While many will agree that the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, the “mastermind” of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, has made the world a safer place, and that we owe a debt a gratitude to the Israelis for this latest act of derring-do, designed to further slow Iran’s ability to produce nuclear weapons, John Brennan – who was head of the C.I.A. under Barack Obama – was enraged by Israel’s action. His view was reported here at Jihad Watch yesterday. This report has more: “US, world leaders mum on Fakhrizadeh killing; ex-CIA chief calls hit ‘reckless,’” Times of Israel, November 28, 2020:
United States officials and world leaders remained mum on the killing of Iran’s top nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh as of Friday night [Nov, 27], while the UN called for restraint and a former head of the CIA said the assassination was “highly reckless.”
Was the targeted assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist any more “reckless” than the American killing of the head of Iran’s Quds Force, Qassem Soleimani, at the beginning of this year? Or was this killing any more “reckless” than the killing of Osama bin Laden by Seal Team Six, in 2011, when Brennan was high up in the C.I.A. (he became the Director in 2013)? The Israelis have surely calculated the likelihood of Iranian retaliation, factoring in Tehran’s desire to avoid doing anything until after Trump leaves office. And when that retaliation does come, surely Jerusalem has already prepared a far more devastating response. “Reckless” the attack on Fakhrizadeh was not. “Bold,” “intrepid,” “meticulously planned” – these are fitter adjectives.
When Soleimani was killed, the Americans had no idea what Iran would do; in the end, it sent missiles into two airbases in Iraq that were used by American troops, wounding 100 soldiers, but there were no deaths. Nor did the Americans know how Al Qaeda might respond to the killing of Bin Laden in Abbotabad. Israel’s killing of Fakhrizadeh was less “reckless” than the American killings of Soleimani and bin Laden; the Israelis were able to factor into their decision what they knew about Iran’s likely response, or rather likely lack of it, until after January 20.
There were no immediate comments from the White House, Pentagon, US State Department, CIA or US President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team.
The leaders of other countries were similarly silent. Israel has not commented on the killing and no group has claimed responsibility.
The former head of the CIA, John Brennan, called the assassination a crime that risked inflaming conflict in the region.
This was a criminal act & highly reckless. It risks lethal retaliation & a new round of regional conflict,” Brennan said in a series of tweets.
Fakhrizadeh’s assassination was no more a “criminal act” than the killings, by American forces, of Soleimani and bin Laden, both of which “risked lethal retaliation and a new round of regional conflict.” Fakhrizadeh was a Major General in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, which the American government has designated to be a terrorist group. As the “mastermind” of the nuclear program, he was possibly the most dangerous man in Iran. He didn’t wear a uniform, but he was no civilian. By killing him, and thus delaying still further Iran’s nuclear program, Israel made the world a safer place.
“I do not know whether a foreign government authorized or carried out the murder of Fakhrizadeh,” he said. “Such an act of state-sponsored terrorism would be a flagrant violation of international law & encourage more governments to carry out lethal attacks against foreign officials.”
Of course Brennan knows perfectly well that Israel, a country for which he has exhibited a palpable want of sympathy in the past, was responsible for the assassination of Fakhrizadeh. He pretends “not to know” so that his extraordinary condemnation of what he calls this “act of state-sponsored terrorism,” this “criminal act,” will not be attributed to his anti-Israel bias.
Brennan has repeatedly defined “Jihad” as a non-violent struggle by Muslims to “purify themselves” or for “a moral goal.” In 2009, Brennan said: “Nor does President Obama see this challenge as a fight against ‘jihadists.’ Describing terrorists in this way—using a legitimate term, ‘jihad,’ meaning to purify oneself or to wage a holy struggle for a moral goal—risks giving these murderers the religious legitimacy they desperately seek but in no way deserve.” And in 2010, he said: “Nor do we describe our enemy as ‘jihadists’ or ‘Islamists’ because jihad is a holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam, meaning to purify oneself or one’s community, and there is nothing holy or legitimate or Islamic about murdering innocent men, women and children.”
Just think: at a time when Jihadists are active all over the world, and threaten America and American interests, the C.I.A. recently had as its director John Brennan, who believes that “Jihad” means a “holy struggle…to purify oneself or one’s community”; that there is nothing “holy or legitimate or Islamic” about those who kill innocent civilians; therefore, everyone must stop calling them (that is, these fanatics who misunderstand the real Islam) Jihadists. There is nothing violent about the “Jihad,” rightly understood. That’s Islam according to the fatuous John Brennan.
