The official Russian response to the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, reputedly the head of Iran's nuclear weapons drive condemned the attack but expected Iran to act with restraint and not succumb to provocations. The foreign ministry announcement condemning the attack stated " We call on all sides to refrain from moves that could escalate tensions." [1] The announcement also did not assign blame to any specific party. Petr Akopov, the lead commentator for Russia's RIA Novosti departed from this pattern in an article for Ria.ru. True, Akopov also believed that Iran should not allow itself to be provoked by the assassination, but his article was a full-throated testimonial to Iran, a country that had valiantly resisted Western globalization and materialism and had successfully welded religion and democracy. Iran, according to Akopov, had successfully rallied the Muslim world to resist the United States and Israel, the true terrorists as proven by the assassinations of Qasem Soleimani and now Mohsen Fakhrizadeh. The main reason why Iran should resist the provocation argues Akopov was that it was winning on all fronts. The US was in retreat from the Middle East, and would be shortly consigning Israel to its fate.
Akopov may not be representative of Russian thinking on this issue, (and the last time this article was accessed, down votes outnumbered up votes by more than ten to one), but he represents a strand of Russian thought that intuitively sides with anti-Western Muslim leaders both in Turkey and Iran.[2]
Akopov's article follows below: [3]
Petr Akopov (Source: Izborsk.md)
Israel And The Americans Are The Real Terrorists But Can Act With Impunity
"How would you call a state, which conducts terrorist attacks in other countries, kills unwanted people, whose armed forces periodically (without any invitations or provocations) attack other countries? - A terrorist country. What if this country also has nuclear weapons? – a terrorist with an atomic bomb.
"Should such a state be punished? Well, of course, if not by counter mirror actions (based on the principle of 'an eye for an eye') or military invasion (which is impossible because of the risk of nuclear war), then by various international sanctions, by the inclusion of this state in the list of countries - sponsors of terrorism. After all, terrorism is the main enemy and threat to humanity: this, at least, that is what they have told us in the past two decades, since the September 11 attacks.
"If so? Well, in that case, you are not only an Americanophobe, but also an anti-Semite, because you oppose 'Israel’s legitimate right to kill Israel's enemies anywhere and anytime.' Yes, I am talking about last Friday's murder of a nuclear scientist and one of the leaders of the Iranian military-industrial complex Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.
"He died near Tehran after a terrorist attack organized by the Israeli special services: Israel, of course, does not officially confirm its involvement, but no one in the world has any doubts about who ordered and organized this murder. Israel has already killed several Iranian nuclear scientists and has repeatedly organized assassination attempts on Fakhrizadeh. Tehran accused the United States and Israel of the murder and promised to take revenge.
But almost everyone is sure that there will be no adequate retaliation: earlier this year, the Americans killed Qasem Soleimani, the legendary Iranian general, in Baghdad, and the response was modest to say the least (a strike on a [military] base in Iraq, for which the Americans had time to prepare).
"But the absence of a mirror response does not mean the< success of the US-Israeli strategy to fight Iran. Although, first one needs to understand at first what and why they are fighting."
Iran Has Carried On The Fight Against Western Globalism And Materialism Even When It Stood Alone
"Iran has been acting as the world’s most consistent ideological enemy of the West for forty years, Israel in this case is only a part of Western civilization removed to the Middle East.
"After the Iranian revolution a unique [political] system was founded - an Islamic theocracy combined with an elective democracy. After the collapse of the USSR and the communist project, only one ideological system was left in the world that promoted itself as an alternative and opponent of Western globalism, consumer society and technocratic materialism – I’m talking about the Iranian Islamic model of society and the state. Like all great peoples, the Iranians (descendants of one of the world's oldest civilizations) are not devoid of messianism.
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"Yes, Iranians are Shi'ites, that is, they belong to the minority of the Islamic world - but their ambitions are pan-Islamic at the very least. [The Islamic world] is composed of one and a half or even two billion people – no small part of the Earth’s population – united by living and burning faith and solidarity. For Atlantic globalizers, Islam is most inconvenient, primarily because it is a traditionalist society that cannot be rebuilt in the desired consumer-hedonistic way. But the Islamic world is fragmented both religiously and politically, divided into dozens of states and peoples. It can be manipulated - both by pitting countries against each other and by creating managed projects and states. The West has been doing the for many years, preventing the emergence of a leader capable of leading the Muslim Ummah.
