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Rumors about a possible Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear facilities forced US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to comment on the reports, but not in the most reassuring way, saying that Israel has not yet made their decision on an attack.
“I don’t believe they’ve made a decision as to whether or not they will go in and attack,” he told reporters.
Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu said recently that time was running out – a view also echoed by Israel’s ambassador to the US.
But Mr Panetta said the US believed there was still room to talk to Iran.
This is a case of the sides playing bad cop/”I don’t know what that guy’s going to do, he’s crazy” cop. This keeps the pressure and uncertainty on in Iran, while Panetta and confreres work behind the scenes to stop a strike before the election. I really think that’s the main concern. And they’re not all that interested in doing it in public. So Panetta having to come out and downplay comments from Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren represent an escalation of this effort.
Panetta added that sanctions, which grew stronger this summer with an EU embargo on Iranian oil, are “beginning to have an additional impact.” This, by the way, should not be described in benign terms. Sanctions “having an additional impact” means that more children are going hungry in Iran. They mean that more people have to sell all their worldly possessions for food. They equal suffering and hardship, weighed down not on those who are generating a nuclear program – which nobody in the US intelligence community has confirmed is a weapons program – but ordinary Iranians. And yet because the language has been filtered, new sanctions get signed into law seemingly every day.
Meanwhile, the sanctions supposed to be targeted at Iran are hitting the opposition forces in Syria:
The economic sanctions imposed by the Obama administration have forced many Western companies, including technology firms, to sever relationships with Syria and Iran. The measures have helped to isolate those governments internationally.
But many of the same measures also have blocked access to online services and software — including e-mail, blogging platforms and security tools that prevent user activity from being traced — that could be helpful to opposition movements, experts say.
“We are fighting on two sides: the side of the regime and the side of the sanctions,” said Dlshad Othman, a Syrian activist who works with opposition groups across the region.
Heckuva job everyone.
23 Comments
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Who’s the terrorists , I’m confused.
geniuses, all of them.
Color me surprised if there is any life on earth after 12-21-12.
I stand amazed at the utter lack of humanity of those who have gathered the reins of our destruction in their hands.
Program….get your program right here…program……
There is a long precedent of Presidents making a call to the Israeli Prime Minister and saying forthrightly that an action not pleasing to US interests would result in a rather immediate suspension of aid. It usually gets the desired results.
Factor in the fact that President Obama does not want a rogue attack (and probably a coordinated attack as well) before the election, and you get more chest-beating. The fact that Panetta had to speak out says that (1) Netanyahu is being perceived as meddling in the US election and (2) Panetta will be the guy whose decision will suspend the military aid (after a cabinet consensus and pro forma Presidential order).
This doesn’t mean that President Obama has made that diplomatic message to Netanyahu yet. Likely that would entail a visit to the White House by the Israeli ambassador to the US. But President Obama is dropping a big hint with Panetta’s statement.
Sanctions were essentially a EU-US idea. Apparently they were thought through only in the context of Iran and not the region.
I wonder if that crazy Netanyahoo can be restrained at all. If he moves forward with an attack, we are in, like it or not, or so he could easily believe especially just before the election. But even allowing you are right for the next few months, it looks ominous after the election. The further out we go with no movement by Iran the worse the outlook gets, it seems. Are we actually thinking Iran will suspend its program?
Don’t worry. It will all be over in a month.
Did you hear the clips of Israeli ambassador on democracynow this morning? He’s raring to go.
Fuck Israel, fuck Netanyahu, fuck Leon Panetta and fuck Obama
There won’t be peace in the ME until Iran gets nukes, or sometime shortly thereafter.
After the elections, it depends on who gets elected in the House and Senate. I think that unlike the Iraq PR campaign, the public isn’t buying the dire threat of Iran and don’t want another war. Netanyahu needs something to divert attention from the fact Israel and finally closed the door on a two-state solution. It is now officially an apartheid state.
Rarin’ to go by ambassador means trying to make the threat credible. The timing before the election means they have to work a little harder to make a credible threat. He might be rarin’ to go, but likely the US will be serious about the consequences. There has been too much effort at a diplomatic solution to allow Israel to torpedo an agreement. I’m convinced the even Israel is still at the kabuki stage. Netanyahu and his inner circle are kind of alone on this one. Mossad and IDF will obey orders but are reported through many leaks to not want to go forward on Netanyahu’s threat.
I assume that you don’t mean in the nice way.
Tell me how that brings peace in the Middle East.
My sense is there won’t be peace in the Middle East until (1) Israeli apartheid is broken, (2) the US and Europe move to an economy and most importantly a military not dependent on oil, and (3) the people of the countries in the Middle East (including Israel) and in the US have enough say over their governments not to be stampeded into war.
The sign that this is happened is when the Fifth and Sixth fleets come home.
That would definitely do it.
No question about it.
someone needs to explain why Iran doesnt have the right to attack israel for threatening to attack Iran.
and btw, israel does NOT have the ability to attack Iran by itself.
it needs our involvement, PERIOD.
and it needs permission to fly over restricted air space too.
of course as the israeli terrorist attack on the USS LIBERTY showed, they could care less about all that.
but of course heres where things get interesting, because Iran will of course STRIKE BACK if attacked.
Iran will certainly level large areas of israel and WW3 is off and running.
world economic depression would be just the beginning of what israel’s former minister for military affairs Shaul Mofaz has warned will be “catastrophic” consequences of a possible strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
americans who support such war will not be impressed when gas soars to 10 bucks a gallon overnight (and thats the end of obamas re-election).
of course once the Jeanie is out of the bottle its anyones guess where it will end.
perhaps the stupidity of the american people is what empowers our congress to be lap dogs for such outcomes.
we may very well see it put to the test.
The US has always held a very close alliance with Isreal. In the past, this alliance has served both sides well. I think now though, that someone needs to make it known to Netanyahu that if he get’s himself into a war with Iran, he’s on his own. America cannot be the world’s police force any longer. Whatever happenes in the Middle East is going to happen anyway. We need to STAY OUT of their affairs
Once in a while there is a spokesperson for an intelligent Jewish-American position (against Israeli aggression and expansion). Very much NOT Joe Lieberman, but I don’t know how strong it is. Ironically, it may be the only chance for survival and I’m all for supporting them. What kind of credibility does that have?
When Iran is armed as well as the Israelis the latter will stop their saber-rattling and military adventuring because it will then have very real consequences. At the root of the problem, the ME is unstable because a couple of states (Israel and K.S.A.) and their patron (the U.S.) get to act unilaterally in their own interests with literally no regard for those who don’t fit into their vision of ME full of client states that exist to “control” the local population and hand development contracts and subsoil rights to international corporations.
They certainly need something as a deterrent to stop the West, Israel and Saudi Arabia from attacking them. The US/NATO push for hegemony continues to vilify a country that’s already been the target of unjustified meddling since 1953 and is a signatory to the NPT. I wouldn’t be surprised if the people of the US, with their advanced case of ADD, could be rallied to support another kinetic military operation if not an invasion of Iran. It’s an action that wouldn’t meet any opposition from the Democrats were it to be ordered by O.
Abizaid: (Former Centcom commander)
“”There are ways to live with a nuclear Iran,” Abizaid said. “I believe we have the power to deter Iran if they go nuclear” he said, just as we deterred the Soviet Union and China. “Iran is not a suicidal nation. Nuclear deterrence would work with Iran.”
Sept 2005.
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!