Trita Parsi writes: Despite the words of friendship, the diverging perspectives of the Obama administration and the Netanyahu government on key issues in the Middle East — the Arab uprisings, the Palestinian issue and the Iranian nuclear program — are profound.
The dispute on the nuclear issue is centered on red lines. Israel, like the Bush administration, considers a nuclear capability in Iran a red line. It argues that the only acceptable guarantee that Iran does not get a nuclear weapon is for Iran to have no enrichment program.
The Obama administration puts the red line not at enrichment — which is permitted under international law — but at nuclear weapons. This is a clearer, more enforceable red line that also has the force of international law behind it.
While expressing his sympathy and friendship with Israel, Obama did not yield his red line at AIPAC. With the backing of the U.S. military, he has stood firm behind weaponization rather than weapons capability as the red line.
This is probably the best we can expect, as it puts the ball back in Bibi’s court. He will, like Bush-Cheney, have to come up with ‘evidence’ of smoking guns and mushroom clouds if he wants to push it any farther. And I think that even Americans (well, most of them anyway) are not gonna buy that again.
I read a piece in Ha’aretz last night that Perez is gonna tell AIPAC that it’s not time for war but rather time to thank the US for all its support.
Still no admission that the threats and suggestions of the USA are war crimes already; there is NO imminent danger from Iran, even to Israel, certainly not to the USA or the rest of us.Why not negotiate with Iran, treating it like a sovereign nation, accepting the word of its leader, Khamenei, rather than hyped-up lies from an aggressive, nuke-holding, illegal-occupying entity called an “ally”?