WarSclerotic

U.S. rejects Netanyahu meeting request: Israel official | Reuters.

(Reuters) – The White House has rejected a request by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to meet President Barack Obama in the United States this month, an Israeli official said on Tuesday, after a row erupted between the allies over Iran’s nuclear programme.

An Israeli official told Reuters on condition of anonymity that Netanyahu’s aides had asked for a meeting when he visits the United Nations this month, and “the White House has got back to us and said it appears a meeting is not possible. It said that the president’s schedule will not permit that”.

Netanyahu, who has met Obama on all his U.S. trips since 2009, has been pushing him to adopt a tougher line against Iran.

He argues that setting a clear boundary for Iran’s uranium enrichment activities and imposing stronger economic sanctions could deter Tehran from developing nuclear weapons and mitigate the need for military action.

In comments that appeared to bring the possibility of an Israeli attack on Iran closer, Netanyahu had earlier taken Washington to task for rebuffing his call to set a “red line” for Iran’s nuclear programme, which has already prompted four rounds of U.N. sanctions.

“The world tells Israel ‘wait, there’s still time’. And I say, ‘Wait for what? Wait until when?'” said Netanyahu, speaking in English.

“Those in the international community who refuse to put red lines before Iran don’t have a moral right to place a red light before Israel,” he added, addressing a news conference with Bulgaria’s prime minister.

“UNPRECEDENTED ATTACK”

The website of Israel’s daily newspaper Haaretz called his words “an unprecedented verbal attack on the U.S. government”.

Iran makes no secret of its hostility to Israel, widely assumed to be the region’s only nuclear-armed power, but says its nuclear programme is purely peaceful.

Netanyahu’s relations with Obama have been strained over Iran and other issues, such as Jewish settlement building in the occupied West Bank.

But he has never framed his differences with Obama – who has pledged he will “always have Israel’s back” and is deep in a re-election campaign – in moral terms.

Republican challenger Mitt Romney has accused Obama of throwing Israel “under the bus”.

Netanyahu’s comments followed U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s remarks on Monday that the United States would not set a deadline in further talks with Iran, and that there was still time for diplomacy to work.

Diplomats have also said six world powers – including the United States – are poised to voice “serious concern” about Iran’s uranium enrichment programme and to urge it to open up access to nuclear sites.

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Tuesday that Washington would have little more than a year to act to stop Iran if it decided to produce a nuclear weapon.

Iran has threatened to retaliate against Israel and U.S. interests in the Gulf if it is attacked, and any such conflict could throw Obama’s re-election bid off course.

DEADLINE

Netanyahu did not mention Clinton by name but pointedly parroted her use of the word “deadline”, saying:

“If Iran knows that there is no ‘deadline’, what will it do? Exactly what it’s doing. It’s continuing, without any interference, towards obtaining a nuclear weapons capability and from there, nuclear bombs …

“So far we can say with certainty that diplomacy and sanctions haven’t worked. The sanctions have hurt the Iranian economy but they haven’t stopped the Iranian nuclear programme. That’s a fact. And the fact is that every day that passes, Iran gets closer and closer to nuclear bombs.”

Recent tougher Israeli rhetoric has stoked speculation that Israel might attack Iran before the U.S. election in November, believing that Obama would be forced to give it military help to avoid alienating pro-Israeli voters.

But over the past week, Netanyahu, in calling for a “red line”, had appeared to be backing away from military action and preparing the ground for a possible meeting with Obama.

Opinion polls suggest that a majority of Israelis do not want their military to strike Iran without U.S. support.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak seemed to criticize Netanyahu’s assault on the Jewish state’s biggest ally.

“Despite the differences and importance of maintaining Israel’s independence of action, we must remember the importance of partnership with the United States and try as much as possible not to hurt that,” a statement from his office said.

(Editing by Kevin Liffey and Michael Roddy)

Obama doesn’t have time to meet later this month, PM says in closed-door meeting | The Times of Israel.

Officials had previously said the US president would sit down with Benjamin Netanyahu during UN confab to talk Iranian red lines

President Barack Obama with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington, DC in March (photo credit: Amos Ben Gershom/GPO/Flash90)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will likely not meet with US President Barack Obama during an upcoming trip to New York, Israeli media reported Tuesday.

