With discussions of a military attack on Iran circulating among U.S. and Israeli political elites, CNN has added fuel to the fire with a series of alarmist reports about supposedly Iranian-linked terrorist operatives inside the United States who are ready to strike.
On the March 21 broadcast of the Situation Room, anchor Wolf Blitzer announced that there could be “a terrifying new reason for all of us to be potentially very worried about U.S. tensions with Iran.”
What’s the terrifying potential worry? Some U.S. officials apparently claim:
Iran has a large terrorist-trained force right here in the United States right now. They say there may be hundreds, maybe even thousands of Hezbollah agents on American soil who could be ready and willing to attack.
Blitzer’s words were accompanied by footage of what seemed to be Hezbollah militants marching and training. As CNN correspondent Brian Todd explained, witnesses at a House Homeland Security Committee hearing—many former U.S. officials—claimed that “many of Hezbollah’s operatives have been in the U.S. for years, blending in, making a lot of money. A perfect resource for Iran if it’s attacked and wants a quick counterstrike on the U.S. homeland.”
Upping the fear factor, Todd added: “It’s called Iran’s A-team of terrorism. Hezbollah, a militant group that’s killed more Americans than any other except Al-Qaeda.” (This would seem to be mainly the 1983 attacks on U.S. Marines who were intervening in the Lebanese civil war.)
After all of this, though, Todd expressed some skepticism: “One law enforcement official tells CNN the cases they’ve been able to build against them involve things like fundraising, attempts to buy weapons, but no actual plot.” Still, the point was that viewers should be extremely concerned. “The sophistication is almost breathtaking,” Todd summed up. Blitzer was left only to say, “What a story.”
Someone at CNN must think so. The same night a similar story was aired. “Stopping a threat to the homeland,” anchor Erin Burnett announced on her show OutFront (3/21/12). Burnett focused on an official with the New York Police Department who suggested that Iranian operatives have been spotted “conducting surveillance”—taking photographs at Grand Central Terminal. (The train station is a New York City landmark; there are hundreds of thousands of photographs of it on Flickr, from every conceivable angle.) Another guest, former FBI official Michael Leverett, declined to answer Burnett’s question about the approximate number of Hezbollah cells in the United States, but he nonetheless declared:
We don’t know the exact number, but we know it’s enough. We know there are enough people here that have military training and many more who are supporters and could be called upon or in some cases could be forced by extortion to do things they don’t want to do.
On March 24, Blitzer was back to sounding the alarm: “A warning that Iran’s A-team of terrorists have hundreds, maybe thousands of agents right here in the United States possibly ready to attack.” He added:
Terrifying new reason to be worried about U.S. tensions with Iran. The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee and other U.S. officials are now warning that Iran has a large terrorist-trained force right in the United States. They say there may be hundreds, even thousands of Hezbollah agents on American soil who could be ready and willing to attack.
Again, correspondent Brian Todd was on the case, reporting that according to the testimony at the hearing, “many of Hezbollah’s operatives in the U.S. have been here for years, blending in, making a lot of money—a perfect resource for Iran if it’s attacked and wants a quick counterstrike on the U.S. homeland.”
Todd mentioned that the “operatives” seem to be involved in fundraising, but closed his report by alluding to law enforcement concerns about those aspects: “They have people inside who know how to work the financial system, who have been here for work. Those are the people they’re worried about, the infrastructure.”
Throughout all of this, CNN gave little reason for viewers to feel anything but frightened. A more sober approach might note more forcefully that, as the Associated Press (3/21/12) noted, “government officials have said there are no known or specific threats indicating Iranian plans to attack inside the U.S.” Or they would point out that at least one of these cases of “Hezbollah” agents didn’t have much to do with Hezbollah, as Marcy Wheeler (Emptywheel, 3/21/12) noted. Or that the New York Police Department, currently embroiled in a scandal over spying on Muslims, might not be the most credible source of information on Hezbollah operatives (Salon.com, 3/22/12). A Huffington Post report (3/21/12) on the King hearing noted:
Most of the testimony—which came from former officials at the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration and Treasury, among others—concerned Iranian-linked attacks in other countries that dated back decades in some cases.
