Iranians taking part in protests against film desecrating Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), September 14, 2012.

Demonstrations have occurred in the past few days at US embassies in more than 20 cities across the world to protest the scurrilous California film originally entitled “Desert Warrior” and then “The Innocence of Moslims.”

In an attack designed to coincide with the protests, a Libyan death squad has assassinated the US ambassador to Libya and three of his associates. The US State Department has set up a crisis management center to monitor developments 24 hours a day.

The film in question was obviously designed as a provocation and nothing else. But was this film, as the US media claim, the work of the isolated Cerrito, California resident and Egyptian-American Nakoula Bassely Nakoula. aka Abanob Bassely aka Israeli citizen Sam Bacile, an ex-convict with a drug problem, and a few actors he hired? Persuasive evidence suggests that this is not the case.

Instead, we are dealing with an ambitious international intelligence operation aimed at creating an October Surprise (a few weeks early) to shock world and US public opinion for the purpose of discrediting and “Carterizing” the current tenant of the White House, and installing Netanyahu’s friend Mitt Romney in his place. Since the US public identifies Obama as the patron of the color revolutions and military interventions of the “Arab Spring,” attacks on US diplomats, assassinations, and possible hostage taking can be expected to weaken his case for reelection. If Romney prevails, control over US foreign policy would pass to the group of incorrigible warmonger neocons who are the Romney’s handlers for international affairs. The current crisis is a sign that the neocons and their friends are attempting a comeback.

The networks involved in this operation appear to be these:

The CIA Mormon Mafia

Featuring top officials across the US intelligence community who are members of Romney’s tightly-knit sect.

This group can also be referred to as the Brent Scowcroft faction. Scowcroft, Henry Kissinger’s right-hand man, used his entrenched bureaucratic position over decades to help promote many of his co-religionists. This group wants Romney in the White House because Romney and his transition team boss Mike Leavitt, also a Mormon, are visibly embarked on a policy of favoring Mormons for top positions.

On Sept. 14, Google rejected an appeal by the Obama White House to remove the controversial film worldwide. As Wired magazine noted on May 11, 2012, “former National Security Agency chief Mike McConnell told the Washington Post that collaboration between the NSA and private companies like Google was ‘inevitable,’” and has been widely reported since January 2010. So Google’s refusal to cooperate with Obama tells us about the views of the NSA, and speaks volumes about which presidential candidate the intelligence community is backing.

The Netanyahu Likud

During the past week, the reactionary Israeli Prime Minister has intervened blatantly and outrageously in US election-year politics in the attempt to secure the election of Mitt Romney, with whom he has been joined at the hip since the two worked together at the Boston Consulting Group in 1976.

About a week ago, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced that the United States has no “red lines” in regard to the Iranian nuclear program. Netanyahu replied with an angry outburst, raving that those who have no red lines have “no moral right” to give Israel a red light when it comes to starting a catastrophic aggressive war against Iran. This was interpreted in Washington as a call to vote for Romney. To underline the message, the deputy speaker of the Israeli Knesset appeared on MSNBC cable news one morning to demand immediate US war with Iran. Republican candidates are using this material for their campaigns.

Some observers have pointed out that, while Netanyahu demands that the US specify some future set of circumstances under which war must begin, the Israeli government has never specified any red lines of its own, meaning that Bibi wants Washington to be more Israeli than the Israelis. These brazen actions by Netanyahu have evoked a wave of American resentment and hostility, even in circles which are usually prepared to go along with the Israelis.

Some have also speculated that, since Romney has shown repeatedly that he has no knowledge of world affairs, Netanyahu believes that he would be able to dictate US foreign policy through his friendship with Romney. During the Republican presidential debates, Romney promised to get Netanyahu’s approval for every US action in the Middle East.

