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by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Israel, with cooperation from the United States, reconstructed Iran’s centrifuges in Dimona, where it tested the Stuxnet worm that has set back Iran’s nuclear program at least five years, The New York Times reported Sunday. The wildly successful virus attack has virtually achieved the same time delay as those envisioned by various scenarios of military attacks.
The clandestine operation at the nuclear center in southern Israel began at least two years ago and has severely affected Iran’s uranium enrichment program far more than previously reported… Read More
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/132634#replies
Arutz 7- Israel National News
by Hana Levi Julian
Russia is joining up with Iran for joint naval exercises for the first time ever, according to the Iranian Mehr News Agency.
The joint Russian-Iranian naval maneuvers, which were announced Wednesday, are taking place this week in the Caspian Sea.
The report, which could not be independently confirmed, quoted a senior Iranian ports authority official who said the drill was aimed at preventing pollution and improving search and rescue operations coordination between the two nations.
However, the maneuver, involving some 30 vessels, is seen by some analysts as a way to join forces against the U.S., which the Asia Times referred to as “the intrusive Western superpower.”
Entitled “Regional Collaboration for a Secure and Clean Caspian,” the two-day drill quietly combines military objectives with environmental goals. A 1921 Iran-Russia friendship agreement was the legal foundation for the present naval cooperation between the two countries, according to political analyst Kaveh L. Afrasiabi.
Russia has been instrumental in protecting Iran from further sanctions by the United Nations Security Council due to its defiance of a U.N. mandate to end its nuclear development program.
Iran has continued to add uranium enrichment centrifuges and improve its ability to produce nuclear weapons-grade uranium, to the dismay of those hoping to persuade the Islamic Republic through diplomacy to abandon the effort.
Russia has been behind the construction of Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant, although Russian banks several months ago balked at funding any more of the project. Nevertheless, Russia has sent at least two shipments of nuclear fuel supplies to the facility, which is expected to come on line by the end of the year.
Israel has warned repeatedly that it will not tolerate a nuclear Iran, whose President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has often threatened to annihilate the Jewish State.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/132430#replies
Israel National News
by Gil Ronen
As two Israeli missile-class warships joined a navy submarine in the Red Sea, an Israeli defense source made it clear that the moves are intended as a threatening message to Iran.
“This is preparation that should be taken seriously,” the unnamed source told the London Times. “Israel is investing time in preparing itself for the complexity of an attack on Iran.”
“These maneuvers are a message to Iran that Israel will follow up on its threats,” he emphasized.
The exercises “come at a time when Western diplomats are offering support for an Israeli strike on Iran in return for Israeli concessions on the formation of a Palestinian state,” the Times said. It quoted an nanonymous British official as saying that if the deal completed, it would make an Israeli strike on Iran realistic “within the year.”
Diplomats said that Israel had offered concessions “on settlement policy, Palestinian land claims and issues with neighboring Arab states, to facilitate a possible strike on Iran. “ A senior European diplomat, also unnamed, said that “Israel has chosen to place the Iranian threat over its settlements.”
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said in a news conference Wednesday that the ships passed through the canal with Egypt’s permission, and that “ships may pass through the canal as long as they do not threaten the country which controls the canal.” He noted that the international agreements regulating which ships may pass through the Suez Canal date back to 1888.
The two Saar-class ships, INS Eilat and INS Chanit, sailed into the Red Sea Wednesday in what was the report described as “a clear signal that Israel was able to put its strike force within range of Iran at short notice.”
Ten days earlier, a Dolphin-class submarine with nuclear-missile strike capabilities passed through the Suez Canal into the Red Sea as well. Later reports said it, too, was accompanied by two Israeli missile boats – meaning that four missile boats have now crossed the canal. Israel has six Dolphin-class submarines, three of which are believed to carry nuclear missiles, the Times said.
Later this month, the Israel Air Force will hold long-range exercises in the U.S. and will test a missile defense shield at a U.S. missile range in the Pacific Ocean.
