A front-page headline on Monday from the New York Times regarding the explosion at a major Iranian nuclear facility stated that “The attack could damage efforts to restart business in 2015.” On Tuesday, also on the front page, the newspaper stated that “Israel’s role in the Iran explosion casts a shadow over US nuclear talks”
Take him? Concluding a new agreement with Iran is a very good thing, anything that harms the chance is a very bad thing, including Israel.
Here’s an alternative perspective: The Times still drinks Kool-Aid that the original Iranian nuclear pact was a success and deserves to be saved. For those who committed the deaths, Iran’s violations of conditions and the spread of regional terrorism are irrelevant.
The cult surrounding the Gray Lady business includes the newspaper’s editorial board. His Saturday screed, written before the weekend attack, began by saying “There is now a short window of time” for President Biden to reach a new agreement. The reason: Iranian moderates could disappear by summer. Ah, yes, moderately Iranian, unicorns that only the blinking left can see. So, let’s hurry up and do a business, any business.
The Times, of course, throws a lot of nonsense that is safely ignored, but this time it plays in harmony with Biden. The president is so eager to join the pact, Donald Trump has wisely cheated, that he is willing to help blame Israel for sabotaging the Natanz underground facility. With initial speculation that the United States and Israel cooperated in the attack, as they did in a cyber attack in 2010, the White House quickly denied any role in the operation, which eliminated all centrifuge power. “The United States was not involved in any way,” Secretary of State Jen Psaki said Monday.
So much for the usual diplomatic ambiguity that would protect an ally and give the US more flexibility when asked about classified operations in the future.
But Biden clearly has no interest in protecting Israel’s likely role. On the contrary, he has notified in many ways that the full American embrace enjoyed by the Jewish state during the Trump years is history.
Indeed, efforts to secede from Israel and clean up Iran illustrate how Biden is determined to give new life to the Obama administration’s foreign policies, even failures. The main one is throwing Israel as more of an obstacle to peace than a friend and a unique ally.
A clear example is that Biden has already given the Palestinians two gifts – hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayers and the heckler veto on American policies in their dispute with Israel. Trump partially stopped payments because part of the money went to salaries for the terrorists’ families. In addition, Palestinian leaders have even refused to speak to the Trump team, so why should they be rewarded with American money. It shouldn’t, but incredibly, none of these issues seem to bother Biden. Maximum reverse speed.
Regarding the Abraham Accords, the historic alliance between Israel and four Muslim nations, a new State Department spokesman could not even speak to say the official name of the agreements. If Trump had been re-elected, it is likely that the Saudis would have signed and gone public with their Israeli secret ties, perhaps even agreeing to full diplomatic recognition. This would be an unprecedented seismic change, however Biden began his administration by insulting the crown prince saying that he would only talk to the king.
He also cut off our military support for the kingdom’s war in Yemen against the Houthis, a terrorist group that attacked Saudi oil fields.
The Houthis themselves provide a window into Biden’s strange priorities. Although – or perhaps because – the Houthis are largely funded and armed by Iran, he has removed the name of terror that Trump imposed on the group in the declining days of his administration. Trump’s action was a slap in the face to Iran and a gift to Saudi Arabia, and Biden reversed that. Again, why?
However, the timing of the Natanz explosion is important, immediately after the Iranian and American negotiators had their first round of meetings. Given that much of the Israeli press assumed it was a Mossad operation, the Times and Biden seem to have concluded that the goal was to thwart progress that could lead to a new nuclear pact. He might be right, but here’s another, more likely one. Israel does not trust that Biden will do a good deal or Iran will respect any restrictions. Therefore, Israel acted to return the mullahs’ nuke program while it was opening and before it was too late. As Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday, “I will never allow Iran to gain nuclear capability to achieve its genocidal goal of eliminating Israel.”
It is unclear whether the United States continues to share this commitment. This doubt is a formula for problems that Iran has already dared and led Israel to act without waiting for American approval or help.
Endless “election day”
Reader Ruth Cohen is puzzled by the fights over early voting and other rules. She writes: “What is wrong with a single election day? People know the date months in advance. They can prepare by registering, making sure there is child care, someone to vote for them if they are disabled. “I can set the alarm clock to wake up early and eat and hydrate. Everyone has a birthday, an anniversary; there is a Christmas day. What is the reason for 12 or 17 days, even voting a month before election day? ”
The party remained unspeakable
Yahoo publishes a detailed story in the Albuquerque Journal about New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, paying $ 62,500 to a former employee to solve a sexual abuse lawsuit. It’s a good read, but the story doesn’t tell which party the governor belongs to.
That’s how you know she’s a Democrat.
Scared of the subway
The findings are so crazy that you wonder why the MTA bothered to do a survey. Then, you remember that the City Hall needs another reminder that subway crime terrifies riders and keeps other people off the trains. About 72% of current passengers say they are “very concerned” about safety. Only 26% said they were “satisfied” with the conditions of crime and harassment, a decrease of 15 points compared to September. About 36% of those who stopped riding mentioned the crime as a reason.
“Our riders have sent a clear message,” interim President Sarah Feinberg told the post. “If you make the system more secure, [they] will return. “The poll of 25,205 people should be a wake-up call to need more police officers. But Mayor de Blasio, his liquidation deadline and NYPD’s decline, is less interested than ever in doing something. Remember your survey next time officials complain that riding is well below pre-pandemic levels.There is a good reason.