Brigadier General Hossein Salami: “They will not even be permitted to inspect the most normal military site in their dreams.”
Who says history has no sense of humor? Just as US President Barack Obama seeks to hide away the salami slices shaved off his deal with Iran, an Iranian named Salami exposes an extra-thick and very telling slice.
Without much ado, the Deputy Commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, Brigadier General Hossein Salami, gave the lie to one of Obama’s most significant contentions about the deal that America’s Commander in Chief is cooking up with the nuke-craving ayatollah regime.
Significantly, Salami didn’t whisper off the record. He didn’t speculate about hearsay in a back room. He didn’t impart hints given to conflicting interpretations. Salami said his piece openly on state TV. He announced out loud that, contrary to American claims, there would be no foreign inspections of Iranian military sites. Period. End of. No quibbling.
Inspections, railed Salami, would be “selling out.” To hear him, “a tour of military facilities by foreign inspectors is to be equated with the occupation of a country. Iran will not become a paradise for spies. We will not roll out the red carpet for the enemy… They will not even be permitted to inspect the most normal military site in their dreams.”
Another prime salami slice was thereby confidently and contemptuously chopped off by Salami. Was official America taken aback? Embarrassed? Heck no. In her characteristically convoluted way, deputy State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf disposed of a query about Salami’s salami-slicing:
“We are still negotiating over all of the people and places where the IAEA will have access required when it comes to possible military dimensions [PMD]. We have a path forward here, an agreement that Iran will undertake a PMD access list process to form out that list when it comes to potential military sites. That’s part of what will be negotiated over the next three months, but in principle, we have agreement that that is a process they will undertake.”
Need a translation? Basically Harf told badgering reporters to buzz off because there’s still work to be done on the final details. Dismissing pesky skeptics for supposedly being out of the loop is one time-tested method to avoid salami-slicing angst – for a while at least.
To be sure, salami-slicing isn’t a ploy invented by the Iranians, Arabs or any other cunning Mideastern players, although salami-slicing is an established local specialty. This familiar, if infamous practice has long been a favorite of assorted shysters – whether in business, party politics or geopolitical machinations.
The essence of salami-slicing in the figurative sense involves small, occasionally innocuous and disconnected actions which, taken in isolation from each other, look inconsequential. Embezzlers, thieves and con-artists, for instance, are adept at paring off apparently paltry amounts in regularly repeated transactions. Initially nobody notices the minor losses. Over time, however, these accumulate to considerable sums.
In politics the salami technique was nefariously used by the Soviets to install communist regimes in post-WWII Eastern Europe. The new overlords started dominating the politics of countries under their control slice by slice, until the entire sausage was devoured.
The Salami indeed entered our political lexicon courtesy of Hungary’s Stalinist puppet Matyas Rakosi who referred to the means employed by his party in the late 1940s as szalámitaktika – Salami tactics. Rakosi maneuvered his opposition to slice off its rightist flank and then its center. Soon only Communist collaborators remained.
Israel’s own Oslo boosters became devoted dupes, making excuses for and downplaying each of Yasser Arafat’s incremental violations of the Accords. Arafat’s duplicity was already evident at the time of the swanky September 13, 1993 signing ceremony ostentatiously produced by that irrepressible impresario, Bill Clinton.
Arafat quickly informed viewers on Jordanian TV that the Oslo deal isn’t for keeps and is indeed part of the “phased plan” to destroy Israel – i.e. to terminate “the Zionist Entity” salami slice by salami slice. Like General Salami of Tehran, Arafat too took little trouble to disguise his aims – particularly when it came to public pronouncements.
Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was hoodwinked by Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Peres wouldn’t part from his grand design just because Arafat exposed it for salami-tactic that it indeed was.
Rather than take Arafat’s word for it, Peres expediently explained it away as having been uttered “for internal consumption.” Of course the very fact that the Arab masses all around us clamored for something very different from a lasting peace should have cooled Peres’s ardor. However, he wasn’t the sort to let reality mess with a good pipe-dream and Nobel Prize prospects.
Not long after, in his May 10, 1994 address to Muslims in South Africa, Arafat proudly crowed that Oslo was a ruse, like the fraudulent 7th Century Kureish truce to lull the defiant Jewish tribe into complacency until the opportunity for attack presented itself and the insubordinate Jews were slaughtered.
In July 1994 Arafat entered Gaza triumphantly, like a conquering hero. Israeli intelligence was well aware that in his convoy Arafat smuggled arms into Gaza, as well as wanted terrorists. It wasn’t an auspicious overture to true peace but Peres ordered the episode kept strictly under wraps so as not to let treachery spoil the festivities.
