How we know Obama won't stop Iran and how he goes about doing nothing.

 

by Anne Bayefsky

 

Part I: Waiting to see: Obama has stopped worrying and learned to accept the Iranian bomb.

Pres. Barack Obama has decided to let Iran acquire nuclear arms. Unless Israel acts in self-defense against the president's wishes, the world's most dangerous regime will command the world's most dangerous weapon.

Notwithstanding the White House's misinformation campaign to the contrary, the evidence of the president's agenda is incontrovertible.

Number one. Obama knows that the U.N. will not prevent an Iranian nuclear bomb. In June 2003 the International Atomic Energy Agency first reported that Iran was breaching its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Six years and five minimalist Security Council resolutions later, the adoption of serious sanctions by the council remains a non-starter. Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said in early July that more sanctions would be "counter-productive." The Tehran Times reported on July 28 that the Iranian nuclear plant at Bushehr — built by Russia's nuclear-power corporation and completed in March — will be operational by the end of September. The latest development in burgeoning Chinese-Iranian ties was an Iranian July 13 announcement that China has agreed to invest $40 billion to increase Iran's gasoline-refining capacity — a move that would hardly be an incentive to buy into new sanctions.

Number two. Heavy-duty sanctions imposed beyond the U.N. would require a serious and prompt push by the E-3 — France, the United Kingdom, and Germany. But Germany has other priorities. In May, the Iranians were able to coo, "around 50 German firms have their own branch offices in Iran and more than 12,000 firms have trade representatives in the country. . . . With some $5.5 billion annual trade, Germany is Iran's major European trading partner and the third worldwide." Not surprisingly, on July 2, German chancellor Angela Merkel championed "keeping open the possibility of talks on Iran's nuclear program." British foreign secretary David Miliband described the EU hurry-up-and-wait preference while in Washington on July 29: "I think it's very important to say that on the important nuclear question, the ball is in Iran's court. And as soon as the new government is formed in Tehran, we look forward to that government addressing . . . the clear package that was put to Iran some 15 or 16 months ago."

Number three. President Obama himself is refusing to back strong, immediate sanctions in response to Iran's umpteen violations of the NPT and human rights. On the contrary, after the July 10 G-8 meeting, he declared: "This notion that we were trying to get sanctions . . . is not accurate." Defense Secretary Robert Gates reiterated on July 27 that sanctions are still not on Obama's agenda. All he could say was that "if the engagement process is not successful, the United States is prepared to press for significant additional sanctions."

Number four. Obama's only concrete plan for dealing with what even Gates has called "the greatest current threat to global security" is more talk. Without an end date. On May 18, Obama declared that deadlines would be "artificial." This is how he explained the snail's pace: "My expectation would be that if we can begin discussions soon, shortly after the Iranian elections, we should have a fairly good sense by the end of the year as to whether they are moving in the right direction. . . . That doesn't mean every issue would be resolved by that point." On July 10, the president said: "We will take stock of Iran's progress when we see each other this September at the G20 meeting." On July 27 in Israel, Gates explained it this way: "I think that the president is certainly anticipating or hoping for some kind of response this fall, perhaps by the time of the U.N. General Assembly." So here's the Obama plan: Maybe by the end of the year he will have some idea sort of where he is going, and in the meantime he is keeping his fingers crossed and looking forward to stock-taking.

Worse, the potential year-end review of the yakkety-yak policy was based on the premise that the yakking had already started. On May 18, the president maintained that the Iranian "elections will be completed in June, and we are hopeful that, at that point, there is going to be a serious process of engagement." Two months of silence later, on July 23, Secretary Clinton admitted: "Well, we haven't had any response. So we've certainly reached out. We've made it clear that that's what we would be willing to do even now."

Clinton has spun Iranian dithering not as an abysmal American miscalculation of Iranian interests but as a result of the mullahs' being too busy. While in Bangkok on July 22 and 23 she pontificated: "The door is open to what we would like to see as a one-on-one engagement with Iran. But they are so preoccupied right now." And again: "The internal debates going on within Iran have made it difficult, if not impossible, for them to pursue any diplomatic engagement. . . . I don't think that they have any capacity to make that kind of decision right now." Yes, brutal suppression takes time — but somehow, finding the hours and capacity for enriching uranium hasn't been a problem.

Number five. No amount of butchery by Iran's government has had any effect on Obama's enthusiasm for breaking bread with the regime. Widely denounced show trials for more than 100 people began August 1. Agence France-Presse reported August 1 that 2,000 people had initially been arrested and 250 remain behind bars. U.S. and U.K. papers reported on July 29 that Tehran hospitals registered 34 bodies of protesters on June 20 alone, while 150 corpses have been counted in hospitals. New stories of torture surface regularly, with the New York Times reporting on July 28 that "some prisoners say they watched fellow detainees being beaten to death by guards in overcrowded, stinking holding pens."

So while Iranians are still taking to the streets to reject the regime's legitimacy — chanting "Neda isn't dead, the regime is" in response to the shooting death of civilian Neda Agha-Soltan — Obama's overtures are sending the opposite message. On June 15 he said: "We will continue to pursue a tough, direct dialogue between our two countries, and we'll see where it takes us." On June 23 he reiterated: "There is a path available to Iran in which their sovereignty is respected, their traditions, their culture, their faith is respected. . . . We don't know how they're going to respond yet, and that's what we're waiting to see." Evidently, it never occurs to Obama that what makes his desired interlocutors criminals also decimates their capacity to conduct genuine dialogue, let alone keep any promises made.

