The Guardian published footage showing the aftermath of a series of explosions in the Thai capital. According to the paper, a man believed to be Iranian is thought to have bombed a house he was renting, then thrown a grenade at a taxi driver who refused to pick him up.
Also, Israel's prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, has accused Iran of being behind twin attacks on Israeli targets in India and Georgia, in a further escalation of tensions between the two countries. The attacks on Monday, in which four people were injured, followed a warning earlier this month from Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, that the Islamic Republic would retaliate against international sanctions and would back any nation or group that sought to confront Israel. High-ranking officials have also warned of the threat to Israeli targets from Iran or its allies. Yoram Cohen, the head of Shin Bet, Israel's internal security agency, said this month that Iranian agents were trying to attack Israeli targets around the world in retaliation for covert operations, including the killing of Iranian scientists. He cited "three serious attacks" in recent months thwarted "on the verge of being carried out" – in Istanbul, Baku and Bangkok."It doesn't matter if it's true or not that Israel took out the nuclear scientists," he told a closed meeting, reported in the Haaretz newspaper. "A major, serious country like Iran cannot let this go on."
According to The Washington Post, “Russia will not cooperate on Iran. Neither will China”. The author of the article points out that the two even vetoed a U.N. resolution regarding Syria. India will continue to buy Iranian oil, and the Iranians themselves have learned that they need only promise to behave and Washington will shimmer in relief. The Palestinians vow to unite in such a way as to dismiss U.S. threats to cut off financial aid, and the Israelis, not to be out-vowed, threaten to bomb Iranian nuclear installations, America and its concerns (and assurances) notwithstanding. As the article reads, “the Middle East is going to pieces. The Arab Spring consumes its own metaphors — fall, winter, etc. Night is more like it. The soccer melee in Egypt that claimed nearly 80 lives in hand-to-hand combat suggests something about that society that does not bring to mind maypoles and penny whistles. Syria is coming apart, Jordan could be next, and for sheer orneriness, we can turn to Pakistan — friend one day, foe the next. America has limited influence over some of this. And roiling democracies, unconcerned with bottom lines and balance of power, limit it further. But a limited America still has unlimited possibilities and solemn responsibilities. If not America, then who? Then nobody”.
The Hurriyet Daily News published an article on Turkey’s tactics in Syria. According to the author, Turkey and China have lately started to appear more frequently in the same sentence. Turkey and China seem to be comparable on both their economic and democratic performances. While on the economic front they race for the top ranking on growth rates, on the democratic front they race for the lowest ranking on fundamental freedoms. Both China and Turkey have also displayed more assertive foreign policies recently, the former to consolidate its position as a global power which until now largely relied on its United Nations Security Council membership, the latter to consolidate its status as a regional power with global relevance. While there have been many times when the U.S. has totally closed its ears to Turkish advice, the frequency of the two countries seeing eye to eye on regional issues is incomparable to that between Turkey and Russia.