US Neocons

The pro-Israeli neocons of the Bush-Cheney era have attached themselves to Romney as their main hope of getting back into power. This group includes John Bolton (the likely Secretary of State if Romney wins), Eliot Cohen, Robert Kagan, Robert Joseph, and Dan Senor (who now tells vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan what to say about foreign policy).

Prince Bandar bin Sultan and the Saudi Arabian royal family

This group would likely prefer Romney to Obama. Since the Saudi royals are the paymasters for the majority of the death squads now operating in the Middle East, including Libya and Syria, their support would be valuable in organizing operations like the attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens.

The French imperialist ideologue Bernard-Henri Lévy, who had strongly advised President Sarkozy to start bombing Libya, is praising Stevens as a “secret craftsman of [Libyan] liberation.”

BHL says Stevens had accompanied Hillary Clinton to a meeting with Libyan rebel chief Mahmoud Jebril on March 14, 2011, and had later helped convince Hillary to call Obama and recommend that he order an immediate start to the bombing. (Le Monde, Sept. 12) Given the Arabic and French language skills of Stevens, he was then well qualified to serve as contact man with the pro-al-Qaeda militant groups of the Benghazi-Derna-Tobruk extremist axis which did much of the fighting against Qaddafi. Many of these armed groups have been transferred by NATO into Syria to fight against President Assad, raising the question of Ambassador Stevens’ role in these currently ongoing operations. Less clear is why he should be singled out at this time. Perhaps he was a witness whose testimony could have proved embarrassing later.

On Tuesday evening, Stevens had left the US consular compound and taken refuge in a secret safe house nearby. Somehow, the well-trained attackers knew of the existence of this safe house and directed professionally accurate mortar fire against these premises. How did they know where Ambassador Stevens was hiding? We would need to ask the CIA and the Saudis.

Nakoula/Bacile served almost two years in jail after conviction for identity theft and bank fraud involving credit cards. He is currently out on parole, and one of the conditions is that he not use a computer. If authorities can prove he posted the incendiary video, they can immediately revoke his parole and send him back to prison for four years. Nakoula/Bacile looks like a patsy - specifically a drug informant. (Peliske and Daly, Daily Beast, Sept. 14)

As for the film, it would appear to be the handiwork of a well-known Islamophobic network reputedly inspired by US intelligence. According to the Los Angeles Times, the permit for the film originally called “Desert Warrior” was requested by a “Christian nonprofit” calling itself Media For Christ of Duarte, California. The blogger Panglozz of The Daily Kos reports that Media For Christ is owned by Joseph Nasrallah Abdelmasih, an Egyptian-born Coptic Christian activist and anti-Moslim firebrand. Nasrallah was prominent in the summer 2010 campaign to prevent the building of a mosque and Islamic community center not far from the site of the former World Trade Center in lower Manhattan. Nasrallah was a speaker at a rally held at Ground Zero on September 11, 2010, to protest the mosque. This rally was organized by a well-connected Islamophobic organization known as Stop the Islamization of America (SIOA).

The main spokesperson and organizer for SIOA is Pamela Geller, a notorious professional Islamophobe and the hostess of the Atlas Shrugs blog. Geller, despite her venom, enjoys access to the US mainstream media. The SIOA rally just mentioned was also addressed via video link by Ambassador John Bolton, a top neocon, close adviser to Romney, and widely touted as a possible Secretary of State in a future Romney regime. Another speaker at this rally was the Netherlands xenophobic politician Geert Wilders, who also wanted to block the mosque. Wilders’ party has just suffered heavy losses in the Netherlands elections earlier this week.

Bolton took a leading role in trying to turn the Stevens assassination against Obama this past week. Bolton told a Washington, DC radio station: “I’ve said for 3½ years the President doesn’t care about national security. He doesn’t think the world is terribly threatening. I think a weak reaction, a failure to demonstrate American power and resolve, will help see this stretched throughout the region.” Bolton warned particularly that a new hostage crisis would replay the “destruction of the Jimmy Carter administration,” this time at Obama’s expense. (Politico, Sept. 13)