EDITORIAL

The Charges Against Iran

Published: October 12, 2011

Charges that Iranian officials ordered the assassination of Saudi Arabias ambassador to
the United States are chilling and bizarre. If true and American officials insist they
have strong evidence this is only the latest reminder of why the United States and its
allies must use all possible diplomatic and economic pressures to isolate Tehran and
block its nuclear ambitions.

Related in News
U.S. Challenged to Explain Accusations of Iran Plot in the Face of Skepticism (October 13,
2011)
Unlikely Turn for a Suspect in a Terror Plot (October 13, 2011)

American credibility following the war in Iraq is fragile, and Washington will have to
fully disclose the evidence and be very careful not to oversell it.

While Tehran fiercely denied the allegations, it has a long history of assassinations and
terrorist attacks and a particular animosity for its Saudi rivals. The Quds Force, the
branch of Irans Revolutionary Guards Corps that the Justice Department said was
behind the conspiracy, is believed to have been responsible for the Khobar Towers
bombing in Saudi Arabia in 1996, in which 19 American servicemen died.

This plot appears extraordinarily brazen the first major Iranian attack on American
soil and almost laughably sloppy.

The Quds Force usually does such work through organized proxies, including Hezbollah,
Hamas and Iraqs Mahdi Army. The Justice Department charges that this time it used an
Iranian-American car salesman, Mansour J. Arbabsiar, who then tried to hire a Mexican
drug cartel to kill Ambassador Adel al-Jubeir. (Officials said the Iranians had also
discussed contracting out attacks on the Israeli and Saudi embassies in Washington and
in Buenos Aires.) As it turned out, thankfully, the member of Los Zetas whom Mr.
Arbabsiar allegedly contacted was an informant for the Drug Enforcement
Administration.

All of this raises a large number of questions, starting with who in Iran is behind the plot
and why they would try something so reckless and do it so clumsily. American officials
say they are certain of the role of several Quds officers and that they cannot imagine
anything this ambitious going forward without the direction of the chief of the Quds
Force, Qassim Suleimani. As President Obama moves forward, he and his aides will have
to figure out how high the responsibility goes.
It is a relief that Mr. Obama will be the one to weigh the evidence and make the
decisions, not his predecessor. He has proved his mettle with the raids that killed Osama
bin Laden and other Al Qaeda leaders. But steely restraint and a dispassionate, effective
response are needed. Not another shoot-first-and-ask-questions-later war.

The administration has begun sharing information with allies and pressing them to
impose additional sanctions on Iran and particularly on organizations and businesses
run by the Revolutionary Guards. The administration should also use this moment to
press hard for a new round of sanctions at the United Nations.

Five years after the Security Council ordered it to halt, Iran is still enriching uranium and
clearly betting that the world will forget or acquiesce. This regime must not be allowed to
develop a nuclear weapon.

Preventing a Syrian Civil War

Doha, Qatar

LAST week, Russia and China vetoed a United Nations Security Council draft resolution
on Syria, dealing a blow to the stability of the country and its neighbors. The double veto
could even lead to civil war.

The inability of the Security Council to act has created a dangerous political vacuum,
sending a clear message to President Bashar al-Assad that he can continue to kill with
impunity and signaling to Syrian protesters that they are on their own.

While Russia and China have emphasized dialogue over confrontation and are proposing
a more balanced resolution, the reality is that the Syrian street has been explicitly
calling for the fall of the Assad regime for months.

Russias and Chinas actions are in many ways a response to the Wests loose
interpretation of United Nations resolutions against Libya, which led to military action
against Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi. While the vetoes may give some political satisfaction
to Moscow and Beijing, the failed resolution has come at the expense of the people and
long-term stability of Syria. This is international politics at its worst.

Since the Security Council began deliberating a resolution on the crisis in Syria in
August, the death toll has doubled, rising to more than 2,900, while the number of those
missing or in detention has reached the tens of thousands.
Susan E. Rice, the American ambassador to the United Nations, may hope that the
people of the Middle East can now see clearly which nations have chosen to ignore their
calls for democracy and instead prop up desperate, cruel dictators. Most, however, are
likely to see only a collective failure on the part of the international community.

The longer the current situation lasts, the more likely it is that Syrias delicate ethnic and
sectarian fabric will be torn apart. Opposition figures, including those from the Muslim
Brotherhood, are fearful of increasing reprisals against the Alawite and Christian elite,
which they would be unable to prevent.