Reporting on allegations that link an official enemy state currently under threat of military attack to vague terrorist plots should be extraordinarily cautious. When such charges suggest without evidence that there are “thousands” of terrorist agents living among us “ready and willing to attack”—implying that we are all in grave danger from our ethnically or religiously suspect neighbors—journalists need to be even more skeptical. CNN is taking the opposite approach: breathlessly reporting the most terrifying scenarios, while occasionally noting that there’s nothing to substantiate these speculations.
This puts CNN in the company of disgraced former New York Times reporter Judith Miller, whose reporting on the Hezbollah threat for the right-wing website NewsMax (3/21/12) sounds a lot like Wolf Blitzer.
You’d think the rest of the corpress would be jumping on this “terrifying” exposé as well, wouldn’t you?
That that isn’t the case should tell you something about the veracity of this intel, don’t you think?
The Zionists on both sides of the world are making sure that they dot all their Is, connect all their Ts and link every possible scenario around the world (from dead birds falling from the sky to the supposedly Planet X that’s hiding behind the moon/sun, will magically appear on Dec. 21, 12 and boom! there goes the Earth) to Iran. They figure that by throwing everything and the kitchen sink at Iran (just like they did with Iraq before that), something will stick and they will be guaranteed a war. From Mexican drug cartels meet Iranian used car salesmen for Tacos at the border to the MEK, they haven’t left one stone unturned.
To quote Rufus T. Firefly, “It’s war. We’re going to war!”
Correction (with apologies). That was supposed to be: “… they dot all their Is,
connectcross all their Ts and link every possible scenario around the world…”“They say there could be hundreds, maybe even thousands of Hezbollah agents right now on American soil, ready to attack.” (or something like that)
LOL! You can easily identify all of these terrorists. They’re wearing hoodies and dark glasses!
personally, if i were not too concerned about all the people who would lose their life in the event of another u.s. fabricated war, i would love to see america get into another afghanistan or iraq. it would weaken america financially and militarily and maybe finally cause the american people to rise up against this “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today”
Remember when CNN (Peter Arnett and even Wolf Blitzer) actually reported The NEWS!?
Time to rename CNN to CTN; the Cable Terrorist Network. They’re doing more to terrorize Americans than Hezbollah, Al Qaeda and then next 12 largest terrorist organizations in the world could do combined. They’re even giving FoxNews a run for its money as the largest employer of Terrorist Talking Heads in the world.
There’s a better chance of being hit by lighting out of the sunny sky, while surrounded by skyscrapers than the chance you will be personally affected by terrorism. Only a moronic sheep could ever take this pathetic fearmongering seriously.
Well 911 did change everything.If something happened in this country with this (hopefully)imaginary network you can bet that the same people that are mocking CNN, would be saying “THEY KNEW EVERYTHING, AND DID NOT DO ENOUGH TO WARN PEOPLE”.
I don’t watch TV so….”The Situation Room..” is this like a new game show reality show, kind of like( as the Wolf man mentioned…) an ” A -Team,” which I do remember was a TV show?
So, Mr Wolf man, we will recognize these ” sleeper terrorist people” by large pieces of gold jewelry hanging on their necks? Will they be driving really fast cars to attract attention? Oh. and does Mr. T stand for terrorist?
Oh wait….that Wolf man is wrong…it’s not Iran…it’s a sleeper group called ALEC, I think.
