Schmuck With Earflaps Goes Nuclear On Netanyahu

[Dave007inVegas]

Sincerity or damage control?

http://www.truthrevolt.org/news/kerry-contradicts-rice-netanyahu-welcome-speak-congress

Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is "welcome to speak," contradicting National Security Advisor Susan Rice, who called the Tuesday speech "destructive."

:think2:

 

[The Guesser]

Nice speech and very accurate Senator. But then you lack the guts to back your convictions by boycotting this travesty. Sad.

[h=1]US Senator Feinstein slams 'arrogant' Netanyahu: 'He doesn't speak for me'[/h]

• [h=3]Netanyahu boards plane for Washington: I go as an emi...[/h]
• [h=3]Former Israeli security commanders: Netanyahu speech ...[/h]

[h=2]California senator gave an interview to CNN on Sunday ahead of Netanyahu's controversial speech before Congress.[/h]



Diane Feinstein, the Democratic senator from California, told CNN on Sunday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s contention that he is speaking for all Jews in lobbying against an agreement between the US and Iran is “arrogant.”

Netanyahu, upon boarding a plane to Washington for what his office says will be a historic address to Congress, said Sunday that he is going as an "emissary of all the citizens of Israel, even those who don't agree with me, and the entire Jewish people."

Netanyahu, whose speech has triggered a great deal of friction with the White House said, "I am greatly concerned about the security of the citizens of Israel and I will do what is necessary in order to ensure our future."

“He doesn’t speak for me on this," Feinstein told CNN's State of the Union. "I think it’s a rather arrogant statement. I think the Jewish community is like any other community. There are different points of view. I think that arrogance does not befit, Israel, candidly."

The senator said that she will attend Netanyahu's speech, even though some of her Democratic colleagues plan to stay away in protest to what they feel is the Israeli premier's overt undermining of President Barack Obama and his administration.

"I intend to go, and I’ll listen respectfully," she said. "I don’t intend to jump up and down."

US Secretary of State John Kerry pressed the case on Sunday for completing nuclear diplomacy with Iran despite Israeli opposition, saying the United States deserves the benefit of the doubt on getting a deal that would prevent any need for military action to curb Tehran's atomic ambitions.

Two days before Netanyahu is due to address the US Congress to warn against an Iran deal, Kerry delivered a stout defense of talks that are entering a critical phase with a key March 31 deadline looming.

Kerry said he hoped Netanyahu's speech does not turn into "some great political football" but said the Israeli leader is "welcome to speak in the United States, obviously."

Six powers - the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany - are negotiating with Iran toward an agreement to restrain Tehran's nuclear program in exchange for easing economic sanctions. Netanyahu has spoken scathingly about a possible deal and says a nuclear-armed Iran would pose an existential threat to the Jewish state.

Netanyahu was invited to speak by Republican congressional leaders, but they did not inform President Barack Obama's administration about the speech in advance. Signs are growing that the speech could damage Israel's country's broad alliance with the United States.

In an interview with the ABC program "This Week," Kerry said of the Iran negotiations: "It is better to do this by diplomacy than to have to do a strategy militarily which you would have to repeat over and over again and which everybody believes ought to be after you have exhausted all the diplomatic remedies."

Kerry said he could not promise that a deal can be reached, but said that "we are going to test whether or not diplomacy can prevent this weapon from being created."

"We have said again and again, no deal is better than a bad deal. We're not going to make a bad deal," Kerry said.

Kerry, who said he spoke with Netanyahu on Saturday, is heading to Switzerland and is due to meet with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif this week just as the Israeli leader comes to Washington.

"Our hope is diplomacy can work," Kerry added. "... Given our success on the interim agreement, I believe we deserve the benefit of the doubt to find out whether or not we can get a similarly good agreement with respect to the future."

 

[ScottL]

Obama’s fear of a reality check

By Richard Baehr, ISRAEL HAYOM

There is a point at which it is obvious that the current administration has no shame and will say or do anything to accomplish its objectives.

What are the administration’s objectives. It seems there are at least three in play related to Iran and Israel:

The administration has been working to move the Democratic Party leftward on both domestic and foreign policy issues since Obama took office. The further left one goes, the more likely one is to be hostile toward Israel. Obama and the Left’s agenda on foreign policy can best be described as an updated version of the Pete Seeger approach — lay down your swords and shields, and give peace a chance. So withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan, make peace with our enemies, and make enemies of our friends (since they worked together with Republican presidents to get us into wars). Iran and Cuba are our new friends, Israel is now much less of one.

The president also seems to have had an obsession with making things right with the Muslim world since he believes the West has behaved badly toward Muslim nations. Terrorism and violence are not Islamic, and the bad actors are a very few individuals who are really embarrassments to and not actually adherents of Islam. The real threat we face is not radical Islam, which does not exist, but Islamophobia and a lack of good jobs at good wages (with no gender imbalance) for jihadists.

