Former Mossad Chief: Israel has a year to stop Iran
In an interview in Sunday's London Telegraph, former Mossad chief Shabtai Shavit says that Israel has a year - at most - to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. "The time that is left to be ready is getting shorter all the time," he said in an interview.Shavit also believes that whether Israel strikes Iran could be affected by whether John Sidney McCain or Barack Hussein Obama is elected President of the United States in November.
Mr Shavit, 69, who was deputy director of Mossad when Israel bombed the Osirak nuclear facility in Iraq in 1981, added: "As an intelligence officer working with the worst-case scenario, I can tell you we should be prepared. We should do whatever necessary on the defensive side, on the offensive side, on the public opinion side for the West, in case sanctions don't work. What's left is a military action."
The "worst-case scenario, he said, is that Iran may have a nuclear weapon within "somewhere around a year".
"If [Republican candidate John] McCain gets elected, he could really easily make a decision to go for it. If it's Obama: no. My prediction is that he won't go for it, at least not in his first term in the White House."Shavit was the Mossad's director from 1989-96.
He warned that while it would be preferable to have American support and participation in a strike on Iran, Israel will not be afraid to go it alone.
"When it comes to decisions that have to do with our national security and our own survival, at best we may update the Americans that we are intending or planning or going to do something. It's not a precondition, [getting] an American agreement," he said.
Add another voice that says that if Obama wins the US election we can look for an attack on Iran by either Israel or the United States between November and January, while if McCain wins, Israel may wait a bit longer to see if the US takes action.
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:32 AM
2 Comments:
I don't think Israel can wait too long. I think Israel should take whatever action is necessary. When you're dealing with a bully, there are two choices: you can fight back or you can roll over. Israel really can't submit to waiting to be annihilated some day in the future so it comes down to fighting back. Its not even a question of whether but when to do it.
To expect Obama to do anything proactive in foreign affairs is a stretch. He would even have trouble with reactive.
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