We won’t even dwell on the buses that soon began exploding everywhere in Israel. The dead and wounded were described by Rabin as “victims of peace.” Rather than declare Oslo null and void, Israel’s headliners sought to convince the citizenry that peace is a Moloch which requires human sacrifice to be sated. They exonerated Arafat and ascribed the bloodshed to generic “enemies of peace.”
Arafat, though, kept on frustrating them with a steady supply of instantly recognizable salami-slicing recipes. The pungent salami smell couldn’t be more unmistakable than on January 30, 1996 (well into the Oslo fiasco), when Peres’s blusterous peace-partner addressed Arab diplomats in Stockholm. The Nobel Peace laureate judged that the “peace process” must inevitably result in Israel’s downfall.
“We Palestinians will take over everything, including all of Jerusalem,” Arafat exulted. “Peres and Beilin,” he emphasized, “already promised us half of Jerusalem.” The rest will be won, salami-slice at a time.
According to Arafat, Israel’s collapse hinged on “PLO efforts to split Israel psychologically into two camps… We plan to eliminate the State of Israel and establish a pure Palestinian State. We’ll make life unbearable for Jews by psychological warfare and a massive influx of Arabs.”
In other words, Arafat promised to continue slicing the salami. His steadfast assistant/understudy was Mahmoud Abbas (Abu-Mazen), who now dons Arafat’s mantle in Ramallah and like him dishes up salami slices to a ravenous world, while posturing simultaneously as the pitiable underdog and the valiant altruist.
By the time January 2002 rolled around, the Second Intifada raged and Arafat’s complicity in the Karine A affair couldn’t be swept under the rug. Israel had seized a mega-shipment of 50 tons of weapons from Iran to the Palestinian Authority exactly while special US envoy, General Anthony Zinni, conferred with Arafat in yet another bid to restart the moribund peace haggles.
On board the Karine A were rockets, missiles, high explosives, shells, sniper rifles, Kalashnikovs and ammo. The lot was valued, all told, at some $15,000,000. So much for peace. But considering Arafat’s volubility all along, no one had the right to even pretend to be surprised.
The same goes now for Obama’s Iranian interlocutors. Like Arafat, they say it as it is and they say it often. Yet for Obama, propping up the sham appears more important than the in-your-face reality. The hype about the process overrides its ostensible objectives.
One day after Obama issued a fawning greeting to the Iranian people on the occasion of the Persian New Year, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reiterated the “death to America” chant to cheering crowds.
When asked if America can negotiate in good faith with Khamenei’s ilk, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest prevaricated: “What we have seen is — we have seen the Iranians sit down at the negotiating table and demonstrate a willingness to have constructive conversations.”
Later, in a response to CNN, the White House belittled the incident as having been “all intended for a domestic political audience.” That surely makes it OK.
When Iran subsequently maintained that all sanctions would be rolled back “in one day,” US Undersecretary of State Wendy Sherman commented on MSNBC that “we understood that our narratives were likely to be somewhat different.”
Not to beat around the bush, Iran’s salami-slicers were given the green light to keep slicing away. No wonder Obama in no-time suggested openness to the notion of the immediate repeal of all sanctions. That piece of salami appears to have successfully gone under the knife.
Obama’s indulgence for Russia’s decision to supply Tehran with S-300 missiles constituted more of the same readiness to countenance any variety of salami-slicing.
This is way worse than the Oslo calamity. The stakes are incomparably higher. Instead of conventional warfare, the threat facing Israel is nuclear obliteration. But who cares? Obama says he has our backs and that alone should suffice to keep us sweet and help us sleep soundly at night.
Quite obviously, to dull our vigilance Obama needs the services of Peres-style barbiturate-peddlers at the highest Israeli echelons. But alas, the current government in Jerusalem doesn’t collaborate with the current White House occupant’s efforts to obfuscate the sliced salami and pass it off as peaches and cream.
His refusal to play along gives Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu top billing on Obama’s “chickenshit” list. Netanyahu is scathingly scorned as a delusional irritant who disturbs the peace of the presumed guardian of global goodwill.
Peres of course faced no recriminations. He always courted international favor and lapped up the world’s accolades regardless of the cost to Israel. But anyone who squawks about insidious schemes upsets the seeming stability. Nothing new here. Those who dutifully sounded the warning bell weren’t kindly regarded, even at the darkest hour for Jews.
Chaim Weizman, who in time would become Israel’s first president, raised the alarm after the 1938 Nazi-perpetratedKristallnacht in Germany, a riotous outbreak of orchestrated pogroms that presaged the Holocaust. He would later recall international vexation with the Jews for making a fuss – the same as is now the case regarding the Jewish state’s fuss about Iranian salami-slicers.
“Our protests,” Weizman noted, “were regarded as provocations. Our very refusal to subscribe to our own death sentence became a public nuisance.”
