Eric Zuesse<\/p>\n
On March 14th, Iran announced<\/span><\/a> that it will never pay the $10.5B that a U.S. court demanded it pay for the 9\/11 attacks.<\/span><\/p>\n The same Bill-Clinton-appointed judge<\/span><\/a> who had ruled, on 29 September 2015, that Saudi Arabia has sovereign immunity for 9\/11 and so can\u2019t be sued for it<\/span><\/a>, ruled recently, on March 9th that Iran doesn\u2019t have sovereign immunity and fined Iran $10.5 billion to be paid to 9\/11 victims and insurers; but, on March 14, Iran\u2019s Foreign Ministry said Iran won\u2019t pay, because, as the Ministry\u2019s spokesman Hossein Jaberi Ansari put it, “The ruling is ludicrous and absurd to the point that it makes a mockery\u00a0of the principle of justice while [it] further tarnishes the US judiciary\u2019s reputation.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The United States is allied with Iran\u2019s enemy Saudi Arabia<\/span><\/a>, the largest purchaser of U.S.-made weapons, and also the top influence in the Gulf Cooperation Council of Arabic oil royal families regarding where they buy their weapons. Those purchases, which are crucial to the stockholders in Lockheed Martin and other U.S. weapons-makers, are determined basically by the Saud family, the owners of Saudi Arabia. The Sauds, as the owners of the leading fundamentalist-Sunni country, including sole ownership of the world\u2019s largest oil company Aramco<\/span><\/a>, also own Islam\u2019s two holiest sites, Mecca and Medina, and are therefore the leaders of Islam worldwide, because all Muslims (not only fundamentalist Sunnis<\/i>) are required to bow down in prayer five times every day facing Mecca<\/span><\/a> \u2014 facing the Saud family and the clergy that authorize continued ownership of Saudi Arabia by the Saud family: the Wahhabist clergy. Back in 1744<\/span><\/a>, the founder of Wahhabism, Muhammad Ibn Wahhab, and the founder of Saudi Arabia, Muhammad Ibn Saud, jointly swore an eternal oath that Saud\u2019s descendants would own the country, and that Wahhab\u2019s clergymen would grant them God\u2019s approval of their ownership and of their right to conquer other lands to expand the faith. (Religions throughout history have mainly been spread by conquest.)<\/span><\/p>\n Part of that oath was also that the Sauds would exterminate Shia Muslims, so as to unify Islam worldwide as fundamentalist Sunnis, in order to enable a unified (100% Sunni) faith to take over the entire world. Iran is the center of Shia Islam, and so is especially the target of the Sauds to conquer and \u2018convert\u2019 the world to Wahhabism \u2014 which is called \u201cSalafism\u201d outside Saudi Arabia, and which is known outside Islam as simply fundamentalist Sunni Islam<\/i>. Al Qaeda, ISIS, and other global-jihadist groups, all are Salafists; they\u2019re all Sunni fundamentalists. Shia Islam has no real equivalent to this \u201cglobal Caliphate\u201d idea, the goal of conquering the world to \u2018convert\u2019 all lands someday to Islam. Jihadism, in that sense, doesn\u2019t exist, except in the Sunni variant of Islam. Perhaps this is what Mr. Ansari meant by calling that judge\u2019s verdict \u201cludicrous and absurd.\u201d (However, Shia Islam tends to be more anti-Israeli<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>than does Sunni Islam; but, again, that\u2019s no sort of global<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>aspiration; it\u2019s strictly<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>Middle-Eastern.) (And, of course, historians, and the U.S. government, know these things, even if the U.S. public don\u2019t \u2014 especially because it would be inconvenient for the U.S. government if the U.S. public knew what\u2019s actually driving<\/span><\/a> this nation\u2019s foreign policies.)<\/span><\/p>\n According to the evidence (or alleged evidence) that the judge in this case, George B. Daniels, cited in his\u00a0\u201cFindings of Fact and Conclusions of Law\u201d<\/span><\/a>\u00a0 \u2014 in this case called \u201cFiona Havlish v. Usama Bin Laden\u201d:<\/span><\/p>\n Iran has been waging virtually an undeclared war against both the United States and Israel for thirty years.\u00a0\u2026Iran wages this undeclared war through asymetrical, or unconventional strategies and terrorism, often through proxies such as Hizballah, Hamas <\/i>[which is actually\u00a0\u201ca\u00a0Palestinian\u00a0Sunni-<\/i>Islamic\u00a0fundamentalist organization\u201d<\/span><\/a>\u00a0and as such is devoted to the destruction of Shiite Iran as well as Jewish Israel], Al Qaeda<\/i> [which is likewise Salafist], and others<\/i>\u00a0 [all of which are Salafist].