I can't believe anyone takes @Mondoweiss seriously

I don't read Mondoweiss, but sometimes people send me links and I simply cannot get over how people think that is a serious site.

The New York Times reported that Israel assassinated an Al Qaeda leader in Tehran in August. Mondoweiss comes up with a conspiracy theory that the entire story was made up, leaked in order to give the US an excuse to attack Iran!

In what universe would the discovery of an Al Qaeda leader in Iran be an excuse for a war?

But the analysis by James North  is even worse (if possible.)

The article reeks of dishonesty. At least one of its four authors, Ronen Bergman, an Israeli (who has lavished praise on the Israel lobby AIPAC), has sources in Israel’s spy apparatus, which immediately raises suspicion. The report’s only sources are those unnamed “intelligence officials,” who provide suspiciously precise details, reminiscent of a movie script: the paper said that last August in Tehran, al-Masri 

was driving his white Renault L90 sedan with his daughter near his home when two gunmen on a motorcycle drew up alongside him. Five shots were fired from a pistol fitted with a silencer. Four bullets entered the car through the driver’s side and a fifth hit a nearby car.

Bergman literally wrote the book on Israel's spy agencies, and it wasn't a hagiography. Mondoweiss' writer has no evidence that Bergman has ever reported anything inaccurate but the fact that he has contacts in the Mossad is by itself enough to discredit his reporting for the anti-Israel drones who read that absurd site.

North, meanwhile, has been warning about the US trying to start a war with Iran pretty much every month for years. He must be very frustrated that his keen analysis of Trump's supposed desire to start a war has been so wrong so many times and yet he doubles down again and again. 

Also, North's claim that the NYT article didn't cover the fact that Iran and Al Qaeda are not normally allies is false:

That he had been living in Iran was surprising, given that Iran and Al Qaeda are bitter enemies. Iran, a Shiite Muslim theocracy, and Al Qaeda, a Sunni Muslim jihadist group, have fought each other on the battlefields of Iraq and other places.

Iran may have had good reason for wanting to hide the fact that it was harboring an avowed enemy, but it was less clear why Iranian officials would have taken in the Qaeda leader to begin with.

Some terrorism experts suggested that keeping Qaeda officials in Tehran might provide some insurance that the group would not conduct operations inside Iran. American counterterrorism officials believe Iran may have allowed them to stay to run operations against the United States, a common adversary.

It would not be the first time that Iran had joined forces with Sunni militants, having supported Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Taliban.

“Iran uses sectarianism as a cudgel when it suits the regime, but is also willing to overlook the Sunni-Shia divide when it suits Iranian interests,” said Colin P. Clarke, a counterterrorism analyst at the Soufan Center.

Mondoweiss is a joke that is taken seriously by a large percentage of the Left. 

(h/t Yoel)

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