Is there such a thing as coincidence?

Iran's former President Rafsanjani is now the Chairman of the Expediency Council.

The Expediency Council was put in place in 1988 to help mediate differences between the Majlis and the Council of Guardians.

Rafsanjani made a visit to Syria last week. And what did he do there?

Iran's influential former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani met with leaders of the radical Palestinian groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad as well as the head of the Shiite Lebanese Hezbollah movement, Iranian sources said, according to AFP.

Rafsanjani is on a four-day visit to the Syrian capital amid worldwide alarm over Iran's announcement Tuesday that it had successfully enriched uranium, a process that can lead to the production of fuel for nuclear power plants or the fissile core of an atomic bomb.

"The Palestinian resistance has today reached a new phase which requires the support of all Muslim countries... to reach victory," Rafsanjani said, according to an Iranian source who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Rafsanjani met Hezbollah chief Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah late Wednesday at the Iranian embassy in Damascus, the source said.

Nasrallah said that Iran's ability to enrich uranium would "be a large moral boost to the resistance."

An Iranian diplomatic source also said that on Wednesday night Rafsanjani met Hamas's political supremo Khaled Meshaal and Islamic Jihad's secretary-general Ramadan Shaleh, AFP noted.

Is it a coincidence, then, that yesterday a suicide bomber killed nine in Tel Aviv?

Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the operation. (Vital Perspective has the story of one of the tragic deaths, as well as additional coverage.)

If you're inclined to think coincidence, recall that in January, Iranian President Ahmadinejad made a visit to Syria. He, too, met with Palestinian terrorist leaders, including representatives of Islamic Jihad. And while he was there, a suicide bomber attacked a Tel Avis restaurant on January 19, killing only himself, fortunately.

Responsibility for that attack was claimed by, you guessed it, Islamic Jihad.

Two visits to Syria by high-ranking Iranian officials. Two meetings with Islamic Jihad, among others. Two suicide bombers in Israel courtesy of Islamic Jihad shortly after those meetings.

In fact, the same restaurant was hit in both attacks. Iran is saying to Israel, bluntly, attack our nuclear facilities and there will be more of this.

While Rafsanjani was on his trip, There was a conference in Teheran on Palestinian solidarity. Iranian leaders were clear in their support for the Palestinians.

The Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has called on the Muslim world to help the Palestinian people and their Hamas-led government.

Both he and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad launched strong attacks on the West as a three-day forum on Palestinian solidarity began in Tehran.

The US Treasury has this week further tightened Palestinian cash flows.

But Palestinian PM Ismail Haniya said on Friday the cuts in funds would not weaken the people's resolve.

Late on Friday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said Moscow had agreed to provide "urgent financial aid" to the Palestinian Authority.

The US and European Union cut off aid to the authority after Hamas took power on 30 March, because the militant group refuses to renounce violence and recognise Israel.

Ayatollah Khamenei, opening the Tehran conference, said all Muslims had a duty to help the Palestinian people and should not remain indifferent to tyranny.

The chain of plots by the American government aimed at governing the Middle East through the control of the Zionist regime will not succeed

He launched a scathing attack on the West, saying its liberal democracy was like a poison.

He said global imperialism led by the US president openly threatened the Muslim world by talking about launching a crusade against it.

President Ahmadinejad widened the attack to include Israel, which he said was "a rotten, dried tree that will be eliminated by one storm".

Steve Schippert has more on the conference here and here. Steve writes:

Not many news outlets have taken note of Iran’s hosting of the Third International Conference on Qods and Support for the Rights of Palestinian People. Do a Google News search for International Conference on Qods and Support for the Rights of Palestinian People. As of Monday morning, only two sites were listed among the first entire page of links: Iran’s state-run IRNA and MehrNews. This is unfortunate considering the importance the conference plays in Iran’s increasingly open co-opting of the Palestinian issue for their own strategic gain and their increasing influence within the Sunni Hamas.

Can Iran be any clearer on its intentions to use terrorism as a way to intimidate its perceived enemies? Iran is saying it is willing to use suicide bombers if attacked by the West. It is a warning painted in blood.

I'll agree with those like James Fallows that the use of the military option against Iran is hardly the best of options. But Iran wants to use these attacks to cow us, to have us trembling in our boots, wringing our hands that nothing can be done to stop Iran's march to nuclear weapons.

Imagine this regime with nuclear weapons. Imagine the next Islamic Jihad operative marching into Tel Aviv not with an explosive belt around his waist, but with a nuclear bomb in the back of his truck. We are so willing to let this regime threaten the world with nuclear weapons?

We have not yet fully experienced nuclear terrorism. Are we so eager to taste it?