No Gloriana they probably will show themselves in ways that seem oh so easy to spot…AFTER THE FACT.Before they hit(the next terrorist sleeper cell) we will probably let their quirky behavior slip by.This country is very open minded to alternative life styles and weirdos.And lets face it…even if I spot one of these clowns and announce it on this blog I would only be shot down as a “weirdo “myself.We are not on that kind of footing in this country (at present) to be worth a damn at enemy identification.Hell on these blogs alone are scores of people that skip over the Terrorists who hit us on 911 as if they never were.The enemy here seems to be our own government!
I am American Lebanese and I am Christian my Parents and their parents are Christians, many here know I was born in Lebanon 57 years ago, so if I sleep every night, does that make me a sleeping terrorist? lmao. You Know? I fear only the ignorant, I try to enlighten my friends the American people, but their is an evil force here that controls the media, and the and with the weakness and the fear American public accumulated through out the years listening to lies on the News every day and let this evil take away their freedom. American people lost all their rights when they allowed Homeland security to take control over their lives. The funny thing is they don’t know it, They still believe this is the only country in the world that practice Democracy, lmao. OK you can all Go back to sleep now.
LOL, michael e.:
Hmm..”terrorists?” Let’s see,this nation is filled with them! ;)
pepper sraying police; people that burn other religions’ religious objects; people that go from state to state and write, ironically the exact same worded laws that favor corporations; the state of Florida and its gun laws, the state of Arizona and its rewriting history, the fetus personhood states, privatizing things that shouldn’t be taken from the public good. We are one weird nation. As this relates to humanity, we seem to be evolving into the United FRIGHTS of America!
Although, if one reads early American religious history, those Puritans were really fascists! It seems that periodically, this nation does go insane, and forgets that OF BY and FOR the people is really a good idea. : )
I wouldn’t put too much stock in what You Know Who is saying, gloriana. And yes, “The Situation Room” is a kind of sitcom. These bogus, laughable stories have been circulating for a while–Blitzer and most of the MSM are very gullible, and like to frighten themselves. I think many of them are just plain ignorant; they don’t have the slightest idea of what life is like out here in the Zone not Known to the Beltwayers. Couple that with an urgent need to believe the received wisdom of their betters, and you get sitcom stars like Blitzer.
Oh Gloriana don’t tell me you are just another self hating liberal, who would eat yourself alive just to rid the world of one more dirty American.Tim I know what you hate.Me and most anything else made in America.Other than Europe and socialism i wish i could expand the list of things you don’t detest.What a fun group of people you are.My next BBQ your invited.Come late.You can drive the people away.Help clear the decks so I can clean up and go to bed early.
The major terrorism threat in the US is right-wing and domestic. Maybe this would be addressed more seriously instead of just stoked if CNN started talking about that…
Tishado
On Rush Limbaugh’s show he often lampoons the fact that to Libs -Conservatism is the real terrorist movement while those arab factions are just people standing up for themselves.We all laugh of course ….but this might be the first time I ever heard a lib admit to it.
Conservative Charles Johnson responds to an attempted firebombing of a Wisconsin Planned Parenthood clinic:
“I’ll come right out and say it. I believe that the religious right and the Republican Party’s irresponsible, dishonest rhetorical attacks on Planned Parenthood — including Mitt Romney’s statement that he’d ‘end Planned Parenthood’ — are responsible for real-world violent attacks like this. The entire GOP is now united in this ugly misogynistic rhetoric, and the violence will almost certainly get worse the more these people stoke the fires of irrational rage.”
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/40152_Wisconsin_Planned_Parenthood_Clinic_Firebombed
Why report the news when you can compose the news?
Real news usually isn’t interesting. Often it is downright boring.
Fabricated news can be fun. And it can further your political agenda.
Why send reporters to the other side of the world?
Two or three imaginative “reporters” and a case of beer and you can come up with great scoops.
LOL michael e.
Hmmm…a self hating liberal….what is that? What am I ? Not that. I think I am a people loving progressive. I also love books and all kinds of ideas .
However, I think that many people believe that the world can only be run in one way ( which always seems to be their way) and they are very strange people. If these people ruled the world, we would all still be living in caves, because new ideas seem to frighten them.
