In Iran's crosshairs?
In response to a comment I left on another blog, someone pointed me to this interview by Michael Totten with Eli Khoury, the president of the Lebanon Renaissance Foundation, publisher of NOW Lebanon, and an informal advisor to a number of Lebanese political leaders. The idea in the interview that they pointed to was this one: Eli Khoury: ...The Arabs know -- even if they won't say it -- they know that Israelis will only use nuclear weapons if they've been annihilated. But an Iranian nuke's destiny isn't in Israel. They all know that the Israel propaganda thing is just BS.The person was trying to convince me that Israel should stand down and let Iran develop its nuclear weapons. Unfortunately, they didn't read what comes next:
MJT: You mean the anti-Israel propaganda from the Iranians?
Eli Khoury: Of course.
MJT: I often think so, too, but I don't know for sure.Why should Israel stand down just because Iran may hit the Sunnis (who include the 'Palestinians,' by the way) first?
Eli Khoury: There are some who say flat out, "why not leave the Iranian nuke program alone because it really threatens the Sunnis and not the Israelis." There are some who...
MJT: Who says that?
Eli Khoury: I can't remember a journalist or a politician saying that, but it's something I've heard in salons and read hints of.
MJT: Here's my read on this: The Iranians continue to threaten Israel while they're building this system, and I suspect they're doing this to calm down Sunni Arabs. The Iranians say "Hey, we're not after you guys, we're after the Jews. Relax." But what they really want to do is dominate Lebanon, Iraq, Bahrain, wherever there are Shias.
Eli Khoury: The Gulf and the Levant. They want to dominate the Gulf and the Levant.
MJT: I'm not sure that's right, but I think that's what's probably happening.
Eli Khoury: I agree. But does that mean Israel is safe?
MJT: No.
Eli Khoury: It's not. Because it's a temporary pattern of domination. Iran means to dominate the Levant and the Gulf. And once that's done, there will be a very different discussion about Israel. So, really, all the options lead to the same thing at the end of the day.
Read the whole thing. He's fascinating as usual.
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 6:52 PM
1 Comments:
The world looks at it as only the Jews' problem. Iran's aspirations in the Middle East, however don't begin and end with - Israel.
That's the big picture every one doesn't want to look at.
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