Number six. With nothing moving "in the right direction" — no genuine dialogue, no legitimate counterpart, no hope of a tough U.N. resolution, no strong sanctions in place or in sight — Obama has attempted to take military action off the table for both Israel and the United States. On July 7, CNN asked the president if the U.S. had given Israel a green light for a preemptive strike against Iran's nuclear sites, to which he responded, "absolutely not." Last week Obama followed up by dispatching to Jerusalem a parade of emissaries instructed to make the same point — carrying no shame about bullying a democratic ally on a matter of its life and death.

As for U.S. action, Israeli defense minister Ehud Barak prompted Defense Secretary Gates on July 27 to keep "all options on the table." Gates's non-response to the plea said it all. On July 16 Gates, speaking in oblique terms about the military option, declared: "If something is done to prevent them [Iran] from getting one, the consequences of that are . . . very bad" — as bad or worse, he intimated, as the consequences of Iran actually getting the bomb. His reasoning was unlikely to have soothed Israelis: "Iran's going to have the capability to deliver nuclear weapons to the people in their region a lot sooner than they're going to have the capability to deliver them to us."

Number seven. In late July while in Thailand, Secretary Clinton spelled out a promise of a U.S. defense shield that would accompany the Iranian acquisition of a nuclear bomb. "We want Iran to calculate what I think is a fair assessment, that if the United States extends a defense umbrella over the region. . . . [Iran] won't be able to intimidate and dominate, as they apparently believe they can, once they have a nuclear weapon." Discussing plans for a post-Iranian nuclear world at this juncture would not occur if the administration's policy were to prevent it from happening, period.

Number eight. The Iranians know a blowhard when they see one. As columnist Amir Taheri notes, an Iranian newspaper with close ties to the government editorialized on July 26 that Obama doesn't have the stomach for a major confrontation with Iran: "The Obama administration is prepared to accept the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran. . . . They have no long-term plan for dealing with Iran. . . . Their strategy consists of begging us to talk with them." In other words, Iran has called Obama's bluff.

Iran is not the only one with Obama's number. Israel, Russia, China, France, Germany, and Great Britain all know. This president has accepted a nuclear-armed Iran. Obama can label it anything he likes: "waiting to see," "hoping for a response," "taking stock," "remaining ready to engage," standing by until the "preoccupation" with oppression ends, "pressing" others to allow "additional sanctions." But it all amounts to the same thing.

Unless Israel exercises its right of self-defense and decides to risk the wrath of President Obama as the lesser of two evils, there will be an Iranian nuclear bomb. Courtesy of Barack Obama.

 

 

Part II : A recipe for even more delay on Iran

 

US President Barack Obama will not prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. This is the stark reality facing Israeli decision-makers, who will be forced to risk the ire of a deeply hostile president if the development of an Iranian nuclear bomb is to be derailed.

 

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, bottom left, embraces judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, during the swearing-in ceremony for his second term, as parliament speaker Ali Larijani, above, looks on, in an open session of parliament, in Teheran, Iran, Wednesday.

No doubt the Obama administration claims to be worried, with Defense Secretary Robert Gates stating on July 16 that an Iranian bomb is "the greatest current threat to global security." But the same administration has no plan to ensure that the threat does not materialize — and is attempting to ensure that Israel doesn't either.

The Iranians have already called Obama's bluff. An Iranian newspaper referred to the American agenda on July 26 this way: "[T]he Obama administration is prepared to accept the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran... They have no long-term plan for dealing with Iran... Their strategy consists of begging us to talk with them."

The president's stance on Iran, and what it says about his anti-Israel bias, cannot be wished away. On August 3 Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the eviction of two Palestinian families illegally living in Jerusalem homes "deeply regrettable," but politely asked Iran for help in locating "the whereabouts of the three missing Americans" — that Iran had taken hostage — "and return[ing] them as quickly as possible." This is an administration more worried about ensuring a Judenrein future Palestinian state (settlements being only the tip of the iceberg) than ensuring the safety of the Jewish state or preventing the dramatic shift in the balance of power that will come with an Iranian nuclear weapon.

With President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sworn into office this week, it is critical that Obama's Iran scheme be in the open. Here are the elements of the "begging us to talk with them" syndrome.

Engagement is the watchword, and it has no expiry date. In May, Obama declared that deadlines would be "artificial," and spoke only of having "a fairly good sense by the end of the year as to whether they are moving in the right direction." In July the President said "we will take stock of Iran's progress" at the G20 meeting in late September. On July 27, Gates told Jerusalem: "I think the president is certainly anticipating or hoping for some kind of response this fall, perhaps by the time of the UN General Assembly." All of which is a recipe for delay.

The daily barbarism on the streets of Teheran has not shaken Obama off the engagement course. The administration has decided to accept the legitimacy of President Ahmadinejad as the rightful Iranian interlocutor, notwithstanding three new American hostages, the fraudulent election, the show trials under way, the torture of pro-democracy advocates, the detained, the dead and the disappeared. At the end of July, all Clinton had to say was: "We've certainly reached out. We've made it clear that that's what we would be willing to do even now."

