Iran has borders with Afghanistan. I am sure if drug traffickers can get through that border each year costing Iran's security forces many lives, AQ folks can get through it as well. Iran has detained some AQ members, handed many of them back to their countries of origin. A few it is holding in custody, based on some reports to bargain in an exchange with the MEK terrorists that are given "protected status" by America. The rest of the nonsense from some groups whose agenda is clear, and whose fabricating sources are as incredible and unreliable as themselves, is fiction.
Well one group that admits AQ is in Iran is the Iranian government. If you agree they often spout nonsense well then we're getting somewhere. Iran admits holding al Qaeda operatives So have any AQ operatives ever been found in Iran, running free, not in custody?
The Crown Prince of KSA condemned it a while ago, right after the bombing. Even AlQaeda has attacked government and public buildings in KSA, the problem is they are private members in the government that privately help AQ and pubicly act like they are against them.
Now you're moving into full bullsh!t mode. Iran was an avowed enemy of America long before the Iran-Israel conflict (or I should say before Iran's genocidal threats began). Iraq was a mortal threat to Israel and that didn't bother America too much until they invaded one of America's puppet oil regimes.
There have been many countries which at some point in history have been "avowed" enemies of the US. When Bush took office, Iran and the US were not enemies. They did not have formal relations, but both were working on how to overcome obstinate domestic lobbies that stood in the way of restorations of relations. In America, the single biggest lobby group against improvement of US relations with Iran was Aipac, showing itself even more influential than many major economic and oil company lobbies who at the time were strongly lobbying for lifting of US sanctions. In Iran, the major lobby in that regard was the regime hardliners led by Khamenie. Now, unlike some here, I am not a demogague to try to mislead anyone. The early anti-Americanism of the revolutionaries and Khomeini towards the US was not focused so much on Israel, with the latter a tangential element in the equation. The basis for the antipathy was the desire to maintain Iranian independence from the country, USA, that was seen by Iran's revolutionaries as having been indirectly calling the shots in Iran. Many years later, however, the single biggest obstacle to improved relations between the two countries ultimately boiled down to Israel. Iran's hardliners did not want to lose the one ideological gripe that they had that still sounded true. Israeli loyalists in the US did not want the US to establish ties with a country that still called for the destruction of Israel. In this stalemale, came the Bush administration and its curious focus on Ba'athist Iraq, Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran as the main enemies to bring down in response to the 9/11 attack. What these countries and groups shared in common had nothing to do with Al Queda; it all boiled down to Israel. Compared to the attention poured on these countries and organizations, the US focus on even the country that had served as a base for Al Queda (Afghanistan) was almost like an after thought. Afghanistan is a very improverished country; one of the poorest nations in the world. Just a fraction of the money the US wasted on the Iraqi adventure spent in Afghanistan wisely, and the money would go far. Very far in undercutting the base of support for the Taleban that still exists in Afghanistan. In the process, that would also send a powerful message to their similarly improverished Pushtu brethren across the border in Pakistan of what benefits friendship with the US, instead of enmity, held promise. If the US really wanted to undercut the base of support for Al Queda, it would concentrate four square on these folks in Afghanistan and Pakistan. As well as on the jihadist being bred and financed by within Saudi Arabia, though no longer by its government. Everyone with a clue knew and knows that countries like Iran, Iraq, Syria and groups like Hezbollah are the last places to look for Al Queda directly, or as breeding groups for their ideology and network of suppporters. Everyone with a clue also knows that one thing all those countries and groups held in common ultimately had and has much more to do wtih their attitudes towards Israel, as they were all that pretty much left of the "rejectionist front". Of course, since we are privy to the thought process of the most influential ideologues in the Bush administration, this is all not even speculative. They had been promoting a "clean break" and a project for new "American" century long before 9/11 and no where much in all their talk about "terrorism" they focused on Al Queda. Their main focus before 9/11 was on the "terrorism" that affected Israel, and it remained that way after 9/11.
There are apparently Al Queda operatives running free in Britain. They were some in the US too. And in Spain. Iran is the biggest enemy of Al Queda for its own reasons regardless of 9/11 or July 7. Al Queda has killed many shia in various countries, including several Iranian officials, Iranian citizens as well as many of Iran's friends in places like Afghanistan, Pakistan and now Iraq. Al Queda has also vowed to destroy the "Badr brigade" -- the militia that was founded by Iran among Iraqi shias and is closest to Iran among all the groups in Iraq. If you like to pick a fight with Iran, as you have said you do in the past, then at least spare the American people lies and concentrate on the numerous groups that Iran has links to ideologically and somtimes officially. Groups such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, various shia groups in Bahrain, the shia in Saudi Arabia, all the shia groups in Iraq especially SCIRI, the Badr Brigade, both factions of Dawa, the Mahdi Army of Moqtaba Al Sadr, etc. Through Hezbollah, Iran had was also alleged to have some links also to Hamas, although for ideological and political reasons, Iran actually established a rival group to Hamas called the Palestinian Islamic Jihad as its instrument of influence among the Palestinians. Al Queda's world is entirely a different one. It is world of that mixes the Wahabi ideology of Saudi Arabian financiers and Saudi extremists, with the swarming poor in places in sunni countries like Pakistan, Egypt, Yemen, Jordan, etc. Iran, for its own reasons, has no interest in Al Queda. Anyone who says otherwise is either an intentional liar or totally ignorant.
When have I said I want to pick a fight with Iran? I'd rather we obliterate their leadership, destroy their nuclear program and let the Iranian people emulate the unchecked democracy for which the US is a role model. I don't want to pick a fight. PS - IM Are you male or female?