The governments efforts to sow strife, including a spate of assassinations of academics

and a campaign of rape targeting women and girls in predominantly Sunni towns, is
making nonviolent protest seem untenable to the opposition.

The Wests strategy at the United Nations has so far focused on opening up Syria to
international scrutiny to bear witness and report on the atrocities there. But within the
Syrian National Council there is growing talk in private for now of the need for the
protection of civilians by any means necessary. These means would include
international monitors, but could extend to the establishment of safe zones for civilians,
and if necessary the establishment of a no-fly zone, or even as a last resort, foreign boots
on the ground.

Washington has instead continued to pursue a strategy of leading from behind. It does
so in part out of a belief that a more gung-ho approach may in fact deflect from efforts by
members of the opposition and paint them as the Wests stooges, as the government has
claimed. But as the killings mount, this policy is merely heightening suspicions that
America is not serious about supporting the protests and preparing for a post-Assad
Syria.

This strategy is not working. America and Europe must push Syrias neighbors to
support punitive measures against Assad and apply diplomatic pressure on Russia and
China.

Russias warning after the United Nations vote that Mr. Assad should carry out reforms
and restore peace or face some kinds of decisions from Russia presents an opening.
Arab states were crucial in pressuring Russia and China when it came to achieving
effective United Nations action in Libya and must do the same now.

Washington should also encourage Turkey to play a more forceful role; the increasingly
exasperated Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, now seems more likely to
 do that. Specifically, Turkey should reduce trade with Syria and place targeted sanctions
on the government.

The United States should also recognize the Syrian National Council as the legitimate
opposition leadership of the Syrian people and encourage key Arab, regional and
European powers to do the same. The decision by European foreign ministers on
Monday to welcome the council as a positive step forward is a useful riposte to Syrian
threats against those who formally recognize the group, but it does not go far enough.

The Syrian National Councils 230-member body represents a broad and inclusive, if
imperfect, cross-section of the Syrian opposition including secularists, Islamists and,
critically, the young generation of street protesters risking their lives. International
recognition would make it more effective and send a strong signal of support to the
opposition.

In addition, the United States should push the Syrian National Council to be as inclusive
as possible, particularly in attracting members of the Alawite and Christian
communities.

Determined American diplomacy can still prevent the pressing danger that these
communities, unable to live with their losses and fearful of the future, will resort to
violence.

Syrias combustible ethnic mix was once grounds for American hesitation in supporting
the opposition; now, with violence spiraling out of control, it has become a reason for
further American involvement.

If the United States and its European and regional allies do not act quickly, Syria will
descend into chaos.

Salman Shaikh is director of the Brookings Doha Center and a fellow at the Saban
Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution

OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR

Tehrans Foes, Unfairly Maligned

By LOUIS J. FREEH

Published: October 12, 2011

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Washington

AS the United States tries to halt Irans nuclear program and prepares to withdraw
troops from Iraq, American voters should ask why the Obama administration has bent to
the will of Tehrans mullahs and their Iraqi allies on a key issue: the fate of 3,400
unarmed members of the exiled Iranian opposition group, Mujahedeen Khalq, who are
living in Camp Ashraf, north of Baghdad.

The government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, a Shiite Muslim, has brazenly
murdered members of the Mujahedeen Khalq. Mr. Maliki justifies his attacks by noting
that the group is on the United States official list of foreign terrorist organizations.

In April, Iraqi forces entered Camp Ashraf and fatally shot or ran over 34 residents and
wounded hundreds more. Mr. Maliki has now given the Mujahedeen Khalq until Dec. 31
to close the camp and disperse its residents throughout Iraq.

Without forceful American and United Nations intervention to protect the camps
residents and a decision by the State Department to remove Mujahedeen Khalqs official
designation as a terrorist group, an even larger attack on the camp or a massacre of its
residents elsewhere in Iraq is likely.
This situation is the direct result of the State Departments misconceived attempt to
cripple the Mujahedeen Khalq by labeling it a terrorist organization, beginning in 1997.
At the time, I was director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I concluded that this
was part of a fruitless political ploy to encourage a dialogue with Tehran. There was no
credible evidence then, nor has there been since, that the group poses any threat to the
United States.

