Feds Disrupt Iranian-Backed Plot to Bomb Israeli Embassy, Assasinate Saudi Envoy to USA

Agents from the FBI and DEA have reportedly disrupted a terror plot liked directly to Iran's Quds force that involved simultaneous attacks against the Israeli and Saudi embassies in Washington D.C.

Federal investigatos allege that an Iranian American identified as 56 year old Mansour Arbabsiar, a Corpus Christi TX used car salesman as the man who approached what he thought was a member of the Los Zetas cartel with a proposal to kill the Saudi ambassador to the USA and bomb the Israeli embassy in Washington D.C. in exchange for $1.5 million and an undisclosed amount of opium.

Arbabsiar and the informant met twice in Reynosa in the northern Mexican state of Tamaulipas, across the border from McAllen, TX [interestingly, observers note that Reynosa is in territory still under control of the Gulf Cartel, but the accused was meeting with what he thought was an enforcer from the archrival Los Zetas- NANESB!] where Arbabsiar bragged that he had a cousin who was a high-ranking member of the Quds force of Iran's Revolutionary Guard and that they were being directed by senior-level officials of the Iranian regime.

The five count criminal complaint names Gohlam Shakuri, an Iranian based member of the Quds force still at large in Iran, as a co-conspirator in the plot. Arbabsiar and the informant negotiated a $1.5 million payment to carry out the attacks, with the accused wiring two seperate payments of $49,960 into a dummy FBI bank account. Arbabsiar also told the informant that his contacts in Iran couild provide Los Zetas with 'tons' of opium if they were interested.

Federal agents said they recorded a number of phone calls and meeting with the informant and Arbabsiar, some of the calls coming from Iran. In late September, when Arbabsiar was flying to Mexico City from Iran via Frankfurt, he was refused entry into Mexico by immigration officers at Arturo Beneitez international airport and was put on a flight to New York where he was taken into custody.

Not surprisingly, Iran has denied the charges against their regime, claiming the case is a 'prefabricated scenario' and propaganda against the Islamic regime.

Interestingly, even though Arbabsiar was taken into custody nearly two weeks ago, Attorney General Eric Holder's press conference announcing the disruption of the plot came a day before House Oversight and Government Reform Committee chariman, Darrell Issa (R- CA49) issued Holder a subpoena in regards to their ongoing Fast & Furious probe in which the ATF allowed firearms to be trafficked from the USA to Mexican drug cartels. In fact, one of the reporters brought up Fast & Furious during the press conference, only to have Holder dismiss it with a boilerplate statement about turning over the relelvant documents before walking out.

There is precedent for Iranian-backed groups co-ordinating attacks out of Latin America. In 1992, 29 people were killed when a truck bomb exploded outside the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires. A group with links to the Iranian back Hezbollah terrorist group and Iran called the Islamic Jihad organization claimed responsibility. The Isreali Embassy attacks were followed up by the 1994 bombing of the AMIA (Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina) building in Buenos Aires, which killed 85 people. Argentine investigators believe that both operations were planned and financed in the Tri-Border area where the boundaries of Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil meet near Iguazu Falls and where Hezbollah has been active over the last two decades. More recently, Mexican intelligence has been aware of a Hezbollah presence in Tijuana and Durango.

Thrice As Nice- A Rosh Hoshanah Tale From Not Another New England Sports Blog!

Because I'm not the most ambitious person in the world to start off with- plus I'll be even further out in the boonies than usual over the next couple of days- I started out thinking I'd do something similar to my blog entry last year for the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hoshanah. Basically some generic wishes peppered with some olive drab clad Rule 5-bait of the Israeli persuasion.

But while doing a search for some IDF eye candy (and lets face it, they are to women in uniform what Brazilians are to female soccer fans), I came across the tale of the very lovely and unique Orbaum Triplets, pictured above.

"The concept of 'one for all and all for one' can get pretty absurd," the late Jerusalem Post staffer and columnist Sam Orbaum wrote about his identical triplet daughters 14 years ago.

Orbaum, who passed away in 2002 at the age of 46, went on in the column, entitled "The threeness of it all," to describe life as a father of identical triplets.

Not only did he sometimes mix them up, Orbaum wrote in his well-known wry, comic style, but he was also constantly impressed by their tight bond - when for example they stood up for one another in fights in the school sandbox.

The three blond 19-year-old sisters are still sticking up for one another, although this time not on the playground but in the IAF, in which they all enlisted a few months ago, making history.

While all three are in khaki-colored air force uniforms, they don't serve together. Odelia, the oldest (born a minute before her two sisters), serves as a control officer in the IAF's underground command-and-control center in the Kirya in Tel Aviv; Nomi is an air traffic control officer at the IAF's Palmahim Base; and Donna is currently in training for a different IAF position near Herzliya.

"Even though we are, in a sense, still together since we are all in the IAF, it was still difficult to split up to different positions and offices," said Odelia.

The sisters say that they think of themselves as one person, which might not make sense - until one sees how they complete one another's sentences or give the same answers during the interview.

Since elementary school the three have been together, going on to the same high school in Jerusalem's Ramot neighborhood and then to the same premilitary academy in the Jordan Valley.

It was there that the triplets decided to enlist in the IDF and not do national service like most of their female classmates.

"As religious girls we were confused about what to do," said Nomi. "But [we] decided to enlist into the IDF since national service, like working in an old age home, is something we can always do after our military service, but military service is right now. [It's] the only time we can do it and is what characterizes the state."

Once they made their decision, all they had left was to find fulfilling jobs in the IDF. Donna said she thought about trying out for the pilot's course; Nomi thought at one point about joining the Ground Forces Command and becoming an infantry instructor.

In the end, they all made their way to the air force, albeit on different bases.

"We didn't all decide to joint the IAF," explained Odelia. "That is just how it worked out."

Nomi, the self-declared "controlling" sister, said that becoming an air traffic controller fit in very well with her personality.

"I usually make the decisions so becoming an air traffic controller was natural," she said.

While the three are not currently together, they all plan on becoming officers and hope to be in the same course at the Bahad 1 Officer Training School near Mitzpe Ramon in a few months.

If that doesn't work out, there's always the post-IDF trip overseas, which they have no doubt they will make together.

The girls also don't doubt that their father would have supported their decision to join the army. When Sam came to Israel he tried to enlist, they said, but he was exempted on medical grounds.

"He supported us in everything we did until he passed away when we were 12," Donna said. "This is the seventh year since he passed away and I think about him all the time and see his smile and know that he would have been proud of us."

The story is from late 2009, so Odelia, Kirya and Nomi are probably 21 and could very well be junior officers by now if they followed through on attending the Officer Training School together.