With regard to Israel, the president has worked to weaken the ties between the Democrats and Israel, and make support for Israel less of a bipartisan position in Congress, and appear to be more of a Republican Party cause. Incredibly, the president and his flacks have accused House Speaker John Boehner and Netanyahu of damaging the bipartisan support for Israel, when they have ?been working to move Democrats away from Israel for six years. The brouhaha about protocol concerning Netanyahu’s speech played into the administration’s strategy and they jumped on it, once again calling the kettle black.

The Obama administration wants Netanyahu to lose the upcoming election in Israel. Obama wants a more compliant Israeli leader, one who will not threaten what he believes is the signature achievement of his second term — a nuclear deal with Iran — and will also be more willing to make concessions to the Palestinians. The best strategy to accomplish that is to make lots of Israelis nervous that a Netanyahu victory will mean two years of American pressure on Israel and further bad blood between the two countries. The message delivered by the Obama team is that a government headed by the Isaac Herzog-Tzipi Livni Zionist Union can get along with Obama. Obama surrogates therefore meet with the opposition team, while ignoring Netanyahu when he visits, an incredible display of rudeness and disrespect that has almost nothing to do with considerations of neutrality in the upcoming election. Instead, the Obama media team (the major networks, newspapers and bloggers) blame Netanyahu’s “collusion” with Boehner for the current impasse and argue that Netanyahu has violated “protocol” and been disrespectful.

The major issue, of course, is the Iran deal itself. As more details emerge on the proposed deal, the record of continuing concessions to Iran is becoming ever more apparent. They include an apparent agreement to remove limits on the number of centrifuges after a few years; an effective sunset provision on limits on the Iranian nuclear program, extending the breakout period for Iran to develop a nuclear weapon by at most a few months in the early years of the agreement; and acceptance of a weak inspection mechanism, all the while ignoring Iran’s missile development.

The administration was hoping that its pressure on Israel would lead Netanyahu to fold his tent and postpone any speech to Congress until hopefully the nuclear deal was signed and he had lost the election. Netanyahu refused, and at this point, he may be talking as much to the American people as he is to Congress, warning them of the dangers of the giveaway to Iran that is underway, and why Iran remains a bitter foe of both Israel and Western interests. As Rick Richman described it, the Obama team is selling the foreign policy equivalent ofObamacare.

Since no administration figure will play the Jonathan Gruber Obamacare role on the nuclear talks (exposing the lies that underlie the policy, while congratulating himself for his cleverness and deceit), Netanyahu will have to expose the deal for what it is. In short, it is a surrender that will result in Iran getting sanctions relief, and over time, a nuclear bomb, with all the increased leverage in the region that this will bring for a nation that is already a very bad actor. Throw in some proliferation of nuclear programs by other nations, and you have a much more dangerous brand of instability in a region where the U.S. has strategically withdrawn. If I were Obama, I would also be trying to hide what is going on.

 

[ScottL]

One of Mr Obama’s major goals has been removal of Binyamin Netanyahu from power in the Israeli Knesset election 16 days from today. An indicator of Mr Obama’s fecklessness as a foreign policy power player is the struggle he has mounted in vain against Mr Netanyahu’s appearance as guest speaker Tuesday evening before a joint session of the Congress of the United States, where the Israeli prime minister can be counted upon to give strong and believable evidence that Mr Obama’s Iran policies will lead almost directly to an Iran armed with nuclear weapons and the means of deploying them. And that those weapons will be controlled by a fanatic Iranian ruling cabal that wishes the destruction not only of Israel but also of the United States of America.

HaShem willing, Mr Netanyahu will arrive safely in the USA, in Washington, and in the Capitol of the United States, escorted and honored by most if not all of the members of the US Senate and the US House of Representatives. They, all of America, and most of the rest of the world — certainly including Israel — will be hanging on every word from the prime minister, and he will be accorded the honors of a hero. Mr Obama and his key aides must surely know what will go down that night and in the weeks and months to follow. And unless the president is made of the toughest of fiber, he will know and will feel that he has been reduced to defeat and helplessness by a man he so foolishly imagined he could treat as if he were a mere pizza delivery boy.

Mr Obama and Ms Rice are not likely to change their Middle East or Iran-focused policies. But the outcomes of what is now very likely to take place this week are multifold, and all against what Mr Obama had hoped for:

1) The Democratic members of the two houses of Congress will not all boycott Mr Netanyahu’s address. As a matter of fact, there is growing pressure from within Democratic Party ranks for their congressmen and senators to be present. And one might well imagine that Hilary Clinton would not want the party that she hopes will win the White House for her next year will not be split merely because her predecessor has lost a political struggle with the Israelis.