Tragically, the State Departments unjustified terrorist label makes the Mujahedeen
Khalqs enemies in Tehran and Baghdad feel as if they have a license to kill and to
trample on the written guarantees of protection given to the Ashraf residents by the
United States. And Tehrans kangaroo courts also delight in the terrorist designation as
an excuse to arrest, torture and murder anyone who threatens the mullahs regime.

For better or worse, the State Department often makes politically motivated
designations, which is why the Irish Republican Army was never put on the list (despite
the F.B.I.s recommendation). Similarly, Moktada al-Sadrs Mahdi Army in Iraq and the
Haqqani terrorist network in Pakistan both of which have murdered many Americans
have successfully avoided being listed.

During my tenure as F.B.I. director, I refused to allocate bureau resources to

investigating the Mujahedeen Khalq, because I concluded, based on the evidence, that
the designation was unfounded and that the group posed no threat to American security.

I did, however, object to the State Departments politically motivated insistence that the
F.B.I. stop fingerprinting Iranian wrestlers, and intelligence operatives posing as
athletes, when the wrestlers were first invited to the United States in a good-will gesture.
And the F.B.I. did try, unsuccessfully, to focus the Clinton administration on the threat
posed by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, which exported terrorism and
committed or orchestrated acts of war against America, including the 1996 Khobar
Towers attack in Saudi Arabia, which killed 19 American airmen. We learned from
prosecutors on Tuesday that a unit of the corps plotted to murder the Saudi ambassador
in Washington.

Some critics call the Mujahedeen Khalq a dangerous cult. But since leaving office, I have
carefully reviewed the facts and stand by the conclusion that the Mujahedeen Khalq is
not a terrorist organization and should be removed from the State Departments list
immediately. Many of the most knowledgeable and respected terrorism experts in the
world have come to the same conclusion. (Though I have on some occasions received
speakers fees or travel expenses from sympathizers of the Mujahedeen Khalq, my
objective analysis as a career law enforcement officer is the only basis for my
conclusions.)
Britain and the European Union have already acted on the evidence, removing the
Mujahedeen Khalq from their sanctions lists in 2008 and 2009, respectively. The British
court reviewing the Mujahedeen Khalq dossier went so far as to call the terrorist
designation perverse.

The Mujahedeen Khalq is now led by a charismatic and articulate woman, Maryam
Rajavi, who enjoys significant support in European governments. In 2001, the
Mujahedeen Khalq renounced violence and ceased military action against the Iranian
regime. And in 2003, the group voluntarily handed over its weapons to American forces
in Iraq and has since provided the United States with valuable intelligence regarding
Irans nuclear weapons program. By the State Departments own guidelines, Mujahedeen
Khalq should be delisted.

Yet Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and the White House have balked at
delisting the group and protecting its members at Camp Ashraf, despite bipartisan calls
for action.

Incredibly, as our duty to protect the camps residents reaches a critical stage, the State
Department offers only silence and delay. The secretary is still reviewing the
designation nearly 15 months after the United States Court of Appeals in Washington
ruled that the department had broken the law by failing to accord the Mujahedeen Khalq
due process when listing it as a terrorist group. Mrs. Clinton has not complied with the
courts order to indicate which sources she regards as sufficiently credible to justify this
life-threatening designation. The reason is clear: there is no evidence.

Louis J. Freeh was director of the F.B.I. from 1993 to 2001.

October 12, 2011, 8:30 pm

A Shelf-Obsessed Writer
By JAMI ATTENBERG

Townies is a series about life in New York.

Tags:

books, Coffee, New York City, Writers

I cant remember when I first became obsessed with the cafes free bookcase,
but sometime in the last year it was suddenly so, and I was regularly making
pilgrimages there. I took books home to read, and brought others in to
replace them. I noticed which ones were snapped up quickly and which sat
for too long. I rooted for the galley of Emily St. John Mandels smart novel
The Singers Gun to find a good home, but felt a little smug about another
novel which sucked up all the press in the universe when it came out, even
though it was not its authors finest work, not by a long shot, and one might
wonder if perhaps the author was even phoning it in which no one touched
for weeks.
But mostly, I waited in both terror and anticipation for my own books of
fiction to show up on the shelves someday. Surely someone in the
neighborhood had read one of them, I told myself, what with my being a
local author and all. But if someone did bring in one of my books, what did it
mean? Was it that he had read it once and did not treasure it? Or was it that
he had read it and found it so delightful that he wanted to share it with the
world? And what would happen next? Would it sit there, gathering dust, or
would someone pick it up and take it home? What would I and my fragile
writers ego do then?
Reader, I forced the issue. Two weeks ago, I brought in the three books Id
written. I had to know what would happen. And so, while the feisty protesters
occupied Wall Street, and our armed forces served our country so admirably
in foreign lands, and all over the world every minute doctors and nurses
saved lives, I stalked my own books for five days.
 James Gulliver Hancock

