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Which headline? - and what truth?

If one follows the media without any scrutiny one would be left with the clear impression that Iran is going to attack Israel and destroy it.    Just take this headline "Iranian Revolutionary Guard predicts war will destroy Israel" from the The Telegraph in the UK.    However, read the piece and then one sees that what the Iranians are saying is that they will counter-attack if they are attacked by Israel.  And hasn't Israel, and others, including the US, threatened to attack Iran.    So, why shouldn't Iran defend itself and its peoples?

"The shameful and cancerous tumour that is Israel is seeking war against us, but it is not known when that war will happen. They now consider war as the only way to confront us, but they are so stupid that their (US) masters should stop them," he said, speaking at a military exhibition in Tehran.

"If they begin, it will spell their destruction and will be the end of the story, even if they act rationally, this incident will happen," he added, noting that the Islamic revolution is "moving rapidly towards its goals and they (Israel) cannot tolerate this."

Iran insists that its nuclear enrichment programme is exclusively for peaceful, civilian purposes. But Gen Jafari warned ominously that any war with Israel would be "very different" in nature to previous conflicts.

"We are putting all of our efforts into boosting our (military) capability so that, if an aggression occurs, we can defend ourselves and those who need our help," he said."

On the other hand, how much publicity and media coverage has this report "Iranian Diplomat Says Iran Offered Deal to Halt 20-Percent Enrichment" from Inter Press Service (IPS) gained?

"Iran has again offered to halt its enrichment of uranium to 20 percent, which the United States has identified as its highest priority in the nuclear talks, in return for easing sanctions against Iran, according to Iran’s permanent representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

Ali Asghar Soltanieh, who has conducted Iran’s negotiations with the IAEA in Tehran and Vienna, revealed in an interview with IPS that Iran had made the offer at the meeting between EU Foreign Policy Chief Catherine Ashton and Iran’s leading nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili in Istanbul Sep. 19.

Soltanieh also revealed in the interview that IAEA officials had agreed last month to an Iranian demand that it be provided documents on the alleged Iranian activities related to nuclear weapons which Iran is being asked to explain, but that the concession had then been withdrawn.

“We are prepared to suspend enrichment to 20 percent, provided we find a reciprocal step compatible with it,” Soltanieh said, adding, “We said this in Istanbul.”

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