\u00a0\u2026<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n For more than two decades, the IRGC <\/i>[Islamic Republican Guard Corps, run by Iran\u2019s Supreme Leader Ali Khameni]\u00a0has provided funding and\/or training for terrorism operations targeting American citizens, including Hizballah and Al Qaeda.\u00a0<\/i>[Hizballah has targeted American citizens who are serving in the U.S. military in Lebanon, because Hizballah is anti-Israeli, not because they are anti-American; and the U.S. military protect Israel. However, Al Qaeda targets non-Sunnis everywhere, and this also means that Al Qaeda is anti-Shia and aims to conquer Iran too: Al Qaeda is Salafist, dedicated to the conquest of all non-Sunni nations. Iran doesn\u2019t fund or train its own enemies, such as Al Qaeda and ISIS.] \u2026 The factual reality\u00a0\u2014 as found by the 9\/11 Report\u00a0\u2014 is that\u00a0\u2019the relationship between Al Qaeda and Iran demonstrated that Sunni-Shia divisions did not necessarily pose an insurmountable barrier to cooperation between terrorist organizations.’ \u2026 While Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda were headquartered in Sudan in the early 1990s, Hassan al-Turabi fostered the creation of a foundation and alliance for combined Sunni and Shi\u2019a opposition to the United States and the West, an effort that was agreed to and joined by Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, leaders of Al Qaeda, and by the leadership of Iran.\u00a0\u2026 Thereafter, senior Al Qaeda operatives and trainers traveled to Iran to receive training in explosives.\u00a0\u2026 In 1993, in a meeting in Khartoum, Sudan, arranged by Ali Mohamed, a confessed Al Qaeda terrorist and trainer now in a U.S. prison,\u00a0\u2026 Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri met directly with Iran\u2019s master terrorist Imad Mughniyah and Iranian officials. <\/i>[Wikipedia\u2019s article on that witness,\u00a0Ali Mohamed<\/span><\/a>, says: “Ali Abdul Saoud Mohamed, is a double agent who worked for both the\u00a0CIA and Egyptian Islamic Jihad simultaneously,\u00a0reporting on the\u00a0workings of each for the benefit of the other.\u201d He would tell U.S. interrogators whatever they wanted to hear \u2014 such as that Iran was significantly involved in the 9\/11 plot.]<\/span><\/p>\n Iran\u2019s\u00a0news-report on March 14th<\/span><\/a>\u00a0summarizes that U.S. court decision by saying:<\/span><\/p>\n The court ruling is based on the 9\/11 Commission Report which stated\u00a0that some attackers moved through Iran and did not\u00a0have their passports\u00a0stamped.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n The verdict comes as none of the 19 hijackers on\u00a0September 11 were Iranian citizens. Fifteen were from Saudi Arabia,\u00a0while\u00a0two from the United Arab Emirates <\/i>[another Salafist-run country]\u00a0and one each from Egypt and\u00a0Lebanon<\/i>\u00a0[Salafists from each].\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n That alleged permission for \u201csome attackers\u201d to move freely through Iran instead of requiring them to use other countries to transit, is the basis of the court\u2019s blaming Iran for 9\/11, even though nothing is alleged in the court\u2019s findings, that Iran participated in the 9\/11 attacks, and also despite the following being noted even in the judge\u2019s findings: \u201cAlthough Al Qaeda operatives Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Ramzi Binalshibh (now Guantanamo detainees) denied any reason, other than Iran\u2019s refraining from stamping passports, for the hijackers to have traveled through Iran or any relationship between the hijackers and Hizballah, \u2026 their denials are not credible. … The actions of Iranian border authorities in refraining from stamping the passports of the Saudi hijackers vastly increased the likelihood of the operational success of the 9\/11 plot.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Therefore, the U.S. government blames 9\/11 on Iran, and only<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>on Iran (not at all on the Sauds and their Salafist friends).