In closed meetings, Netanyahu reportedly told advisers that Obama no longer had the time to meet the Israeli premier during the United Nations General Assembly later this month.

In the past several weeks, unnamed Jerusalem officials had said the two would plan to meet in late September; at the top of the agenda would be coordination regarding military action against Iran over its nuclear program.

“I want to meet with Obama the day after Yom Kippur and am even ready to travel to Washington for it,” Netanyahu said in closed-door meetings Tuesday, according to Channel 10. “Obama says there is no time, that it doesn’t fit in with his schedule.”

Relations between Jerusalem and Washington soured in the last few days as the State Department rebuffed lobbying by Netanyahu to set a clear ultimatum for Iran.

On Tuesday, Netanyahu struck back, telling reporters that the US had no business telling Israel to hold off on military action when it would not back it up in creating a credible military threat.

“The world tells Israel to wait because there is still time. And I ask: Wait for what? Until when? Those in the international community who refuse to put red lines before Iran don’t have a moral right to place a red light before Israel,” Netanyahu said. “If Iran knows that there is no red line or deadline, what will it do? Exactly what it is doing today, i.e., continuing to work unhindered toward achieving a nuclear weapon.”

On Sunday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that Washington still considers sanctions the best way to get Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions. “We’re not setting deadlines,” she said.

A day later, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland reiterated Clinton’s statement, saying setting red lines was “not useful.” She added: “So, you know, we are absolutely firm about the president’s commitment here, but it is not useful to be parsing it, to be setting deadlines one way or the other, red lines.”

Jerusalem officials had said Foggy Bottom’s stance served to calm Iran.

Netanyahu’s recent calls for the international community to set clear red lines regarding the Iranian threat was understood by many analysts as a way to signal Israel’s willingness to hold back on a unilateral and uncoordinated strike on Iran, after growing international opposition to such a move became apparent in recent weeks.

The US believes time exists for diplomacy and sanctions to work against Iran’s nuclear program, while Israel says it is on a different timetable. However, Jerusalem would like US backing in any military action, which could set off a regional war.

Raphael Ahren contributed to this report.

U.S. rejects Netanyahu meeting request: Israel official – chicagotribune.com.

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu speaks during a joint news conference with his Bulgarian counterpart Borisov in Jerusalem (POOL New Reuters, REUTERS / September 11, 2012)

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – The White House has rejected a request by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to meet President Barack Obama in the United States this month, an Israeli official said on Tuesday, after a row erupted between the allies over Iran’s nuclear programme.

An Israeli official told Reuters on condition of anonymity that Netanyahu’s aides had asked for a meeting when he visits the United Nations this month, and “the White House has got back to us and said it appears a meeting is not possible. It said that the president’s schedule will not permit that”.

Netanyahu, who has met Obama on all his U.S. trips since 2009, has been pushing him to adopt a tougher line against Iran.

He argues that setting a clear boundary for Iran’s uranium enrichment activities and imposing stronger economic sanctions could deter Tehran from developing nuclear weapons and mitigate the need for military action.

In comments that appeared to bring the possibility of an Israeli attack on Iran closer, Netanyahu had earlier taken Washington to task for rebuffing his call to set a “red line” for Iran’s nuclear programme, which has already prompted four rounds of U.N. sanctions.

“The world tells Israel ‘wait, there’s still time’. And I say, ‘Wait for what? Wait until when?'” said Netanyahu, speaking in English.

“Those in the international community who refuse to put red lines before Iran don’t have a moral right to place a red light before Israel,” he added, addressing a news conference with Bulgaria’s prime minister.

“UNPRECEDENTED ATTACK”

The website of Israel’s daily newspaper Haaretz called his words “an unprecedented verbal attack on the U.S. government”.

Iran makes no secret of its hostility to Israel, widely assumed to be the region’s only nuclear-armed power, but says its nuclear programme is purely peaceful.

Netanyahu’s relations with Obama have been strained over Iran and other issues, such as Jewish settlement building in the occupied West Bank.

