Israel Matzav: Does Obama want to stop Iran?

Sunday, August 19, 2012

Does Obama want to stop Iran?

Writing in Friday's Washington Post, former IDF intelligence chief Amos Yadlin gives the Obama administration a roadmap to convince Israel not to attack Iran.

The U.S. president should visit Israel and tell its leadership — and, more important, its people — that preventing a nuclear Iran is a U.S. interest, and if we have to resort to military action, we will. This message, delivered by the president of the United States to the Israeli Knesset, would be far more effective than U.S. officials’ attempts to convey the same sentiment behind closed doors. The administration should also take five immediate steps to convince allies and adversaries alike that military action is real, imminent and doable — which are key to making it less likely.

First, Obama should notify the U.S. Congress in writing that he reserves the right to use military force to prevent Iran’s acquisition of a military nuclear capability. This would show the president’s resolve, and congressional support for such a measure is likely to be strong. Forty-four senators signed a bipartisan letter to Obama in June, urging him to “reevaluate the utility of further talks at this time” and focus instead on sanctions and “making clear that a credible military option exists.”

Second, Washington should signal its intentions via a heightened U.S. military presence in the gulf, military exercises with Middle East allies and missile defense deployment in the region. Media coverage of these actions should be encouraged.

Third, Washington should provide advanced military technology and intelligence to strengthen Israel’s military capabilities and extend the window in which Israel can mortally wound Iran’s program. This support would be contingent on Israeli pledges to give sanctions and diplomacy more time to work.

Read the whole thing. These steps might have a chance of working if Obama were serious about trying to stop Iran. But he's not. This is Benny Weinthal in the National Review:

Writing in today’s Wall Street Journal, David Feith, an assistant editorial features writer at the paper, delves into “what Obama isn’t saying about Iran.”

He outlines Obama’s reluctance to aggressively enforce sanctions targeting Iran’s energy sector. “All of Iran’s major oil-trading partners — 20 of them — received exemptions from U.S. sanctions,” Feith writes about the administration’s decision to decrease pressure on Tehran.

Sadly, the Obama administration has made no real effort to convince its European allies to outlaw Iran’s instruments terror, namely the Lebanese-based Hezbollah group and its parent organization, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). The U.S. designated Hezbollah a global terror entity in 1995 and the Bush administration blacklisted the IRGC as a global terrorist organization in 2007. Hezbollah uses Europe as a base to raise funds for its organization and murder Iranian dissidents.

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Writing in his New York Post column this week, Benny Avni noted that that top U.S. diplomats are struggling to persuade U.N. head Ban Ki-moon to not attend a meeting of Non-Allied Movement countries in Iran. Avni notes, “if the West’s top diplomats can’t use their tact and talent to convince even the most pro-Western UN chief in memory to keep Iran off his itinerary, how will they ever manage to isolate Iran so completely that the mullahs will quit their most prized pet project?”

All of this helps to make the case that Obama’s timidity toward Iran’s rulers, and Europe’s meek posture toward Hezbollah and the IRGC, reminds the mullahs that he is not serious about stopping their nuclear-weapons program.

Coming to Israel and speaking to the Knesset won't help unless Obama is serious about stopping Iran. Until and unless he means it, coming to Israel is just another campaign stop.

Labels: Amos Yadlin, Barack Hussein Obama, Campaign 2012, Iranian nuclear threat, Israeli attack on Iran