Kommer Obama tillåta ett nukleärt Iran?

Igår höll president Obama ett tal på AIPACs policy conference. New York Times har ett referat.

Alana Goodman på Commentary Magazine skriver om talet: Does Obama Want to Contain a Nuclear Iran?

President Obama clarified today that he’s looking to prevent, not contain, a nuclear-armed Iran, during his speech to AIPAC. While this was a welcome acknowledgement, it’s not particularly meaningful. Containment policy toward Iran has become so unpalatable that even American apologists for the Iranian regime rarely openly advocate it in mainstream discourse. 

Instead, these regime allies promote a different kind of containment policy: containment of a nuclear-capable Iran. In other words, the bomb is the redline – but everything that Iran does leading up to the bomb, including high-level enrichment, is acceptable.

This strategy brings Iran within arms-length of obtaining a nuclear weapon (which is also well after Israel would have the ability to take military action). And it gives regime apologists more time to argue that a nuclear-armed Iran is less of a threat to the world than commonly believed.

Trita Parsi, ledare för National Iranian American Council, skriver också om Obamas tal i Huffington Post:

While expressing his sympathy and friendship with Israel, Obama did not yield his red line at AIPAC. With the backing of the U.S. military, he has stood firm behind weaponization rather than weapons capability as the red line. 

He said: "I have said that when it comes to preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon [emphasis added], I will take no options off the table, and I mean what I say." 

This is crucial because it is essentially a question of war and peace. Critically, Obama's rejection of containment at AIPAC was in the context of containing a nuclear-armedIran, not a nuclear capable Iran. 

He said: "Iran's leaders should know that I do not have a policy of containment; I have a policy to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon." 

Nowhere in the speech is he aligning himself, or even mentioning, the Israeli red line of "nuclear capability." 

The president's tough words regarding his readiness to use military action is all in the context of preventing a nuclear weapon in Iran, not a nuclear capability. 

Det verkar alltså ganska uppenbart att Obama tänker tillåta Iran att få nukleär kapacitet. Detta borde knappast lugna Israel.

Obama gör allt för att framstå som Israels bästa vän, men med hans track record är det inte lätt. Om jag vore Israels regering skulle jag tänka både en, två och tre gånger innan jag lägger min överlevnad i hans händer. Och vore jag amerikansk israelvän skulle jag tänka ett par varv till innan jag röstade på Obama.

PS: I Vanity Fair skriver en gammal Bush-rådgivare att Israel inte kan slå ut Irans kärnvapenprogram. Det pågår ett intensivt lobbande, så jag gissar man får se artikeln ovan i ljuset av detta. Särskilt som denne före detta Bush-tjänsteman numer öppet stöttar Obama.