Netanyahu Tells World Israel Will Stand Up To Iran Alone If Needed

October 2, 2013

4 min read

Benjamin Netanyahu

Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help, and rely on horses, and trust in chariots, because they are many, and in horsemen, because they are exceeding mighty; but they look not unto the Holy One of Israel, neither seek the LORD! Yet He also is wise, and bringeth evil, and doth not call back His words; but will arise against the house of the evil-doers, and against the help of them that work iniquity. Now the Egyptians are men, and not God, and their horses flesh, and not spirit; so when the LORD shall stretch out His hand, both he that helpeth shall stumble, and he that is helped shall fall, and they all shall perish together. For thus saith the LORD unto me: Like as the lion, or the young lion, growling over his prey, though a multitude of shepherds be called forth against him, will not be dismayed at their voice, nor abase himself for the noise of them; so will the LORD of hosts come down to fight upon mount Zion, and upon the hill thereof. As birds hovering, so will the LORD of hosts protect Jerusalem; He will deliver it as He protecteth it, He will rescue it as He passeth over. Turn ye unto Him against whom ye have deeply rebelled, O children of Israel. For in that day they shall cast away every man his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which your own hands have made unto you for a sin. Then shall Asshur fall with the sword, not of man, and the sword, not of men, shall devour him; and he shall flee from the sword, and his young men shall become tributary. And his rock shall pass away by reason of terror, and his princes shall be dismayed at the ensign, saith the LORD, whose fire is in Zion, and His furnace in Jerusalem. (Isaiah 31)

Israel Iran
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses the 68th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York October 1, 2013. (Photo: Kobi Gideon/GPO/Flash90)

In his address to the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did his best to discredit Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s charm offensive towards the West. Netanyahu stated firmly that if Israel needs to deal with Iran and their nuclear weapons program on its own, it will not hesitate to do so.

There should be no confusion over this, Netanyahu stressed, warning that “Israel will never acquiesce to nuclear arms in the hands of a rogue regime that repeatedly promises to wipe us out.”

“If Israel is forced to stand alone” against that threat, “Israel will stand alone,” he said, though it would know that it was also defending others.

After meeting with US President Barack Obama the day before, who had told Netanyahu he plans to explore the diplomatic route to disarming Iran, Netanyahu made sure not to discount these efforts in his speech, according to The Times of Israel. “We all want to give diplomacy with Iran a chance to succeed,” he said. Indeed, he went on, sanctions had put Iran “on the ropes.” If the world wanted to stop Iran peacefully, he pleaded, “don’t let up the pressure. Keep it up!”

In the opening of his speech, Netanyahu offered detailed evidence that Rouhani’s recent words of outreach were duplicitous. He quoted from a book written by Rouhani, Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator from 2003 to 2005, and said the president had bragged about masterminding “the strategy which enabled Iran to advance its nuclear weapons program behind a smokescreen of diplomatic engagement.”

For all Rouhani’s “very soothing rhetoric,” the only difference between him and his predecessor, said Netanyahu, was that while Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was “a wolf in wolf’s clothing, Rouhani is a wolf in sheep’s clothing — a wolf who thinks he can pull the wool over the eyes of the international community… I wish I could believe Rouhani. But I don’t.”

Netanyahu, the final world leader to address the 68th United Nations General Assembly, ridiculed Rouhani for speaking from the UN podium about Iranian democracy, when “the regime that he represents executes political dissidents by the hundreds and jails them by the thousands.”

Rouhani claimed that Iran does not seek nuclear weapons, Netanyahu noted. “Any of you believe that?” he asked the well-filled hall. In fact, he said, intercontinental ballistic missiles, such as Iran is building, and with which he said it will bring the US into range within three or four years, have only “one purpose: to carry nuclear warheads.” Iran, he said flatly, “is developing nuclear weapons.”

Netanyahu said Rouhani had been elected to “smile a lot,” pay “lip-service to democracy,” offer “meaningless concessions,” and “ensure that Iran retains sufficient nuclear material and sufficient nuclear infrastructure to race to the bomb at a time it chooses to do so”.– while, crucially, getting sanctions lifted. “It’s a ploy… He fooled the world once, now he thinks he can fool it again.”

In a rare play on words in an otherwise grave address, he added: “Rouhani thinks he can have his yellowcake, and eat it too.”

Comparing Iran’s weapons drive to that of North Korea, and quoting a New York Times editorial that erroneously hailed the success of diplomacy in thwarting North Korea, he warned: “A nuclear-armed Iran in the Middle East wouldn’t be another North Korea. It would be another 50 North Koreas.” Cameras flashed to the North Korean delegation in the hall, looking rather glum.

Netanyahu acknowledged that some people believe he is exaggerating the Iranian threat. “Sure, they know that Iran’s regime leads these chants, ‘Death to America, Death to Israel,’ that it pledges to wipe Israel off the map. But they think that this wild rhetoric is just bluster for domestic consumption. Have these people learned nothing from history? The last century has taught us that when a radical regime with global ambitions gets awesome power, sooner or later its appetite for aggression knows no bounds. That’s the central lesson of the 20th century. And we cannot forget it. The world may have forgotten this lesson. The Jewish people have not.”

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