Bucking the Trend ... 
Oh Sarah! where have you been! great to have you back!, the voice of reason and sanity is back, your article is again brilliant, and again disturbing for the right reasons, why oh why is anybody listening anymore to this American regime, they cannot be trusted, maybe Obama likes Salami, that should be his own business, not something he should force everyone else to swallow!, Israel at last needs a right wing Government, US cannot be trusted as an ally anymore and I doubt if Hilary will be much of a change when she gets in the door…
welcome back Sarah, we all know Obama likes others to swallow his Salami/Baloni but he expects just a little too much from little Israel, good time for a right wing Gov, welcome back
Brilliantly done. IMHO, one of the reasons that Jodi Rudoren of the NY Times continues to ignore all evidence that the 2nd Intifada was planned in advance is because she does not want to acknowledge that Arafat was violating the Oslo Accords.
Back in the old days, on the Lower East Side, Katz’s Delicatessen used to put leftover ends of sliced-up salamis in a basket on the counter with a sign: “A NICKEL A SHTICKL”
Another observation worth noting: The White House is very selective as to which leaders it takes at their word. If the Ayatollah shouts “Death to America,” not to worry folks: he doesn’t mean it, that’s for domestic consumption. But if Netanyahu says no two state solution on his watch during the heat of the campaign and clarifies the statement after the election, the original statement (“no two state solution”) is taken at his word, and threats of abandonment at the UN are issued. So the enemy calling for our destruction is given a pass, and the friend trying to keep his country safe incurs the president’s wrath. It’s upside down.
Iran constantly threatens to annihilate = to nuke Israel…
That threat is the REAL thing and not propaganda !
The clock is ticking faster EVERY day and only a military attack on Irans nuclear holocaust program can dismantle the threat.
Mullah Obama will NEVER do that…it has to be done by Israel.
Many years ago our family decided to be ‘rid of salami’ as part of our diet for the ‘familiy well being’.
As any good dietician would tell you, ‘Fat is not Easily Digestible’. We rid ourselves of this bad food, and nobody craves this indigestible ‘troublemaker’ anymore. My suggestion: How about everybody purchasing a ‘salami’ and sending the ‘package’ to the White House’, to the Attention of: President Barack Obama,.who looks like he could stand a ‘few extra pounds’ added to his belly.
A note enclosed inside of the ‘gift’ could read; “Please eat all of the salamis you are receiving from your ‘admirers’,,and then at the next ’round of your nuclear negotiations’ you could reveal to your admired Iranian mullahs ‘the results of your experience with ‘Salami Indigestion!
PS: Mr. President, you might also wish to share all of these fine ‘salamis’ with Mr.John Kerry and your ‘ex’ secretary of state Hillery Clinton….They also might enjoy this generous ‘feast’ with you! Burp!
NOT 9/11 was the ultimate attack of militant Islam on America, but the election and reelection of HuSSein Obama.
That man is Irans agent.
The title of the baloney that General Salami waxes arrogant about is the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act. In this farcical piece of dreck, 6000 centrifuges are supposed to be moth-balled, and as Sarah correctly points out, inspections of Iranian sites have been entirely removed from the table. But even though those 6000 centrifuges can be easily dusted off and quickly turned on again, the most shameful part of this travesty has to do with the proposed amendments to it, that were rejected. While a certain American-Jewish lobbying organization makes a big deal about Congress now having review power over this agreement(as if Congressional review power, in this age of “pass it first so we can find out what’s in it.” means anything), proposed amendments by Senators Tom Cotton and Marco Rubio were rejected. Rubio suggested that ratification should be made conditional, upon Iran accepting an amendment that affirms Israel’s right to exist, while Cotton wanted Iran to be required to disclose their nuclear program’s history, and shut down all centrifuges. Nothing, except this dubious Congressional review power, now stands in the way of Iran getting the bomb.
The most cognizant, complete and accurate analysis.
Search for the following. Can We Ban Islam? – Legal Guidelines for the Criminalization of Islam in the United States
I will say it again (with some updates)…
Like Nazis and Nazism which together with Islam, its followers and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem who all worked together so diligently to murder our people, Islam itself must be eradicated. Islam goes even further by canonizing in their Qur’an and their own religious works the command and examples to murder our people to the very last one.
Now, all the Germans did not need to be killed. But Nazism, its leaders and the symbolic vestiges promoting its presence were eradicated. Only places of horrors it created and the history of what it did are preserved as a reminder to humanity.
Through indoctrination of its children, it becomes intrinsic to the underlying nature of all followers of Islam. Very few (I count them on thumbs, say Ayaan Hirsi Ali or Wafa Sultan) are smart and lucky enough to escape this indoctrination alive. These courageous and intelligent people pay dearly by living under constant threat of death.