While local Israeli media have played up alleged tensions between Egypt and Israel over past statements by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, the Times report says that Israel “has strengthened ties with Arab nations who also fear a nuclear-armed Iran” and quotes an Israeli diplomat who said that relations with Egypt, in particular, have grown increasingly strong this year over the “shared mutual distrust of Iran.”
The report estimates that Israel’s missile-equipped submarines and its fleet of advanced aircraft could simultaneously strike at more than a dozen nuclear-related targets in Iran.
The Arrow interceptor system that will be tested in the Pacific is designed to defend Israel from ballistic missile attacks by Iran and Syria. According to Lt.-Gen. Patrick O’Reilly, Director of the Pentagon’s Missile Defense Agency, this month’s test will be against a target with a range of more than 1,000km. This range is too long for testing in the eastern Mediterranean, where Israel held its previous tests of the Arrow.
The Israeli Air Force, meanwhile, will send F16C fighter jets to participate in exercises at Nellis Air Force base in Nevada later this month, and Israeli C130 Hercules transport aircraft will participate in the Rodeo 2009 competition at the McChord Air Force base in Washington.
“It is not by chance that Israel is drilling long-range maneuvers in a public way. This is not a secret operation. This is something that has been published and which will showcase Israel’s abilities,” an Israeli defense official said.
http://www.carolineglick.com/e/
May 8, 2009, 6:42 PM
Obama’s green light to attack Iran
Caroline Glick
Arctic winds are blowing into Jerusalem from Washington these days. As Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s May 18 visit to Washington fast approaches, the Obama administration is ratcheting up its anti-Israel rhetoric and working feverishly to force Israel into a corner.
Using the annual AIPAC conference as a backdrop, this week the Obama administration launched its harshest onslaught against Israel to date. It began with media reports that National Security Adviser James Jones told a European foreign minister that the US is planning to build an anti-Israel coalition with the Arabs and Europe to compel Israel to surrender Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem to the Palestinians.
According to Haaretz, Jones was quoted in a classified foreign ministry cable as having told his European interlocutor, “The new administration will convince Israel to compromise on the Palestinian question. We will not push Israel under the wheels of a bus, but we will be more forceful toward Israel than we have been under Bush.”
He then explained that the US, the EU and the moderate Arab states must determine together what “a satisfactory endgame solution,” will be.
As far as Jones is concerned, Israel should be left out of those discussions and simply presented with a fait accompli that it will be compelled to accept.
Events this week showed that Jones’s statement was an accurate depiction of the administration’s policy. First, quartet mediator Tony Blair announced that within six weeks the US, EU, UN and Russia will unveil a new framework for establishing a Palestinian state. Speaking with Palestinian reporters on Wednesday, Blair said that this new framework will be a serious initiative because it “is being worked on at the highest level in the American administration.”
Moreover, this week we learned that the administration is trying to get the Arabs themselves to write the Quartet’s new plan. The London-based Al-Quds al-Arabi pan-Arab newspaper reported Tuesday that acting on behalf of Obama, Jordanian King Abdullah urged the Arab League to update the so-called Arab peace plan from 2002. That plan, which calls for Israel to withdraw from Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights and accept millions of foreign Arabs as citizens as part of the so-called “right of return” in exchange for “natural” relations with the Arab world, has been rejected by successive Israeli governments as a diplomatic subterfuge whose goal is Israel’s destruction.
By accepting millions of so-called “Palestinian refugees,” Israel would effectively cease to be a Jewish state. By shrinking into the 1949 armistice lines, Israel would be unable to defend itself against foreign invasion. And since “natural relations” is a meaningless term both in international legal discourse and in diplomatic discourse, Israel would have committed national suicide for nothing.
To make the plan less objectionable to Israel, Abdullah reportedly called on his Arab brethren to strike references to the so-called “Arab refugees” from the plan and to agree to “normal” rather than “natural” relations with the Jewish state. According to the report, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was expected to present Obama with the changes to the plan during their meeting in Washington later this month. The revised plan was supposed to form the basis for the new Quartet plan that Blair referred to.