"But here Iran enters the stage, and that country claims not only independence, but the right to rally all Muslims against external pressure and attempts to manipulate them. The struggle for Jerusalem became a symbol of Islam’s resistance to the West. The city was taken from the Muslims not just by Israel, but by the West as a whole. It is no coincidence that the unit headed by Soleimani is called “Al-Quds” – by the Arabic name for Jerusalem.
Iran Supports The Justified Resistance Of The Palestinians And The Lebanese
"Iran is Israel’s enemy exactly to the same extent as the West and Israel, which occupies Palestine and does not want to return East Jerusalem, are enemies of the Islamic world. For more than half a century, Israel has refused to liberate East Jerusalem, despite any UN resolution whatsoever and the position of most of the world's countries. Is it the right of the strong? - Yes, but then one should not be surprised at the right to resistance. Iran, more than anyone else in the Islamic world, supports those, who fight against Israeli occupation or aggression: Palestinians, Lebanese.
“'Ah, he supports terrorists from the Lebanese Hezbollah!' - say the Anglo-Saxon media, but in fact, Hezbollah is not even a party or an army, it is a self-organization of the Shiite population of Lebanon, which has long been the majority in the country, but does not have adequate representation in government. Iran supports not only the Shiites of Hezbollah, but also the Sunnis in Palestine. Yes, it supports those who are determined to resist Israel. Well, it would be strange to expect that the entire Islamic world will come to terms with the loss of Al-Quds and the Al-Aqsa mosque.
"In response, the United States and Israel demonize Iran in every possible way: it has been declared the devil incarnate, included in the lists of states sponsoring terrorism, and subjected to various international sanctions. Why international sanctions? - Because the whole world was scared by the fact that Iran wants to get an atomic bomb, of course, in order to immediately destroy Israel.
"Shameless speculations on the topic are devised: 'We will not allow a new Holocaust!', which in fact, boils down to the idea, that 'in order to save the Jewish state, Iran must be defeated.' It is clear that it should be done by hands of the United States. After the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, for several years they tried to bring the American-Iranian war closer, at the minimum a strike upon Iran, and at the maximum to its military defeat. What for? - Allegedly in order to stop the Iranian program to create atomic weapons, although the Iranian leadership has repeatedly stated, that the state is not going to create an atomic weapon.
"And in 2013, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei even issued a fatwa on the inadmissibility of nuclear weapons as conflicting with Islam. [iv]But Iran continues to live under sanctions - not only on weapon acquisitions, but also on oil, which deprived potentially one of the world's richest countries of a large part of its national income. But Iran did not give up, and even its 'expansion' in the region, which was used by both Israel and the Saudis (Iran’s main competitors for influence both in the region and in the Islamic world as a whole) to frighten the West and themselves, only gained further headway. Iran strengthened its positions in Iraq, Lebanon, sent an army to help Assad in Syria, supported the Yemeni rebels – these are the most part of the country’s successes, which were only the result of the very same West's defeats and failures (the most striking example is Iraq).
"In 2015, largely thanks to Russia’s participation, an agreement was signed on the Iranian nuclear program - the United States began to look for a way out of the stalemate. It seemed that with a bit more effort Iran would be free of sanctions and begin to breathe freely, but this was not acceptable either for Israel or Saudi Arabia. And, desiring to play ball with them and earn points for this, Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the nuclear deal by tightening pressure on Iran. And in January of this year, he ordered the assassination of Soleimani - a provocation that could cost the whole world very dearly.
"Wanting to play along with them and earn [political] points, Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the nuclear deal by tightening pressure on Iran. So, in January of this year, he ordered the assassination of Soleimani - a provocation that could be very costly to the entire world.