The much-vaunted engagement, however, hasn't even started. The excuses abound. In Clinton's words in Bangkok at the end of July: "The door is open to what we would like to see as a one-on-one engagement with Iran. But they are so preoccupied right now. The internal debates going on within Iran have made it difficult, if not impossible, for them to pursue any diplomatic engagement... I don't think they have any capacity to make that kind of decision right now."

Or as Assistant Secretary of State Philip Crowley put it a day later: "We'll have to wait and see where Iran is... Obviously, right now, the government has its hands full."

In effect, the administration is giving Iran a time-out for brutality.

In the meantime, there is no American push for tough immediate sanctions in response to Iran's massive violations of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and human rights. On the contrary, Obama declared in July: "This notion that we were trying to get sanctions... is not accurate."

Gates confirmed no sanctions yet on July 27: "If the engagement process is not successful, the United States is prepared to press for significant additional sanctions." On August 3, Clinton managed only: "In the absence of some positive response from the Iranian government, the international community will consult about next steps, and certainly next steps can include certain sanctions."

If and when the administration reverses course on sanctions, its first stop will be the UN. It will start by begging the Security Council for another resolution with "significant" sanctions. Except that nobody believes the Security Council will deliver. More than six years ago the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency found Iran was violating the NPT. And here we are on the brink of disaster five trivial resolutions later.

Russia and China, with major and growing investments in Iran, have already made their objections clear. In July, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev expressly labeled more sanctions "counterproductive." After wasting more time at the UN over resolution number six, Americans may claim they can get the job done outside the UN in concert with the E-3 — France, the United Kingdom and Germany. But Germany has $5.6 billion in trade annually with Iran, making it the country's largest European trading partner and the third largest worldwide. Not surprisingly, Chancellor Angela Merkel said in July that she prefers "keeping open the possibility of talks on Iran's nuclear program."

Or as British Foreign Secretary David Miliband explained Britain's hurry-up-and-wait foreign policy on July 29: "On the important nuclear question, the ball is in Iran's court... [W]e look forward to that government addressing... the clear package that was put to Iran some 15 or 16 months ago."

By the time the sanctions route finally takes hold in the administration's imagination — and those of its allies — it would be foolhardy to assume that design, implementation and evaluation will proceed at a rate sufficient to beat the nuclear clock.

In short, Obama's Iran policy has two prongs. Set a snail's pace on engagement and sanctions. And send waves of brass-knuckled emissaries to Jerusalem in an effort to take military action off the table.

The only question now is whether Obama's fundamental disrespect for Jewish self-determination will convince Israel not to take the military steps necessary to forestall an Iranian nuclear bomb. If it does, Ahmadinejad's reign of terror will have only just begun.
 

Anne Bayefsky is a senior fellow at Hudson Institute and the editor of EYEontheUN.org

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

 

Golda and the Terrorists - "There can be no deals with terrorism whatever the circumstances."

 

by Yehuda Avner

 

How does one treat terrorists? Deal with them and you're done for; don't and innocents die. Take the case of Schoenau. It is a tale of infamy that seized the assemblage of the Council of Europe in September 1973.

The Council of Europe, Strasbourg, is that continent's approximation to a representative House. At the time in question its 400-odd delegates watched with various degrees of curiosity as a stooped, aging woman with a face deeply scarred with tragic lines, mounted the podium. She was Israel's Prime Minister Golda Meir, and she was there at the invitation of the European Council to state the case for Israel.

Generally speaking, Golda Meir preferred to speak extemporaneously, but since this was a formal occasion protocol required she deliver a pre-prepared address. I, her in-house speechwriter, drafted one. In its preparation I had torn up a dozen or more versions, leaving tooth marks on my pen as I wrote and rewrote page after page, scribbling deranged doodles while mentally struggling for concise, rhythmic, salvationary nouns and alliterative descriptions in my effort to give her words a defining oratory.

Finally, a coherent theme emerged and a speech surfaced. It thanked the Council and individual European parliaments for raising their voices in support of Soviet Jewry's right to freely emigrate to Israel [this was at the height of the worldwide "Let my People Go" campaign], delved into the intricacies of the Middle East conflict, pleaded for "the European Council's help to enable the Middle East to emulate the model of peaceful coexistence that the Council itself had established," and perorated with a quote from the great European statesman, Jean Monnet, that "Peace depends not only on treaties and promises. It depends essentially upon the creation of conditions which, if they do not change the nature of men, at least guide their behavior towards each other in a peaceful direction."

 

Seven Jews were taken hostage, among them a 73 year-old man, an ailing woman, and a three-year old child. The terrorists issued an ultimatum.

To my consternation Golda never enunciated a single one of these words. Instead, she scanned the assembly from end to end, jaw jutting, her expression defiant, and after combing back her hair with the fingers of both hands, brandished the written speech, and in a caustic tone said, "I have here my prepared address, a copy of which I believe you have before you. But I have decided at the last minute not to place between you and me the paper on which my speech is written. Instead, you will forgive me if I break with protocol and speak in an impromptu fashion. I say this in light of what has occurred in Austria during the last few days."

