by Boaz Bismuth
The time for pleasantries and politeness is over. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was re-elected to fight a nuclear Iran. It is not his job to secure a foreign policy legacy for U.S. President Barack Obama.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
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Photo credit: AP  |
What didn't Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu's detractors say about his speech to Congress in March? They
said he was jeopardizing Israeli-American relations, thus putting
Israel's security at risk. They said he was ruining his relationship
with U.S. President Barack Obama; they said the Iran issue was nothing
more than election propaganda. Today, in hindsight, we see that the
fight against Netanyahu's speech was the election propaganda, and that
the speech itself was part of a crucial campaign on behalf of Israel's
security.
In retrospect, Netanyahu wasn't wrong: The
trip to Washington, while the timing was perceived as problematic, was
extremely necessary. Congress has become the last barricade able to stop
the bad deal from materializing. Congress members on Tuesday had
already begun formulating the opposition document.
Now that the superpowers have capitulated to
the regime of the ayatollahs, to the charms of rekindling business
relations and to the atmosphere of appeasement hovering in the air since
November of 2008, it is only us and Congress, along with Israeli and
American public opinion (all the latest polls in the U.S. point to
adamant objection to the deal). In other words, Netanyahu is not alone.
Israel is not alone. No one is promising that Israel will win this fight
in Congress. But Netanyahu was elected in May, among other things, to
fight the Iranian nuclear program. Not to clap his hands for Obama.
The same chorus that wailed against his speech
in March will now do the same against the speech he gave on Tuesday to
American Jews. Suffice it to say, we will likely hear the same chirping
voices telling us that Netanyahu is worsening his relationship with
Obama (can it get any worse?) and therefore putting Israeli interests at
risk. Is it not at all possible that Obama worsened his relationship
with Netanyahu, or that the terrible deal with Iran is a severe
detriment to Israel's topmost interest -- its security and existence?
America needs to understand that Israel is not
trying to stir up war -- quite the opposite. Netanyahu didn't say
Tuesday (or any other day) that war is the preferred option to a bad
deal. He simply thinks that capitulation is not necessarily the best
option, and that a good deal is better than a bad one.
The White House needs to understand that the
prime minister of Israel has moved beyond the realm of pleasantries and
politeness. He is engaged in managing a conflict. Not only does the
nuclear deal with Iran fail to foster regional stability, it bolsters
terrorism, energizes a nuclear arms race and primarily strengthens the
Iranian regime. And this is before mentioning that when the deal
expires, it will be easier for the ayatollahs to snag a bomb than it was
for them to snag the country in 1979.
Obama on Wednesday will respond to Netanyahu's
speech by defending the deal to the American people. In the meantime,
Obama has met with representatives of the Jewish community to explain
the merits of the deal. What Obama will not do, presumably, is utter the
quote by Benjamin Franklin: "Necessity never made a good bargain."
Indeed, the necessity for a legacy.
The fight being put up by Netanyahu is forcing Obama on
the defensive. Of course there are those who will see this and posit
that Netanyahu is making the whole thing personal (between him and
Obama). But it is not personal; it is a matter of principle between
Israel and the regime of the ayatollahs. The administration is signing a
deal with a terrorist regime that calls for Israel's destruction; a
Holocaust-denying regime with anti-Semitic leanings; a regime that over
the past two decades has secretly built nuclear facilities for military
purposes, which can lead to another holocaust. Yet after taking all this
into account, the prime minister of Israel is the one who must keep
silent, lest he harm Obama's legacy?
Boaz Bismuth
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=27377&hp=1
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
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