But the Arabs would have none of it. On Wednesday, both Arab League General Secretary Amr Moussa and Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas announced that they oppose the initiative. On Thursday, Syria rejected making any changes in the document.
The administration couldn’t care less. The Palestinians and Arabs are no more than bit players in its Middle East policy. As far as the Obama administration is concerned, Israel is the only obstacle to peace.
To make certain that Israel understands this central point, Vice President Joseph Biden used his appearance at the AIPAC conference to drive it home. As Biden made clear, the US doesn’t respect or support Israel’s right as a sovereign state to determine its own policies for securing its national interests. In Biden’s words, “Israel has to work toward a two-state solution. You’re not going to like my saying this, but not build more settlements, dismantle existing outposts and allow the Palestinians freedom of movement.”
FOR ISRAEL, the main event of the week was supposed to be President Shimon Peres’s meeting with Obama on Tuesday. Peres was tasked with calming the waters ahead of Netanyahu’s visit. It was hoped that he could introduce a more collegial tone to US-Israel relations.
What Israel didn’t count on was the humiliating reception Peres received from Obama. By barring all media from covering the event, Obama transformed what was supposed to be a friendly visit with a respected and friendly head of state into a back-door encounter with an unwanted guest, who was shooed in and shooed out of the White House without a sound.
The Obama White House’s bald attempt to force Israel to take full blame for the Arab world’s hostility toward it is not the only way that it is casting Israel as the scapegoat for the region’s ills. In their bid to open direct diplomatic ties with Iran, Obama and his advisers are also blaming Israel for Iran’s nuclear program. They are doing this both indirectly and directly.
As Obama’s chief of staff Rahm Emmanuel made clear in his closed-door briefing to senior AIPAC officials this week, the administration is holding Israel indirectly responsible for Iran’s nuclear program. It does this by claiming that Israel’s refusal to cede its land to the Palestinians is making it impossible for the Arab world to support preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Somewhat inconveniently for the administration, the Arabs themselves are rejecting this premise. This week US Defense Secretary Robert Gates visited the Persian Gulf and Egypt to soothe Arab fears that the administration’s desperate attempts to appease the mullahs will harm their security interests. He also sought to gain their support for the administration’s plan to unveil a new peace plan aimed at isolating and pressuring Israel.
After meeting with Gates, Amr Moussa – who has distinguished himself as one of Israel’s most trenchant critics – said categorically, “The question of Iran should be separate from the Arab-Israel conflict.”
Just as the administration is unmoved by objective facts that expose as folly its single-minded devotion to the notion that Israel is responsible for the absence of peace in the Middle East, so the Arab rejection of its view that Israel is to blame for Iran’s nuclear program has simply driven it to escalate its attacks on Israel. This week it opened a new campaign of blaming Israel directly – through its purported nuclear arsenal – for Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
Speaking at a UN forum, US Assistant Secretary of State Rose Gottemoeller said, “Universal adherence to the [Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty] NPT itself, including by India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea… remains a fundamental objective of the United States.”
As Eli Lake from The Washington Times demonstrated convincingly, by speaking as she did, Gottemoeller effectively abrogated a 40-year-old US-Israeli understanding that the US would remain silent about Israel’s nuclear program because it understood that it was defensive, not offensive in nature. In so doing, Gottemoeller legitimized Iran’s claim that it cannot be expected to suspend its quest to acquire nuclear weapons as long as Israel possesses them. She also erased any distinction between nuclear weapons in the hands of US allies and democratic states and nuclear weapons in the hands of US enemies and terror states.
The Israeli media are largely framing the story of the US’s growing and already unprecedented antagonism toward Israel as a diplomatic challenge for Netanyahu. To meet this challenge, it is argued that Netanyahu must come to Washington in 10 days’ time with an attractive peace plan that will win over the White House. But this is a false interpretation of what is happening.