Clearly, the woman had decided it was idiotic to read her formal address after the devastating news which had reached her just before leaving Israel for Strasbourg:

A train carrying Jews from communist Russia en route to Israel via Vienna was hijacked by two Arab terrorists at a railway crossing on the Austrian frontier. Seven Jews were taken hostage, among them a 73 year-old man, an ailing woman, and a three-year old child. The terrorists issued an ultimatum that unless the Austrian government instantly closed down Schoenau, the Jewish Agency's layover near Vienna where the émigrés were processed before being flown on to Israel, not only would the hostages be killed, but Austria itself would become the target of violent retaliation.

The Austrian cabinet hastily met and, led by Chancellor Bruno Kreisky, capitulated. Kreisky announced that Schoenau would be closed forthwith, and the terrorists were hustled to the airport for safe passage to Libya.

The entire Arab world could hardly contain its glee, and a fuming Golda Meir instructed her aides to arrange for an early flight from Strasbourg to Vienna where she intended to confront her fellow prime minister, her fellow socialist, and her fellow Jew, Bruno Kreisky, herself.

To the European Council she said, "Since the Arab terrorists have failed in their ghastly efforts to wreak havoc in Israel they have, of late, taken their atrocities against Israeli and Jewish targets into Europe, aided and abetted by Arab governments."

This remark caused a fidgety buzz to drone around the packed chamber, and it seemed to deepen when she spoke bitterly about the eleven Israeli athletes kidnapped and murdered at the Munich Olympics the summer before, an outrage compounded by the German government's subsequent release of the surviving killers in return for the freeing of a hijacked Lufthansa plane and its passengers.

"Oh yes, I fully understand your feelings," said Golda cynically, arms folded as tight as a drawbridge. "I fully understand the feelings of a European prime minister saying, 'For God's sake, leave us out of this! Fight your own wars on your own turf. What do your enmities have to do with us? Leave us be!' And I can even understand" -- this in a voice that had gone grimmer than ever -- "why some governments might even decide that the only way to rid themselves of this insidious threat is to declare their countries out of bounds, if not to Jews generally then certainly to Israeli Jews, or Jews en-route to Israel. It seems to me this is the moral choice which every European government has to make these days."

 

"...there is but only one answer — no deals with terrorists; no truck with terrorism."

And then, chopping the air with balled fists, her face as granite as her eyes, she thundered, "European governments have no alternative but to decide what they are going to do. To every one which upholds the rule of law I suggest there is but only one answer — no deals with terrorists; no truck with terrorism. Any government which strikes a deal with these killers does so at its own peril. What happened in Vienna is that a democratic government, a European government, came to an agreement with terrorists. In so doing it has brought shame upon itself. In so doing it has breached a basic principle of the rule of law, the basic principle of the freedom of the movement of peoples -- or should I just say the basic freedom of the movement of Jews fleeing Russia? Oh, what a victory for terrorism this is!"

The ensuing applause told Golda Meir that she had gotten her message across to a goodly portion of the European Council, so off she flew to Vienna.

Ushered into the presence of the impeccably dressed, bespectacled, heavy-set man in his mid-sixties whom she knew to be the son of a Viennese Jewish clothing manufacturer, she extended her hand which he shook while rising with the merest sketch of a bow, but not budging from behind the solid protection of his desk. 'Please take a seat, Prime Minister Meir," he said formally.

"Thank you Chancellor Kreisky," said Golda, settling into the chair opposite him, and placing her copious black leather handbag on the floor. "I presume you know why I am here."

"I believe I do," answered Kreisky, whose body language bore all the signs of one who was not relishing this appointment.

"You and I have known each other for a long time," said Golda softly.

"We have," said the chancellor.

"And I know that, as a Jew, you have never displayed any interest in the Jewish State. Is that not correct?"

"That is correct. I have never made any secret of my belief that Zionism is not the solution to whatever problems the Jewish people might face."

"Which is all the more reason why we are grateful to your government for all that it has done to enable thousands of Jews to transit through Austria from the Soviet Union via Schoenau to Israel," said Golda diplomatically.

"But the Schoenau transit camp has been a problem to us for some time," said Kriesky stonily.

"What sort of a problem?"

"For a start, it has always been an obvious terrorist target..."

Golda cut him off, and with a strong suggestion of reproach, said, "Mr. Kreisky, if you close down Schoenau it will never end. Wherever Jews assemble in Europe for transit to Israel they will be held to ransom by the terrorists."

"But why should Austria have to carry this burden alone?" countered Kreisky with bite. "Why not others?"

"Such as whom?"

"Such as the Dutch. Fly the immigrants to Holland. After all, the Dutch represent you in Russia."

It was true. Ever since the Russians had broken off diplomatic relations during the 1967 Six Day war the Dutch embassy in Moscow represented Israel's interests there.

"Oh, I'm sure the Dutch would be prepared to share the burden if they could," responded Golda, trying to sound even-tempered. "But they can't. It doesn't depend on them. It depends entirely on the Russians. And the Russians have made it clear that they will not allow the Jews to fly out of Moscow. If they could we would fly them directly to Israel. The only way they can leave is by train, and the only country they will allow Jews to transit through is yours."