In May 2010, Brennan called for building up the “moderate” elements of Hezbollah: “There is [sic] certainly the elements of Hizballah that are truly a concern to us what they’re doing. And what we need to do is to find ways to diminish their influence within the organization and to try to build up the more moderate elements.”
What can he have been thinking? By 2010, Brennan was very high up in the C.I.A., and surely knew all about Hezbollah’s activities in Lebanon and Syria, as an ally and proxy of the Islamic Republic. He knew about their more than 100,000 rockets and missiles, their attempts to build terror tunnels, their cross-border killings and kidnappings that led to the 2006 Hezbollah-Iran War. What “moderate elements” of Hezbollah is he talking about? Are there any Hezbollah members who do not believe in killing Israelis?
In an address to a meeting at New York University School of Law, sponsored by the Islamic Society of North America, Brennan said in February 2010: “As Muslims you have seen a small fringe of fanatics who cloak themselves in religion, try to distort your faith, though they are clearly ignorant of the most fundamental teachings of Islam. Instead of creating, they destroy — bombing mosques, schools and hospitals. They are not jihadists, for jihad is a holy struggle, an effort to purify for a legitimate purpose, and there is nothing, absolutely nothing holy or pure or legitimate or Islamic about murdering innocent men, women and children,” Brennan said. “We’re trying to be very careful and precise in our use of language, because I think the language we use and the images we project really do have resonance. It’s the reason why I don’t use the term jihadist to refer to terrorists. It gives them the religious legitimacy they so desperately seek, but I ain’t gonna give it to them.”
What do you think of John Brennan’s confident reassuring words to a Muslim audience – they must have been delighted at his display of such ignorance — about those “fanatics…who try to distort your faith, though they are clearly ignorant of the most fundamental teachings of Islam”? Isn’t he describing himself? And what should we make of his insistence that “jihad is a holy struggle, an effort to purify for a legitimate purpose”? Remember, this is not a man on the street, for whom such ignorance may be forgiven. This is someone who spent more than three decades in the C.I.A., and who headed our chief intelligence agency from 2013 to Jan. 20, 2017.
At the NYU meeting where Brennan spoke, he was introduced by then-ISNA President Ingrid Mattson, who made the writings of Sayyid Qutb, a leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt in the 1950s, required reading in a course she taught. Mattson has long inveighed against using terms like “Islamic terrorism,” since the earliest days after 9/11. During his speech, Brennan praised Mattson as “an academic whose research continues the rich tradition of Islamic scholarship and as the President of the Islamic Society of North America, where you have been a voice for the tolerance and diversity that defines Islam.”
Yes, Ingrid Mattson, a deep admirer of the Muslim Brotherhood’s fanatical Qutb, is for John Brennan “a voice for the tolerance and diversity that defines Islam.” And Brennan, who delivered this utter nonsense, was for four years the man in charge of dealing mortal threats to American well-being from Jihadi terrorists worldwide.
Don’t you think that John Brennan, as part of his duties as head of the C.I.A., should have read and studied the Qur’an? (Shouldn’t it, in fact, now be required reading of everyone now in the C.I.A.?) Of course he should have, and of course he did not. He has no idea, even now, that the Qur’an commands all Muslims to fight, to kill, to smite at the necks of, to strike terror in the hearts of, the Infidels. He doesn’t know, either, that Muslims are told that they are the “best of peoples,” while non-Muslims are “the most vile of created beings.” That just might bring him up short.
At the very least, Brennan ought to have read a baker’s dozen of Qur’anic verses: 2:191-193, 3:151, 4:89, 5:33, 8:12, 8:60, 9:5, 9:29, 47:4, 98:6. A starter kit. But he never mentions the Qur’an, without a knowledge of which no one should presume to pontificate, as he has so often, on the essence of Islam. He’s been retired from the C.I.A. since January 2017, but still John Brennan has not managed to find time to read, and study, the Qur’an. He should accompany that study by reading Robert Spencer’s The Complete Infidel’s Guide to the Koran. Having that under his belt, he could then read several dozen of the most important Hadith (including “War is deceit” and “I have been made victorious through terror”), and parts of the Sira (the biography of Muhammad). He could complete his cursus studiorum by reading Spencer’s The History of Jihad: From Muhammad To ISIS. If he does all that, he’d be able to understand what was so absurd about his definition of Jihad as a “moral struggle to purify oneself or one’s community” that had nothing to do with violence, and his praise of “the tolerance and diversity that defines Islam.” He doesn’t strike me as someone who would ever own up to his intellectual failures, especially as colossal as his complete failure to understand Islam, but one never knows. Miracles do happen; hope springs eternal.
