April 1, 2010- Weak Sanctions on Iran are Worse the None

At sundown today, Israel began commemorating Yom Hashoah (the 24 hour period when the victims of the Holocaust are memorialized). The commemoration began with the national ceremony at Yad VaShem. At the ceremony Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke and stated: "Iran's leadership is racing to develop nuclear weapons and declares its intention to destroy Israel. The world is gradually accepting Iran's exterminatory declarations regarding Israel and still we do not see the international determination required to stop the arming of Iran. But if we learned something from the Holocaust, it is that we cannot remain quiet or flinch in the face of evil."

Unfortunately, nothing can be more true. Most of the world (except, interestingly, the European countries that had a direct experience with the Holocaust- be it Germany, or France) seem to be willing to accept a nuclear armed Iran. No one who truly understands contemporary Jewish history can believe, with any certainty, that Iran would refrain from using a nuclear weapon against Israel. Unfortunately, Israel has only two realistic strategies. The first, is to accept a nuclear armed Iran, and put the future of the Jewish people in the hands of the designers and operators of Israels anti-missile systems.

The second option, is to get as close to the United States as possible, and get the US support for either an Israeli military strike or better, but less likely, an American attack. I wish I understood what policy the Israeli government is following, since for the moment it seems like, none of the above. In the meantime, Prime Minister Netanyahu's failure to participate in President Obamas summit on keeping nuclear weapons out of the hands of terrorist, or rogue states, says it all. The explanation Netanyahu is afraid of being ambushed by Turkey and Egypt seems a little hard to believe. Is Israel any less likely to be ambushed because its represented by Deputy Prime Minister Meridor? Of course Meridor makes a better spokesman for Israel, so maybe its not bad. There is certainly no need to get Netanyahu and Obama together again, and hope it will work out better.

Reports from Israel yesterday seem to indicate Foreign Minister Lieberman was responsible for convincing Netanyahu not to attend Obama's Summit. Last night, on a TV interview show Lieberman was asked if he is so concerenced about the Iranian problem and shouldnt Israel be doing all it can to make sure that relations with the Obama administration were the best they could be. Lieberman sidestepped that answer, by saying that Israel was an indpendent state and needed to act in its own self interests, and not always listen to America. He went on to highlight his own accomplishments, claiming that Israel now has close relations with many new nations. He gave Panama as one example. I guess we will use all those ships with false Panamanian registry to attack Iran. Or the non-existent Panamanian UN veto to support Israel.

Israelis are schizophreic in their views of Lieberman. In a poll this past week, 54% agreed with him in standing up to the US. Yet in the same poll, 74% of Israelis believed Lieberman was harming the interests of Israel as foreign Minister.

If you wish to be further depressed, read the article by the Jerusalem Post editor David Horowitz l in today's Jerusalem Post Editors Notes:Downhill by the Numbers http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=172704