A Member of the Israeli Knesset made a statement yesterday which was lost in the McCain/Palin coverage. Some say a step closer to a preemptive strike against Israel is a risky place to go.
American politics aside, Israel and Iran are still not getting along, and are very unlikely to get along anytime in the near future (say... the next two thousand years).
With that firmly in mind, the issue of a preemptive strike against Iran is one step closer today than it was last week. As reported in the
Jerusalem Post,
Ephraim Sneh a veteran Labor MK who has recently left the party, has reportedly sent a document to both US presidential candidates, John McCain and Barack Obama. The eight-point document states that "there is no government in Jerusalem that would ever reconcile itself to a nuclear Iran. When it is clear Iran is on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons, an Israeli military strike to prevent this will be seriously considered."
That is perhaps as blunt a remark as any I've noticed from Iran yet. Coming as it does from a Member of the Knesset (MK) it has more weight than the remarks of the typical hard line Rabbi extolling the current government for being soft on terrorism.
One of the thorniest problems with an Israeli strike against Iran will be the need for Israeli warplanes to travel across the Iraqi air space, now being controlled by American aircraft. The disruption to the world oil markets is what some would also call a thorny issue, since it would likely do something obscene to the price of oil overnight.
So far the Israeli government has not offered any evidence, nor has the American government offered a statement offering Israeli warplanes safe passage across Iraq.
The possibility of American warplanes or ground to air missiles being used to shoot down Israeli aircraft is an idea which would certainly entail enormous political risk for President of either political party, and could have it's own disruptive influence on the Mid East balance pf power, if Israel was seen to be left to its own devices for protection.
The act of crossing Iraqi airspace with either the confirmed or even just tacit approval of the American government will place the next President squarely in the cross hairs of the entire Reactionary Arab world. Some Arab nations might quietly applaud the decision as one which removes the need for a nuclear race enmasse by the rest of the Middle East region, but it is so unlikely for any of the Arab nations to say so publicly as to be not even be worth consideration.
In a visit to Switzerland and Austria trying to drum up support for stronger American and European sanctions against Iran to make the air-strike unnecessary, MK Sneh remarked
"Talk of the Jewish Holocaust and Israel's security doesn't impress these guys," Sneh said wryly.
Hearing his hosts speak of their future investments, Sneh replied quietly "it's a shame, because Ido will light all this up." He was referring to Maj. Gen. Ido Nehushtan, the recently appointed Israeli Air Force (IAF) commander and the man most likely to be the one to orchestrate Israel's attack on Iran's nuclear facilities, should this become a necessity.
"Investing in Iran in 2008," Sneh told his Austrian hosts, "is like investing in the Krupp steelworks in 1938, it's a high risk investment." The Austrians, according to Sneh, turned pale.
The loss of such a large amount of investment capital may give pause to those looking to invest in Iran, with the sole exception of Russia, which also has investments in Iran.