"So let them be picked up by your own people immediately upon arrival in Vienna, and flown straight to Israel," argued the chancellor holding his own.

"That's not practicable. You know and I know that it takes guts for a Jew to even apply for an exit permit to leave Russia to come to us. They lose their jobs, they lose their citizenship, and they are kept waiting for years. And once a permit is granted most are given hardly more than a week's notice to pack up, say their goodbyes, and leave. They come out to freedom in drips and drabs, and we never know how many there are on any given train arriving in Vienna. So we need a collecting point, a transit camp. We need Schoenau."

The chancellor settled his elbows on the desk, steepled his fingers, looked the woman directly in the eye, and said sanctimoniously, "Mrs. Meir, it is Austria's humanitarian duty to aid refugees from whatever country they come, but not when it puts Austria at risk. I shall never be responsible for any bloodshed on the soil of Austria."

"And is it also not a humanitarian duty not to succumb to terrorist blackmail, Herr Chancellor?" Her words, sudden and raw and angry, were a declaration of war. What had begun as conflicting views between opponents was now a nasty cut and thrust duel between antagonists.

Kreisky shot back: "Austria is a small country, and unlike major powers small countries have few options in dealing with the blackmail of terrorists."

"I disagree," seethed Golda. "There can be no deals with terrorism whatever the circumstances. What you have done is certain to encourage more hostage taking. You have betrayed the Jewish émigrés."

 

"You have opened the door to terrorism, Herr Chancellor."

The man's brows drew together in an affronted frown. "I cannot accept such language, Mrs. Meir. I cannot..."

"You have opened the door to terrorism, Herr Chancellor," the prime minister spat undeterred. "You have brought renewed shame on Austria. I've just come from the Council of Europe. They condemn your act almost to a man. Only the Arab world proclaims you their hero."

"Well, there is nothing I can do about that," said the Austrian in an expressionless voice, looking uncomfortably still. And then, with a hint of a shrug, "You and I belong to two different worlds."

"Indeed we do, Herr Kreisky," said Golda Meir in a voice cracked with sardonic Jewish weariness. "You and I belong to two very very different worlds." And she rose, picked up her handbag, and made for the door. As she did so an aide to the chancellor entered to say the press were gathered in an adjacent room awaiting a joint press conference.

Golda shook her head. She asked herself, what was the point? Nothing she could say to the media could make any difference. Kreisky wanted to keep in the good books of the Arabs — it was as simple as that. So, she turned and hissed in Hebrew to her aides, "I have no intention of sharing a platform with that man. He can tell them what he wants. I'm going to the airport." To him she said contemptuously, "I shall forego the pleasure of a press conference. I have nothing to say to them. I'm going home," and she exited through a back stairway.

Five hours later she told the waiting Israeli press at Ben-Gurion airport, "I think the best way of summing up in a nutshell the nature of my meeting with Chancellor Kreisky is to say this: he didn't even offer me a glass of water."

Postscript: Schoenau was shut down, but Golda Meir's remonstrations triggered such an international whirl of protest that the Austrian chancellor had no choice but to offer alternative arrangements.

One day a few years later, after Menachem Begin assumed the premiership [1977], I was about to walk into the room of his bureau chief, Yechiel Kadishai, when a bedraggled-looking fellow in a battered trilby hat and a tattered raincoat, whom I recognized as a peddler of matches in downtown Jerusalem, walked out.

"What's that hawker doing here?" I asked. "Do you know him?"

"Sure." said Yechiel, his face deadpan. "His name is Kreisky,"

"Kreisky who?"

"Shaul Kreisky, brother of the Chancellor of Austria, Bruno Kreisky."

My mouth dropped open. "You're pulling my leg," I said.

"No I'm not. He's been living here for years. The Prime Minister occasionally helps him out. He's a great fan of Begin. Run after him and ask him."

I did. It was true.

 

Yehuda Avner served on the personal staff of five prime ministers, including Golda    Meir and Menachem Begin.

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

 

Will Tel-Aviv become an "illegal settlement"?

 

by Ami Isseroff

 

They are after Tel Aviv now. It was inevitable.

 

First they went after Jerusalem. UN resolutions "internationalized" Jerusalem. The "international" status of the city was ignored as long as Jordan illegally occupied the old city and east Jerusalem, but vigorous protests were issued when Israel conquered Jerusalem in the Six day war. Even the United States does not recognize any Jewish claims to Jerusalem, does not recognize any part of Jerusalem as part of Israel in violation of United States law, the 1995 Jerusalem Embassy Act. The US Consulate in Jerusalem insists that it is a mission to the Palestinian Authority. The Palestinians have long insisted that Jews had no historical connection with Jerusalem. The most recent statement to that effect was issued by the Muslim Chief Justice, Taysir Tamimi, denying Jewish historical rights in Jerusalem. He claimed it was never inhabited by Jews. The first temple is erased from history as well as the second temple, as well as the long habitation of Jews in Jerusalem prior to 1948, when Jerusalem was ethnically cleansed by the Jordan Legion. The Arab and Muslim "narrative," given academic credentials by such people as Nadia Abu el-Hajj of Barnard University, is that Jerusalem was always an Arab city. Never mind the Menorah in the Arch of Titus. Never mind the description of the siege of Jerusalem by Josephus Flavius. Never mind the inscription from the time of Hezekiah, which describes the tunnel built to divert water from Shiloach during the siege - precisely as recorded in the Old Testament. The Palestinians have a different "narrative." The Beit al Maqdes (temple) was built by Suleiman the Muslim. Muhammad secured Jerusalem for the Muslims by flying to Jerusalem in one night on his horse (pretty good horse!) al-buraq, and tying it up at the Wailing wall, which ensures that the wailing wall is Muslim too. So much for "Zionist Myths. Jerusalem is Arab and "Arab East Jerusalem" now belongs to the Muslims.

