This article was originally published by Michael Snyder at The Economic Collapse Blog. 

Did we just witness a moment that will permanently alter history?  As I write this article, the entire world is waiting for confirmation that Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi is either dead or alive.  If it turns out that he is dead, that will be really bad news, because that could push the Middle East to the brink of all-out war.

No matter what actually happened, there is no way that you are going to be able to convince Iranian leaders that the U.S. and Israel were not responsible for bringing that helicopter down.  So let us hope that Raisi survives, because if he doesn’t the Iranians will be overwhelmed with emotion and will begin planning how to avenge the death of their president.

Ultimately, this could have just been a tragic accident.  Flying a very old helicopter while there is “heavy fog” in a very remote area surrounded by high mountains is never a good idea, and shortly after the helicopter went down it was reported that “information coming from the crash site is very concerning”…

The lives of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and his foreign minister were feared to be in jeopardy after their helicopter crashed Sunday in heavy fog in a mountainous area following a visit to the country’s northwest border, prompting a massive search and rescue effort.

“We are still hopeful, but information coming from the crash site is very concerning,” an official who spoke on condition of anonymity told Reuters.

There were three helicopters that were traveling in a convoy, and several of Iran’s highest-ranking officials were all traveling inside one of them…

The helicopter was one of a convoy of three and foreign minister Hossein Amirabdollahian, Friday prayer Imam Seyyed Mohammad-Ali Al-Hashem and other high-ranking officials were also reportedly on the helicopter with the president.

Once Raisi’s helicopter went down, the other two helicopters should have known exactly where it happened.

And we are being told that the helicopter that Raisi was on should have been able to send out a signal unless it had been completely destroyed somehow…

“Helicopters used for high-ranking officials can send out their exact location in case of a crash, unless an explosion has disabled all onboard systems, including the emergency system,” Iranian defense and security analyst Farzin Nadimi told @IranIntl.

“It’s possible that a bomb exploded inside, or due to pilot error and insufficient visibility, the helicopter might have collided with a rock or the top of a hill, resulting in its sudden destruction.”

So something is not adding up here, because for hours after the crash happened it was being reported that rescuers were having difficulty locating the crash site…

Details about the incident remained unclear, although reports indicated that the president’s helicopter suffered a “hard landing” in foggy weather. As night fell, the search became even more difficult. According to the Iranian IRNA news agency, the helicopter crashed in a forest area between the villages of Pir Davood and Uzi in northwestern Iran.

IRGC-affiliated Tasnim News Agency said emergency services were conducting searches to try to find the helicopter, but the weather and 70-meter tall boulders in the area were complicating the search efforts. Over 40 rescue teams were operating in the area.

To me, it seems like the Iranians are trying to keep a lid on this thing.

I don’t think that they are ready to tell the world what really happened.

And I think that it is a very bad sign that IRGC forces have been positioned around a number of government buildings in Tehran…

A Significant Deployment of Iranian Security and Military Personnel has been noted across the Capital of Tehran, with Members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) claimed to be taking up Positions near several Government Buildings.

If Raisi was perfectly fine, this would not be happening.

On Twitter, Israel News Pulse is claiming that there has been confirmation that Raisi is dead…

Confirmation: Ali Reza Dawari, head of the communications department in Ahmadinejad’s presidency, confirms the deaths of the President of Iran and his Foreign Minister, Abdollahian, in the president’s helicopter crash in the mountains of East Azerbaijan Province.

I haven’t been able to find confirmation of this anywhere else.

So for now, I am still operating under the assumption that his fate is unknown.

But I will admit that it doesn’t look good for Raisi at this point.

Arnaud Bertrand is pointing out that if Raisi is dead this could be “an Archduke Ferdinand of the Middle East scenario”…

If Raisi is confirmed dead and foul play was found to be involved (a strong possibility given the geopolitical context), this has the potential to turn into an archduke Ferdinand of the Middle East scenario, especially given Raisi was rumored to be Khameini’s successor.

For those that aren’t familiar with history, many historians regard the death of Archduke Ferdinand as the spark that started World War I.

Could we be on the verge of another historic war?

Needless to say, for a very long time I have been warning that Israel and Iran were headed for a showdown.

Speaking of Israel, it appears that Benjamin Netanyahu’s wartime government could potentially be starting to crumble…

Tensions within the Israeli government are exploding, after Defense Minister Yovav Gallant earlier this week called out Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and gave him an ultimatum, demanding that a day-after plan be offered and approved by the government.

“I call on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, to make a decision and declare that Israel will not establish civilian control over the Gaza strip, that Israel will not establish military governance in the Gaza strip, and that a governing alternative to Hamas in the Gaza strip will be raised immediately,” Gallant said recently.

What’s more is that Washington is backing Gallant’s pressure campaign against Netanyahu. “We share the Defense Minister’s concern that Israel has not developed any plans for holding and governing territory the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] clears, thereby allowing Hamas to regenerate in those areas. This is a concern because our objective is to see Hamas defeated,” a senior Biden administration official told The Hill.

This is the most dangerous moment that we have witnessed in the Middle East in decades.

And I am entirely convinced that all-out war is eventually coming.

Will this helicopter crash be one of the events that sparks such a conflict?

We shall see.

For now, let’s pray for peace, but let’s also brace ourselves for war.

Michael’s new book entitled “Chaos” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

About the Author: Michael Snyder’s extremely controversial new book entitled “Chaos” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com. He has also written seven other books that are available on Amazon.com including “End Times”, “7 Year Apocalypse”, “Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”, “The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”.  When you purchase any of Michael’s books you help to support the work that he is doing.  You can also get his articles by email as soon as he publishes them by subscribing to his Substack newsletter.  Michael has published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream, and The Most Important News, and he always freely and happily allows others to republish those articles on their own websites.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, we strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.