WarSclerotic

Borderline threat.

Sunday, October 17, 2010

THE UNITED STATES and its allies on the U.N. Security Council are patiently waiting for the Iranian government of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to turn up in Geneva for new negotiations on its nuclear program — or, at least, to formally respond to their offer. So it can’t be a good sign that Mr. Ahmadinejad chose instead to travel last week to southern Lebanon, where he offered a vivid demonstration of what is actually on his mind.

“The entire would should know that the Zionists will disappear,” the Iranian leader said in a speech delivered within sight of Israel’s border. “Rest assured that occupied Palestine will be liberated from the filth of the occupation by the power of the resistance and the faith of the resistance.”

Mr. Ahmadinejad has said such things before — but his timing and choice of locale were particularly suggestive. Southern Lebanon is the province of the Shiite Hezbollah militia, which Iran and Syria have supplied with tens of thousands of missiles and rockets it has aimed at Israel. As the Iranian’s presence underscored, Tehran can use its client to trigger a new war in the Middle East at any time; it’s a lesser form of the intimidation that it hopes to exercise around the region with an arsenal of nuclear weapons.

Mr. Ahmadinejad no doubt hopes that his Lebanese front will deter Israel from launching an attack against Iran’s nuclear facilities. But his visit served other purposes, as well. It reminded the Lebanese government and its Western allies of Iran’s ability to intervene in the country’s affairs — just as a U.N. investigation reportedly contemplates the indictment of senior Hezbollah members for the murder of a Lebanese prime minister. It also underlines Iran’s capacity to disrupt any peace settlement between Israel and the Palestinians, or Israel and Syria — a reality the Obama administration has tried to ignore.

The larger message here is that Mr. Ahmadinejad’s and his boss, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, have no interest in a “grand bargain” with the United States or an accommodation with the Security Council. Sanctions have hurt the Iranian economy, but they have had no impact on the regime’s belligerence. Iranian negotiators may eventually turn up in Geneva. But as long as these rulers are in power, Iran will not give up its ambition to exercise hegemony over the Middle East

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