The cafe in question, Caf Grumpy in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, is home to a

youthful, charmingly messy clientele who, laptops in tow, come to work
there more often than to socialize. The bookcase is located to the right of the
bathroom in the rear of the cafe, near a large machine that roasts the coffee
beans. All day long the roaster hums, and it smells fantastic.
It is no more remarkable than any other bookcase: light brown, unvarnished
wood, and each of the four shelves is tall enough to hold hardcover books,
with a few inches to spare. There are some random objects on the shelves:
two English as a Foreign Language cassette tapes and two yoga and pilates
VHS tapes. There is also a brown paper bag containing homemade laminated
recipe card bookmarks, another brown paper bag of half-used tubes of block
printing paint and an old tin tomato can full of zippers.
And then there are the books. Mostly paperbacks. There are a lot of novels,
split fairly evenly between mass market and literary fiction, a handful of
books of criticism, and some dated political tomes. The gorgeous and moving
non-fiction book Number Our Days by Barbara Myerhoff sits placidly on
the top shelf, knowing that while it is more than 30 years old, it is still a very
good book. Theres not a lot of poetry, but a beat-up copy of The Norton
Anthology of Poetry has been there for quite a long time, and I like that it
remains as some sort of reference manual for the people waiting in line to use
the restroom.
Pilates VHS tapes, an old tin can full of zippers, and my books.
On the first day, I placed my books strategically among these odds and ends.
My first book, Instant Love, a short story collection with the image of a
wishbone on a baby blue cover, got what I guessed would be the sweet spot
top row, dead center. I placed the galley version of my first novel, The
Kept Man, which has a pretty but depressed-looking woman on the cover,
horizontally across the tops of the other books, on the third row down. And
finally, the paperback of my latest book, The Melting Season, the title in
gorgeous, drippy colorful letters, went horizontally across the top row in the
left corner. They all had their appeal, but if I had to call it, Id pick Instant
Love to go first, if only because people like to read books about love.
While there, I ran into a comedy writer I know, Alex, the author of a book
himself, and told him about my project. He admitted that he, too, stalked the
bookcase. (And then, like a junkie sharing the name of a dealer, he told me
about a different coffee shop nearby that also had a pretty good free
bookcase.) Alex said he had recently noticed a friends memoir on the
bottom shelf, and he had taken a picture of it and texted it to her. You made
the Caf Grumpy bookshelf, he told her, but she hadnt been that excited
about it. Yeah, I cant tell if its a good thing or a bad thing, I said.
Whatever it is, its the end of the line. Heres what happens when a book
comes out: you have a short window of time where everything is just as it
should be. Your book is sitting in a beautiful bookstore where someone
(usually a blood relation or your college roommate) walks in and is prepared
to pay full price for it. And then review copies are on sale for three bucks on
Amazon. Not to mention places like the Strand in Manhattan, where I have
been unable to shop since 2006, when I saw review copies of my first book
on sale within a few days of its release. And now Id stooped even lower; I
was trying to give mine away. So, to recap, the life of a printed book goes
something like this: bookstores, Amazon bargains, used bookstores, free
bookshelves, landfills. And then, someday, we all die.
The second day at the cafe I noticed a few changes: the addition of three
AAA driving guides to various locations in New England, as well as a
coverless hardcover copy of The Little Friend by Donna Tartt. There had
been no movement on my books. I was disheartened.
To make matters worse, a tight group of worker bees had taken all the tables
in the back room, and I was forced into the front. The only place to sit was
next to a guy who had noisily pulled out a salad, his own bottle of dressing, a
container of hummus, a piece of pita bread and a hunk of sausage, all in
flagrant violation of the No Outside Food or Drinks sign clearly posted
nearby. I was appalled, and left the cafe early. Tomorrow is going to be my
day, I told myself.
And it was! When I arrived on the third morning, the copy of Instant Love
was gone. Oh joy! Validation! I wanted to do victory laps around the cafe. I
had successfully given my book away for free.
I moved the copy of The Melting Season into the same slot Instant Love
had occupied. Maybe that really is the sweet spot, I thought. Maybe thats
precisely where the eye goes. I spotted on the bottom shelf a hardcover copy
of Andrea Levys fine, accomplished novel, The Long Song, with its cover
of twining purple tree limbs. Should I move that copy up a few shelves so
that people could see it better? But if I do that, will it distract from my own
books? This wasnt a game for me anymore. This was serious. Id tasted
triumph, and I wanted more.
Related
More From Townies
Read previous contributions to this series.