<\/span><\/p>\n However,\u00a0according to<\/span><\/a>\u00a0the bookkeeper and bagman for Al Qaeda \u2014 the man who travelled to collect in cash each one of the multi-million-dollar donations to Al Qaeda, with which donations the organization paid, as he said, the \u201csalaries\u201d of all of the fighters, including all of the 9\/11 hijackers \u2014 almost all of the donors were members of the Saudi royal family, and a few of their friends. Among the named multimillion-dollar donors were: Prince Bandar bin Sultan al-Saud, Prince Waleed bin Tallal al-Saud, Prince Turki al-Faisal al-Saud, and Prince Mohammed al-Faisal al-Saud. Furthermore, he delivered sealed letters back-and-forth between bin Laden and Turki as well as “Abdullah, Fahd, okay, Salman [the present King], Waleed bin Talal,\u00a0Bandar, Turki of course, and … Shaykh Bin Baz,\u00a0Shaykh Uthaimeen,\u00a0Shaykh Shehri, and Shaykh Hammoud al-Uqlaa.\u201d Bin Laden was advising them on whom the next Saudi King should be. He also advised, on that, “Halad or Shaykh Abu Hasan, Shayk Mujahideen, Shaykh Aman, and Shaykh Abul Sef \u2026 they want to know who they should support.\u201d However, ultimately, the deciders on whom the next King should be were \u201cUlema [the Wahhabist clergy], essentially they are the king maker, \u2026 the people who \u2026 certify the Islamic legality of the jihad of Osama bin Laden.\u201d He explained that the royals donated to bin Laden because he was spreading the faith and was therefore important to the Ulema \u2014 the clergy. That\u2019s why they funded Al Qaeda \u2014 to spread the faith. For example, “Prince Nawaf” (bin Sultan bin Abdulaziz al-Saud<\/span><\/a>), even though he, like \u201call the Prince(s), they were giving money\u201d to Al Qaeda, was rejected<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>by the Ulema, “because Nawaf was known as a(n) extremely anti-Islamic person, okay, Sul \u2014 Sultan was being seen as a sodomite.\u201d So, the ultimate people behind 9\/11 were not only the Saud Princes but the Ulema \u2014 the kingmakers (who, however, are required to select the King only from among the Saud Princes).<\/span><\/p>\n But, like the Sauds, and their lesser royals (all of them likewise Salafist) who rule the other Arabic oil-kingdoms, the U.S. government wants to conquer (yet again, after the first<\/i>\u00a0 <\/span>time, the 1953 coup<\/span><\/a>) Iran; so, the U.S. court-system, in this decision, is declaring the Iranian government to be not just a cause, but \u2014 in effect \u2014 the sole cause, of 9\/11. It\u2019s a way to squeeze Iran, to keep it down until another \u2018revolution\u2019 there (hoped to be by the CIA, like the first one was).<\/span><\/p>\n And, as far as the 9\/11-victim families are concerned: the U.S. government, obviously, has higher priorities than to be concerned about any sort of real \u201cjustice\u201d for them. Punishing Iran (until it breaks, \u2018America\u2019s\u2019 way) is far more important, to the powers-that-be in America. The victim-families can find their \u2018justice\u2019 only in heaven \u2014 if ever. (And, of course, the Salafists \u2014 including the 9\/11 perpetrators \u2014 would have a different opinion regarding which individuals go to heaven, and which to hell.)<\/span><\/p>\n \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of\u00a0 They\u2019re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010<\/i><\/span><\/a>,<\/i> and of \u00a0<\/i>CHRIST\u2019S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity<\/i><\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Eric Zuesse On March 14th, Iran announced that it will never pay the $10.5B that a U.S. court demanded it pay for the 9\/11 attacks. The same Bill-Clinton-appointed judge who had ruled, on 29 September 2015, that Saudi Arabia has sovereign immunity for 9\/11 and so can\u2019t be sued for it, ruled recently, on March […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1254,"featured_media":230074,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[461],"tags":[1022,115,30,1036,27,32,96,1035,535,34,59,524,8748,92,76,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-231683","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-editorials","8":"tag-1022","9":"tag-barack-obama","10":"tag-big-brother","11":"tag-breaking-news","12":"tag-bush","13":"tag-cia","14":"tag-cover-up","15":"tag-daily-news","16":"tag-global-news","17":"tag-iran","18":"tag-military","19":"tag-russia","20":"tag-saud","21":"tag-terrorism","22":"tag-warfare","23":"tag-white-house"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1254"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=231683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231683\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/230074"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=231683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=231683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=231683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}