Even Ethan Bronner of the The New York Times pointed out this week that Obama’s Middle East policy is not based on facts. If it were, the so-called “two state solution,” which has failed repeatedly since 1993, would not be its centerpiece. Obama’s Middle East policy is based on ideology, not reality. Consequently, it is immune to rational argument.
The fact that if Iran acquires nuclear weapons, all chance of peace between Israel and the Palestinians and Israel and the Arab world will disappear, is of no interest to Obama and his advisers. They do not care that the day after Hamas terror-master Khaled Mashaal told The New York Times that Hamas was suspending its attacks against Israel from Gaza, the Iranian-controlled terror regime took credit for several volleys of rockets shot against Israeli civilian targets from Gaza. The administration stills intends to give Gaza $900 million in US taxpayer funds, and it still demands that Israel give its land to a joint Fatah-Hamas government.
REGARDLESS OF the weight of Netanyahu’s arguments, and irrespective of the reasonableness of whatever diplomatic initiative he presents to Obama, he can expect no sympathy or support from the White House.
As a consequence, the operational significance of the administration’s anti-Israel positions is that Israel will not be well served by adopting a more accommodating posture toward the Palestinians and Iran. Indeed, perversely, what the Obama administration’s treatment of Israel should be making clear to the Netanyahu government is that Israel should no longer take Washington’s views into account as it makes its decisions about how to advance Israel’s national security interests. This is particularly true with regard to Iran’s nuclear weapons program.
Rationally speaking, the only way the Obama administration could reasonably expect to deter Israel from attacking Iran’s nuclear installations would be if it could make the cost for Israel of attacking higher than the cost for Israel of not attacking. But what the behavior of the Obama administration is demonstrating is that there is no significant difference in the costs of the two options.
By blaming Israel for the absence of peace in the Middle East while ignoring the Palestinians’ refusal to accept Israel’s right to exist; by seeking to build an international coalition with Europe and the Arabs against Israel while glossing over the fact that at least the Arabs share Israel’s concerns about Iran; by exposing Israel’s nuclear arsenal and pressuring Israel to disarm while in the meantime courting the ayatollahs like an overeager bridegroom, the Obama administration is telling Israel that regardless of what it does, and what objective reality is, as far as the White House is concerned, Israel is to blame.
This, of course, doesn’t mean that Netanyahu shouldn’t make his case to Obama when they meet and to the American people during his US visit. What it does mean is that Netanyahu should have no expectation that Israeli goodwill can divert Obama from the course he has chosen. And again, this tells us two things: Israel’s relations with the US during Obama’s tenure in office will be unpleasant and difficult, and the damage that Israel will cause to that relationship by preventing Iran from acquiring the means to destroy it will be negligible.
Originally published in The Jerusalem Post.
Posted on May 8, 2009 at 6:42 PM
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123897547166291201.html
Wall Street Journal
Obama’s NK Reaction: More Talks
The president sends the wrong messages to Israel and Iran.
By JOHN R. BOLTON
Prior to North Korea’s launch yesterday of a Taepodong-2 ballistic missile, President Barack Obama declared that such an action would be “provocative.” This public statement was an attempt to reinforce the administration’s private efforts to urge the Democratic Peoples’ Republic of Korea (DPRK) not to fire the missile.
That effort failed, as have countless other attempts to deal softly with Pyongyang. Incredibly, U.S. Special Envoy for North Korea Stephen Bosworth revealed — just a few days before the launch — that he was ready to visit Pyongyang and resume the six-party talks once the “dust from the missiles settles.” It is no wonder the North fired away.
Once the missile shot was complete, the administration’s answer was hand-wringing, more rhetoric and, oh yes, the obligatory trip to the U.N. Security Council so that it could scold the defiant DPRK. Beyond whatever happens in the Security Council, Mr. Obama seems to have no plan whatever.
