Bibi’s Iran Speech Was a Bust
The Israeli prime minister’s much-hyped revelations make the case for keeping the Iran deal.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has issued the lamest critique of the Iran nuclear deal that one might imagine. Though his avowed aim was to convince President Trump to back out of the deal, he in fact unwittingly made a strong case to stay in.
In his Monday broadcast, which he recited in English and Hebrew, Netanyahu did publicize a remarkable heist by Israeli intelligence agencies—if his claims are true—of 55,000 pages of “files” and “archives” showing that 15 years ago, Iran did have a plan with an avowed intent to build nuclear weapons.
But did the prime minister think his viewers, at home and abroad, would glide over those key words—files and archive—or that they wouldn’t notice that the quotations from some of those files were dated 2003?
He said and showed nothing to suggest that the Iranians ever put their plan into motion or that they are violating the deal’s restrictions on nuclear activities now. In fact, at one point in his telecast, he acknowledged that Iran stopped the program—supporting the conclusion of a U.S National Intelligence Estimate, published in 2007, that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program in the fall of 2003. ....
....However, the larger message of the archive—and Netanyahu’s briefing—is that the Iran nuclear deal, now more than ever, is worth preserving. ...
In Senate hearings last week, Secretary of Defense James Mattis testified that after reading the full text of the deal three times, he was struck by how solid its inspection provisions are. “I will say it is written almost with an assumption that Iran would try to cheat,” Mattis said. “So the verification, what is in there, is actually pretty robust as far as our intrusive ability to get in” and check on compliance....
Trump faces a May 12 deadline on whether to certify that Iran is in compliance with the deal and thus extend sanctions relief—or to pull out of the deal and reimpose sanctions. He has signed the certification twice before but has threatened to pull out this next time. On the earlier occasions, he was pressured to stay in the treaty by Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, and his national security adviser, Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster. Tillerson and McMaster have since been replaced by Mike Pompeo and John Bolton, who are fervent critics of the deal and supporters of regime change in Iran.
Several allied leaders have urged Trump not to withdraw from the deal. Ironically, many Israeli security and intelligence officers have publicly said that the deal is better for Israel than the abandonment of the deal. Netanyahu, ignoring their analyses, is trying to whip up a frisson of alarm but without any substance.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018...keeping-it.html
"
| 11.462 Beiträge
zitieren
Besucher
Forum Statistiken