 

But now they are going after Tel Aviv as well. According to the old "Zionist narrative," apparently incorrect, Tel Aviv was founded in 1909, originally to be called "Achuzat Bayit." It was built on empty land purchased from Arabs. But a film festival in Toronto celebrating Tel-Aviv's Centennial is being boycotted, on the grounds that Tel-Aviv was stolen from the Arabs! No doubt, soon it will be discovered that Muhammad visited Tel Aviv too, and tied his horse up in Dizengoff Center. Such luminaries as Jane Fonda are boycotting the film festival:

 

Jane Fonda, Danny Glover and Eve Ensler have joined the growing list of artists who are boycotting the Toronto film festival over a program honoring Tel Aviv's 100th anniversary, gossip blogger Perez Hilton reported on Friday.

The three have added their names to a letter aimed at festival officials claiming that Tel Aviv was built on violence, ignoring the "suffering of thousands of former residents and descendants," Hilton reported.

Well yes, there was a war here. There were also a few wars between Germany and France. Alsace is also "built on violence, ignoring the 'suffering of thousands of former residents and descendants.'" What about "former residents" of Washington DC or for that matter Toronto? Or former Jewish residents of Cairo and Baghdad? Is that a reason to boycott the cities? Will Jane Fonda and her friends leave any corner of Israel that may be claimed by Jews as our birthright?

 

If Tel Aviv does not belong to the Jewish people by right, then surely Beersheba, an Arab town from 640 C.E. until 1948 is Arab by right, and Neve Gordon, the boycott advocate, should not be living and teaching there. Even the most obtuse boycotters can now understand that the boycott movement is not aimed at ending the occupation, but at ending Israel.

 

 

Ami Isseroff

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

 

 

Beware of Serial White House Middle East Blunders!

 

by Yoram Ettinger,

 

Israeli policy-makers and public opinion molders tend to accept US Administrations as top authorities on the Middle East. They have sometimes chosen to depart sharply from their own ideology/strategy – under US Administration pressure - in spite of systematic and dramatic US policy blunders, which have undermined US interests in the Middle East and have jeopardized Israel's existence.

 

For instance, in 1948, the US State Department, the Pentagon and the CIA were convinced that establishment of the Jewish State would trigger a war, producing a second Jewish Holocaust in less than a decade, that a Jewish State would be a strategic burden upon the US, that Arab oil producers would boycott the US and that Israel would join the Communist Bloc. In order to dissuade Ben Gurion from declaration of independence, they imposed a military embargo on the region (while Britain supplied arms to the Arabs) and threatened Ben Gurion with economic sanctions.

 

During the 1950s, President Eisenhower courted Egyptian dictator, Nasser, in an attempt to snatch him out of Soviet influence. However, accepting Nasser as the Arab leader and as a key Non-Aligned statesman, offering financial aid to construct the Aswan Dam and leaning on Israel to "end occupation of the Negev," evacuate the entire Sinai Peninsula and internationalize parts of Jerusalem did not moderate Nasser's subversion of pro-US Arab regimes, support of Palestinian terrorism, recognition of Communist China and moving closer to Moscow.

 

During the 1970s and 1980s, until the day of the invasion of Kuwait, the US Administration supported Saddam Hussein. It concluded an intelligence-sharing accord with Baghdad, authorized the transfer of sensitive dual use US technologies to Saddam and approved five billion dollars in loan guarantees to "The Butcher from Baghdad." President Bush – and his National Security Advisor, Brent Scowcroft, who is a role model for National Security Advisor Jim Jones and Defense Secretary Gates and has the ear of President Obama -   assumed that "the enemy of my enemy (Iraq VS Iran) is my friend."  However, the "enemy of my enemy" proved to be "my enemy."

 

In 1977, President Carter – who is admired by President Obama - opposed the Begin-Sadat peace initiative. He lobbied for an international conference and focused on the Palestinian issue and Jerusalem. However, the determination of Begin and Sadat forced Carter to join their peace bandwagon, which reached its destination by bypassing the Palestinian and the Jerusalem issues.

 

In 1979, President Carter abandoned the Shah of Iran, the bulwark of US interests in the Persian Gulf.  Carter and his National Security Advisor, Brzezinski – an informal advisor to Obama – facilitated the rise of Khomeini to power, thus triggering a strategic volcano, which is still haunting vital US concerns in the Middle East.

