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Uri Avnery - Ariel Sharon’s plot to overthrow Iran (193/315)

273 views · Published 25 July 2017 · 3:58 · Indexed 20 September 2026

Channel: Web of Stories - Life Stories of Remarkable People · 2017 · News & Politics

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Uri Avnery (1923-2018) was an Israeli writer, journalist and peace activist. He was editor-in-chief of the weekly news magazine "HaOlam HaZeh" and founded the Gush Shalom peace movement. [Listener: Anat Saragusti; date recorded: 2017]

TRANSCRIPT: One day he called me to the Ministry of Defence, when he was already the Minister for Defence. He called me and told me that he was going to go to America for a bi-annual conference between the US Joint Chiefs of Staff and the IDF for discussions, to exchange points of view and so on. He was going to surprise them with something big! And this was it! 'There is information that Khomeini in Iran is very ill and will die. Once he dies, a competition will begin between America and Russia about who will get there first to take over the area. Russia is close, it has a common border with Iran, while America is far away. So I'm going to suggest to the Americans that they could have large warehouses of weapons in Israel, which won't be touched except in this situation. As soon as the news is received that Khomeini has died, the warehouses will be opened, and the IDF will rush to Iran and grab it before the Russians are able to move'.  He called to his aide: 'Bring the maps'. Then he spread the maps on the table. I don't know if you've ever seen anything like it, a map this thick. Thick. A map on a map, cellophane. Cellophane and more cellophane and more cellophane. A map of how the Israeli army will conquer Iran: zero hour, zero hour plus 6, plus 12, plus 24, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, processed in great detail, how the IDF reaches Iran. Then he said: 'We will be there before the Russians. Then the Russians will have a problem because they will have to decide: either to wage war against America, or to accept the fact as it is. And I', he said, 'I know from my experience that in arguments such as these, those in favour of the status quo almost always win. So we will create a fait accompli. America will come slowly, take hold of the territory and we will leave', and so on.

It just so happened that I was friends with the Prime Minister of Austria, Bruno Kreisky. We were very friendly and I used to visit him occasionally. After this I met him in Vienna and he took me on a trip to a variety of select districts and the route was boring so he took me aside for a conversation and I told him about this. Then he said: 'Oh my goodness, this is exactly the thing that will make an impression on the Americans'. But no, the Americans laughed at Sharon. They told him politely: 'Leave all this, all the maps, we will review it, we will consider it'. They actually threw him out. That is Arik.

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