2) Mr Obama, in order to carry out his intended policy, will have to veto all but certain legislation passed against that policy by both houses of Congress. It is possible that enough Democrats will join with the Republicans on the other side of the aisles to override any such veto. Such overrides have happened before in American history, and they shall happen again, depending upon the issues and the personalities in the White House.

3) With the rapid shrinkage of US power and influence in the Middle East, Mr Obama has all but ceded imperial influence in that region to an enemy who rules the largest country in the world and whose power is being rebuilt by one of the most judicious and careful tsars in Russia’s long history. Mr Putin has been given many reasons and opportunities to regard Mr Obama and his key foreign policy advisors in contempt. Conversely, he may well regard Mr Netanyahu and the State of Israel with growing respect because that country and its leader has stood up to Mr Obama and his misplaced version of American exceptionalism. Russia will come out of all this as the most influential non-local power on the chess board of the Middle East. There are now a number of reasons why Israel should build up its relationships with Russia, China, and India — all of which are in the process of growing in any case. Because Israel, like any other sovereign country, has no permanent friends, only permanent interests.

4) About the coming election. the latest I24 New election poll, performed for that group by the Geocartography Knowledge Center, a respected Israeli market research firm. That poll now shows Mr Netanyahu’s Likud ticket leading Herzog’s and Livni’s temporarily joint ticket by two Knesset seats. With the upshot of the this week’s main event in Washington and its short-term aftermath, I cannot imagine that Mr Netanyahu will come out even stronger in the weeks leading up to the election, certainly enough to be able to make a coalition with 70 or even more seats out of the 120 in the Knesset. If Mr Netanyahu is an intelligent as I think he is, he will promise and turn over to Mr Kahlon the Finance Ministry, which that man so strongly wants. All things considered, he may do a very good job in that function.

Can all this be settled in a manner that does not promise an all but certain and destructive nuclear war involving Israel? I think so. But that shall require a strong combination of Eurasian powers able and willing to act as necessary. I do not think the USA will regain its base of influence in the Middle East. But what is taking shape is the groundwork for an Israel that will be allied with the military and anti-Moslem Brotherhood government of Egypt, with the kingdoms of Trans-Jordan and Saudi Arabia, with a coming Kurdish Federation, with Greece and other Orthodox Christian countries of the Balkans, with Azerbaijan, and with the Eurasian great powers. HaShem willing yet again, the future need not necessarily be permanently dark, for the Jewish nation and state, for the Middle East, and for the world.

Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI

 

[The Guesser]

[h=1]Netanyahu’s Speech Opens Political Divisions in Israel, Too[/h] By ISABEL KERSHNERMARCH 1, 2015

JERUSALEM — At Jerusalem’s bustling Mahane Yehuda market, a traditional bastion of support for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s conservative Likud Party, Israeli divisions played out among the fruit and vegetable stalls on Sunday as Mr. Netanyahu departed for Washington with plans to deliver a contentious speech on the Iranian nuclear threat before a joint meeting of Congress.
“This is the best step he could take,” Avraham Levy, 63, a merchant, said of the speech in which Mr. Netanyahu is expected to deliver a strong warning against a possible deal being discussed to limit Iran’s nuclear activities. The address has set Mr. Netanyahu on a collision course with the Obama administration.


“When six million Jews were murdered in the Holocaust nobody came and saved us,” Mr. Levy said as he sold bananas and avocados below a fading portrait of Menachem Begin, the Likud founder who became the first Likud prime minister. “We were slaughtered like sheep. We can only rely on ourselves,” he said. If Mr. Netanyahu could persuade a few Democrats to cross the aisle, Mr. Levy added, perhaps the whole Iran deal could be thwarted.
Rivka Alkalai, 84, a retired civil servant who defined herself as a centrist on the Israeli political map, shook her head and tut-tutted in disapproval.
“You don’t blatantly go and fly in the face of your good friends,” Ms. Alkalai said of Mr. Netanyahu and the Americans. “He will only do harm,” she said as she shopped for green beans and celery.
Mr. Netanyahu’s speech to the Republican-led Congress, set for Tuesday, is not only proving divisive in the United States, where he is being accused of interfering in American politics and damaging a decades-old alliance based on bipartisan support for Israel. It is also taking place in the highly charged period before Israel’s March 17 elections and has spawned an increasingly fraught debate in Israel about the potential benefits versus the risk of damaging to the crucial Israeli-American relationship.
More broadly, Israelis are now questioning whether Mr. Netanyahu, who is running for a third consecutive term, is Israel’s savior against the Iranian nuclear threat, which many here regard as existential, or whether his Iran policy has, instead, been an abject failure, with Iran apparently on a course to gain the potential to produce nuclear weapons regardless.

