of trying to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner had his suicide mission personally blessed in Yemen by Anwar al-Awlaki, the same Muslim imam suspected of radicalizing the Fort Hood shooting suspect, a U.S. intelligence source has told The Washington Times.

The intelligence official, who is familiar with the FBI's interrogation of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, said the bombing suspect has boasted of his jihad training during interrogation by the FBI and has said it included final exhortations by Mr. al-Awlaki.

"It was Awlaki who indoctrinated him," the official said. "He was told, 'You are going to be the tip of the spear of the Muslim nation.'"

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula took credit Monday for the Christmas Day attack on Northwest Airlines 253, an Amsterdam-to-Detroit flight. The al Qaeda group and U.S. officials both say Mr. Abdulmutallab was able to smuggle explosive powder in his underwear and only a detonator failure prevented him from blowing up the plane and killing almost 300 passengers and crew.

Mr. al-Awlaki, an American-born imam who formerly led a large Northern Virginia mosque but now lives in Yemen, has gained considerable public notoriety in recent months because of his influence on Maj. Nidal Hasan, another U.S.-born Muslim.

Mr. al-Awlaki had e-mail contact with Maj. Hasan as many as 20 times from December 2008 until the Fort Hood shootings, where Maj. Hasan is accused of killing 13 people. Mr. al-Awlaki praised Maj. Hasan's actions as a "hero" and said all Muslims in the U.S. military should "follow the footsteps of men like Nidal."

Several British news sources, including Sky News and the Daily Mail, have reported, in vague terms, that authorities suspect unspecified links between Mr. Abdulmutallab and Mr. al-Awlaki. Rep. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, has said an al-Awlaki/Abdulmutallab link "appears" to be the case.

"It appears that just like with Major Hasan, Awlaki played a role in this," he told ABC News. "All roads point back to Yemen; they point back to Awlaki. I think it is a pretty deadly combination."

According to the U.S. intelligence official, Mr. Abdulmutallab cited Maj. Hasan in his interrogations, but only to praise his religion's diversity, as "an example of how Islam accepts even American soldiers."

Mr. Abdulmutallab did not show any operational knowledge of the Army major or the Fort Hood attack.

In his FBI interrogation, according to the U.S. intelligence official, Mr. Abdulmutallab spoke of being in a room in Yemen receiving Muslim blessings and prayers from Mr. al-Awlaki, along with a number of other men "all covered up in white martyrs' garments," and known only by code names and "abu" honorifics.

The official said such clothing and the lack of familiarity among the men suggests al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula intends to use the men in that room in suicide missions.

The intelligence official's description comes in the wake of several reports that Yemen is breeding scores of jihadists ready to strike the West...

Mehdi Forough (From Wikipedia)

Mehdi Forough, ca. 1990

Mehdi Forough (1911-2008) was an Iranian scholar, author, dramatist, writer on dramatic arts and culture, translator, and founder of the College of Dramatic Arts in Tehran. A native of Esfahan, Mehdi Forough attended Danesh Sara-ye Aali in Tehran and went on to study at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, London. He did graduate studies at Columbia University, NYC, where he completed his thesis, Comparative study of Abraham's sacrifice in Persian passion plays and Western mystery plays, 1954. This work was later published by the Ministry of Culture, in Tehran.

Upon his return to his native land he founded the College of Dramatic Arts at which he was teacher and mentor to a whole generation of notable actors, playwrights, and theater producers who continue his legacy around the world. He wrote for the journal Sokhan and authored numerous articles for many other publications. Amongst his books are a treatise on music, titled She'r va Musighi (Poetry and Music, 1957), Nofooz e elmi va elm-e-musighi-e Iran dar keshvar hay-e digar (The Scientific and Cultural Influence of Persian Music in other Countries), and Shahnameh va Adabiat-e-Dramatic (Shahnameh and the Dramatic Literature). In the late nineteen seventies he was the president of Bonyad-e-Shahnameh, an institution devoted to the preservation of the authenticity of Ferdowsi's epic poem.

He is also known for his excellent translations of English texts into Persian. Amongst his many translations of plays are Tennessee Williams' Glass Menagerie and August Strindberg's The Father both of which he staged and directed. Furthermore, he translated Henrik Ibsen's plays, A Doll's House and Ghost. Another translation related to the Theater is Lajos Egri's The Art of Dramatic Writing. He also translated Aaron Copland's What to Listen for in Music, and Men of Music by Wallace Brockway and Herbert Weinstock. Mehdi Forough, is said to have possessed a legendary voice, although he never performed publicly. He is the composer of a song cycle in which he set well-known Persian poems of Hafez, Saadi, and others to music.

Mehdi Forough was married to Fakhri Dowlatabadi, one of the Iranian women pioneers in playing and teaching of western classical music and the daughter of Haji Mirza Yahya Dowlatabadi, prominent Constitutionalist of the 1906 Revolution and one of the founders of the modern school systems in Iran. Mehdi Forough's son is the violinist and professor, Cyrus Forough.

Listen here.

Kenneth Timmerman, just returned from Israel, commented in an email:  “from my own talks with Israeli leaders (see Newsmax today,), I think they are in a serious holding pattern – hoping, praying (and hopefully, scheming) to make the revolution come in Iran.”

That was reflected in comments from senior Israeli officials in Timmerman’s NewsMax.com article: “Israelis feel Obama weak on Iran sanctions.”