Go to All Posts

On the fourth day, I got to the cafe early enough to secure a spot facing the
bookcase. I watched exactly one woman linger in front of the paper bag of
bookmarks while she was waiting for the bathroom, and that was it.
Meanwhile more books had arrived, and the shelves were starting to look a
little sloppy. Everyone sitting at the table with me had tattoo sleeves and
headphones. My high from the day before had completely dissipated. Also, I
was starting to hate coffee.
Day five. Nothing good can come from this, I thought. Isnt it better not to
know? One day the books will be there, and maybe the next day they will be
gone, and there is nothing I can do about it. Ive published three books in six
years, and there is one thing I have learned: no one can make anyone want to
read a book, let alone buy it. The only thing you can do is write the best
books you can.
I chatted with one of the baristas, a pretty young woman who had a piece of
lace tied in a bow above her long, wavy hair. She had a steady gaze. I asked
her who took care of the bookcase, and she said she did sometimes. She told
me that she often cleared out the dime store novels and put them on the
sidewalk in front of the cafe. I told her I was writing about the bookcase, and
 she asked me why I was interested. Well, its the end of the line, isnt it? I
said.
Although it wasnt quite the end of the line, I realized. Someone cared
enough to bring them in to the cafe instead of tossing them in the trash.
Someone believed these books were worth reading.
I asked her if she ever read any of the books, and she told me she did. She
had moved to Brooklyn from another state, and had left all of her books
behind. So everything she read came from the shelves in the cafe. She would
take the books home, read them, and then bring them back with her when she
was done.
I pictured many things at once after that: being brand-new in New York,
struggling to make ends meet, reading a book for company or comfort,
tending to a bookcase that was not your own just because you loved books. I
remembered the way I felt about books before I ever published one, before I
knew anything about what the end of the line meant. I wanted to ask her if
she was the one who took the copy of Instant Love, but I let my ego rest
for the first time that week. I sincerely hoped that she had, though. I hoped
that she had read it, and liked it, and would bring it back for someone else to
read, shelving it with care.

EDITORIAL

A Smart Immigration Move at Rikers

Published: October 12, 2011

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Mayor Michael Bloomberg speaks often about the need for smart and humane
immigration reform. He has now rightly thrown his support behind a City Council bill
that would place sensible limits on how far New York City goes to help the federal
government detain and deport illegal immigrants who pose no threat to the community.

The bill, sponsored by Speaker Christine Quinn, involves immigrants jailed at Rikers
Island. Officials there, as in most of the country, routinely send lists of foreign-born
inmates to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The agency, known as ICE, checks
its databases for immigration violators and sends back requests that certain inmates be
held until taken into federal custody. The city usually obliges, though no law or
agreement requires it to.

The agency issued so-called detainers on 3,506 Rikers inmates in 2009. But were they all
dangerous criminals? The City Council found that while about 22 percent of the
detainers were placed on inmates with felony records, more than half involved inmates
with no prior convictions.

Under Ms. Quinns bill, the city would still allow ICE into its jails and would keep firm
hold on criminals who threatened public safety. But it would end the voluntary practice
of handing over inmates who clearly do not belong in ICEs dragnet. That is, those who
are about to be released because charges have been dropped, who have no prior
convictions or outstanding warrants, who have not been previously ordered deported,
and who do not appear on watch lists of gang members and terrorists.

It is a sensible approach, nothing like the thoughtless harshness we see in Alabama and
Arizona, where radical laws have enabled indiscriminate roundups, without regard to the
devastating harm to families, citizen children or the economy. With deportations at
record highs under President Obama partly because of the outsourcing of immigration
enforcement to local police agencies discretion and compassion are needed more than
ever. His administration recently declared that it would focus on deporting dangerous
criminals, not harmless workers. With this bill, New York would help make sure those
good intentions stick. The Council should swiftly pass this bill.
The Charges Aga http://w w w .nytim default October 13, 2011 The New York Tim

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