Garbanzo Toons

Is Anyone Surprised by This?

According to this report from the Associated Press,

Iran's hard-line president on Saturday inaugurated a heavy-water production plant, a facility the West fears will be used to develop a nuclear bomb, as Tehran remained defiant ahead of a U.N. deadline that could lead to sanctions.

But don't worry, because,

The U.N. has called on Tehran to stop the separate process of uranium enrichment — which also can be used to create nuclear weapons — by Thursday or face economic and political sanctions.

In addition,

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad declared that his nation's nuclear program poses no threat to other nations, even
Israel, "which is a definite enemy."

Ahmadinejad said in a speech that Iran would never abandon what he once again called its purely peaceful nuclear program.

"There is no discussion of nuclear weapons," he said. "We are not a threat to anybody even the Zionist regime, which is a definite enemy for the people of the region."

Sanctions? They've worked so well in the past. The assurances of a madman? Sure puts my heart at ease.

However,

A senior Israeli lawmaker warned in a statement that the plant inauguration marks "another leap in Iran's advance toward a nuclear bomb."

Israeli legislator Ephraim Sneh of the Labor Party, a partner in the ruling coalition, said that the Jewish state must "prepare itself militarily." Ahmadinejad last year called for Israel to be "wiped off the map."

The spent fuel from a heavy-water reactor can be reprocessed to extract plutonium for use in a bomb.

Gee Whiz, don't those Israelis ever think of anyone but themselves? I'm sure there is a statement coming soon from some "human rights" group condemning Israel for trying to interfere with Iran's unalienable right to destroy the "zionist entity" with nuclear weapons. And besides,

Vice President Gholamreza Aghazadeh, who also heads the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, said the heavy-water facility will be used to treat and diagnose
AIDS and cancer, and for other medicine and agricultural purposes.

From news reports coming out of Iran, we know that the Iranians have been extremely concerned with AIDS and cancer.

Ahmadinejad has openly stated his desire to see Israel "wiped off the map," and has warned the West that if it does not eliminate the Israeli "cancer" by absorbing the nation's six million Jews, the Muslim world will deal with the problem in its own manner.

OK, so there's room for interpretation there. On the other hand, that was last year's Ahmadinejad. But I'm sure French diplomacy will help to solve this seeming intractable problem. After all, it's been so effective so far in slowing down the Iranian push to build nuclear weapons.

Joining the French in their reliance of the diplomacy that has shown so much promise is columnist Trudy Rubin. As she tells us,

Iran's top nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, said yesterday that Tehran was ready to enter "serious negotiations," but he left opaque what that meant. Given the options, why not test Iran's bona fides?

Why not indeed? Maybe becuase the Iranians have used these years of meaningless negotiations as a Trojan Horse to lull the craven appeasers in the West into thinking that the Iranians have been negotiating in good faith? Maybe because the Iranians know Trudy Rubin and French better than Rubin and the French know the Iranians? Maybe because if we don't acknowledge the Iranian threat we don't have to deal with it? We can, as Ms. Rubin does, go on blaming the U.S. and Israel for Iranian sins.

But the administration constantly dropped hints about the need for a new regime in Tehran. U.S. support for Israel's bombing campaign in Lebanon looked like a dry run for a possible U.S. attack on Iran. So why be surprised that Iran stirs up problems in Iraq or arms its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah?

There go those nasty Israelis stirring up more trouble in the Middle East by defending themselves again! How dare they worry the Iranians like that!

When in doubt, blame the Jews, the World's oldest scapegoats rather than face the real problem. I can't wait to see how Rubin and the French blame Israel when the Iranians attempt to nuke Tel Aviv.

Actually, yes I can.

Labels: Ahmadinejad, Iranian nukes, Israel

posted by Harry @ 10:27 AM