“I am leaving for Washington on a fateful, even historic, mission,” Mr. Netanyahu said before his departure on Sunday. “I feel that I am the emissary of all Israelis, even those who disagree with me, of the entire Jewish people.”
Adding gravitas to the occasion, Mr. Netanyahu was photographed offering a prayer the night before at the Western Wall, and at his desk handwriting the address in a bold script.
Still, many here remained unconvinced.
Adir Ben-Nahum, 28, a medical student who said he was generally liberal and left-leaning, described Mr. Netanyahu as “brilliant, but unfortunately only at politics.” The speech to Congress, he said, was “a dangerous political exercise” intended to bolster Mr. Netanyahu’s standing in the Israeli elections.

That popular criticism has now been bolstered by prominent voices from Israel’s security establishment. A group of nearly 200 former military and intelligence officials called on Mr. Netanyahu to cancel the speech, an unusually public challenge. At a news conference in Tel Aviv on Sunday, several of the former officers and officials warned that Mr. Netanyahu’s policies were endangering the strategic alliance with the United States and were actually bringing Iran closer to a nuclear bomb.
“It is hard for me to come out against Bibi,” said Amiram Levine, a retired general, referring to Mr. Netanyahu by his nickname. Noting that he had recruited Mr. Netanyahu into the elite Sayeret Matkal unit and was his commander there, Mr. Levine said, “I taught Bibi navigation, how to get to the goal, and this time I regret that I have to say, ‘Bibi, you made a mistake in navigation, the goal is in Tehran, not in Washington.’ ”
Meir Dagan, the former chief of Israel’s Mossad spy agency, has described Mr. Netanyahu as “the person who has caused the greatest strategic damage to Israel on the Iranian issue.”
In an interview published in the Yediot Aharonot newspaper this weekend, Mr. Dagan, who has been critical of Israel’s leaders before, said Mr. Netanyahu’s conduct was likely to motivate the American administration to hurry to reach a deal with Iran. “How would Obama explain not reaching a deal?” Mr. Dagan said. “That Netanyahu persuaded him? Or the Republicans?”
On Sunday, Secretary of State John Kerry, seeking to soothe the bruised relations between Washington and Tel Aviv, said on ABC’s “This Week” that Mr. Netanyahu was welcome to speak in the United States. The two men spoke by telephone on Saturday.
Israel says that a proposal under consideration that would strictly limit, for at least 10 years, Iran’s ability to produce nuclear material in exchange for an easing of sanctions, would allow thousands of Iranian centrifuges to continue spinning and enriching uranium — a far cry from Israel’s demand for zero enrichment and the complete dismantlement of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and capabilities.
Top Israeli officials and experts say the concern expressed by Mr. Netanyahu is genuine and legitimate. But that has not stopped internal criticism about his approach from growing, and becoming louder.
Giora Eiland, a former Israeli national security adviser, said Mr. Netanyahu had made a critical error in continuing to insist on an end to enrichment instead of, say, the transfer of low-enriched material to a third country, which might have been more palatable to the world powers negotiating with Iran.

“When you say all or nothing, you are left with nothing, and that is where we are,” Mr. Eiland said in a telephone interview. “Our official position was so far from the international consensus that no one thought we had to be considered,” he said.
But Israel, a party with a crucial stake in the nuclear talks even though it is not at the negotiating table, apparently decided to stick to a maximalist position for fear that any Israeli flexibility might be taken as a pass for even more concessions.
Isaac Herzog, the center-left Zionist Union candidate who is challenging Mr. Netanyahu for the premiership, has called the speech “a mistake” and argues that the way to deal with the strategic threat of a nuclear-armed Iran is through intimate relations with the United States.
Amos Yadlin, the former chief of Israel’s military intelligence and the Zionist Union’s candidate for the post of defense minister, told Israeli television that “speeches won’t stop Iran’s nuclear program” and that Iran was “on the threshold, a few months away from a nuclear bomb.” That, he added, had happened on Mr. Netanyahu’s watch.
And for many Israeli voters, there are more immediate concerns. As Mr. Netanyahu was preparing to leave for Washington a few hundred chemical industry workers from southern Israel were demonstrating outside his residence to protest against recent mass layoffs. One placard read, “Bibi, unemployment in the Negev is the real threat,” and another, “Bibi, we will die of hunger before Iran.”
“The speech to Congress is important,” said Ilan Hajaj, 51, a father of four who had just lost his job. “But at the moment, the war for us is at home.”

