Israel Holds America Hostage

An American president never breaks with his predecessor’s policies, except in speech. What President Obama awaits is the Iranian renunciation of uranium enrichment, while the Iranian president is caught between a rock and a hard place: Carrying out Obama’s version of Bush’s orders or Bush’s version of Obama’s orders to the letter would endanger the trend that he represents, while adopting extreme positions would contribute to putting Iran in international quarantine.

Another possibility for creating a fait accompli is to get both presidents out of the interminable diplomatic game whose outcome is in Israel’s hands. Israel would launch an attack against Iranian nuclear sites in order to start an international process, an Iranian military reaction against Israel, and the enforcement of defense agreements binding Israel and the United States and, possibly equally, defense agreements binding the Arab countries of the Gulf and the United States. Israel would thus divert international attention from the colonization of the West Bank and from its harsh repression of the people there. Obama is a watered down version of Bush, who does not need to brandish the use of force since that had already been sufficiently done by his predecessor and was taken up by the French Minister of Foreign Affairs (who had spoken of the incontrovertible nature of the military option, in the case where Iran did not agree to what would be its “surrender”).

It is the Iranian president who holds Obama’s destiny, and not the reverse. Obama has reached the moment where he must think of his re-election. He has two years to succeed and two others to devote to his second term.