by Yoni Hirsch, Shlomo Cesana, Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff
Netanyahu to use U.N. address to try curb the West's enthusiasm of the new Iranian regime • Steinitz: Iranian president's charm offensive aims to deceive West, "and some people want to be deceived."
In 2012, Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu drew a red line at the U.N. to denote the threshold
of uranium enrichment Iran must not be allowed to cross
|
Photo credit: AP  |
Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu, who is scheduled to address the U.N. General Assembly in New
York next Tuesday, will arrive at the U.N at an awkward time, as he
will have to try and curb the international community's enthusiasm of
the new Iranian leadership.
"A bad agreement is worse than no agreement at
all," an Israeli source was quoted by the New York Times as saying on
Sunday. According the source, Netanyahu's address will draw parallel
lines between the Iranian and North Korean nuclear programs.
"Iran must not be allowed to repeat North
Korea’s ploy to get nuclear weapons," the Israeli official told the New
York Times. "Just like North Korea before it, Iran professes to
seemingly peaceful intentions; it talks the talk of nonproliferation
while seeking to ease sanctions and buy more time for its nuclear
program."
The White House, meanwhile, did not fully
subscribe to the comparison between Tehran and Pyongyang. "The
comparison is simply that they are two nations that have not abided by
international nonproliferation norms. But the fact of the matter is
North Korea already has a nuclear weapon. They acquired one, tested one
in the beginning of 2006. And Iran does not yet have a nuclear weapon,"
Deputy National Security Adviser Benjamin Rhodes said.
"That’s all the more reason why we need to
take steps to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon so that we’re
not presented with the type of situation that we have in North Korea
where you’re seeking to denuclearize a country that has already crossed
that threshold," he added.
"It seems the world is willing to fall for
[Iranian President Hasan] Rouhani's charade," Minister for
International, Intelligence and Strategic Affairs Yuval Steinitz said in
an interview with Army Radio on Tuesday. "We are aware of the fact that
some of the world is willing to be fooled."
Steinitz, who is currently in New York, added
that "Rouhani is trying to deceive the world and some of the world is
willing to be deceived. Israel's role is to fight for the truth and we
are doing our best. What we are seeing from the Iranian president is a
charm offensive and smile diplomacy, but there is no change is the
substance [of Iran's rhetoric]."
Asked about the chances of a potential
handshake between Rouhani and U.S. President Barack Obama, Steinitz
said: "I hope not. I don't know."
He stressed that "the important thing is not
just words and appearances. The important thing is the actions. The
important thing is the resolutions... and I really hope that the whole
world, and chiefly among them the United States, will say, 'Okay, it's
nice to see the smiles, to hear the new rhetoric, but as long as you
don't change the conduct, and as long as you don't make a real
concession in the nuclear project, the economic sanctions will continue
and if there is need, will be joined by a military threat as well.'"
Rouhani and Obama were scheduled to deliver speeches to the General Assembly on Tuesday.
Washington says it remains determined to deny
the Iranians the means to make nuclear arms but its willingness to
engage them directly complicates strategy for Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu, who will address the world forum on October 1.
The day before, Netanyahu is scheduled to meet
Obama at the White House for discussions on Iran that Israeli officials
say will affect the content and tone of his U.N. speech.
At last year's speech, Netanyahu set a "red
line" that he said would trigger Israeli military strikes on Iranian
nuclear sites, drawing it across a cartoonish bomb representing the pace
and scale of the Islamic Republic's uranium enrichment.
This time around, some Israeli officials
predict, he will opt for a more sober message, with facts trumping
rhetoric. As Iran has kept its uranium enrichment below the Israeli
threshold, they said, he will note it has also made progress on another
track that could yield bomb-grade plutonium.
Steinitz said last week that Iran, on its
current course, could make a nuclear weapon in six months. "There is no
more time" for nuclear negotiations, he told Israel Hayom.
But with a new round of such talks in the
works, Steinitz reaffirmed Israel's position that it would support a
diplomatic solution that truly halted Iran's nuclear program. He
described this as unlikely, saying Rouhani brought a deceptive change of
style but not substance to Iranian policymaking.
"We are certainly warning the entire
international community that Iran may want an agreement, but it is
liable to be the Munich agreement," Steinitz said, referring to the 1938
appeasement of Nazi Germany.
"Rouhani wants to hoodwink, and some in the
world want to be hoodwinked, and the role of little Israel is to explain
the truth and to stand in the breach. And that is what we are doing to
the best of our abilities. It is a long struggle."
Yoni Hirsch, Shlomo Cesana, Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=12151
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
No comments:
Post a Comment