 

[ScottL]

Obama’s Iranian Charade in Geneva By Abraham H. Miller

Here is what you need to know about how inspections really work.
Published: Friday, February 27, 2015 10:01 AM

Professor (Emer.) Abraham H. Miller


Succumbing to Iran’s desire to have a nuclear bomb, the Obama administration is entering into a charade in Geneva that will allegedly halt Iran’s nuclear program for ten years.


President Barack Obama has repeatedly assured the world that he would not permit Iran to develop a nuclear weapon.


That promise is now as believable as Obama’s promise that if you like your healthcare you can keep your healthcare.


Even the idea that the president’s use of the International Atomic Energy Agency and the inspection process will keep Iran from developing a bomb in ten years is an exercise in deception. The inspections have been largely meaningless.


News reports claim the Geneva deal, with its lifting of sanctions, permits Iran to not only develop a bomb but also to acquire the resources for further aggression in the Middle East, as it is currently doing on Israel’s northern frontier, in Yemen, and with its propping up of the Assad regime in Syria.


For those who will be swayed by the allusion to the IAEA and inspections, here is what you need to know about how inspections really work.


The inspection process relies on the country’s own description of its processing procedures. As it turned out, the IAEA reported in 2009 that Iran “miscalculated” how their procedures worked and produced 33% more low enriched uranium (LEU) than could be calculated from their information.
This is not a trivial error. It means the difference between having enough material for a nuclear bomb or not.


If that was not sufficient concern, the amount of nuclear material that leaves the enrichment facility is also at issue. The inspectors do their own inventory just once a year, so the diversion of material for further surreptitious enrichment is hardly an obstacle.


At the technical level there is one greater and more obvious problem. LEU needs to be enriched only to five percent to be used to generate power. Iran enriches its LEU to twenty percent. It is far easier to get from 20% percent enrichment to 90% than from one percent to five percent.
The technical issues more than suggest that Iran intends to build a bomb by having a breakout capacity, moving quickly from LEU to high enriched uranium (HEU). Equally important are the human characteristics of the negotiations.


The Iranians have issued a fatwa that it is un-Islamic to possess nuclear weapons, but as James Robbins has insightfully noted, that fatwa, unlike the other fatwas issued by the Iranian government, has never been published, raising the question of whether it even exists—not that its existence would alleviate concerns about the regime’s nuclear ambitions.


President Obama has referred to the missing fatwa as if it is a meaningful statement about Iran’s intentions. This is an incredulous act of naiveté or deception. Pakistan has not found it un-Islamic to possess a nuclear device, and other Islamic states have more than stated their intentions to pursue a nuclear bomb should Iran possess one.


The Iranian regime has scorned Obama as desperate to reach an agreement with them.


If you listen to what the Iranians say, there is nothing that will deter them. Neither sanctions nor asset seizure or diplomatic isolation has remotely comprised the Iranian pursuit of a nuclear weapon. Iran will never give up its enrichment program.


And then there is Parchin, an advanced military weapons facility that is widely believed to be the site of surreptitious enrichment. New construction has been taking place at the facility, which seems to be designed to cover up enrichment work that was done there. To date, Iran has not permitted IAEA inspectors to inspect Parchin.


The very nucleus of Iran’s weapons program is off limits to inspection. In addition, the IAEA has raised new concerns about questions Iran will not answer.


If Iran was not interested in creating a nuclear device, it would not be enriching uranium above 5% and equally important, it would not be creating an intercontinental ballistic missile, which has only one function, to deliver a nuclear strike.


Iran has everything it needs to create a nuclear weapons program. It has announced its intentions to do so, and that Israel is its target.


Obama believes that Iran will emerge as the hegemonic power in the Middle East, and that America needs to build a relationship with it. If that means Iran will possess a nuclear device, then the only immediate threat will be to Israel, and Obama does not care about its survival.


The ten years palliative is designed to tell the true believers that something meaningful happened in Geneva to thwart Iran’s ambitions. Nothing of the sort has happened. Iran will continue as it has with Parchin, and equally clandestine operations at its Fordow facility, providing the highly enriched uranium for a breakout weapons program.


It will wait ten years the same way Mohammed observed the peace with Mecca, the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, for ten years.
Obama has brought the entire world one step closer to Iranian hegemony in the Middle East and a potential nuclear arms race in the region.
Abraham H. Miller is an emeritus professor, University of Cincinnati, a former counterterrorism consultant to the National Institute of Justice, and a senior fellow with the Salomon Center.

