This exclusive article about the author’s interview with Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel tells me that Netanyahu is not going to allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons. There are other problems with allowing Iran to get nuclear weapons besides the threat of a nuclear strike on Israel. If Iran acquired nukes it would upset the stability in the whole unstable Mid-East. The threat would also bully Israel citizens and some would depart Israel. Having Iran as a nuclear umbrella is certain to embolden all the terrorist groups in the area. Iran would also be a threat to Europe and Arab nations and could supply terrorists with a weapon of mass destruction that they might use anywhere. Another of Israel’s concerns is that eventually a Iranian leader would use the nukes to start a war with Israel and the West to fulfill his own Islamic Mahdi apocalyptic beliefs.
It is obvious that Netanyahu will give Obama a short period of time to use diplomacy. The chances of a peaceful solution are slim, but stranger things have happened in the world. After the Iranian election when Iran finds itself in increasing economic distress due to low oil prices and the leadership of Iran knows that an attack by Israel is imminent they might agree to a last minute agreement to allow some oversight of their nuclear program.
From my understanding of Bible prophecy, I think Iran’s nuclear weapons program will be put on hold or it will be delayed by a military strike on Iran. I do not see them being allowed to develop nuclear weapons at this time. Bible prophecy tells us that Iran will come against Israel with Gog of Russia but Russia is at least a decade away from having the modern military forces necessary to even fulfill that prophecy.
In any case, all this will probably come to a head by fall. Once again things might get very interesting around the time of the Jewish New Year.
Netanyahu to Obama: Stop Iran—Or I Will – The Atlantic (March 31, 2009)
In an interview conducted shortly before he was sworn in today as prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu laid down a challenge for Barack Obama. The American president, he said, must stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons—and quickly—or an imperiled Israel may be forced to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities itself.
“The Obama presidency has two great missions: fixing the economy, and preventing Iran from gaining nuclear weapons,” Netanyahu told me. He said the Iranian nuclear challenge represents a “hinge of history” and added that “Western civilization” will have failed if Iran is allowed to develop nuclear weapons.
In unusually blunt language, Netanyahu said of the Iranian leadership, “You don’t want a messianic apocalyptic cult controlling atomic bombs. When the wide-eyed believer gets hold of the reins of power and the weapons of mass death, then the entire world should start worrying, and that is what is happening in Iran.”
Neither Netanyahu nor his principal military advisers would suggest a deadline for American progress on the Iran nuclear program, though one aide said pointedly that Israeli time lines are now drawn in months, “not years.” These same military advisers told me that they believe Iran’s defenses remain penetrable, and that Israel would not necessarily need American approval to launch an attack. “The problem is not military capability, the problem is whether you have the stomach, the political will, to take action,” one of his advisers, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told me.
Both Israeli and American intelligence officials agree that Iran is moving forward in developing a nuclear-weapons capability. The chief of Israeli military intelligence, Major General Amos Yadlin, said earlier this month that Iran has already “crossed the technological threshold,” and that nuclear military capability could soon be a fact: “Iran is continuing to amass hundreds of kilograms of low-enriched uranium, and it hopes to exploit the dialogue with the West and Washington to advance toward the production of an atomic bomb.”
In our conversation, Netanyahu gave his fullest public explication yet of why he believes President Obama must consider Iran’s nuclear ambitions to be his preeminent overseas challenge. “Why is this a hinge of history? Several bad results would emanate from this single development. First, Iran’s militant proxies would be able to fire rockets and engage in other terror activities while enjoying a nuclear umbrella. This raises the stakes of any confrontation that they’d force on Israel. Instead of being a local event, however painful, it becomes a global one. Second, this development would embolden Islamic militants far and wide, on many continents, who would believe that this is a providential sign, that this fanaticism is on the ultimate road to triumph.
“Third, they would be able to pose a real and credible threat to the supply of oil, to the overwhelming part of the world’s oil supply. Fourth, they may threaten to use these weapons or to give them to terrorist proxies of their own, or fabricate terror proxies. Finally, you’d create a great sea change in the balance of power in our area—nearly all the Arab regimes are dead-set opposed to Iran’s acquisition of nuclear weapons. They fervently hope, even if they don’t say it, that the U.S. will act to prevent this, that it will use its political, economic, and, if necessary, military power to prevent this from happening.”
If Iran acquires nuclear weapons, Netanyahu asserted, Washington’s Arab allies would drift into Iran’s orbit.
Few in Netanyahu’s inner circle believe that Iran has any short-term plans to drop a nuclear weapon on Tel Aviv, should it find a means to deliver it. The first-stage Iranian goal, in the understanding of Netanyahu and his advisers, is to frighten Israel’s most talented citizens into leaving their country. “The idea is to keep attacking the Israelis on a daily basis, to weaken the willingness of the Jewish people to hold on to their homeland,” Moshe Ya’alon said. “The idea is to make a place that is supposed to be a safe haven for Jews unattractive for them. They are waging a war of attrition.”
