The article I’m about to link focuses on Obama reaching out to Iran’s new President, Hassan Rouhani, due to a NBC interview earlier this week where he made a shift in some of Iran’s political stances.
Mr. Rouhani, unlike his predecessor, Ahmed Ahmadinejad, has a more liberal view on Iran’s political troubles, such as the crippling sanctions by the West in response to Iran’s pursuit of a nuclear weapon. Also, he even stepped back from Iran’s long term stance regarding wiping Israel off the map moving to a more moderate position of pursuing peace in the region. So in light of this shift in posture the White House has opened communications with Tehran hoping to start a dialog focusing on lifting the sanctions in return for Iran abandoning it’s nuclear program.
But what the article really focuses on though are the criminals in Israel and Jerusalem’s views on this whole matter. Israel PM Benjamin Netanyahu says this is all farce and an attempt by Rouhani to lighten the sanctions upon Iran’s economy while the nuclear program secretly continues.
Now, let’s get back into the same old argument here that I have addressed many times before. Even though the NYT article states that the Israeli nuclear arsenal is kept foggy regarding how many bombs they have if they even have any at all. But outside sources places the number at 250 nuclear weapons. And this does not include the American arsenal that would surely be fired upon Iran if they lobbed their single bomb into Tel Aviv or somewhere else not holy to Muslims.
Now Iran, unlike other Middle Eastern nations, is not filled with extremists that are known for suicide attacks. The reason why, amongst others, is that they are a Shia nation and 90% of suicide bombers are Sunni Muslims, e.g., Osama bin Laden, Al-Zawahiri, and every 9/11 hijacker. Also on this point you never here of Iranian suicide bombers. Iran prefers to financially and materially support these groups. Suicide bombers are all from Arab states too, e.g., Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the Palestinians. Iran isn’t even Arab, they’re Persian.
So what I am trying to get to here is this: Iran is not full of extremists in the violent/terrorist sense of the word. So why would they take the risk of being wiped off the map by Israel/U.S. by starting a nuclear war with their single bomb or a few more thereafter? It’s a simple argument of M.A.D., i.e., Mutually Assured Destruction. Iran is smart and calculating. They put politics above extremism. They are a rational nation that prefers political action rather than martyrdom.
So why is Israel so nervous?
If the West has any bravery or fortitude in them the real answer for a safe and anti-nuclear Middle Eastern region is to make it a Weapons of Mass Destruction-free zone. Collect all the nuclear bombs with the IAEA and collect all the sarin gas warheads and anthrax from nations like Syria.
But, unfortunately, the U.S. will never allow that to happen due our outdated interests in Israel, which is way out of view now that the Cold War is over. We need to rethink our policies in that region.
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