 

[The Guesser]

[h=1]Netanyahu will not be judged kindly for thwarting a nuclear deal with Iran[/h] It seems remarkable that the Israeli prime minister wants to torpedo diplomatic efforts that could heal Tehran’s relations with the west and his own country




Christopher de Bellaigue
Sunday 1 March 2015 12.37 EST Last modified on Sunday 1 March 2015 16.02 EST

Binyamin Netanyahu will address the joint houses of the US Congress tomorrow, but he will be boycotted by many Democrats – including the vice-president, Joe Biden.
Controversy over the visit, less than three weeks before Israeli elections, has centred on his incursions into US politics and their implications for one of the most successful bilateral relationships of modern times.
Susan Rice, Barack Obama’s national security adviser, has called Netanyahu’s acceptance of an invitation to address the Republican-dominated Congress on the administration’s continuing negotiations with Iran “destructive to the fabric” of US-Israeli relations. Her comment elicited furious reactions from hard-line Jewish groups. At the same time, many other American Jews–and many Israelis–have been squirming at Netanyahu’s abandonment of the universally accepted principle of keeping out of the internal politics of an ally.
The burden of Netanyahu’s message will be that the deal now in sight of the five permanent members of the UN security council plus Germany (the so-called P5+1), on the one hand, and Iran on the other is – as he has already put it – “dangerous for Israel, the region and the world”.
Whatever one thinks of Netanyahu, and whether or not his Washington gambit will win him votes, this is the crux of the matter: no Iran deal will work if it does not dispel for the foreseeable future the possibility of a nuclear-armed Islamic Republic. No deal can work if it gives Israel genuine cause to feel vulnerable.
Everything we know about the negotiations over the past 14 months suggests the deal being hammered out looks like being a good one for Israel. A comparison with the situation as recently as two years ago suggests that the current interim agreement signed by Iran and the powers in November 2013 – which Netanyahu denounced as a “historic mistake” – has been a good one too.

Back when Iran was governed by the gruesome Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the country galloped ahead in its ability to produce enriched uranium and held its cooperation with the UN’s nuclear watchdog, the IAEA, at the bare minimum.
By the time Ahmadinejad stepped down, in 2013, Iran’s breakout time – the time it would take it to build a nuclear bomb – had come down to well under the one year the US has postulated as the minimum time necessary to compose a response. All the while, bilious rhetoric, proxy fighting (in Syria), dirty ops and escalating economic sanctions were the weapons of choice in what amounted to an undeclared war between Iran and the west.
Since then, the situation has improved greatly and measurably. As Antony Blinken, US deputy secretary of state, informed the Senate in January, Iran has diluted or converted all its 20% enriched uranium and suspended uranium enrichment above 5%, while the IAEA has “daily access to Iran’s enrichment facilities and a far deeper understanding of Iran’s nuclear programme”.

Iran is not only further away from the ability to build a nuclear bomb than it was, but a truce has interrupted the undeclared war. Ahmadinejad’s successor as president, the moderate Hassan Rouhani, barely mentions Israel, and no longer is there feverish talk of imminent Israeli or American strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities. According to reports from recent talks , progress has been made on permitting Iran to retain face-saving numbers of centrifuges while ensuring that they work less efficiently (a combination designed to preserve a break-out time of at least a year).The lifetime of a putative deal could be as long as 15 years and encompass not only enrichment levels but also inspections of an unprecedented intrusiveness, as well as the reconfiguring of a controversial reactor so it cannot produce weapons-grade plutonium. Many details are yet to be nailed down, including a schedule for lifting sanctions that reassures the Iranians they will not be strung along, and it is by no means certain that agreement can be reached on all particulars by the end of June, when the (already twice-extended) interim agreement expires.
No deal can forestall definitively an attempt by Iran to make a bomb in the future, but a combination of restrictions, monitoring and economic and diplomatic incentives could make that extremely unlikely. A deal could remove the animus in Iranian-western relations since the 1979 Iranian revolution, and even defuse the Iranian-Israeli enmity. It seems remarkable that an Israeli prime minister should attempt to torpedo diplomacy that is making his country safer, and yet this is what Netanyahu will do when he has the ears of America and the world. He is unlikely to be judged kindly for doing so.

Christopher de Bellaigue is the author of Patriot of Persia: Muhammad Mossadegh and a Very British Coup

 

[ScottL]

Scott I had to Google for another article. I couldn't bear to see your name at the top of the thread, even for a moment.

No problem Conrad. Only Duckhunter is reading your posts. Everyone else has already figured out how much you hate Israel.

 

[The Guesser]

No problem Conrad. Only Duckhunter is reading your posts. Everyone else has already figured out how much you hate Israel.

Of course, since I Support Israel, and am as far from hating Israel as one could possibly be, another Lie by Lying Tout Fixer Boy Scott. Trying to horn in on Lying Ace's territory?? You are making progress, but you have a LONG LONG way to go.

 

[ScottL]

You can either stand with Israel, or Obama & the Iranians. I choose Israel.

 

[The Guesser]

I choose America And Israel, you choose Bibi.