In 2006, when Pyongyang last lit off a volley of missiles and then exploded a nuclear device, the Security Council responded unanimously with Resolutions 1695 and 1718, which imposed extensive military and some economic sanctions. Unfortunately, the impact of these resolutions was dramatically undercut by subsequent Bush administration diplomacy, which effectively let North Korea off the hook. By re-engaging Pyongyang diplomatically rather than increasing the external pressure, George W. Bush relegitimized the North and gave it yet more time to bargain.
Yesterday’s launch is attributable to prior failures, but the global consequences now unfolding are Mr. Obama’s responsibility. In fact, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is expected to announce today deep cuts in the U.S. missile defense program, an extraordinarily ill-advised step.
The initial draft Security Council resolution responding to yesterday’s missile launch, written by Japan and the U.S., is weak. It essentially only reaffirms Resolutions 1695 and 1718, and minimally tightens existing enforcement mechanisms. Moreover, China and Russia made it plain before the launch they had no interest in stricter sanctions — even arguing with a straight face that Pyongyang was only interested in peaceful satellite communications.
What the Security Council will ultimately produce is of course uncertain — but resolutions almost never get tougher as the drafting and negotiations proceed. Even worse than a weak resolution would be a “presidential statement,” a toothless gesture of the Council’s opinion. Either way, North Korea has again defied the Security Council, gotten away with its launch with the support of Russia and China, and now will likely confront only pleas by Mr. Obama and others to return to the six-party talks.
Those talks are exactly where North Korea wants to be. From them ever greater material and political benefits will flow to Pyongyang, in exchange for ever more hollow promises to dismantle its nuclear program.
So far, therefore, the missile launch is an unambiguous win for North Korea. (Although not orbiting a satellite, all three rocket stages apparently fired, achieving Pyongyang’s longest missile flight yet.) But the negative repercussions will extend far beyond Northeast Asia.
Iran has carefully scrutinized the Obama administration’s every action, and Tehran’s only conclusion can be: It is past time to torque up the pressure on this new crowd in Washington. Not only is Iran’s back now covered by its friends Russia, China and others on the U.N. Security Council, but it sees an American president so ready to bend his knee for public favor in Europe that the mullahs’ wish list for U.S. concessions will grow by the minute.
Israel must also be carefully considering how the U.S. watched North Korea rip through “the international community.” The most important lesson the new government headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should draw is: Look out for No. 1. If Israel isn’t prepared to protect itself, including using military force, against Iran’s nuclear weapons program, it certainly shouldn’t be holding its breath for Mr. Obama to do anything.
Russia and China must also be relishing this outcome. They will have faced down Mr. Obama in his first real crisis, having provided Security Council cover for a criminal regime, and emerged unscathed. They will conclude that achieving their large agendas with the new administration can’t be too hard. That conclusion may be unfair to the new American president; but it will surely color how Moscow and Beijing structure their policies and their diplomacy until proven otherwise. That alone is bad news for Washington and its allies.
Mr. Bolton, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, is the author of “Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations and Abroad” (Simon & Schuster, 2007).
I want to take this opportunity to invite each one who reads this blog to visit Caroline’s blog. A link to it is in the left hand column of this page and this latest article is linked below. This particular article addresses two topics near the top of my personal list for prayer–Israel and the presidency of the United States.
Caroline’s views are intelligent and objective. She writes with honesty and directness. I believe that she is an invaluable source to hear the heart beat of what is going on in Israel for prayer purposes. She is currently Deputy Managing Editor of The Jerusalem Post where she writes two weekly columns. These columns are regularly syndicated. Her articles have also been published in The Wall Street Journal, National Review, The Journal of International Secrutiy Affairs, The Boston Globe, The Washington Times, The Jewish Press, Frontpage Magazine and Moment Magazine and numerous online journals focus on the strategic and political issues challenging the Israel and the United States. She has appeared on MSNBC, FOX News, Sky News, Christian Broadcast Network, Israel Television channels 1, 2, 3 and 10. Caroline is also frequent guest on talk radio shows in the US, Britain, Australia and Israel.