But he has never framed his differences with Obama – who has pledged he will “always have Israel’s back” and is deep in a re-election campaign – in moral terms.

Republican challenger Mitt Romney has accused Obama of throwing Israel “under the bus”.

Netanyahu’s comments followed U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s remarks on Monday that the United States would not set a deadline in further talks with Iran, and that there was still time for diplomacy to work.

Diplomats have also said six world powers – including the United States – are poised to voice “serious concern” about Iran’s uranium enrichment programme and to urge it to open up access to nuclear sites.

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Tuesday that Washington would have little more than a year to act to stop Iran if it decided to produce a nuclear weapon.

Iran has threatened to retaliate against Israel and U.S. interests in the Gulf if it is attacked, and any such conflict could throw Obama’s re-election bid off course.

DEADLINE

Netanyahu did not mention Clinton by name but pointedly parroted her use of the word “deadline”, saying:

“If Iran knows that there is no ‘deadline’, what will it do? Exactly what it’s doing. It’s continuing, without any interference, towards obtaining a nuclear weapons capability and from there, nuclear bombs …

“So far we can say with certainty that diplomacy and sanctions haven’t worked. The sanctions have hurt the Iranian economy but they haven’t stopped the Iranian nuclear programme. That’s a fact. And the fact is that every day that passes, Iran gets closer and closer to nuclear bombs.”

Recent tougher Israeli rhetoric has stoked speculation that Israel might attack Iran before the U.S. election in November, believing that Obama would be forced to give it military help to avoid alienating pro-Israeli voters.

But over the past week, Netanyahu, in calling for a “red line”, had appeared to be backing away from military action and preparing the ground for a possible meeting with Obama.

Opinion polls suggest that a majority of Israelis do not want their military to strike Iran without U.S. support.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak seemed to criticize Netanyahu’s assault on the Jewish state’s biggest ally.

“Despite the differences and importance of maintaining Israel’s independence of action, we must remember the importance of partnership with the United States and try as much as possible not to hurt that,” a statement from his office said.

(Editing by Kevin Liffey and Michael Roddy)

Jerusalem Post – Breaking News.

( We’ll do everything we can for the sake of our relationship, until…. – JW )

No U.S. Red Lines Equals Iranian Nuke « Commentary Magazine.

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is bubbling over with frustration at U.S. policy toward Iran. While President Obama has continued to reiterate his pledge not to allow Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon, this concern was shown once again to be an empty boast by Secretary of State Clinton’s statement on Sunday that the United States was not “setting any deadlines” to make Iran stop enriching uranium. That was reinforced on Monday when State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said, “It is not useful to be parsing it, to be setting deadlines one way or the other, red lines.” Far from responding to Israeli requests for a firm statement of an intent to set some red lines beyond which Tehran dare not cross, Washington has sent a clear signal to Iran that the U.S. was content to sit back and watch events as they unfolded.

The subtext to this exchange is that the hints coming out of Jerusalem about a unilateral Israeli attack on Iran to forestall the nuclear threat may very well turn out to have been a bluff. The United States remains firmly focused on preventing any such attempt to resolve this problem and the Israeli PM knows that he would be risking a confrontation with his country’s main ally should it decide to strike on its own. Netanyahu is a cautious man and those who have been predicting all along that he would back down if President Obama remained obdurate may be right. If true, this would be a tactical triumph for the president but there shouldn’t be any doubt as to its ultimate meaning. In the absence of the sort of deadline that Clinton dismissed, time may soon run out on any chance for the West to stop Iran.

The most recent report of the International Atomic Energy Agency should have been enough to concentrate the minds of the president and secretary of state. The IAEA report underlined the fears being expressed in Israel about Iran moving inevitably into a zone of “immunity” beyond which attacks on their nuclear facilities might be futile. It stated that Iran had doubled the number of its centrifuges enriching the uranium needed for a bomb and is now housing them in a secure underground bunker. Yet the news left Clinton unmoved even though her boss and his re-election campaign continued to issue boilerplate statements about his promise to prevent an Iranian bomb.

Under the circumstances, Netanyahu’s outburst is entirely understandable:

 “The world tells Israel ‘wait, there’s still time.’ And I say, ‘Wait for what? Wait until when?’ Those in the international community who refuse to put red lines before Iran don’t have a moral right to place a red light before Israel.”