So, I am definitely against the “one way” people, and love the “What if” people.
Sadly, the people that make up the news are often the “one way”people. Thank goodness that gravity is real, because I think that their credibility is going down , down, down and with real science too.” The Boy who cried Wolf” is a very good story. More people should read it, especially some who say they are journalists. : )
Well Gloriana i agree that the WORLD should not be run in just one way.BUT…..this country SHOULD BE( run in just one way).According to the constitution of the United States.
Boy who cried wolf is good.Three little pigs is better.Or little red riding hood.Those wolves were for real.
michael: ‘you can bet that the same people that are mocking CNN, would be saying “THEY KNEW EVERYTHING, AND DID NOT DO ENOUGH TO WARN PEOPLE”.’
This is BS. On 9/12/2001 I was much more concerned with Americans’ “lets go to war” mentality than with “why didn’t they stop the attack?”, or “who can we get revenge on?”. I knew plenty of people who agreed with me. Unfortunately, reasonable, cool, thought-out reasoning does not play well on TV after a terrorist attack. In fact, I saw a video at ground zero of a couple of college kids warning against over-reacting and they were threatened and belittled. I had a flag with Bob Marley on my car antennae when you were supposed to have The Flag – someone broke the antennae off my car!
9/11 didn’t change everything… it just made us afraid to speak up and say “please don’t change everything Big Brother” Now it cost $1200 to fly across the country, I have to spend $80 on back ground checks when I apply for work, thousands of Americans and hundreds of thosands of civilians are dead over-seas, AND I DON’T FEEL SAFER. Jesus, a nursing student shot 7 people to death yesterday! I guarantee that guy wasn’t on any no-fly list… you have to pass background checks to apply for nursing school.
I’ve been saying it for the last 11 years: If you’re willing to get in a motor vehicle, then you should be willing to accept thirteen 9/11s per year before considering destroying your country’s economy/freedom for “safety”
I bet we could have completely automated our nation’s transportation including free Artificial intelligence for every one’s car for less than we’ve spent on safety from terrorism… and it actually would have made us safer! OR how about preventative medicine for everyone? OR $10,000 cash per year to each person who quits smoking? OR medical research (diabetes, heart disease, COPD)? ok, I’m out of random ideas.
My point is… not everyone screams for more security after tragic statistical outliers.
Once agin, P. Ness, thanks for giving us that bit of info. The Right’s gone off the rails, perfectly embodied in the paranoia and gullibility of our trolls. I hate everything made in America, including You Know Who, hotdogs, apple pie, Chevys, guns (of course!), Bibles (most of them are actually not printed here, but whatever), religion in general, the mountebanks who enrich themselves in particular, and Republicans. And myself, because like gloriana, I’m a self-hater, which I didn’t even know! And now I do! Gloriana, don’t let it get you down–just look in the mirror, and say, “I’d rather be a self-hating liberal who hates __ (here name all the things you’re supposed to hate–like I did above), than a screeching little paranoid toady who’s got a thing for Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.” That’s all it takes.
Carter…..Im not sure if you are saying that the course we took against the forces who attacked us was wrong in Afghanistan.Can you give me an idea of how we could of handled that better?
Tim you are a self hater.In the sense that everything about America that is good to most people….. you see as bad.Or at least you dwell on the flip side.You are that guy on a beautiful day, who is with a beautiful woman,having a picnic by the lake who cant enjoy a minute of it because you are lecturing to this lovely creature every minute about the sweat shops you believe her cloths came from.Wondering what chemicals made the grass so green(and will end up killing you).Preaching to her that the sky may look perfect and blue, but is really filled with Earth warming world ending particles.She brought a picnic basket but your a vegan.Actually you only eat fruit that fell naturally from a tree.She wants to swim al la natural in the crystal clear stream but no- you heard all about PCPs and heavy metals in ALL Americas streams so no pass on that.She takes out an apple pie made from naturally falling apples and you smash it face down in the mud.Far to happy dappy and republican for your lot.Finally ms Jessica Alba look alike gets the message, and storms away.You are in short a liberal pain in the ass.Or better put….. a socialist pain in the ass.You hate so much around you because after all your the only one smart enough to see these things.And that is Liberalism today.So negative you cant enjoy the forrest OR the trees.