She has written a book, Shackled Warrior: Israel and the Global Jihad, which is featured on her page and has links here to our online bookstore for your convenience as well.
It isn’t legal for me to repost her articles on this site, but I do have the blog link which I hope you will pay attention to, and add to your own pages as well.
Pray for Caroline Glick. May God continue to use and bless her to get the truth out, as the Day of The Lord approaches.
Read this latest article by clicking here: Honest Obama and Iran January 30, 2009
Thank you for praying for the peace of Jerusalem,
Ruth Mayfield
www.ruthmcmillanmayfield.com
MEMRI Special Dispatch | No. 2188 | January 13, 2009
Reform Project/Palestinians
Lebanese Journalists ‘Uqab Saqr, May Chidiac Criticize Arab Media for Airing
Graphic Footage of Casualties in Gaza
On a January 8, 2009 segment on LBC TV, Lebanese journalists ‘Uqab Saqr and May Chidiac (1) condemned the Arab media for showing graphic footage from Gaza, including “body parts and bits of flesh.”
(To view this clip, visit <www.memritv.org/clip/en/1982.htm> .)
The two, also criticized to his face, Hamas leader in Lebanon Osama Hamdan for a speech he made earlier in the week covered by Al-Jazeera TV(2) calling for Israeli Arabs to “shake the foundations of the enemies home from within.” (To view this clip, visit <www.memritv.org/clip/en/1974.htm
> .)
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The following are excerpts from the LBC segment:
“How Can All This Destruction and Blood Cause Exhilaration?”
‘Uqab Saqr: “Arab mentality has been accustomed to defeats with many casualties. Today, Hamas and Hizbullah suffer tremendous casualties, but no defeats. This leads Arab mentality to a sense of exhilaration. The West – and most of us – do not understand this. How can all this destruction and blood cause exhilaration?”
May Chidiac: “Personally, I don’t understand how they can show body parts and bits of flesh on TV. Some may view this as a victory, but I consider it to be sacrificing our children.”
“You, Me, and the Whole World Ask How This Can Be Described as a Victory –
The Resistance Movement Views Things Differently”
‘Uqab Saqr: “Of course. You, me, and the whole world ask how this can be described as a victory. The resistance movement views things differently. It believes that its survival as a resistance movement, and its maintaining of its regional confrontation plan, are more important than avoiding the death of some martyrs, because in its view, there is a cause that is more important than the human factor, while others believe that the human factor is the central issue in our countries.” […]
The Israelis “Value Human Life More Than We Do; We Have No Respect for Human”
May Chidiac: “Are our children worth less than [Israeli] children?”
‘Uqab Saqr: “The question is why their blood is worth more than ours, and the answer, to be frank, is that they value human life more than we do. We have no respect for human life in our society – you see this in our jails, in the crimes we commit against one another. Look back a little, and see what happened between Fatah and Hamas. The Israeli newspapers wrote that there were massacres, and some Fatah members fled to Israel for fear of Hamas.” […]
“Osama Hamdan Said That Israeli Arabs Should Shake The Foundations of Israel… We Have Never Heard Any Israeli Official Telling [Jews and Israelis in the U.S.] to Shake the Foundations of Anything”
“Osama Hamdan said that Israeli Arabs should shake the foundations of Israel from within. The Jews and Israeli citizens in America serve Israel 24 hours a day, but we have never heard any Israeli official telling them to shake the foundations of anything in the service of Israel. On the contrary, they say to them: Assimilate in U.S. society, and serve the Israeli cause.”
Endnotes:
(1) May Chidiac, who moderated this debate, survived an attempt on her life in 2005 that left her severely disabled (see MEMRI TV Clip No. 1190, http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/1190.htm).
(2) January 4, 2009.
