Israel: Iran Deal Would Harm War Plans
Jason Ditz: Officials Say US Trying to Make Deal to Avoid Israeli Attack ■ Israeli officials continue to rail against a diplomatic pact between the P5+1 and Iran, today focusing on the idea that such a deal would get in the way of Israeli plans to attack Iran. Over the weekend, the collapse of the deal was nominally on the exact opposite pretext, that Israel would use the deal as an excuse to start a war with Iran, but that seems not to be the case. Major General Giora Eiland says that the deal would as a practical matter shut down any option of an Israeli attack, and while others insisted Israel would “do what’s necessary,” it would risk a major backlash against them in the international community. Other officials went as far as to accuse the US of trying to make a deal, even a “bad” one, specifically to avoid an Israeli attack. Israeli officials have insisted repeatedly that they “reject” any deal and wouldn’t feel bound by it.
Justin Raimondo: ‘Peace Scare’ in Geneva ■ The United States long ago concluded "with high certainty" that Iran abandoned any effort to build a nuclear weapon in 2003 – and yet here we are, a decade later, threatening war over a program our intelligence agencies have declared to be nonexistent. Why is that? To begin with, we’ve been subjected to a years-long propaganda campaign by Israel and its amen corner in this country: the Israel lobby claims the Iranians are secretly constructing nukes with the ultimate goal of attacking the Jewish state. It’s basically the same scenario that played out in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq – and we all know how that turned out. This time, you’d think we learned our lesson. One only has to ask how many times, over the years, has Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed Tehran is "months" away from joining the nuclear club? I’ve lost count. Whether it’s three months, six months, or a year or so, his predictions have always turned out to be false: if he had been right, by this time Iran’s nuclear arsenal would almost be on a par with Israel’s. It never happened.