“Bibi” Netanyahu was disgusted.<\/p>\n
“My initial reaction is that Iran<\/strong> has gotten a freebie. It has got five weeks to continue enrichment without any limitation.”<\/p>\n The Israeli prime minister was referring to Saturday’s meeting in Istanbul of the P5-plus-1 — the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and Germany — with representatives from Iran<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Subject: Iran<\/strong>‘s nuclear program. After a “constructive” meeting of one day, all agreed to meet again in Baghdad<\/strong>, May 23, and departed.<\/p>\n For Bibi, it was a strategic defeat.<\/p>\n For Israel<\/strong>‘s goal is a halt to Iran<\/strong>‘s enrichment of uranium and the removal of enriched uranium from that country.<\/p>\n But Catherine Ashton<\/strong>, the foreign minister for the European Union who is leading the P5-plus-1, stated that the West accepts Iran<\/strong>‘s position that, as a signatory to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, she has a right to a peaceful nuclear program and nuclear power.<\/p>\n “Iran<\/strong>‘s right to the peaceful use of nuclear power” must be fully respected, Ashton said. No one dissented.<\/p>\n If the United States assents to Iran<\/strong>‘s enrichment of uranium, and Iran<\/strong> gives assurances that the Ayatollah’s fatwa against the acquisition of nuclear weapons is being observed, a Washington-Tehran deal may be in the offing.<\/p>\n What would be the elements?<\/p>\n An end to Iran<\/strong>‘s enrichment of uranium to 20 percent, once Iran<\/strong> has a sufficient stock for its program of nuclear medicine.<\/p>\n Transfer of any excess 20 percent uranium outside the country to prevent further enrichment to weapons grade.<\/p>\n Regular intrusive inspections of Iran<\/strong>‘s nuclear facilities to ensure there is no diversion of uranium to bomb-making.<\/p>\n What would Iran<\/strong> demand?<\/p>\n Step-by-step lifting of sanctions, as it demonstrates it is telling the truth about not seeking nuclear weapons.<\/p>\n Such a deal would end the U.S.-Iran<\/strong> confrontation, yet allow Iran<\/strong> to continue to gain the knowledge, experience, and technical capacity to break out, should it ever decide to take the risk and build the weapons.<\/p>\n Netanyahu believes Israel<\/strong>‘s security and survival mandate the nuclear castration of Iran<\/strong>. Sunday, in a detailed report cleared by military censors, Israeli TV showed how an attack would be mounted.<\/p>\n Yet reporter Alon Ben David conceded that the Israeli Air Force “does not have the capacity to destroy the entire Iranian program.”<\/p>\n Unlike the Iraqi nuclear reactor and the Syrian reactor Israel<\/strong> bombed in 1981 and 2007, Iran<\/strong> has many more nuclear facilities, spread over a far larger country, farther away and better defended.<\/p>\n And given the public threats by Israel<\/strong> and test runs by the IAF<\/strong> as far as Gibraltar, no attack on Iran<\/strong> will come as a total surprise. There would be losses of planes and pilots.<\/p>\n What would be the results?<\/p>\n While it would destroy some of Iran<\/strong>‘s nuclear facilities, it would not end the program but rally Iranians behind the regime. And it might trigger retaliation by Iran<\/strong> and Hezbollah, by missile, against Israel<\/strong> itself.<\/p>\n An Israeli attack on Iran<\/strong>, which President Obama and the U.S. military strongly oppose, would also put the issue of a U.S. war with Iran<\/strong> front and center in the presidential election.<\/p>\n What would America do; what would Obama do?<\/p>\n The election of 2012 could turn on that decision.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"