On another of his visits to the provinces (this time he was in Bandar Abbas, in Hormozagan Province) . Iranian President Ahmadinejad said this, just a couple of days ahead of a forthcoming IAEA report on Iran’s nuclear activities expected on Friday:

In yet another verbal attack against Israel, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called the Jewish state a “filthy bacteria” whose sole purpose was to oppress the other nations of the region.

“The world powers established this filthy bacteria, the Zionist regime, which is lashing out at the nations in the region like a wild beast,” the Iranian president told supporters at a rally in southern Iran.

“[Israel] won support [from the other nations] which created it as a scarecrow, so as to keep the people of this area under control,” Ahmadinejad said.

He also said,

The president said Iran would not stop enriching uranium – a process that yields material needed for the generation of electricity by nuclear power plants – under any conditions. Tehran says its program is to generate fuel only, but Washington and some of its allies allege the program is aimed at building nuclear weapons.

“They (US and its allies) expected the Iranian nation … to surrender after a resolution is issued or sanctions are imposed, but today … it has brought all big powers to their knees,” Ahmadinejad told supporters in Bandar Abbas.

His speech drew chants of “Nuclear energy is our definite right!” from the crowd.

Bandar Abbas was a suitably symbolic place to rattle the cages about Iran’s nuclear ambitions. The city sits right at the narrowest point of the Straits of Hormuz, a likely spot to choke off oil shipments in the event of a crisis. A serious interruption in oil supplies would send oil prices even higher than they already are. (Iran has threatened to do this in the past if attacked.)

There have been other disturbing remarks lately from Iran and its minions concerning Israel. The dispatching of Hezbollah’s Imad Mughniyeh to his reward occasioned these remarks (also from the Jerusalem Post):

Referring to the assassination of Hizbullah terror chief Imad Mughniyeh, the Iranian leader said that Israel “uses terror as a threat every day, and afterwards is happy and joyful.”
….
Last week, the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) reported that Commander-General Muhammad Ali Jafari of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps wrote in a letter to Hizbullah head Hassan Nasrallah that he was convinced “that Hizbullah’s might is increasing with every passing day, and that in the near future, we will witness the disappearance of this cancerous growth called Israel.”

Later that day, the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of Iran, Maj.-Gen. Hassan Firouzabadi, said in his own letter to Nasrallah that “the hero-breeding land of Lebanon… [would] nurture hundreds and thousands of such heroes… and that combatants of the Lebanese and Palestinian Islamic resistance [would] continue the struggle until the complete destruction of the Zionist regime and liberation of the entire Islamic land of Palestine.”

At Mughniyeh’s funeral, Hezbollah chief Nasrallah said:

“Zionists, if you want this kind of open war, then let the whole world listen: Let this war be open,” Hassan Nasrallah said at the funeral of top Hezbollah commander Imad Mughniyeh, killed in Damascus on Tuesday by a car bombing blamed on Israel.

“The blood of Imad Mughniyeh will contribute to the disappearance of the Jewish state,” said Mr Nasrallah, whose fighters claimed victory in the devastating July-August 2006 war against Israel.

“You killed him outside our natural battleground. Our battleground with you is on Lebanese territory and you have overstepped the border.”

Understandably, Israel does not dismiss such rhetoric as so much hot air. It can’t afford to. Back in this post, I pointed out there was a series of anti-Israeli rhetoric leading up to the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers that provoked the war between Israel and Hezbollah in the summer of 2006. Israel is concerned Iran and Hezbollah may be leading up to another confrontation.

Here are a couple of good posts about Hezbollah, Mughniyeh and Iran. First, from Martin Kramer:

Now that Nasrallah’s eulogy has placed Mughniyah officially in the pantheon of Hezbollah’s greatest martyrs (with Abbas al-Musawi and Raghib Harb), this question looks absurd. That it ever arose is a testament to the discipline of Hezbollah in sticking to lies that serve its interests. One of its paramount interests is concealing from scrutiny that apparatus of terror that Mughniyah spent his life building. Hiding the clandestine branch protects it from Hezbollah’s enemies, and makes it easier to sell the movement to useful idiots in the West, who insist that the movement hasn’t done any terror in years, and maybe never did any at all. They produce statements of such mind-boggling gullibility that one can easily imagine Mughniyah chuckling to himself on reading them. The “literature” is rife with claims that Mughniyah didn’t really belong to Hezbollah, or he answered to Iran, or he had his own agenda—anything to dissociate his terrorist acts from the party.

