Iran Analysis: Duelling Propaganda Banjos Play Over Backroom Manoeuvres

David Ignatius of The Washington PostLet's start with some of the loudest propaganda around the alleged Iranian plot to kill the Saudi Ambassador to the US, as Al Arabiya tries to convict the Iranian President. Muhammad Sahimi summarises the presentation of the pro-Saudi outlet:

Quoting unnamed sources, the website claimed that not only was Mahmoud Ahmadinejad aware of the plot, but that he had planned it himself. According to the claim, the Iranian president suggested to Khamenei that terrorist operations be authorized outside Iran to neutralize the effect of the Arab Spring on Iran and prevent the toppling of the Islamic Republic. The goal, according to Al-Arabiya, was to carry out the terrorist acts and then present them as a result of "Islamic awakening" by the masses that Iranian officials have been talking about. The claim is in sharp contrast with the view of many Iran analysts [including some at EA] that Ahmadinejad wishes to improve Iranian relations with the United States to benefit his own position in the domestic political realm.

The Iranians, of course, have their own machinery to churn out the line that the so-called Plot is an American attempt to divert attention from its internal problems, including the challenge of Occupy Wall Street, while the US Government has Eli Lake at Newsweek and David Ignatius of The Washington Post as its messenger boys. Ignatius initially brought out a column, fed by US officials, to insist every aspect of the alleged plot --- as bizarre as it sounded --- was definitely the work of "Those Keystone Iranians". But even more provocative was this blog, also propped up by the Saudis, which conjured up more scare stories:

U.S. and Saudi officials believe Iranian operatives were behind the May 16 murder of a Saudi diplomat in Karachi, Pakistan — adding more evidence that Tehran has engaged in high-risk covert actions beyond the allegations of a Washington assassination plot made in a Justice Department indictment Tuesday.

Hassan al-Qahtani, a Saudi security official working at their consulate in Karachi, was gunned down in July about 200 feet from his office by a man on a motorbike. News reports at the time linked the killing to tension between Pakistan’s Sunni and Shiite communities.

But a Saudi official said Thursday that his country and the United States agree that Iran’s Quds Force was involved in the Karachi killing. That allegation, if true, adds important new detail to the portrait of an Iranian covert-action service that has been escalating its attacks against Saudi targets.

The Saudi official, reached by telephone, said that Pakistani intelligence had identified the killer as a member of a Shiite dissident group known as Sapih Mohammed, which has connections with the Quds Force. The Saudi official said this conclusion, that the group had links with Tehran, was based on messages between Iranian officials in Islamabad and members of the dissident group.

The Saudi official noted additional examples of Iran’s campaign against Riyadh and its allies. He cited the 2005 killing of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Al-Hariri. A U.N. Special Tribunal charged this year that the murder was plotted by four officials of Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Shiite militia in Lebanon. The senior Hezbollah official among the four, Mustafa Badr al-Din, is viewed by U.S. counterterrorism analysts as having close links with the Quds Force.

As further evidence of the Iran-backed campaign, the Saudi official cited the threats against Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Beirut, Abdel Aziz al-Khoja, who was forced to flee in 2008 after Hezbollah took to the streets in West Beirut and other parts of Lebanon.

The Saudi official also provided new allegations about Gholam Shakuri, the Quds Force official who was named in Tuesday’s indictment as having conspired with an Iranian American named Manssor Arbabsiar to murder the Saudi ambassador to Washington. He described Shakuri as an important Quds Force case officer who had helped organize militant Shiite protesters in Bahrain.

According to the Saudi official, Shakuri was among the Iranians who met Hasan Mushaima, a radical Bahraini Shiite cleric, during a stopover in Beirut last February, when Mushaima was on his way back home to lead protests in Bahrain.

You will note --- whatever your opinion on Iranian responsibility for The Plot --- that none of this Saudi, Iranian, and American propaganda has a shred of evidence beyond the insistence of the spokesman, website, or columnist that it must be true.

But it is loud enough to drown out other developments. One of those is the fencing to take advantage of The Plot while avoiding an escalation to conflict beyond the political battle. Note this statement from Washington on Friday:

"I will again confirm that we did meet with the Iranians," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.

"The substance on our side was to make absolutely clear that we consider this whole behavior a violation of U.S. law, a violation of international law and unacceptable and that we intend to hold them to account," Nuland said.

"They know that very well, and any efforts on their part to deny it speaks again to how truthful they are about any of these sorts of matters," she added.

Nuland had initially indicated the meeting took place on Wednesday but U.S. officials later clarified it was on Tuesday [the day the Americans revealed The Plot]. The spokeswoman declined to identify the participants or the venue of the meeting....

Of course, Nuland's affirmation is meant to keep pressure on Tehran, but at the same time the very fact that a meeting took place --- if that is true --- indicates that the US wants to keep channels open while the game is played.

And the same may be true in Iran, even as Tehran denies that there has been a meeting. The Tehran Friday Prayer, to the ears of some observers, hinted at discussions with the US even as Washington was being denounced for The Plot --- an extract, only in Persian at this point, is available on YouTube.

And consider this significant or insignificant. While Iran, up to the Supreme Leader, has put out a river of rhetoric that the US scheme will not deflect the Tehran-led "Islamic Awakening", there has been a notable silencing of the military declarations that were prominent until early this week. None of the "We Have a  Missile, We Have a Big Navy, We Will Challenge You in the Persian Gulf and Beyond" chatter has been obvious since Washington made its accusations.

Just as the propaganda is not going to lead to war, none of this means there will be a sudden Washington-Tehran reconciliation. But it does point to a backroom dance in which the US is pressing for a stronger political position. Whether that is eventually for meaningful discussions or just to ratchet up the diplomatic and economic pressure on Iran until it cries Uncle is an important --- and open --- question.