@TimN
USAToday ran a long piece about the violent right wing sovereign citizens movement just the other day.
At its most extreme sovereigns have been linked to threats of violence and the murders of six police officers since 2002, including the slayings of officers Brandon Paudert and Bill Evans in West Memphis, Ark., in 2010.
“There are people at war with this country who are not international terrorists,” said Robert Paudert, the former chief of the West Memphis Police Department and the father of one of the slain officers.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/story/2012-03-30/anti-government-militia-groups-freeman/53873496/1
P.Ness
These nuts have no relation whatsoever to the tea party movement or constitutionalists if that is what you are implying.They are criminals who have been left to rot because its safer that way.Im not sure if I agree with that, but that is how it is.They do not follow any rules from any authority.If they step off that land and threaten anyone- I say send in the seals and take them out.Other than that as long as they wither away up there I suppose it is up to the proper authorities to make the call.Im sure in a country of over 300 million their are some people who agree with them.Couple thousand here or there.Out of those people probably 99% are not armed for confrontation.They are simply off the grid minding their own business.I know a few like that in upstate New York.Good folks.Like the Amish ,just doing their own thing.
“These nuts have no relation whatsoever to the tea party movement or constitutionalists if that is what you are implying.”
I’m not implying that, although they may well have some tenuous ties….They are conservatives and right wing terrorists, though. That’s the subject under discussion.
They are conservatives, and right wing terrorists?From what i have read they do not vote… or follow any party affiliation.So how do we get claim of them?That is like saying the majority of Americas incarcerated criminals list themselves as Democrats.That may well be true.It’s inference is a truckload of horse poop.
Does “operating in the public interest,” a requirement to renew an FCC commercial broadcasting license, include the invention of news, rather than the mere reporting of it or commentary on it?
How does spreading outright lies and innuendo qualify as operating in the public interest? (Consider how the right of “free speech” impacts what might be a common-sense response.)
Note: Don’t forget to ask our defense industrialists, their political and retired 3-4 star minions for whom war and the preparation for war furnishes a good living!
Educate yourselves, see THE PUBLIC AND BROADCASTING- http://transition.fcc.gov/mb/audio/decdoc/public_and_broadcasting.html
Michael e
“These nuts have no relation whatsoever to the tea party movement or constitutionalists if that is what you are implying.”
Me
I’m not implying that, although they may well have some tenuous ties….They are conservatives and right wing terrorists, though. That’s the subject under discussion.
Michael e says:
They are conservatives, and right wing terrorists?From what i have read they do not vote… or follow any party affiliation.So how do we get claim of them?
—————–
Because they’re right wing and conservative. I’m not talking about Party ID, I never said they were Republicans, I’m talking about ideology. They are anti AFT, anti-IRS, anti-goverment.
They’re terrorists, just like the guy who got arrested on his was to shoot up The Tides Foundation, the guy who murdered Dr. Tiller, the guy who shot up the Unitarian church in Tennessee, the guy in Pittsburg who called 9-1-1 to set up an armed ambush of police, the guy who attempted to bomb Planned Parenthood.
Those people were all driven by their right-wing political beliefs.
When people talk about right wing domestic terrorism, that’s what they’re talking about.
Interestingly enough…that type of terrorism spiked during the Clinton years [culminating in Oklahoma City], dropped way down during the Bush years and came back with a vengence after Obama was elected.
Party ID isn’t totally unrelated in all this.
Bank of Beirut