Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will go into his meeting with US President Barack Obama on Monday aiming not only to reveal the "true face" of the Iranian regime, but also wanting to hear a reaffirmation from Obama - in the midst of the current diplomatic overtures toward Iran - of Israel's right to defend itself.
One of Israel's main concerns presently is that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's "charm offensive" has chipped away at Israel's legitimacy for military action if Tehran crosses the red line Netanyahu established at the UN General Assembly last year.
Netanyahu is expected to urge Obama not to relieve the sanctions regime on Teheran until it stops uranium enrichment, removes enriched uranium from the country, closes down the uranium enrichment plant at Qom, and abandons a plutonium channel to a nuclear bomb.
Netanyahu arrived early Sunday morning in New York, and besides meetings scheduled with Canadian Foreign Minister John Baird and Turkmenistan's Foreign Minister Rashid Meredov, is spending the day in his hotel in meetings with top aides preparing both for the Obama meeting, and for his speech to the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday.
Just before leaving after midnight Sunday overnight, Netanyahu said he was going to "represent the citizens of Israel, our national interests, our rights as a people, our determination to defend ourselves and our hope for peace."
Netanyahu, referring to Rouhani's blitz last week in the US, said "I will tell the truth in the face of the sweet-talk and the onslaught of smiles. One must talk facts and one must tell the truth. Telling the truth today is vital for the security and peace of the world and, of course, it is vital for the security of the State of Israel."
“Any miscalculation of one’s position, and of course, of others, will bear historic damages; a mistake by one actor will have negative impact on all others.” These words were spoken Tuesday by President Hasan Rouhani, but they aptly reflect what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is currently thinking about the thawing relations between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the United States of America.
Netanyahu has made it abundantly clear that he doesn’t mind standing alone in his opposition to the Iranian overtures, and that he will continue to pour cold water on the budding détente between Tehran and Washington. He seems to embrace being the sole voice of dissent to a Western chorus that is willing to test Iran’s sincerity, and it wouldn’t be surprising if the prime minister makes a point about being a party-pooper during his speech at the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday.
It has become a tradition for Netanyahu to insert some sort of gimmick into his major speeches to draw attention, be it a visual aid such as last year’s UN cartoon bomb or rhetorical shtick like the similarly awkward “nuclear duck” he discussed in a March 2012 speech to AIPAC delegates. So internet meme-makers, be prepared. A possible motif for his speech at the UN this week could be an image of Rouhani barely a week ago, presiding over a military parade which featured Shehab-3 missile trucks bearing anti-American messages and the slogan “Israel must be destroyed.” “And I’m the party-pooper?” Netanyahu might ask.
Netanyahu and his speechwriters, as of Sunday, had said very little about its content, beyond that it will compare the Iranian regime to North Korea and warn of the inherent dangers in striking deals with rogue states. The prime minister will almost certainly mention the fact that Rouhani was Iran’s nuclear negotiator in 2003 and has reportedly prided himself on fooling the West into believing that the program had been halted. He may also highlight Rouhani’s place at the heart of the regime going back many more years.
Netanyahu knows all too well that the Iranian diplomatic train has left the station. Obama is already engaging with Rouhani, regardless of what “my friend Bibi” has to say. It’s too late to dissuade the president from at least testing Rouhani’s sincerity. Rather, at the White House on Monday, the Israeli leader will focus on the substance of that engagement, trying to define the parameters of a possible deal as tightly as possible.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Secretary of State John Kerry said a deal on Iran's nuclear program could be reached relatively quickly, and it would have the potential to dramatically improve the relationship between the two countries.
ReplyDeleteKerry said intensifying diplomatic efforts to resolve the dispute over Iran's nuclear program could produce an agreement within the three- to six-month time frame that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has called for.
"It's possible to have a deal sooner than that depending on how forthcoming and clear Iran is prepared to be," Kerry said in an interview aired on CBS's "60 Minutes" on Sunday.
"If it is a peaceful program, and we can all see that - the whole world sees that - the relationship with Iran can change dramatically for the better and it can change fast," he said.
Rouhani and U.S. President Barack Obama spoke by telephone on Friday in the highest-level contact between the two countries in three decades, raising hopes of a breakthrough in Western efforts to prevent Iran from building a nuclear bomb.
The call was the culmination of a recent, dramatic shift in tone between Iran and the United States, which cut diplomatic relations a year after the 1979 Iranian revolution.
Kerry said Iran could prove its sincerity by immediately opening its nuclear facilities to inspections and keeping its uranium enrichment efforts at lower grades that were not suitable for military use.
Iran has defended its right to enrich uranium as part of a civilian nuclear energy and medicine program and denied that it aims to develop atomic weapons, but the United States and its allies have sought an end to higher-grade uranium enrichment that could be a step away from the production of weapons-grade material.
"Iran needs to take rapid steps, clear and convincing steps, to live up to the international community's requirements regarding nuclear programs, peaceful nuclear programs," Kerry said.
"Words are not going to replace actions," he said. "What we need are actions that prove that we and our allies, our friends in the region, can never be threatened by this program."
In a separate interview, Iran's foreign minister said the country's right to peaceful nuclear enrichment was not negotiable but it did not need to enrich uranium to military-grade levels.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Iran was willing to open its nuclear facilities to international inspections as part of a nuclear deal as long as the United States ended painful economic sanctions.
I just sit here and shiver....Its not possible to put into words the chill this give me.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that any nation or ethnic group feels the need to approach the UN and especially the US for this....affirmation of the very right to exist. For it to be Israel is beyond words, beyond the ability to either express or identify with. Its like a dream...a nightmare....its surreal.
And then tying several posts together....the stated goal to destroy America both economically and militarily....and seeing the concentration of our troops, planes and ships in this part of the world....it just gives me the shivers.
the term "...powers and principalities..." comes heavy on my heart.
Praying hard for Israel, our troops in Theater, and that the Lord strips the mask of evil off each and every individual taking part in this charade and opens all Believer's eyes for them to see the truth, evil, and betrayal.
Its sickening