4 Comments. Add your own...

• 1. Jimmy | November 9th, 2006 at 11:32 pm

  An interesting point.
  but why it is like wherever there is a muslim there is violence?

• 2. Herbert Kaine | November 10th, 2006 at 4:19 am

  BUENOS AIRES, Argentina - A federal judge on Thursday ordered the detention of former Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani and eight others in connection with the 1994 bombing of a Jewish cultural center that killed 85 people, the judge’s office said.

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  A special prosecutor sought the order, alleging that the worst terrorist attack ever on Argentine soil was orchestrated by leaders of the Iranian government and entrusted to the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah.

  Iran’s leading diplomatic envoy in Buenos Aires, speaking with The Associated Press by telephone, said his government would oppose any efforts to detain Rafsanjani or other Iranian nationals. Mohsen Baharvand, Iran’s charge d’affaires here, called the case politically motivated.

  An official in the office of Federal Judge Rodolfo Canicoba Corral who spoke with the AP on condition of not being identified by name said the judge was seeking the detention of Rafsanjani and eight others. The official said details would be released later.

  The July 1994 bombing of the Jewish cultural center here killed 85 people and injured more than 200 others. Investigators say an explosives-packed van was driven up to the building and detonated.

  Iran’s government has vehemently denied any involvement in the attack following repeated accusations by the Jewish community and other leaders here.

  Baharvand called the effort a “huge propaganda” campaign against his country, adding Iran was “a scapegoat for the shortcomings of the countries that are not able to find the real perpetrators of this act.”

  “These are baseless allegations against my country,” he added.

  Two special prosecutors on Oct. 25 urged Canicoba Corral to seek international and national arrest orders for Rafsanjani, who was Iran’s president between 1989 and 1997 and is now the head of the Expediency Council, which mediates between parliament and the clerics in ruling the country.

  Alberto Nisman, the lead prosecutor, said last month that the decision to attack the center “was undertaken in 1993 by the highest authorities” of the Iranian government at the time, and that the actual attack was entrusted to Hezbollah.

  Nisman also asked Canicoba Corral to detain several other former Iranian officials, including former intelligence chief Ali Fallahijan, former Foreign Minister Ali Ar Velayati, two former commanders of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, two former Iranian diplomats and a former Hezbollah security chief for external affairs.

  A botched investigation into the case by judge Juan Jose Galeano was halted in 2004 by federal courts and a special investigation unit was created. Galeano was removed from the case and later stripped of his judgeship.

  Nisman announced in November 2005 that investigators believed a 21-year-old Lebanese Hezbollah militant had been identified as the suicide bomber.

  The attack on the seven-story Jewish center, symbol of a Jewish population numbering more than 200,000, was the second of two attacks targeting Jews in Argentina during the 1990s.

  A March 1992 blast destroyed the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, killing 29 people in a case that has also been blamed on Hezbollah.

• 3. lynne wooldridge | November 10th, 2006 at 6:15 am

  I agree: the violence is crazy and needs to stop. I don’t care if people have differences, they should be able to live their own lives, not impose their religion or values on others, and live respectfully. Killing is sick. I believe that things are worse every day. I hear about hatred but very little about compassion and understanding. I just read today that the Palestinians are calling for retaliation against Israel for the errant shell that hit a family in Gaza. They are not looking at their own actions and the part that their violence played in this tragedy. Calls for hatred and violence and very few calls for peace, making amends, or forgiveness. Thank you for your insightful post–a voice for reason and sanity.

• 4. Europia | November 10th, 2006 at 4:53 pm

  The thirst for power, the arrogance of ideologies and the lacking respect for any human life has accompained mankind throughout its history. No change in sight…

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