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NOTES FROM CONFERENCE CALL WITH BENJAMIN NETANYAHU
Warns of Iran’s “nightmare scenario”
By Joel C. Rosenberg
(Jerusalem, Israel, January 12, 2009) — Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a 25 minute conference call today with conservative bloggers in which I had the opportunity to participate, made it clear that he sees Israel’s current war against Hamas in Gaza as a “just war,” as a proxy war with Radical Muslim leaders in Iran, and very possibly as a prelude to a future war to stop Radicals in Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, an event he described as a “nightmare scenario.”
Israel is pursuing a “just war,” Netanyahu said early in the discussion. He noted that “Hamas is pursuing an illegitimate goal to accomplish the annihilation of the Jewish State” and is using “illegitimate means,” including the “firing rockets on innocent civilians.”
“This is a classic case of justice pitted against injustice” and “against the forces of darkness,” said the Likud leader who when the war began suspended his party’s campaign for the February 10th elections. “Everyone has to choose which side of the battle he is on?”
Is this really an isolated local skirmish, asked one blogger, or is there a larger story at work here?
“Our fight with Hamas,” he replied, is with terrorists who have “backers in Iran” and have shown the “willingness to use any methods including firing rockets on innocent civilians….Israel is now the front line in the battle between militant Islam and the rest of the world – witness what has happened [in terms of terrorist attacks in recent years] in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Mumbai, New York, Washington….and there are enormous global consequences. Does Iran have a victory in one of its two forward outposts [the other being Hezbollah]?”
“Israel cannot tolerate an Iranian forward position [in Gaza],” he continued, saying that Israel’s long-term goal needs to be blocking Iran from becoming the dominant regional power. He also noted that Israel’s “immediate goal should be…removing the threat by stopping the firing and preventing the resupply of rockets and other weaponry by Hamas.”
The call was organized by One Jerusalem, an organization founded in the fall of 2000 by former Israeli deputy prime minister Natan Sharansky. One Jerusalem’s executive director, Allen Roth, moderated the discussion.
I had emailed in a question asking what can Jews, evangelical Christians and others can do to help Israel in the current conflict. Undoubtedly other bloggers emailed in similar questions. This was the second question posed to the former Prime Minister by Allen Roth.
“The most important thing [friends of Israel can do] is to tell the truth,” Netanyahu said. “There is a campaign of lies against us,” including that Israel started this conflict [they didn’t], that Israel is targeting innocent Palestinian civilians [they aren’t], that Israel isn’t allowing humanitarian aid to enter Gaza to care for innocents who are suffering [they are]. “Get the facts straight….the facts do count….the sequence counts.”
Hamas, he noted, has been “firing these rockets for eight years – eight years! Can you imagine what the U.S. would do if 6,000 rockets were fired from Mexico at San Diego? Would the U.S. wait eight years? Would they wait eight months? I don’t think they would wait eight minutes to fight back.”
Netanyahu pointed out that Hamas is launching rockets out of mosques, hospitals, elementary schools, universities — putting innocent Palestinians in harm’s way when Israel seeks to retaliate. “We don’t deliberately target civilians, though we regret when civilians are injured or killed,” he said. “That basic fact should be spoken…loud and clear by the friends of Israel and the friends of Jews.”
Regarding the immediate future of the Arab-Israeli peace process, Netanyahu said “the idea that you can have a final settlement….I think that is just not realistic.”
He noted that he had resigned from the cabinet in 2005 when the government of then-Prime Minister Ariel SharonGaza for free and when it came to any future potential “deals” with the Palestinians, “don’t repeat the mistakes of the past.” decided to give away
Before there is anymore international talk of Israel ceding territory to the Palestinians, Israel needs to pursue four strategies:
1. Fight Islamic radicals
2. Strengthen Islamic moderates
3. Reestablish security on all of Israel’s borders
4. Begin rapid economic development for Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza
He was asked if he thought Hamas was holding out for the new administration of Barack Obama, hoping that Obama would put new pressure on Israel to stop fighting and accepting a potentially premature cease fire.
“I do remember Mr. Obama visited Sderot not long ago and said something to the effect that, ‘If my two girls lived in a home that was rocketed by terrorists, I would do everything in my power to stop it.'” He added, “I think the U.S. has an interest in stopping terrorists wherever they are.”
