Delenda Israel, Iran dixit (o tema mais quente de 2012)

Raras vezes nas relações internacionais, líderes de um Estado são tão explícitos nas ameaças de destruição de uma outra nação, um outro povo, um outro Estado.
Israel poderia até invocar o capítulo da autodefesa da Carta da ONU e golpear as instalações militares do Irã, mas não vai ser fácil, pois o Irã de hoje está superarmado, e não parece ter medo de incorrer em perdas humanas ou materiais.
Este ano de 2012 vai ser movimentado, podem apostar...
Paulo Roberto de Almeida 

Khamenei: Iran will back ‘any nations, any groups’ fighting Israel

Thomas Erdbrink

The Washington Post, February 3 2012 

TEHRAN — A fiery anti-Israel speech by Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Friday, and a successful satellite launch by his country, added to growing global tensions, as Israel warned it might make a preemptive strive against Iran’s nuclear facilities despite U.S. objections.

“From now onwards, we will support and help any nations, any groups fighting against the Zionist regime across the world, and we are not afraid of declaring this,” Khamenei said during a rare Friday prayer lecture at Tehran University.

“The Zionist regime is a true cancer tumor on this region that should be cut off,” Khamenei said. “And it definitely will be cut off.”

Most of Khamenei’s rhetoric was not new. But the timing and setting of his speech ratcheted up a standoff that, some analysts say, has the potential to spark military action that would disrupt the international coalition that has emerged to confront Iran over its nuclear program and jeopardize oil markets and fragile world economies.

Khamenei’s statements could poison the atmosphere ahead of upcoming nuclear talks between Iran and world powers. His speech illustrated his conviction that Iran is the flagbearer in battles against the “arrogant powers,” a term used in Iranian political discourse to describe the United States and its allies.

Khamenei said Israel has become “weakened and isolated” in the Middle East due to the revolutions — he called them “Islamic awakenings” — that have spread through the region.

He suggested that Iran’s support for the Palestinian militant group Hamas and Lebanon’s Hezbollah helped lead to victory in their battles with “the Zionist state,” as Israel is officially called here.

“We got involved in the anti-Israeli issues, which resulted in the victory in the 33-day and 22-day wars,” Khamenei said, referring to Israel’s 2006 war with Lebanon and its incursion into Gaza Strip in late 2008.

Khamenei’s speech came hours after Iran’s state-run media reported that the country had launched a small satellite into space, carried by a homemade rocket.

The launch, which had been planned and announced months ago, is part of a series of festivities celebrating the 33rd anniversary of Iran’s Islamic Revolution, which culminated in the collapse of the monarchy on Feb. 11, 1979.

State-run television reported that the satellite Navid Elm o Sanat (“Good message of science and industry”) carries camera and telecommunication devices and was designed and produced inside Iran.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad joined the launch remotely via video conference and said he was hopeful the launch “will send a signal of more friendship among all human beings,” wire services reported.

Iran’s space program is controversial, as Western nations fear the rockets can be used for regional attacks and — if the country were to produce a nuclear weapon — be fitted with a nuclear warhead. Iran had repeatedly stated that its missile program is for defensive purposes only.

The Navid microsatellite, which weighs 110 pounds, will orbit the earth at an altitude of up to 234 miles, the Associated Press reported, citing the Islamic Republic News Agency.

Navid is the third small indigenously built satellite Iran has launched during the past few years and the first of three to be launched in early 2012. Iran launched Omid in 2009 and Rasad in 2011. Both lasted less than three months in space. Iran’s first satellite, Sina-1, was built and launched by Russia in 2005.

The country’s space agency and defense ministry are jointly planning to set up a launch site in the southeastern region of the country, Iranian officials have said.