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April 17, 2006
More On Iran: It Happens 'In every generation'
With what this article describes as "a characteristic lack of fanfare", we are told that Efraim Halevy, Israel's spymaster and former head of the Mossad, published a book last week. The book, "Man in the Shadows" is described as being in large part a memoir of the former Mossad director's twilight years of quiet creative thinking, common sense and troubleshooting in the upper echelons of the Israeli intelligence community, and in a small part - a recipe for trying to sustain life on the planet in the face of al-Qaida style global terrorist aspirations.
Every year our Haggada reminds us, in the "Vehi She'amda" passage, of the forces that have arisen "in every generation" to try and wipe us out. Every year now, we mark the Seder as the still-fresh anniversary of the second intifada's worst suicide bombing, at the Park Hotel in Netanya in 2002. And this year we sat down to delve into our people's bloody history of implausible survival in the fresh shadow of Iran's announcement of another stride toward nuclear capability.Halevy's key points for us to reckon with is that the war cannot only be won through offensive action. It is primarily "an internal struggle within Islam", and in order to triumph against global Muslim fundamentalist terror, the world will need to muster all its imagination and all of its intelligence. Because the very act of living, he concludes, "is fast becoming more impossible than ever in human history."What Halevy takes pains to point out, however, is that Israel is only one priority for the global Islamic terrorists, and not a major one at that. "Al-Qaida," he writes, "has set its sights on the entire world with the goal of effecting an Islamic international revolution that will encompass the entire planet. It is as simple and diabolical as that."
He notes that the perpetrators make no secret whatsoever of this agenda. "It is not a hidden blueprint. It is stated up front for everyone to read and absorb." It is equally clear that the enemy will use whatever means at its disposal to achieve the goal - "from the roadside bomb to the civilian aircraft." Were it to obtain non-conventional weaponry, it would have "no reservation about employing that device at any moment considered appropriate and against any target, civilian or military, across the globe."
Posted by Richard at April 17, 2006 8:08 AM