The truth is (and always has been) a simple one. Hezbollah is many things, but it has always included within it a clandestine terrorist branch, and it probably always will. Indeed, Nasrallah’s threat in his eulogy—to commence an “open war” with Israel outside the Israel-Lebanon theater—alludes to the “global reach” that Mughniyah helped to build.

And, from the Across the Bay blog:

Most of the names Ranstorp listed in his book are still recognizable active senior Hezbollah commanders today (Khalil, Kaouk, Safa, and Hassan Khalil, whom he mentions in the Le Figaro interview as the “liaison with military intelligence [i.e. Asef Shawkat] in Damascus,” etc.). Some have speculated that Mughniyeh’s successor might be none other than the above-mentioned Ibrahim Aqil.

When asked by Le Figaro about Hezbollah’s ultimate goal in Lebanon, Ranstorp explained that it was “to provide itself with a platform that would permit it to continue the armed struggle against Israel. Its agenda surpasses the Lebanese framework, and is dictated by Iran.”

He also made sure to remind of the organization’s terrorist “global reach”: “Don’t forget that it also maintains a terrorist capacity abroad.”

Regarding that “global reach,” it’s useful to remember what Hezbollah’s flag looks like.

The arm holding up the AK-47 forms the “A” (alef) in “Allah.” The text above the AK-47 reads “Lo, the Party of God, they are the victorious ones.” It’s from the Quran, Sura 5:56. This Sura has some critical things to say about Jews and Christians specifically, and their lack of believe in the true faith. For context, here are the verses preceding the one that appears on the Hezbollah flag.

“5.51″:    O you who believe! do not take the Jews and the Christians for friends; they are friends of each other; and whoever amongst you takes them for a friend, then surely he is one of them; surely Allah does not guide the unjust people.

“5.52″:    But you will see those in whose hearts is a disease hastening towards them, saying: We fear lest a calamity should befall us; but it may be that Allah will bring the victory or a punish ment from Himself, so that they shall be regretting on account of what they hid in their souls.

“5.53″:    And those who believe will say: Are these they who swore by Allah with the most forcible of their oaths that they were most surely with you? Their deeds shall go for nothing, so they shall become losers.

“5.54″:    O you who believe! whoever from among you turns back from his religion, then Allah will bring a people, He shall love them and they shall love Him, lowly before the believers, mighty against the unbelievers, they shall strive hard in Allah’s way and shall not fear the censure of any censurer; this is Allah’s Face, He gives it to whom He pleases, and Allah is Ample-giving, Knowing.

“5.55″:    Only Allah is your Vali and His Apostle and those who believe, those who keep up prayers and pay the poor-rate while they bow.

“5.56″:    And whoever takes Allah and His apostle and those who believe for a guardian, then surely the party of Allah are they that shall be triumphant.

There is a globe beneath the AK-47, indicating the desire to spread Islam across the world, by might if necessary.

Above the letter b in “Hizb”, which is just to the right of the raised arm, there is a Koran shaped like a lectern typically used by Islamic teachers.

Hezbollah was created in the wake of the Iranian Revolution, and ever since has fought against Israel and the “Christian” West. The State Department declared Hezbollah a terrorist organization in October 1997, describing it this way:

Formed in 1982 in response to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, this Lebanese-based radical Shia group takes its ideological inspiration from the Iranian revolution and the teachings of the late Ayatollah Khomeini. The group follows the religious guidance of Khomeini’s successor, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Hizballah is closely allied with Iran and often acts at its behest, but it also can and does act independently… Hizballah remains the most technically capable terrorist group in the world… Hizballah supports a variety of violent anti-Western groups, including Palestinian terrorist organizations. This support includes the covert provision of weapons, explosives, training, funding, and guidance, as well as overt political support…

When one’s enemy says they want to destroy you, it’s best to take them seriously.