Search for the following. matthias kuntzel ahmadinejad’s world
Search for the following. jihad watch islam 101
Search for the following. The Brussels Journal, The Truth About Islam in Europe. You may also find the article by searching for as follows. Western Civilization and Culture, The Truth About Islam in Europe. Skip to the twenty first paragraph which starts out with “Robert Davis’ methodical enumeration in Christian Slaves, Muslim Masters indicates that perhaps one and one-quarter million white European Christians were enslaved by Barbary Muslims from 1530 through 1780.”
Search for the following. Can We Ban Islam? – Legal Guidelines for the Criminalization of Islam in the United States
Search for the following. An Invasion of Refugees
Search for the following. How Islam breathed new life into slavery and the slave trade in Europe
Search for the following. Bat Ye’or: Andalusian Myth, Eurabian Reality
Search for the followng. Devshirme: A Muslim Scourge on Christians
The first step to dealing with Islam and its followers is to learn about it and then to educate others. And don’t take your education from the followers of Islam but rather from its critics. People will then step back in horror at the realization of what we have in our midst. Islam and its followers will then become marginalized, and that will be the beginning of the end for Islam and its followers.
The destruction and takeover of our Jewish homeland would either simply be a byproduct of the murder of our people, or by gradual process, it would facilitate the same objective of our murder.
The destruction of Israel is just another way for the followers of Islam to murder our people. After the destruction our homeland, the murder of all the remainder of our people would then continue to the purpose of attempting to murder every last one of us.
To put it another way, the followers of Islam, Muslims, never cared about the land in the first place. They never did anything with it. Their primary objective has always been our murder. The byproduct of which would be the takeover of our homeland and the loss of our independence as a people.
Islam and its followers, al-Aksa and all mosques must be eradicated, same as the Nazis and Nazism.
Ours is not a cause of this conflict but rather a response to a conflict thrown upon us.
Yes, al-Aksa needs to be razed. Had our people known the nature of Islam in 1967 (after nearly 1400 years we still have not internalized the nature of Islam and its followers… shame on us), we would have exposed Islam for what it is, say by reading aloud the Qur’an, and started demolitions.
The solution for the moment is not a war of aggression against Islam but rather the education of our people and of western civilization regarding Islam.
Religions can be evil. People need to understand the exact details of Islam, its history to this day, its tactics, its strategies, and to grasp the Darwinianly perfected nature and makeup (with the intelligence of captured and bred blood of other peoples including our own) of its people. We need not to take for granted extrapolations of early unrelated biblical texts that predate by thousands of years where the people of Islam may have originated. We must not blindly accept as truths Muslim explanations for their origins. They simply are what they are, and have Darwinianly perfected themselves by systematically killing off any of their own people who become apostates or voice civilized and intelligent ideas.
Note that Allah is not the same as G-d, and Islam although “monothesism” is not the same as Judasim.
Lets take a look at some of Islam’s diktats as follows.
Note that a convenient source many more quotes may be found by searching for the following. the religion of peace violence
Note that in the article that you should find from that search above, that I disagree with the statement “…the problem is not bad people, but bad ideology.” Rather, I propose that as long as these people follow Islam, they are in fact bad people.
Now on to a few diktats from Islam.
8:12 “And when your Lord revealed to the angels who reinforced the Muslims, ‘I am with you with help and support so make those who believe firm through the help and good news you bring. I will cast terror (extreme fear) into the hearts of those who disbelieve, so strike their necks (behead them) and strike all their finger joints, cutting off their fingers and toes!’ ”
“Fight them until there is no more chaos and [all] religion belongs to Allah” (8:39).”
“slay the idolaters wherever you find them” (9:5)
“until they pay the jizya with willing submissiveness and feel themselves utterly subdued” (9:29)
9:33. It is He {Allah} Who has sent His Messenger (Muhammad) with guidance and the religion of truth (Islam), to make it superior over all religions
9:80 “You Muhammad, may ask forgiveness for them, or not ask forgiveness for them…Even if you asked forgiveness for them seventy times, Allah still would not forgive them..That is because they have rejected Allah and His Messenger. Allah does not guide deviant people.”
(47:4) “Therefore when you meet those who disbelieve, strike their necks—
In the words of Turkish PM Erdogan regarding the term “moderate Islam” to describe the AKP party – “These descriptions are very ugly, it is offensive and an insult to our religion. There is no moderate or immoderate Islam. Islam is Islam and that’s it.”
“Learn about Islam. That is the most important thing for people to do. Learn who it is that you are not.” – Samuel Lurie
Thank you for gathering, in one chronological list, several of the pieces of evidence that Arafat was never really pursuing a peace process. (You might also have added his waffling on his commitment to modify the Palestinian National Charter.)