Noam Sheizaf writes: The top stories in all Israeli dailies this weekend discuss a coming strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Thirty-seven percent of Israelis think President Obama would stop Iran from developing a bomb, while only 29 percent doubt it.
The front page headlines in all major daily papers in Israel deal with the increased likelihood of a war with Iran.
Yedioth Aharonoth has an important expose: the paper’s diplomatic correspondents, Nahum Barnea and Shimon Shifer, report that Defense Minister Ehud Barak has gathered senior army generals twice (the latest meeting took place at Mossad headquarters) in order to obtain their support for a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. He met fierce opposition on both occasions; the army is very reluctant to carry out the attack in the absence of American support, it seems. “Not a single security chief supports the attack,” Barnea and Shiffer write. Yedioth’s headline declares: “Barak and Natanyahu are determined to strike Iran in the autumn.”
The pro-Netanyahu tabloid Israel Hayom claims that “Iran has speed up its effort to gain a bomb.”
Maariv has a poll according to which 37 percent of the public think that an Iranian bomb would mean “a second Holocaust.” Forty percent of the Jewish public – that’s 33 percent of the population – believes that Israel should strike the Iranian nuclear facilities on its own. Forty-one percent think that Israeli should leave the mission of stopping Iran to the United States and the international community.
More Israelis (37 percent) believe that president Obama will prevent Iran from getting a nuclear bomb than those who think he won’t keep his promise (29) percent.
Haaretz cites a senior Israeli official speaking in favor of an Israeli attack on Iran (“Iran nuclear threat bigger than one Israel faced before Six Day War”). It’s not hard to figure out that the official is Defense Minister Ehud Barak. [Continue reading…]
If you’re anti-Zionist you can go away and do something else you like for a few months and when you come back you’ll see that Israel has done far, far worse to itself than you could have ever contemplated doing it. Yet, Israel is full of wonderful people. Unfortunately, most who make it into political leadership or have been poloiticos for a while are the scum of the earth or, if not, invariably become so in order to politically survive. Those few that stubbornly try to be good, undergo some epiphany about the power of shysters or can’t take it anymore either quit, never to be heard from again, or as assassinated by the crazies who somehow always end up on top. Let this be a lesson to us all: the road to Hell is paved with good intentions that adapted in order to rule Israel. Barak is a sad bumble-bimble who doesn’t realize that all his failed gimmicks, trying to go up and down simultaneously, have made him a laughing stock. In Wizard of Oz terms, Netanyahu is the lion in search of courage and Barak the scarecrow in search of a heart, making Israel a clinking and squeaking tin man that can’t be disregarded because it makes so much noise all the time. ALL THIS NEED NOT BE. But first they’ve got to be cured of the Holocaust Psychosis Israeli officials act out all the time. It’s a runaway gimmick that got the best of those trying to sacrilegiously exploit it. If they don’t stop kvetching about Iran they’ll end up losing Israel’s massive welfare check from the American people. As the US Ambassador to Israel warned: another ten years of this pandemonium from the war mongers that never met a Mideast war they didn’t like America to fight and US may abandon Israel to its own devices. That would be more than $10 billion saved per year. I hope Israel fits into the Mideast, guiding it to modernity rather than, as now, aim its thousands of nukes at Mideast population centers to bully world. It has a lot to offer the region that’s better than bullying with threat of a nuclear winter.
“In every generation they rise against us to destroy us”. Uri Avnery
Israel is a weak nation, vulnerable to enemies who want to destroy it. Israel has gone through a revolving door of enemies. Once it was “the Arabs,” then particular Arab nations, then “the Palestinians,” then “the PLO,” now “Hamas terrorists”,” “the Iranian bomb” and Iran which both Israel and the U.S. agree is bogeyman number one.
The Secret Tie That Binds the US and Israel –Ira Cherus
Related post:http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/10820-the-secret-tie-that-binds-us-and-israel-
As usual, this is about the Israel-first crowd trying to get the US to fight their wars for them.
And their threat: if you don’t do it, we will.
Let’s make sure there is a high cost for them starting Middle East War III. We can do this nonviolently by pledging to BOYCOTT ISRAEL IF IT BOMBS IRAN:
http://www.divestfromwar.org
Let’s PREVENT the next war, instead of protesting it after the fact!
Since I assume this “comment” was posted by someone involved in this campaign, here’s a suggestion: don’t refer to Middle East War III. Depending on how you count, Israel has been involved in 8 wars since its creation. Then there have been at least three other multi-state wars not involving Israel plus the Middle East components of World Wars One and Two.
Also, why wait until bombs start falling on Iran before boycotting Israel? Why not support BDS now?