The United States may not have a moral right to prevent Israel from defending itself but it can make it difficult and expensive for it do so. The question for Netanyahu is whether he is sure that waiting another few months will render any attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities — even a theoretical assault by the far more powerful U.S. forces in the region — too little and too late.

The idea that Israel must have a green light from the United States before it attacks Iran is not backed up by history. The Jewish state has pre-empted threats throughout its history and rarely has it gotten permission in advance from the United States for doing so. Netanyahu knows the costs of inaction could be incalculable. But an Iran attack against a hardened diversified target that is so widely anticipated and against a powerful country with terrorist auxiliaries is not analogous to previous strikes on Syria or even the one on the nuclear reactor at Osirak, Iraq.

Moreover, Netanyahu also knows that an attack on Iran, especially one that takes place during an American presidential campaign, will be viewed as a transparent tactic aimed at forcing Washington’s hands and might not play well even among some supporters of Israel. Given the fact that there is at least a 50-50 chance that Barack Obama will be re-elected, the prime minister may reason that alienating a re-elected American incumbent in this manner is not an acceptable risk. What we don’t know is whether Netanyahu is sufficiently alarmed about the time frame of the Iranian program that he will be willing to hazard such a confrontation in order to save his country.

But no matter what Netanyahu’s calculations may turn out to be, there should be no mistaking the fact that by digging in and refusing to offer red lines or deadlines to the regime in Tehran, the United States is making a conscious decision to accept an Iranian nuke. Though President Obama has vowed he opposes containment of Iran, his continued reliance on failed diplomacy and belated and loosely enforced sanctions is a guarantee that containment may be America’s policy destination in a second term.

If so, it will not just be a betrayal of every promise President Obama has made on the issue since he was elected. It will be an act of moral cowardice that will, at the very least, ensure a less stable and more violent Middle East in his second term.

What You Will Need if Israel is Attacked – Latest News Briefs – Israel National News.

A lot of Israelis have gotten their gas masks in case of a war with Iran.  But what else will they need to prepare for? And what does everyone need if there is a war, or they find themselves in a natural disaster?  Tamar speaks with a rescue and emergency expert from the Israel Aid Mission as he gives you a list of  essentials to pack and have on store, to help save you and your family in times of trouble – wherever you are in the world.  Bring a paper and pencil!

Also, Tamar is joined by former Islamic terrorist, Walid Shoebat, where they discuss the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on the USA.  Has justice been meted out to the perpetrators?  What role did Saudi Arabia play in the planning and funding of the attack, and why have many of them not been prosecuted?

All this now, on air.

Join Tamar as she covers the latest news of Israel, politics and current events!

To Listen LIVE click HERE.

JOIN US IN LIVE CHAT!

Go to http://www.Paltalk.com, download the free program and look in the Religion-Spirituality section/Judaism/Arutz 7 room.

Looking over today’s stats I noticed that the site received 9 visits from Irandefense.net

While no restricted information would ever be released on this site, it’s creepy nonetheless to know that I’m being read by people dedicated to killing me and my whole nation.

To the IRG scumbags reading this blog:  Grab your family and “disappear,” before it’s too late for you. 

You have NO idea what is coming for you.

Joseph Wouk

Benjamin Netanyahu says US does not have ‘moral right’ over Iran – Telegraph.

Benjamin Netanyahu warned the US on Tuesday that it had lost the “moral right” to restrain Israel from taking military action against Iran.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says US does not have ‘moral right’ over Iran  Photo: AP

White House declines Netanyahu request to meet with Obama – Israel News | Haaretz Daily Newspaper.

( EMERGENCY ! !  To my American readers: Please get this story out to anyone you know who cares about foreign affairs.  We asked to talk and Obama turned us down.  Please understand that we REALLY have no choice in what we need to do to protect ourselves and the Western world. – JW )

The White House’s response marks a new low in relations between Netanyahu and Obama, underscored by the fact that this is the first time Netanyahu will visit the U.S. as prime minister without meeting Obama.

Panetta’s comments underline Israel rift – FT.com.