 

During 1993-2000, President Clinton and his advisor, Rahm Emanuel – President Obama's Chief-of-Staff - embraced the Oslo Process and Arafat as harbingers of peace and democracy. They anointed Arafat to the Most Frequent Visitor to the White House. However, never has a peace process produced as much bloodshed, terrorism, hate-education and non-compliance as has the Oslo Process. Clinton – just like Obama – contended that terrorism should be fought, primarily, through diplomatic and legal means. Hence Clinton's meek response to a series of assaults by Islamic terrorism from 1993 (First "Twin Towers") to 2000 (USS Cole), which led to 9/11.

 

President Bush's "Two State Vision" – which has been adopted by President Obama – constitutes an extension of the severely-flawed White House track record in the Middle East.

 

The nature of the leadership of the proposed Palestinian state can be deduced from the profile of its potential leaders, who have become role models of inter-Arab treachery, subversion and terrorism.  The "Good Cop," Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas) – a graduate of KGB training and of Moscow University and the engineer of hate education – was expelled from Egypt (1955), Syria (1966) and Jordan (1970) for subversion. He played a key role in the PLO violent attempts to topple the government in Beirut and PLO collaboration with Saddam's invasion of Kuwait.  

 

A Palestinian state would doom the Hashemite regime to oblivion, would constitute a tailwind to pro-Saddam terrorists in Iraq and to Islamic terrorists in Egypt, Lebanon and the Persian Gulf and would provide a foothold in the eastern flank of the Mediterranean to Iran, Russia, China and North Korea. A substantial annual net-emigration/flight, by moderate Palestinians, attests to the Palestinians' own expectations of the proposed Palestinian state.

 

The proposed Palestinian state on one hand, and Middle East stability and US and Israel national security on the other hand, constitute a classic oxymoron. A Palestinian state would add fuel – and not water – to the fire of terrorism and Middle East turbulence. The promotion of "The Two State Solution" proves that the US and Israeli policy-makers are determined to learn from history by repeating – rather than by avoiding – past dramatic blunders.

 

 

Yoram Ettinger,

 

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

 

Time's up on Iran

 

by Caroline Glick

 

Over the past few weeks evidence has piled up that Iran is not years away from being capable of building nuclear bombs at will. It is months away. As the latest report by the International Atomic Energy Agency on Teheran's nuclear program makes clear, at its present rate of uranium enrichment, Iran will have sufficient quantities of enriched uranium to build two atomic bombs by February.

 

What is most notable about this IAEA finding is that it comes in a report that does everything possible to cover up Iran's progress and intentions.

 

Israel responded angrily to the report, alleging that the agency's outgoing director, Mohamed ElBaradei, suppressed information that confirms the military nature of Iran's program. In a statement released last Saturday, the Foreign Ministry alleged that the report "does not reflect the entirety of the information the IAEA holds on Iran's efforts to advance their military program, nor their continued efforts to conceal and deceive and their refusal to cooperate with the IAEA and the international community."

 

Two weeks before the IAEA released its report, the US State Department published its assessment that Iran won't have the wherewithal to develop a bomb until 2013. According The Washington Post, this conclusion is based on the State Department's analysis of Iran's "technical capability."

 

For all its failures, the latest IAEA report puts the lie to this State Department assessment.

 

Moreover, as a recent study by Israeli missile expert Uzi Rubin shows, Iran already has several delivery options for its burgeoning nuclear arsenal. In a report published by The Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Rubin, who has been awarded the Israel Defense Prize and oversaw the development of Israel's Arrow missile defense system, concludes that Iran today has the capacity to develop solid-fuel-based intermediate ballistic missiles with a range of 3,600 kilometers. That is, today, Iran has the capacity to attack not only Israel and other states in the Middle East. Since its successful test of its solid-fuel based Sejil missile in May, it has the demonstrated capacity to attack Europe as well.

 

Furthermore, Teheran's successful upgrade of its ballistic missiles to satellite launchers has given it the capacity to launch nuclear weapons into the atmosphere. This renders Iran capable of launching an electromagnetic pulse attack from sea against just about any country. An EMP attack can destroy a state's electromagnetic grid and thus take a 21st-century economy back to the pre-industrial era. Such an attack on the US, for instance, would cripple the American economy, and render the US government at all levels incapable of restoring order or preventing mass starvation.

 

THESE LATEST disclosures should focus the attention of Israel's leaders on a singular question: What can Israel do to prevent Iran from further expanding its nuclear capacity and block it from emerging as a nuclear power?

 

The answer to this question is the same as it has been for the past six years, since the scale of Teheran's nuclear program was first revealed. Israel can order the Israel Air Force to bomb Iran's nuclear and missile facilities with the aim of denying Iran the ability to attack the Jewish state.

 

The necessity for Israel to exercise its one option grows daily in light of what the rest of the world is doing in regards to Iran. Following the release of the IAEA report and ahead of the UN General Assembly's opening meeting later this month, this week US, German, British, French, Russian and Chinese diplomats met in Germany to discuss the possibility of ratcheting up Security Council sanctions against Iran. Ahead of the meeting, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel both announced that they support stronger sanctions.

 

But right on schedule, as the representatives of these countries sat down with one another, the Iranians told the media they are interested in negotiating. Suddenly, after stonewalling for more than a year, Teheran is willing to think about telling us the terms under which it will discuss the West's offer to provide the mullahs with all manner of rewards in exchange for an Iranian agreement to suspend the expansion of its of uranium enrichment, (which, as the IAEA report notes, is already great enough to produce two nuclear bombs by February).

