Posted 10:28 pm Friday, September 14, 2012
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Isolating Israel will speed war
Israel is on her own. President Barack Obama seems to be working hard to make that clear. If the Jewish state decides to strike Iranian nuclear facilities, the U.S. will be in no position to criticize the decision. We’ve left Israel no other realistic option.
The Israelis have been shown they can no longer count on U.S. support.
“Ties between the United States and Israel showed new signs of strain, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticized the U.S. for not taking a harder line on Iran,” NBC News reported on Tuesday. “The White House, for its part, denied an Israeli source’s claim that President Barack Obama had refused Netanyahu’s request for a meeting later this month during the U.N. General Assembly.”
But the White House did make a point of publicizing a telephone conversation Obama had with Netanyahu, in which the two “discussed Iran.”
That’s not enough.
Netanyahu was entirely justified in his response to the snub.
“The world tells Israel ‘Wait, there’s still time.’ And I say, ‘Wait for what? Wait until when?’” Netanyahu said Tuesday. “Those in the international community who refuse to put red lines before Iran don’t have a moral right to place a red light before Israel.”
He later added, “As the prime minister of Israel, it is my duty to protect the interests of the state of Israel. At the moment, Israel’s biggest interest is preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear power; nuclear power in the hands of a country that is calling for the destruction of Israel and which has every intention of achieving that goal.”
But that’s in America’s interest, as well. A nuclear Iran — even if it refrained from using its bombs — would trigger an atomic arms race in the most volatile part of the world.
But the White House did make a point of publicizing a telephone conversation Obama had with Netanyahu, in which the two “discussed Iran.”
That’s not enough.
Netanyahu was entirely justified in his response to the snub.
“The world tells Israel ‘Wait, there’s still time.’ And I say, ‘Wait for what? Wait until when?’” Netanyahu said Tuesday. “Those in the international community who refuse to put red lines before Iran don’t have a moral right to place a red light before Israel.”
He later added, “As the prime minister of Israel, it is my duty to protect the interests of the state of Israel. At the moment, Israel’s biggest interest is preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear power; nuclear power in the hands of a country that is calling for the destruction of Israel and which has every intention of achieving that goal.”
But that’s in America’s interest, as well. A nuclear Iran — even if it refrained from using its bombs — would trigger an atomic arms race in the most volatile part of the world.
And Iran is getting ever closer to nuclear power.
“The U.N. atomic agency has received new and significant intelligence over the past month that Iran has moved further toward the ability to build a nuclear weapon, diplomats tell The Associated Press,” the AP reported on Tuesday. “They say the intelligence shows that Iran has advanced its work on calculating the destructive power of an atomic warhead through a series of computer models that it ran sometime within the past three years.”
That should be as unacceptable to us in the West as it is to Israel. Even the Canadians — the Canadians — agree, and last week severed diplomatic ties with Iran, recognizing it as a state sponsor of terrorism.
“The Iranian regime is providing increasing military assistance to the Assad regime; it refuses to comply with U.N. resolutions pertaining to its nuclear program; it routinely threatens the existence of Israel and engages in racist anti-Semitic rhetoric and incitement to genocide; it is among the world’s worst violators of human rights; and it shelters and materially supports terrorist groups,” Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird’s statement said.
On the surface, it seems the Obama administration doesn’t want Israel to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities.
But by isolating Israel, rather than Iran, the strike may happen all the sooner.
“The U.N. atomic agency has received new and significant intelligence over the past month that Iran has moved further toward the ability to build a nuclear weapon, diplomats tell The Associated Press,” the AP reported on Tuesday. “They say the intelligence shows that Iran has advanced its work on calculating the destructive power of an atomic warhead through a series of computer models that it ran sometime within the past three years.”
That should be as unacceptable to us in the West as it is to Israel. Even the Canadians — the Canadians — agree, and last week severed diplomatic ties with Iran, recognizing it as a state sponsor of terrorism.
“The Iranian regime is providing increasing military assistance to the Assad regime; it refuses to comply with U.N. resolutions pertaining to its nuclear program; it routinely threatens the existence of Israel and engages in racist anti-Semitic rhetoric and incitement to genocide; it is among the world’s worst violators of human rights; and it shelters and materially supports terrorist groups,” Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird’s statement said.
On the surface, it seems the Obama administration doesn’t want Israel to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities.
But by isolating Israel, rather than Iran, the strike may happen all the sooner.