Netanyahu said the biggest threat Israel faces is not from Hamas, or even from Hezbollah, but from Radical Islamic terrorists or states possessing nuclear weapons. He described Iran acquiring such weapons of mass destruction as a “nightmare scenario,” along with militant Islamists seizing control of Pakistan. Though he did not lay out how he would approach the Iran crisis should he be elected Prime Minister, he strongly hinted that time is running out and that the West had to take decisive action before it is too late.
Netanyahu concluded by insisting that Israel “should do everything can to return Gilad Shalit, the IDF soldier kidnapped by Hamas on June 25, 2006, though he declined to criticize the current Olmert government when asked if Olmert and his team were doing enough to bring Shalit home and to make his return a precondition of a cease fire.
Not asked — unfortunately — was whether Netanyahu believed Israel’s government should fully invade Gaza’s urban centers and bring down the Hamas leadership and terror infrastructure once and for all. It would have been useful to get his take on this because at the moment, my read is that the Olmert government is hedging on that decision. True, they have been calling up the Reserves and putting those Reserves into the Gaza theater to bolster the IDF forces already inching their way forward towards Hamas positions. But we have not seen a full scale ground campaign into Gaza’s toughest urban centers, the strongholds of the Hamas forces. Instead, the Olmert government seems to be waiting for a deal to emerge with Hamas, Egypt and the international community to bring about a rapid cease fire. Many here in Israel are worried that Olmert will accept a cease fire too quickly, as he did with the Hezbollah in Lebanon in 2006. No Israeli parent wants to see another of their sons killed in combat. But scores of Israeli parents are telling me they want to see “the whole job done” — Hamas destroyed and the rocket threat squashed once and for all. They do not want to have the nation sacrifice so much in the last sixteen days only to see the threat reemerge all over again. Finish the job, they say. Under the circumstances, I agree.
[01.12.2009]
Exclusive One Jerusalem Call With Benjamin Netanyahu
In a news-making and fact-filled presentation, Israel’s former Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, briefed American and international bloggers on Israel’s defensive action against Hamas, Iran’s role in the conflict and its threat to the free world, and the need for friends of Israel to set the record straight — by repeating the facts.
The facts include:
- Eight years of rockets being fired on innocent Israeli citizens
- Hamas’s commitment to the destruction of the State of Israel
- Israel’s humanitarian treatment of Arabs caught in the crossfire.
In answer to the charge that Israel is targeting civilians, Mr. Netanyahu reminds listeners that during World War II, Britain carpet-bombed German cities. In contrast, Israel’s air strikes have been directed against military targets. Netanyahu also noted that Israeli hospitals are treating wounded civilians from Gaza.
In response to a question about the goals of this operation, Mr. Netanyahu said that objectives are to re-establish Israel’s security and to end the supply of armaments for Hamas.
Time and again, Mr. Netanyahu reminds the audience that Hamas is a proxy for Iran. Defeat of Hamas is a defeat for Iran. Netanyahu ended the call with an interesting insight into the dangers of Iran any any radical Islamic regime that possesses nuclear weapons. Mr. Netanyahu further recalled President-elect Obama’s comment about raising children under the threat of enemy rockets.
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Military Victory? Worm Delays Iran’s Nuke Ambitions
December 18, 2010 in Commentaries, News Updates | Tags: computer virus, Iran, Israel, war, worm | Comments closed
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/insideisrael/2010/December/Stuxnet-Worm-Delays-Irans-Nuclear-Program-/
by Julie Stahl – CBN News Reporter
JERUSALEM, Israel — Some have called it a digital warhead. Stuxnet – the computer worm that infected computers inside Iran’s nuclear program — may have caused a two-year setback in the Islamic Republic’s development of an atomic weapon.
Some have even considered it a military victory.
Israel, the U.S. and/or other Western nations have been suspected of creating the malicious software.
(click read the rest of the story and watch the video)