Car Bombs in India, Georgia Target Israeli Diplomats

BBC News reports that bombers aboard motorcycles in Delhi have attempted to “target Israeli envoys,” injuring four people, “one seriously.” The attacks in the Indian capital, targeting the Israeli embassy there, appear to replicate the type of assassinations against Iranian nuclear scientists, where a moto-terrorist places a magnetic bomb to a car, blowing it up as he speeds away.

However, no one has stepped forward to claim responsibility, although the reaction in Jerusalem was immediate, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pilloried Iran for its alleged involvement.

Tehran vociferously denied that it had dispatched bombers to India to target Israeli diplomats, calling the charges “sheer lies,” as BBC reporter Sanjoy Majumder wrote. Another explosive device was safely defused in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, which represented yet another attempt on Israelis.

Majumder quoted an Iranian spokesman, Mehdi Nabizadeh, as saying: “Any terrorist attack is condemned and we strongly reject the untrue comments by an Israeli official.”

The cold war between Iran and Israel seems to be heating up, and the Delhi attack and the averted one in Tbilisi have further ratcheted up tensions between the countries, one with an established nuclear arsenal and the other trying to nuclearize.

Netanyahu was also quoted as saying, “Iran is behind these attacks and it is the largest terror exporter in the world.” The Islamic Republic has certainly not been exporting much petroleum lately, due to an embargo backed by the United States and the European Union.

Some observers see those moves, along with efforts to quash Iran’s Central Bank, as insurance against an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.