A massive suicide bomb blast by Sunni Jundallah (Soldiers of God) fighters in the Iranian province of Sistan Baluchistan  claimed the lives of deputy Revolutionary Guards commander, Gen. Noor Al I Shooshtari, several other revolutionary commanders and tribal chiefs gathering at a sports stadium for a parlay. More than 42 bodies have been recovered and dozens injured. The Washington Times  account, “Bomb attack kills Guard Commanders,”  reports the toll , swift  Obama Administration condemnation and denials of involvement all while  Ahmadinejad calls for blood revenge.

In May, Jundallah said it sent a suicide bomber into a Shi'ite mosque in the southeastern city of Zahedan, killing 25 worshippers.

The latest attack, however, would mark the group's highest-level target. It also raised questions about how the attacker breached security around such a top delegation from the Revolutionary Guard - the country's strongest military force, which is directly linked to the ruling clerics under Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The official Islamic Republic News Agency said the victims included the deputy commander of the Guard's ground forces, Gen. Noor Ali Shooshtari, as well as a chief provincial Guard commander, Rajab Ali Mohammadzadeh. The others killed were Guard members or tribal leaders, it said.

The agency quoted the provincial forensics director, Abbas Amian, as saying 42 bodies had been handed over to his department. More than two dozen others were wounded, state radio reported.

State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said the United States condemned what he called an "act of terrorism." Reports of alleged U.S. involvement are "completely false," he said.

The commanders were entering a sports complex to meet with tribal leaders to discuss Sunni-Shi'ite cooperation when the attacker detonated a belt fitted with explosives, IRNA said.

Mr. Ahmadinejad - who counts on support from the Revolutionary Guard - vowed to strike back.

"The criminals will soon get the response for their inhuman crimes," IRNA quoted him as saying.

The Revolutionary Guards moved into the Southeastern province allegedly to thwart the cross border opium trade that the Jundallah control that fuel their insurgency against the central government in Tehran. This terrain is very hard to police and the Baluchi insurgents know how to conduct hit and run operations within the warren of sanctuaries that abuts both Afghanistan and Pakistan. 

Note this from the Washington Times report:

Drug traffickers ferry opium and other narcotics through the cross-border badlands - a key source of income for the Taliban in Afghanistan and the ethnic Baluchi tribes that straddle the three-nation region and include members of Jundallah. Iran has pleaded for more international help to cut off the drug routes and criminal gangs.

Iran also has accused Jundallah of receiving support from al Qaeda and the Taliban, though some analysts who have studied the group dispute such a link.

"There is no evidence of outside help for Jundallah from wider militant networks," said Mustafa Alani, director of security and terrorism studies at the Gulf Research Center in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. "It's a homegrown group that moves across the borders within fellow Baluchi tribes. It is very hard to control the border."

The Jundallah attacks in Baluchistan are  an indication of the presence of large ethnic religious minorities in the Islamic Republic that can spell trouble if the Mullacracy crumbles. Global Security notes:

By 2008 the main ethnic groups in Iran remained the Persians (65 percent). Other groups were the Azerbaijani Turks (16 percent), Kurds (7 percent), Lurs (6 percent), Arabs (2 percent), Baluchis (2 percent), Turkmens (1 percent), Turkish tribal groups such as the Qashqai (1 percent), and non-Persian, non-Turkic groups such as Armenians, Assyrians, and Georgians (less than 1 percent).

In a 2005 Jerusalem Center for Public affairs analysis, “Domestic Threats to Iranian Stability: Khuzistan and Baluchistan” of sectarian violence in Khuzistan (Iran’s oil producing region adjacent to Iraq in the southwestern Gulf region) and Baluchistan, AEI scholar Michael Rubin had these comments:

Iran is ethnically diverse. While the recent terrorism may have some ethnic or sectarian component, Iranian nationalism trumps ethnic separatism. Often, regional violence is more a sign of weak central government control and local disaffection than separatist sentiment.

When Iraq invaded Iran in 1980, Saddam Hussein sought to play the ethnic card. The Iraqi leader portrayed himself as the liberator of the Khuzistani Arabs. His rhetoric backfired. Rather than divide Iran, he unified it.

Any U.S. or Western attempt to play an ethnic card in Iran will backfire and betray not only the Iranian people, but also long-term Western interests.

The question is given the most recent problems the Islamic Republic in Iran is facing, is that assessment still valid?

Note these comments from Richard Baehr and Ed Lasky at The American Thinker about the swiftness of response by the Obama Statement Department about this insurgent Baluchi act of terrorism versus those acts of the Revolutionary Guards and the hated Basiji militia.

Richard Baehr notes that it took days for the Obama administration to condemn the brutalization of democracy demonstrators in Iran, but that condemnation of attacks on the brutalizers was nearly immediate.

Ed Lasky asks:

Did the US condemn Iranians' role in the Khobar Towers bombing; the support given to Hezbollah that led to the massacre of hundreds of American and French soldiers-- and the continuing killing of Lebanese and Israelis, the lies and broken agreements that have followed the building of its nuclear weapons program?

So whose side is Obama on?

For sure, we know that Obama is not on the side of those oppressed opposition Iranians,  and ethnic minorities, whether Persians, Kurds, Arabs, Baluchi, Azeris. From this all we can discern is that the Obama Administration earns a red letter “A” for appeasement.