Brennan’s furious reaction to the assassination of Fakhrizadeh included his charge that this was a “criminal act,” because Fakhrizadeh was not himself a terrorist. But he was. Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was a Brigadier General in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, which the American government has designated as a terrorist organization. Brennan has it wrong: Fakhrizadeh was indeed a member – a very high-ranking member – of a terrorist group and hence, a legal target.
A strong critic of US President Donald Trump, Brennan urged Tehran to “resist the urge” to retaliate and “wait for the return of responsible American leadership on the global stage,” referring to Biden, who will replace Trump in the White House on January 20.
Reading between the lines, Brennan is advising Iran to wait until a much more pliant President Biden is in office, ready to return the U.S. to the disastrous 2015 Iran deal, and unlikely to be on board with Israel’s efforts to protect itself, its Sunni allies, and America itself, by continuing its relentless campaign to ensure that Iran never acquires nuclear weapons. Brennan is not advising Iran to refrain from retaliating, but only urging it to wait for a more propitious time, when Biden in in the Oval Office.
John Brennan for more than a decade has been a defender of the faith of Islam, insisting that Jihad refers to a “moral struggle,” never to violence against Infidels. He praises Islam for the “tolerance and diversity that defines Islam.” He describes the killing of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, that has set back the genocidal plans of a criminal regime that regards the U.S. as the “Great Satan,” as a “criminal act,” “an act of state-sponsored terrorism.” It was no more a “criminal act” or “state-sponsored terrorism” than were the killings of Osama bin Laden and Qassem Soleimani. We should be celebrating, for the world is, as an unnamed Israeli official told The New York Times, a “safer place” because of the death of Fakhrizadeh.
Brennan’s over-the-top reaction to the assassination is useful: We already have his scandalous record of empty-headed fatuities about Islam. Now he’s revealed his anti-Israel animus as never before. It’s flabbergasting that this was the man who for four years headed the C.I.A. Or perhaps not, since at the time Barack Obama was president. Could Biden, try as he might, possibly appoint someone worse?
mortimer says
The CIA and its predecessor has been sponsoring, managing and performing political killings since WWII. Iran is in an undeclared war against Israel, the US and other religions in general.
To do nothing to stop Iran is immoral.
mortimer says
It is important for an investigative reporter to identify what John Brennan actually believes.
The evidence points to the fact that he converted to Islam while working in Saudi Arabia. Does he still adhere to Islam. Is Brennan a genuine Muslim? A globalist? An atheist?
maria says
Brennan is a Communist and during his stay in Saudi Arabia he converted to islam. He is a liar like exactly according to his devilish ideology islam
mortimer says
Who is Brennan’s boss?
Veracious_one says
Mohammad…
eduardo odraude says
He was raised and educated as a Catholic, and like the current pope, Brennan might be one of the Catholics who is ignorant about and soft on Islam. Some Catholics have a soft spot for authoritarianism, and ignorantly see Islam as not all that different from Catholicism. They should read William Kilpatrick, a Catholic who has studied Islam in depth and understands that it is totalitarian at its core.
Ironically, it is precisely the ignorance of many Muslims about Islam that permits Islam to spread. Many Muslims believe in a whitewashed version taught them by lying imams who know very well they are lying. Many Muslims are completely unaware that their own most trusted sources show that Muhammad bought, owned, sold and traded slaves, that he tortured a man to get hold of a treasure, that he consummated marriage with a prepubescent 9-year-old girl, that he allowed his soldiers to rape their captive women, that he had sex slaves, that he presided over the beheading execution of 600 to 900 disarmed captive Jews, that he married the wife of his own adopted son after causing his adopted son to divorce her, and then Muhammad abolished adoption in Islam, so that taking his adopted son’s wife would not look so bad — after all, the man who gave up his wife to Muhammad was not really Muhammad’s son, because one could no longer adopt someone as a son. And many Muslims have been taught the lie that the Qur’an has been perfectly preserved since the time of Muhammad.
Here is an example of a very well-known imam, whom David Wood caught contradicting himself and lying to Muslims and others about Islam:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wa8uIxgJ8Rc
Beneath the Veil of Consciousness says
Iran is on its heels where the free world needs to keep it. They know that retaliation on their part will result in a world of hurt that will send them to the mat for the ten count.
Power is the only thing these thug leaders understand. Pity the people of Iran.
somehistory says
Who should really care what rats have to say about anything? Especially when they are no longer head of the pack, but just another bit of vermin in the sewer.
Would he have the same thing to say if a moslim terror group sneaked into Israel from iran and killed a top Israeli scientist?