"It could be the case if Iran behaved as recklessly as the United States and Israel. Yes, it does not have their sense of impunity, but most importantly, it has a long-term strategy. It is simple: sooner or later the West will be forced to leave the Middle East. The Arab regimes friendly to the West have lost much of their people’s respect - either because of an unrighteous for Muslims way of life, or due to undignified accommodation to the Americans and the foreign world. None of them prioritized the struggle for al-Quds and the right of Muslims to live by their own laws on their land, but Iran does. Iran’s rival in the struggle for influence on the “Islamic street” is only Recep Erdogan, a Turkish leader close to the Muslim Brotherhood, who is constantly talking about Pan-Islamic interests and goals. But the Anglo-Saxons cannot afford to behave with Turkey like they do with Iran, and the Turkish elite's degree of autonomy from the West is still below that of the Iranian elite.
"The Americans believe that the direction of Turkey's policy still can be changed simply by removing Erdogan - either via a coup or elections. Iran will not turn from its path - therefore, they killed Soleimani and Fakhrizade.
Soleimani (l) and Fakhrizadeh, victims of US-Israeli terror (Image: Translarium.info)
"But the murder of Fakhrizadeh obviously won’t change anything. Even if you believe in Iran’s desire to create an atomic bomb, the Iranian nuclear and missile programs will continue even without him. On the contrary, what if, after his assassination, Ayatollah Khamenei will reconsider his position and decide that the atomic bomb is no longer haram [forbidden]?
"This logic would be appropriate, if Israel really feared the creation of an Iranian atomic bomb and believed that it was intended to attack their country. But no! Israel just really wants to provoke Iran to retaliate. Yes, this was pure provocation: let Iran take revenge, and this will be used as a pretext for an American attack on it. That is, by hook or by crook, Netanyahu for a decade and a half has been trying to encourage the United States to attack Iran. But this time he won’t succeed - neither with Trump nor with Biden. And not only because Iran will not succumb to provocation.
"Because Trump, although he was led astray by the neocons (both with respect to increased pressure on Iran and the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital), still does not consider an attack on Iran as a possible option.
"One should take with caution the recent 'leaks' about his desire to organize an attack on Iranian nuclear facilities - the only thing that looks like the truth is Trump’s desire to study the possibility and effectiveness of a cyber-attack. A war with Iran - and any missile strike on Iranian territory will critically raise such risks - runs counter to Trump’s plans to stop the United States’ involvement in new military conflicts. But the Biden administration will not make waves either – even if it does not return to the nuclear deal – Washington will not pull the chestnuts out of the fire for Israel.
"After all, even such a 'hawk' as Dick Cheney, the US vice-president and the de facto ruler of America under Bush Jr., did not decide to attack Iran, realizing the catastrophic consequences this endeavor could cause. Of course, there are supporters of a military solution to the 'Iranian problem' in Washington like John Bolton, but they do not make decisions. Neither globalists nor new isolationists want to cause Armageddon.
Iran's Victory Over Israel Is Assured
"No one will help Israel, which for a long time (illegally, that is, secretly) is in possession of nuclear weapons, simply because there are no good options in its current strategy.
"An attack on Iran will lead to a major war in the Middle East, in which everyone, including those who provoked it, will be consumed.
"A bet on pressure on Iran and on its isolation will not work either, not because Iran will sooner or later acquire an atomic bomb and drop it on Israel. No! Iran will not do this, but it will continue to support those forces in the Islamic world that do not agree with Israel’s attempts to maintain the status quo in Palestine and Jerusalem forever. And sooner or later it will end with the defeat of this young state [Israel] - after it loses the support of its overseas ally, which will inevitably depart its role of the world hegemon.
"Injustice will kill, not the atomic bomb."
[1] Mid.ru, November 27, 2020.
[2] See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 8874, Russia's Reactions To Turkey's Decision To Turn Hagia Sophia Back Into A Mosque, Part II: Russian Commentator Akopov: 'Two Romes Have Fallen, The Third Stands... That Is, There Is No Longer Constantinople – There Is Istanbul', July 31, 2020.
[3] Ria.ru, December 1, 2020.
[4] MEMRI has published numerous studies that explode the fatwa argument. Akopov clings to this story despite the Israeli abduction of the Iranian Nuclear Archive in 2018. See MEMRI Inquiry & Analysis No.1394, Insights Following Exposure Of Iran's Military Nuclear Program – Part I: The Leadership Of Iran's Religious Regime Lies About Essential Islamic Matters, Manipulates Religion To Justify Its Grip On Power, Regional Expansion, May 6, 2018.