 

Taking their cue from the mullahs, the Russians and the Chinese are now saying that there is no reason to be hasty. Far wiser, in their view, would be a decision to sit down and see what the Iranians would like to do. No doubt, the Russians and Chinese are arguing that it will take some time - perhaps until February - to arrange such a meeting. And then, there is the prospect that such a meeting could end inconclusively but keep the door open for further talks sometime in late-2010 or early 2011. In the meantime, as far as the Russians and the Chinese are concerned, further UN sanctions would be unfair in light of Iran's willingness to engage diplomatically.

 

But then even if the Russians and the Chinese supported stronger sanctions, the measure now being debated will have no impact on either Iran's ability or willingness to become a nuclear power. Today these leading nations are discussing the prospect of banning refined petroleum imports into Iran. Given that Iran, with its currently limited capacity to refine petroleum, is a net oil importer, for the past several years, the notion of banning the Iranian imports of refined petroleum products has been raised every time the IAEA submitted a report on Iran's nuclear program and every time more information came out describing its spectacular progress in missile development and uranium enrichment. Inevitably, this talk was dismissed the moment a mullah approached a microphone and hinted that Iran might be interested in cutting a deal.

 

But while the West has consistently postponed imposing such sanctions, the Islamic republic has taken the prospect seriously. Over the past four years, Iran moved to reduce its vulnerability to such a ban. It has required citizens to adapt their cars to run on natural gas, which Iran has in abundance. Furthermore, in a joint venture with China, Teheran has launched a crash program to expand its domestic oil refining capabilities. With Chinese assistance, Iran is expected to have the refining capacity to meet its domestic needs by 2012.

 

Beyond that, as former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton noted this week in The Wall Street Journal, even if the West were to impose such sanctions on Iran today, they would not impact the Iranian military's ability to operate. The only people who would be impacted by such sanctions are Iranian civilians.

 

Here, too, it should be noted that the entire rationale of the ban on refined oil imports to Iran is that oil shortages will turn the public against the regime and the regime in turn will be forced to stand down against the international community in order to placate its gasoline-starved constituents. But if the regime's brutal repression of its opponents in the wake of the stolen June 12 presidential elections tells us anything, it tells us that the regime doesn't care about what the Iranian public thinks of it. Indeed, in the face of rising domestic opposition to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the regime's best bet may be to launch a war against the hated Jews in order to unify the clerical leadership - which is now split between those supporting the regime and those supporting the opposition - behind the regime.

 

Finally, the discussion of sanctions is irrelevant because every move that Iran is making shows that the regime is determined to go to war. Its massive diversion of resources to its nuclear and ballistic missile program shows that the regime is absolutely committed to becoming a nuclear power. Its move to build an open military alliance with the Lebanese government, together with its expansion of its military ties to Syria through the financing of the sale of advanced Russian aircraft to Damascus and the proliferation of nuclear technology, shows that it is building up the capabilities of its underlings. Then, too, this week's report that the Hizbullah weapons cache in southern Lebanon which exploded in July contained chemical weapons indicates that Iran is already providing its terror proxies with nonconventional arsenals to expand its war-making capabilities against Israel and the West.

 

ALL IN all, the totality of Iran's moves make clear that it is not interested in using its nuclear program as a bargaining chip to gain all manner of goodies from the West. It is planning to use its nuclear program as a means of becoming a nuclear power. And it wishes to become a nuclear power because it wishes to wage war against its enemies.

And all in all, the totality of the UN-led international community's responses to Teheran's moves make clear that the world will take no effective action to prevent Iran from gaining the capacity to wage nuclear war. The world today will again do nothing to prevent the genocide of Jewry.

 

And that's the thing of it. So long as the mullahs continue to signal that the Jews are their first target, the world will be content to allow them to build their nuclear weapons and to use them. As US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's contention that the US will retaliate against Iran if it launches a nuclear attack against Israel makes clear, Washington will only consider acting against Teheran after the US moves to the top of Teheran's target list.

 

The question then is whether Israel has the ability to effectively attack Iran even if the US opposes such a strike. Based on open source material, the answer to this central question is yes, Israel can launch an effective strike against Iran.

 

Over the past several years, the IAF has demonstrated that it has the power-projection capability to reach Iran's nuclear installations, strike and return home. The key nuclear installations have been visited by IAEA inspectors. They are not hundreds of meters underground. They are not invulnerable to ordnance Israel already possesses. They can be destroyed or at least severely impaired.

 

The route to Iran is also open. Various leaked reports indicate that Saudi Arabia has given Israel a green light to overfly its airspace en route to Iran.

 

Finally, consistent polling data shows that the Israeli public understands the need for a strike and would be willing to accept whatever consequences flow in its wake. The public will support a government decision to strike even if the strike is not a one-off like the 1981 IAF strike that destroyed Iraq's Osirak reactor. The public will support the government even if the strike precipitates a condemnation by the US and a resumption of hostilities with Lebanon and even with Syria.

 

With each passing day, Iran moves closer to the bomb and closer to initiating war on its terms. The international community will do nothing to preempt this danger. Israel must act. Fighting a war on our terms is eminently preferable to fighting one on Iran's.

 

 

Caroline Glick

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.