The US president's visit is not meant to hold Israel back.
On the surface, the
words seem almost banal: Israel has the right to defend itself, by itself,
against any threat.
Upon first hearing, one
could be excused for thinking this is merely stating the obvious, that all
independent, sovereign states possess that inalienable right to self defense.
Isn't that what sovereignty is all about.
This was a line former
prime minister Ariel Sharon made sure was included in the famous letter from
then-president George W. Bush that preceded the disengagement from Gaza, and it
is a line that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu repeated time and time again
on Wednesday at the his public appearances with US President Barack Obama.
"Thank you for
unequivocally affirming Israel’s sovereign right to defend itself by itself
against any threat," Netanyahu said at the airport following Obama's
speech upon landing, where he said "today the sons of Abraham and the
daughters of Sara are fulfilling the dream of the ages – to be masters of their
own fate in their own sovereign state."
He said it again at the
start of his press conference with Obama following the first round of their
meetings. In fact, Netanyahu mentioned Israel's right to independently defend
itself during the press conference no less than three times, with the most
significant reference at the beginning.
"Notwithstanding
our joint efforts and your great success in mobilizing the international
community, diplomacy and sanctions so far have not stopped Iran's nuclear
program," he said. "And as you know, my view is that in order to stop
Iran's nuclear programs peacefully, diplomacy and sanctions must be augmented
by a clear and credible threat of military action. In this regard, Mr.
President, I want to thank you once again for always making clear that Israel
must be able to defend itself by itself against any threat."
For months, in fact even
years going back to at least January 2011, Netanyahu has said that sanctions on
Iran will only work if coupled with a "credible military
option." The reasoning was that only if Iran had a dagger over its
head would it use the sanctions and political isolation to back down. In recent
weeks he stepped up the drumbeat of that mantra, saying this line almost every
time he made public comments on Iran, although never spelling out exactly what
he considered to be that credible military threat.
Over the first two days
of Obama’s visit that threat emerged: it is Israel itself.
Speculation has been
rife for years that the US is holding Israel back when it comes to Iran.
Indeed, prior to Obama's trip there was speculation that one of the main
purposes of his journey was to hold a bright red stop light up to Netanyahu.
No one -- including the
Iranians -- knows what Obama and Netanyahu said to each other privately on
Wednesday. Publicly, however, restraining Israel has not been Obama’s message.
Indeed, the opposite is true -- and these are the words the Iranians are
hearing as well.
"I think that what
Bibi alluded to, which is absolutely correct, is each country has to make its
own decisions when it comes to the awesome decision to engage in any kind of
military action, and Israel is differently situated than the United
States," Obama said at Wednesday’s press conference. "And I would not
expect that the prime minister would make a decision about his country's
security and defer that to any other country, any more than the United States
would defer our decisions about what was important for our national
security."
The most solemn
responsibility of a leader, he said, is the security of his people."That’s
job number one. My job as president of the United States, first and foremost,
is to keep the American people safe. Bibi, as prime minister, your first task
is to keep the people of Israel safe. And Israel’s security needs are truly
unique, as I’ve seen myself.”
During the last four
years, Netanyahu's efforts regarding Iran were two fold: raising the issue to
the top of the international agenda, and creating a credible Israeli military
option. Actually, these two efforts were interconnected, because the world put
the issue on the agenda, and significantly ratcheted up sanctions on Iran
precisely because it felt that Israel posed a serious military threat.
And now Obama comes to
town and instead of sheathing that threat, instead of openly warning Israel not
to take action, he makes it clear publicly that he recognizes Israel's right to
defend itself by itself against all possible threats. Obama hopes it will not
come to that on Iran, he hopes the Iranians will back down. But if they don’t,
the credible military threat Netanyahu wants to see waved along with the
economic, political and diplomatic pressure already being applied against Iran
is no less than Israel itself.
Iran, and the
international community, have been warned.
It is a bit
strange that the most powerful nation on Earth with a population of 330 million
is delegating the leadership of the free word to a country of 7.7 million. But
this is definitely progress. If the reports
about the newly revealed Iranian site, 14 miles long and miles 7 .5 wide are
true, events seems be coming to a head.
The mutually assured destruction doctrine (MAD) does not work with Iran and according to some apocalyptic
hadiths the Twelvers would start a
nuclear war in order to kill 2/3 of humanity and trigger the return of the
Mahdi who is in “occultation”.
Iran is led by a
group of irrational men who believe they can hurry the arrival of the Mahdi –
the 12th Imam who, according to Shi’ite Islamic tradition, went missing in 874
CE and will return under conditions of global chaos. The Iranian leadership
appears willing to sacrifice the population of its own country to achieve this
goal.
In his book The Rise of Nuclear Iran, former Israeli
ambassador to the UN Dore Gold writes, “Mahdi Khaliji, an Iranian Shi’ite
scholar... has noted that there are apocalyptic hadiths [received Shi’ite
traditions] that the Mahdi will not return unless one-third of the world
population is killed and another third die. But Ahmadinejad and his followers
believe man can actively create the conditions for the Mahdi’s arrival in the here
and now...”
This means that the US and everyone else on this planet is in the same boat
and if the US expects Israel to be the one to act first then it is delegating its
defense to Israel.
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