ISRAEL MATZAV - by Carl in Jerusalem
Thursday, June 7, 2012
Israeli officials also balked when the senior American nuclear negotiator, Wendy R. Sherman, an under secretary of state for political affairs, declared on a visit to Israel after the Baghdad meeting that the United States and Israel were on the same page when it came to dealing with Iran. “We believe that the Iranian goal is to drag this out as long as possible,” said an Israeli official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the delicacy of the matter.The perception here is that the Obama administration is willing to let Iran go all the way to the wall while it continues to do nothing but talk until it's too late. Short of the UN ordering him to go to war, it is clear to us that Obama will do nothing. Look at Libya (where he 'led from behind') and Syria (where Obama continues to do nothing - not that I am advocating supporting the al-Qaeda in Syria, but there is much that could have been done before things got to this point). We have no confidence in this administration, and unless Romney is far, far ahead in he polls in the fall, I believe there will be an attack in September or October, if not sooner.
“We’re happy to hear what they have to say,” this official said of the visiting Americans. “We’re happy to try to be reassured.”
Ms. Flournoy, who now advises the Obama campaign, devoted most of her remarks in Tel Aviv to making the case that Israel should not launch a premature or unilateral strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Such an attack, she said, would set back the Iranian nuclear program, at most, one to three years. And it could splinter the coalition the United States has assembled to impose crippling sanctions on Tehran.
“Here’s the rub,” Ms. Flournoy said at Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies. “If Israel or any other country were to launch a unilateral strike against Iran’s nuclear program prematurely, before all other options to stop Iran have been tried and failed, it would undermine the legitimacy of the action.”
In an interview on Wednesday, Ms. Flournoy said she was encouraged because several Israelis approached her at the conference to express opposition to an Israeli strike and skepticism of the government’s assertions that the window was fast closing for a military attack that would incapacitate Iran’s nuclear abilities.
But she added that the diversity of opinion among ordinary Israelis did not ease her fears of military action since, she said, Mr. Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak “are getting clearer and clearer in their intentions.”
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 5:59 PM