 

[The Guesser]

[h=1]Will Netanyahu's speech to Congress backfire?[/h]By Alexandra Jaffe, CNN
Updated 2:10 PM ET, Sun March 1, 2015

Frayed edges showing in U.S.- Israel relationship 02:26




Washington (CNN)In his speech to Congress Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to lobby Congress for tougher sanctions on Iran and appeal for support from the American public in pushing back against a nuclear deal he opposes — but the speech may have just the opposite effect.

Netanyahu's detractors and even some supporters are expressing concern that he may have overplayed his hand by going before Congress to oppose President Barack Obama's Iran policy without consulting the White House.





READ: Why Netanyahu is confronting the White House
The controversy surrounding the address, they warn, may have overshadowed the message and turned potentially friendly Democrats toward the position of their president, who wants to see the deal with Iran go through and opposes further sanctions at this point.
Negotiators have until the end of the month to lay out the political framework of a deal. But a group of 10 pro-Israel Senate Democrats have said they'd be willing to consider joining with Republicans to pass new sanctions on Iran after March 24, giving the GOP a near veto-proof number of votes in favor of the measure.
Netanyahu's address could make or break the three remaining Democratic votes needed to override a certain presidential veto on new sanctions. Allies of the prime minister say that he felt a sense of urgency on the issue that made him willing to risk a break with the White House, which had recently asked him not to publicly lobby against the deal.
Netanyahu is known for his oratorical skills and believes in the power of a speech to shape history, which is ultimately his goal with Tuesday's address. He feels the threat to Israel from a nuclear Iran is an existential one, and he has explained that his decision to speak, despite the consequences, is informed by a deep concern for the future of his nation.
"I respect the White House and the President of the United States, but on such a fateful matter, that can determine whether or not we survive, I must do everything to prevent such a great danger for Israel," he said in Israel Wednesday.




RELATED: Has Israel lost the Democratic Party?
But many are questioning how much Netanyahu's Washington visit -- during which the White House has pointedly declined to arrange an Oval Office visit -- will go towards preventing the outcome he fears.

"It will only undermine Israel's ability to influence the critical issue of securing a genuine guarantee that Iran will never gain access to nuclear weaponry," Israel's Opposition Leader, Isaac Herzog, who is challenging Netanyahu in the upcoming election, wrote in The New York Times Friday. "Such an outcome is what Israel needs, but it can be achieved only through a full and trusting dialogue with the American administration, based on broad bipartisan support."
Meir Dagan, the former head of Israel's Mossad spy agency and a Netanyahu critic, told Ynet News Friday that strained ties with Obama have already hurt Israel.
"The risks involved in such a confrontation [with the U.S.] are intolerable," he said.
There have been reports of American officials limiting some of their consultations with Israel on Iran, and in a sign of how fraught the relationship has become -- with the invitation from Republican Speaker John Boehner lending the event a partisan agenda in the eyes of Democrats -- both the White House and Netanyahu have ramped up their rhetoric over the past week. National Security Adviser Susan Rice called the speech "destructive" to the U.S.-Israel relationship.
More than 30 Democrats are planning to boycott the speech and some have indicated they are more torn now on whether to vote in favor of sanctions. Many view Boehner's invitation and the lack of consultation with the White House as a snub of Obama, and that could complicate their decision on whether to deal their party leader a major blow by voting to override his promised sanctions veto.
"The 'bull in the China shop' manner in which Netanyahu has handled this whole situation makes it very difficult for both the U.S. Jewish community and Congress to fully sympathize with him and his whole message," said Ori Nir, spokesman for Americans for Peace Now, which supports the U.S. negotiations with Iran.
Even Netanyahu's supporters have said that, because of the way the situation has been handled, he may face a bigger challenge in convincing Congress and the U.S. as a whole to come around to his perception of the threat from Iran.

