Israel Matzav

Netanyahu backs Clinton on Iran

In an earlier post, I reported that Secretary of State Clinton had attempted to walk back outgoing Mossad director Meir Dagan's comments about Iran not obtaining nuclear weapons before 2015. Prime Minister Netanyahu has now joined Clinton's efforts.

“I think that intelligence estimates are exactly that, estimates,” Netanyahu said. “They range from best case to worst case possibilities, and there is a range there, there is room for differing assessments.”

Speaking at the prime minister’s annual press conference with the foreign press, Netanyahu made clear that he believed the Iranian threat had not in any way become less acute, and reiterated what he said two months ago in New Orleans – and for which he was chastised publicly by US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates – that sanctions needed to be backed up by a viable and serious military option.

Since the US-led sanctions against Iran were aimed at changing the Iranian government’s determination to obtain nuclear arms, “those sanctions have not yet achieved their objective,” the prime minister said. “I think they [the sanctions] should be strictly enforced and materially strengthened.”

Netanyahu said “the only chance these sanctions will achieve their objectives would be to couple them with an understanding from Iran that if they [the sanctions] don’t achieve their goal, they would be followed by a credible military option.”

Netanyahu, clearly unhappy with the idea that the world has somehow gained a great deal more time to deal with Teheran, said that the only time the Iranians halted their nuclear program over the last 15 years was in 2003, after the US invasion of Iraq, when they feared American military action. The diplomatic process with the Palestinians would be halted, and the vital interests of almost every Arab government in the region would be threatened, were the Iranian nuclear program not stopped, he said.

Netanyahu is right to be concerned with the prospect of the world letting up on Iran. I don't believe that the sanctions have achieved even half of what they could achieve if everyone was taking them seriously. But I don't believe that the sanctions can accomplish their goal without a credible military option behind them. So far, the Obama administration has been reluctant to provide one.

Labels: Barack Obama, Binyamin Netanyahu, Hillary Clinton, Iran sanctions regime, Iranian nuclear program

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:17 PM