Who will remember a few years from now that he objected to what was done to a dangerous iranian moslim?
Walter Sieruk says
John Brennan by saying that fool statement is exposing what an ignorant man he truly is .
This is because Fakhrizadeh was a highly dangerous man .,Therefore it was necessary and important that he was eliminated.
As Thomas Jefferson had ,so wisely , written “With every barbarous people…force is law.”
Wellington says
Brennan should consider Abraham’s Lincoln advice, to wit, better to say nothing and be thought a fool than to open one’s mouth and leave no doubt.
Again and again Brennan reveals himself as a truly bad man, but he also has demonstrated many times he is a colossal fool.
cole richards says
like
Charlie in NY says
Brennan argues that by refusing to call a terrorist a jihadist denies that terrorist the religious legitimacy he is craving. That is a pretty bold, not to say narcissistic, statement from a Westerner. I would think that the Islamist terrorist would not care what an infidel calls him or thinks of him. Why does Brennan even think that any Islamist terrorist would look to a non-Muslim for religious legitimacy.
Far more important to such a fanatic would be what the recognized religious scholars of Islam at, for instance, al Azhar, say and believe about his actions. And it is precisely their continuing and studied silence that is as reprehensible as it is telling. Actually, it is not really silence because, certainly when it comes to Jews, these “scholars” have already made their malevolent views plain. It should not be enough for them to spout, on the rare occasions when they do speak, the generic pablum that Islam is against violence. They need to provide an argument that counters those laid out by Qutb, al Qaeda, the Taliban, Islamic State, Boko Haram and their fellow travelers.
Chris D says
Brennan would have objected to the killing of the man who was responsible for the gas chambers in Germany. Just saying.
Michael Copeland says
The “tolerance and diversity that defines Islam” is set out in Koran 3:85
“If anyone desires a religion other than Islam (submission to Allah), never will it be accepted of him”.
There we are. Quite clear now.
eduardo odraude says
Something is very wrong with John Brennan. How can he condemn the killing of a scientist instrumental in iran’s pursuit of a nuclear weapon with which to murder millions of people? Occasionally, we hear rumors that Brennan while in the Middle East converted to Islam. That might explain his bizarre attitude toward the killing of this would-be genocidal scientist.
eduardo odraude says
Either this former high-level US official really does not know that what he is saying is shockingly ignorant and foolish, or he knows, but says it anyway because he is secretly an enemy of the United States. But either way, Brennan is bad news.
Idiocy — though it is hard to comprehend how Brennan could be thatidiotic — seems slightly more likely than malign intent to be the cause of the particular statement he makes about the killing of the head of Iran’s nuclear program. On the other hand, it would be easier to understand Brennan talking this way if he had secretly converted to Islam and adopted or already agreed with the Qur’an’s and Hadith’s anti-Semitic attitudes.
And of course, idiocy and evil are hardly mutually exclusive.
James Lincoln says
In case you missed it:
Glazov Gang: Ex-Intelligence Agents Expose Brennan’s Islamic Conversion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6OmDCFzSUY
gravenimage says
Thanks for that link, James.
gravenimage says
John Brennan: Killing of Fakhrizadeh ‘An Act of State-Sponsored Terrorism’
……………….
Apparently wiping Israel off the map is hunky-dory, though…
Mojdeh says
Is he drunken horse? Iranian give each others chocolates and burning pictures of Khamanie and Rohani in thier homes with flag of Islamic Satanic Government. Great job we want more of this heads of serpents be cut off. We Iranian so happy when USA strike Iran , we do not need atom bombs , we need food and security..They keep giving money for Iranian people to repair roads and infrastrucres, They feed terrorism globally. We love peace and want be Island of stability once again.Long Live Reza Shah II
James Lincoln says
Apparently John Brennan feels that the killing of Fakhrizadeh was an act of “State-Sponsored Terrorism.”
There is now *no* question as to where his loyalty lies…
shambhu singh says
First thigs first. Who is Brennan- a Christian, an athiest or an Islamist? who is he alone to call something a state terrorism when he cannot produce an iota of evidence for his statement? the turncoats need to look up their own sleeves first before starting to blame others. And I see no harm in eliminating someone who is only going to be a threat to humanity. Did any one know that the head of Islam in Iran can only be an Arab with a black turban? No Persian can be an Ayatollah in Iran. Draw your own conclusions.
gravenimage says
Clerics who wear black turbans claim to be descended directly from Muhammed. Likely tosh in most cases, though.
OLD GUY says
Check Brennan’s bank accounts, follow the money is always a good rule of investigation. Can’t say I trust him.