Iranian Leader Believes Allah Has Spoken to Him

(Tehran)"As Iran rushes towards confrontation with the world over its nuclear programme, the question uppermost in the mind of western leaders is 'What is moving its President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to such recklessness?'

Political analysts point to the fact that Iran feels strong because of high oil prices, while America has been weakened by the insurgency in Iraq.

But listen carefully to the utterances of Mr Ahmadinejad - recently described by President George W Bush as an 'odd man' - and there is another dimension, a religious messianism that, some suspect, is giving the Iranian leader a dangerous sense of divine mission.

In November, the country was startled by a video showing Mr Ahmadinejad telling a cleric that he had felt the hand of God entrancing world leaders as he delivered a speech to the UN General Assembly last September."

When an aircraft crashed in Teheran last month, killing 108 people, Mr Ahmadinejad promised an investigation. But he also thanked the dead, saying: "What is important is that they have shown the way to martyrdom which we must follow." More...

So perhaps now the world understands why Saddam went to war with Iran. Sure Sunni vs Shiite conflict is historical but it was deeper than that. Saddam understood that Islamic Fundamentalism would eventually de-stabilize his country and his power. Ironically with 9/11 as a pretext to "finish the job half done by Bush I" the West finds itself in Iraq with an emboldened enemy to the east in Iran seeking to capitalize on the fall of their tyrannical neighbor. Moderate Islamic nations in the region must now surely recognize the need to prop up and stabilize the new Iraqi gov't and begin to move more strongly against radical Islamic clerics who may, like President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, believe they are doing God's work in starting holy Jihad with the use of WMD and martyrdom as a jihadic sword.

Does anyone have any faith in the U.N. Security Council to keep this genie in the bottle? What do you think world nations need to do about Iran refusing to allow inspections of their uranium enrichment program?? Will the sobering events developing in Iran unite Democrats and Republicans in our currently dysfunctional political system just as the sobering events did in 2001 ? Or will it take an underground nuclear test in Iran, or worse, a mushroom cloud in Tel Aviv within a few years, to stop the dysfunctional politics in Washington?? So off the world goes again to the U.N. Security Council and the 12 year cycle begins anew... or does it ?