Jewish World Review March 28, 2001 / 4 Nissan, 5761
Bush can't ignore Iran's terror outposts
http://www.jewishworldreview.com --
GEORGE W & Co. should take in one of those old Hollywood
movies. You know, the kind where the hero
declares: "Real Americans don't run from fights." The
fight in mind is in the former Yugoslavia, where ethnic
hatred has burst into predictable flame again this
time in Macedonia.
Bush campaigned on an election platform to get U.S.
troops out of the Balkans. Secretary of State Powell has
backed down from that election promise. But the U.S. is
showing no inclination to prevent the new bloodletting
from turning into a full-scale bloodbath.
We can't leave it up to the Europeans to quelch it; they
failed miserably in the past. The world's only full-
fledged superpower can't afford to stick its head in the
sand. The stakes are just too high.
The bad guys this time are ethnic Albanians, the same
people who were the victims when Serbia was squeezing
Kosovo. Extremists have been demanding independence from
what's left of Yugoslavia and have begun using terrorist
attacks on Kosovo Serbs to get their way.
Recently, they ratcheted up the stakes with artillery
pounding towns in nearby Macedonia, a former Yugoslav
republic that's been hitherto free of violence. Now
Macedonia has sent in its tank corps to flush out the
rebels.
That's the bad news.
The worse news is that the troublemaking Albanian Muslim
rebels in Kosovo and Macedonia are being financed and
aided by one of the world's most sinister masterminds of
terrorism: Iran's Revolutionary Guard.
According to senior Mideast intelligence sources, a high-
level Iranian Revolutionary Guard officer, a sabotage
expert code-named Al-Haj Ja'afari, has been secretly
based in Kosovo for several months. According to the
sources, Ja'afari runs a unit of 10 other Iranian
operatives whose sole task is to coordinate and help
direct the Kosovo rebels.
Interestingly enough, say the sources, Ja'afari was back
in Tehran last month on a working visit three days after
a bus was spectacularly blown up by remote control on
the border between Kosovo and Serbia, causing the deaths
of seven Serbs.
While in Tehran, Ja'afari updated the head of the
Revolutionary Guard, Rahim Safavi, on the aid the
Iranians have been giving the Albanians: weapons and
military training as well as logistical and planning
consultations.
When he returned to Kosovo, say the sources, Ja'afari
carried $750,000 to buy electronic equipment that the
rebels use to prepare sabotage demolition charges. The
work reportedly is done at two underground labs
constructed with Iranian technical assistance.
Commanders of the rebels also receive part of their
training in the same Iranian camps used by the
Revolutionary Guard to teach other fanatic terrorist
groups such as the Lebanese-based Hezbollah guerrillas.
NATO-led peacekeepers are trying to block further
infiltration into Macedonia. But NATO including the
United States has made it clear it has no intention of
using its forces to fight the insurgents. That job is
being left up to the Macedonian Army, one of the weakest
in the Balkans.
This is no time for NATO or the Bush administration to
be waffling especially if Iran's dirty hands are
involved in the new violence. The Mad Mullahs of Tehran
and their Revolutionary Guard have been making murderous
mischief in Bosnia, Kosovo, Chechnya, Lebanon, Turkey
and the Persian Gulf states, and now in Macedonia. They
must be stopped in their
By Richard Z. Chesnoff
JWR contributor and veteran journalist
Richard Z. Chesnoff is a senior correspondent at US News
And World Report and a columnist at the NY Daily News. His latest book, recently updated, is Pack of Thieves: How Hitler & Europe
Plundered the Jews and Committed the Greatest Theft in History.
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