Eight months ago, the talk in Israel was of war. Israelis has just elected a tough new prime minister, who announced that stopping Iran’s nuclear weapons program was his top priority. The Israeli Air Force conducted two long-distance exercises with in-flight refueling to demonstrate the capability of striking Iran. There was ominous talk of “red lines” that Israel would not allow Iran to cross.
Now Iran appears to have crossed those red lines, and it has enough uranium to make at least two bombs. Yet the talk of war has receded.
So what changed? A nuclear-armed Iran represents a threat of “biblical proportions,” said government spokesman Daniel Seaman. But the extent of the domestic turmoil that has rocked Iran since the disputed June 12 presidential election has given new hope to some members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet that war over Iran’s nuclear weapons program now can be avoided.
“The unrest [inside Iran] has led to a change in the calculation,” a top Netanyahu adviser told Newsmax. "In April, it was hard to make the argument that putting pressure on Iran would have any effect. Now the case for sanctions is stronger because there seems to be a growing likelihood of success."
Senior advisers to Netanyahu, including cabinet members, told Newsmax in Jerusalem that they now believe a combination of external pressure and help to the opposition inside Iran might convince the regime to change its behavior — or better yet, could provide the catalyst for a change of regime.
“The nuclear issue is tremendously important,” said a veteran Iran watcher who has advised prime ministers for many years. “But regime change must be the objective.”
He and other Netanyahu advisers contend that a secular democratic government in Iran most likely would focus on Iran’s economy and on rebuilding the country’s international reputation, rather than the aggressive pursuit of nuclear capabilities that have made the Islamist regime an international pariah.

Mohsen Sazegara, a founder of the Revolutionary Guards who went into opposition in 1989 and has been jailed repeatedly, agreed.
“The biggest mistake of my generation was to make a revolution against the world,” he told Newsmax. “The new generation wants to join the world, not destroy it.”

Israel now sees the Iranian regime as vulnerable in ways no one could conceive of just months ago. “Recently, they had to expand subsidies on basic foodstuffs,” another senior adviser said. “This is putting economic pressure on the regime.”
New international sanctions “are needed as soon as possible, and they can have a real impact on the Iranian economy. But this must be coupled with support from the outside for the green movement. Unfortunately, until now the U.S. has not provided any support to them at all,” the adviser said.
The third element of a tougher policy on Iran must be a credible threat of military action, should other measures fail to effect a change in Iranian behavior, the adviser added.
“These three things together — economic pressure, support for the opposition, and a credible military option always in view — are the only way you can avoid military action,” he said. “The goal of our policies should be to make the Iranian regime feel they are facing a dilemma, where they must choose between a nuclear bomb, and the survival of the regime. “

These statements by Israeli sources corroborate many of the observations made by Ami Imani in our NER interview with him about possible regime change.

 President Obama’s immediate attention has been   diverted from what to do about roiling events in Iran by the damage control over intelligence and security lapses by his Administration in the foiled al Qaeda plot to blow up North West Airlines flight 253 in Detroit on Christmas.  We doubt seriously if the useful suggestions of these senior Israeli officials, reflected in the Imani interview, will be understood, let alone adopted.

Timmerman notes the skepticism of Israeli officials given the failed quest for engagement with the Mullahs involving Senator John Kerry of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee:

“The track of engagement has been cluttered with a lot of debris, making it harder to pursue,” a Netanyahu adviser said. “Is engagement over? That’s your headline, not mine. But the Iranians are making it increasingly difficult to go down that track.”
Contested Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad swept aside any prospect that Iran would comply with Obama’s end-of-year deadline, saying on Thursday that the United States and the West can set "as many deadlines as they want. We don't care."
The possibility that Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., would travel to Iran, which The Wall Street Journal disclosed last week, appears to be a last-ditch effort to revive engagement before it dies a natural death.
A Kerry trip to Tehran “would be a disaster,” a former senior Israeli intelligence official said, because it would allow the Iranian regime to buy more time to continue its pursuit of nuclear weapons.
“Iran is gaming the situation, playing for time. They think they can avoid sanctions by making some new proposal at the very last minute,” a senior Israeli cabinet member said.
A Kerry spokesman said the senator doesn't plan to travel to Iran, but the White House welcomed such an effort.

It looks like Obama’s Hawaii vacation may end with a quick return to Washington for a huddle with his National Security Advisers to undertake damage control on his failed strategy in the war against Islamic terrorism at home and abroad.  Given the news from Iran,  he and his advisers will have to  rethink his feckless world vision vis a vis ‘engagement’ with the faltering  Islamic Republic of Iran,  its panicky Mullahs and puppet President Ahmadinejad.

From a report that could, if used correctly, help to unsettle Arab claims to dominate the countries of North Africa and, since Berber attachment to Islam is far weaker than that of Arabs (Berber ethnic identity undercutting, rather than, as in the case of the Arabs, reinforcing Islam), this could also weaken the hold of Islam on thse who recognize their Berber ancestry and decide to identify with it rather than with an Arab (Muslim) identity: 

Mitochondrial DNA heterogeneity in Tunisian Berbers

Berbers live in groups scattered across NorthAfrica whose origins and genetic relationships with their neighbours are not well established. The first hypervariable segment of the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) control region was sequenced in a total of 155 individuals from three Tunisian Berber groups and compared to other North Africans. The mtDNA lineages found belong to a common set of mtDNA haplogroups already described in NorthAfrica. Besides the autochthonous North African U6 haplogroup, a group of L3 lineages characterized by the transition at position 16041 seems to be restricted to North Africans, suggesting that an expansion of this group of lineages took place around 10500 years ago in NorthAfrica, and spread to neighbouring populations. Principal components and the coordinate analyses show that some Berber groups (the Tuareg, the Mozabite, and the Chenini-Douiret) are outliers within the NorthAfrican genetic landscape. This outlier position is consistent with an isolation process followed by genetic drift in haplotype frequencies, and with the high heterogeneity displayed by Berbers compared to Arab samples as shown in the AMOVA. Despite this Berber heterogeneity, no significant differences were found between Berber and Arab samples, suggesting that the Arabization was mainly a cultural process rather than a demographic replacement.