"I do think it's tougher to make the case now," said Malcolm Hoenlein, head of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations and a close ally of Netanyahu.
Recent polling seems to bear that out. Sixty-three percent of Americans opposed congressional leaders' move to invite Netanyahu to speak without sufficiently alerting the White House, according to a CNN/ORC survey out this month. And a Gallup poll found that Democratic support for Israel fell 10 points over the past year, possibly due to the rising tensions between Obama and Netanyahu.
READ: Israeli security experts oppose Netanyahu speech
Still, many Netanyahu backers argue that the prime minister has made the right call in delivering the high-profile speech.
"He didn't come here to insult the president," said Morrie Amitay, a former executive director of AIPAC. "He came here to warn of an extreme danger that needs to be articulated in whatever form, whatever way possible."
Amitay pointed to the "many unanswered questions about the deal in the works" to describe the skepticism with which many supporters of Israel are greeting its emerging contours.
"Of course we want a deal, but what is in the deal?" he asked.
And while some have expressed concern that the dominant narrative around the speech has become the antagonism between Netanyahu and the White House rather than the substance of the Iran deal, there is no doubt that the controversy has spiked interest in his address.
Demand for tickets to the event has been "unprecedented," according to Boehner's office. In fact, requests have been so overwhelming that the House and Senate have set up alternate viewing locations, which are also ticketed. Media coverage has been intense, and at least some high-profle figures have endorsed Netanyahu's appearance — including Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel, who will attend as a guest of the speaker.
A spokesman for the Israeli embassy did not respond to a request for comment.
Whether or not the speech helps advance Netanyahu's position on Iran, its fallout could continue far beyond the March deadline.
Dan Arbell, a former Israeli diplomat and a Brookings fellow, said in the wake of the controversy surrounding the speech, he believes Netanyahu may find "zero tolerance for his requests" at the White House and predicted a long-term negative impact on Netanyahu's diplomatic efforts should he retain office after the March 17 vote.

"This is a basic issue of trust, and how do you go from here?" Arbell wondered. "How can you actually work together in such a situation where you clearly challenge the president of the United States?"

 

[SheriffJoe]

Guesstard actually believes he can prevent Bibi from speaking by posting all these ridiculous far left editorials.

Some Democrats May Skip It, but Netanyahu Speech Is Still a Hot Ticket

http://www3.blogs.rollcall.com/218/...u-speech-may-not-have-their-absence-felt/?dcz

"an aide for Speaker John A. Boehner told CQ Roll Call that at least 350 requests are being fielded by the Ohio Republican’s office.
“I don’t expect many empty seats on the floor,” the aide said. “This is a big draw.”

 

[The Guesser]

Guesstard actually believes he can prevent Bibi from speaking by posting all these ridiculous far left editorials.

Some Democrats May Skip It, but Netanyahu Speech Is Still a Hot Ticket

http://www3.blogs.rollcall.com/218/...u-speech-may-not-have-their-absence-felt/?dcz

"an aide for Speaker John A. Boehner told CQ Roll Call that at least 350 requests are being fielded by the Ohio Republican’s office.
“I don’t expect many empty seats on the floor,” the aide said. “This is a big draw.”

You mean Bibi isn't reading a Right Wing Circle jerk in a Sub Forum of a Sports betting website, Casper?? I'm shocked. He'd fit right in with pathetic Sick people like you.

 

[SheriffJoe]

The Cliff Notes version:

Will Netanyahu's speech to Congress backfire?

I HATE ISRAEL!

 

[The Guesser]

The Cliff Notes version: I HATE ISRAEL!

I know you do Casper. You hate Democracy, and a place that has Health Care for it's Population. That's why you're a self Hating Canadian.

 

[SheriffJoe]

I know you do Casper. You hate Democracy, and a place that has Health Care for it's Population. That's why you're a self Hating Canadian.

You want Iran to get nukes, you Jew-hating Hussein cock gobbling cum guzzler. :>(

 

[SheriffJoe]

JEREMIAH WRIGHT ENDORSES ANTI-SEMITIC 'MARCH TO JERUSALEM'

12​

by BEN SHAPIRO13 Mar 2012110

President Barack Obama’s longtime pastor at Trinity United Church, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, has announced his support for the anti-Semitic “March to Jerusalem” at the end of March. The White House has refused comment.

The “March to Jerusalem” is a massive campaign designed to send anti-Israel partisans across Israel’s borders and into Jerusalem. The National Conference on Jewish Affairs reports Iran’s government is involved in the organization of the event and plans to send thousands of participants in caravans, whose schedules have been published by the Quds News agency.

As the Anti-Defamation League has pointed out, the Facebook page for the group features “worldwide Jewish lobby news”; when you click for such nefarious news, you’re directed to a website pushing Holocaust denial. The Facebook page is also virulently anti-gay, condemning Tel Aviv for its gay-friendly policies and stating that such policies are part and parcel of “historical Jewish efforts to spread corruption and perversion among all human societies.”

Does Jeremiah Wright still matter? Of course. These are the sorts of folks Obama has spent a lifetime palling around with and learning from. And no amount of throwing-under-the-bus can change Barack Obama’s history of anti-Semitic associations.

 

[SheriffJoe]

Israel flight ban 'prudent,' Obama says

http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/213288-obama-defends-israel-flight-ban

 

[duckhunter]

No problem Conrad. Only Duckhunter is reading your posts. Everyone else has already figured out how much you hate Israel.

You are correct.........I do not read your articles, because there is no need to... they are nothing but useless BS, and I don't have time for that. By the way, Guesser is not posting anything I have not read before. Keep living in your dreamworld. Have a nice day.