President Obama was all smiles at the Brookings Institute Saban Forum on last Saturday, December 7th, ironically Pearl Harbor day. Haim Saban is a well known Israeli asset who has made great use of his huge wealth to influence American policy through the insider tools available to A-level American think tanks which have become the espionage weapon of choice.
The Intel trade calls this ‘front door’ espionage because there is no need to sneaking around to find an open back door. You just call and make an appointment to request the information you want from the right person who also wants to avail themselves of the goodies you have to offer.
This was quite a catch for Saban, getting on stage next to an American president where he was expected to be ‘defending’ his policies. After all, Haim’s Likud friends in Israel did everything they could to replace Obama with Mitt Romney, the international crime syndicate’s candidate who they felt was a sure thing to beat him. Next time the Republicans might want to consider running someone with not as big a criminal background history, although that would be a challenge.
Saban and friends have also worked tirelessly to defeat any Palestinian peace process, any efforts to solve the many decades of Iran’s isolation with its endless charges of having nuclear weapons ‘soon’. We also find them active in assisting opposition to his health care reform and other domestic programs, punishing him for not taking instructions for Tel Aviv as seriously as he should. This is the high end modern version of whipping a errant slave.
So we got to see Obama visiting the Lion’s Den on Saturday and he was not there to grovel. Much has been reported on his defense of his efforts to resolve the Iran nuclear controversy. It gave him an opportunity to restate his position, which is fiercely opposed by Netanyahu…and he did that like brain surgeon with a scalpel.
He used measured words which a head of state always must, as over playing your hand is usually a sign of weakness, not strength. But Obama has won the battle with the Israeli Lobby trying to trash the interim agreement by pushing for increased sanctions as the P5+1 deal included no new sanctions for six month period. They knew the lobby would do want they are trying to do, and cut them off at the pass.
“There are times where I, as president of the United States, am going to have different tactical perspectives than the prime minister of Israel,” Obama said. The President was being polite here. It is more than a tactical difference. Bibi and his Likudites have wanted an American attack on Iran and had wanted one on Syria, and they were bitterly disappointed to not get one on Syria and to see it slipping away on Iran.
Obama wants to resolve the Iran issues. Israel does not as it needs a never ending bogeyman as a diversion from it’s slow motion domestic economy implosion with Israelis already leaving the sinking ship. The country is supported with all kinds of foreign cash infusions year after year.
I was interviewed for Al-Alam television, Iran’s Arab network Sunday morning, and their focus was understandably on Obama’s use of mentioning that the military option was still on the table if an agreement was not reached at the end of the negotiations. The consensus was that he was repeating that line for domestic consumption to deflect charges that he is being snookered by the Iranians at Israel’s security expense.
Obama dealt with the Lobby flanking moves against him head on. He shot down Netanyahu’s demand for zero Iranian nuclear activity despite its having been an NPT member for decades and having gone through thousands of inspections compared to Israel having had none. This is finally having a boomerang effect here in the states with more people talking about Israel’s huge weapons of mass destruction programs and why are they so censored out of Mid East security discussions.
President Obama cut Bibi off at the knees, stating that it was his demand for zero reprocessing activity that was unrealistic. He also made a rare mention of President Rouhani’s political concerns for obtaining his own domestic support for a final agreement as being one requiring a “dignified solution”, very carefully chosen and powerful words. Of course we know that Netanyahu could not care less about Iranian dignity. The difference in statesmanship from Obama, and the lack thereof by Netanyahu has made Bibi his own worst enemy.
Obama had some help from AIPAC in his set up to trounce Bibi at the Saban Forum. In a telephone conference call, AIPAC’s Howard Khor had initiated a policy shift in tactics away from the ‘bad deal’ and ‘big historical mistake’ smear campaign slogans that failed so miserably.
Khor pushed his people to work on getting control over what the final deal would be like, something that Iran could never agree to, and of course pushing for new sanctions which the Iranians have already stated they would leave the talks if passed. That was like waiving a red flag in front off Netanyahu.
The White house staff knows the Israeli Lobby flank move tactics are usually to gain the initiative by attacking an American President through Congress, making him look weak by getting him on the defensive. Obama was too smart to play that game. He had brought a trump card to the Saban forum.
He did something no American President has ever done…conceded a major issue demanded by Israel BEFORE the final negotiations had even begun. He told the audience that Iran would obviously have a nuclear program as part of any final resolution and that the P5+1 all understood why. No country would ever surrender their sovereignty in such a way. It would be political suicide. Israel tells everybody to go fly a kite when probed to discuss its nuclear activities.
The Israeli strategy was to undermine the moderate Iranian leadership hoping the hardliners would get back in control and Tel Aviv would have a good solid visible bogeyman threat for another twenty years.
So Obama cut AIPAC off at the pass on their strategy. If they thought they were going to drive this negotiation via their US Congress sock puppets, they aren’t. Missed in the discussion is the critical item that no treaty is being negotiated with Iran that would have to be approved by the Senate through ‘advise and consent’. This is a P5+1 negotiation…and the US Congress is not holding a veto despite all of their bluster. The polls show the American people solidly with Obama on the Iranian peace process. I am sure the antacid pills were being passed around in the Likud party offices when they read Obama’s remarks.
And lastly, on the issue of the military option, let’s put that to bed. That is something in the realm of Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. There will be no military strike on Iran. And the reason is very simple, a little item called mutually assured destruction, something that served us well during the Cold War to keep the missiles in their silos.
But there is a twist to that history. Today the result of such a miscalculation would be mutually assured Economic Destruction. Our sources all confirm that Iran can close the Straits, and if the Saudis and other Gulf States assisted in an attack, destroy their oil and gas facilities on the first day. Oil would go through the roof and economies hanging on by a thread (almost everybody) would tumble like dominoes, taking the banking system down in a week.
The economic destruction would be fast and furious, and so would the world’s anger on whoever the attacker had been who brought about their being wiped out. We know there are powerful entities out there who would love such a collapse so they could pick up all the marbles after it was over at two cents on the dollar. Fortunately we are not without some cooler heads that don’t want to have that go down on their watch.
And lastly, Americans have been subjected to the humiliation of having to watch our highest Congressional people reading AIPAC talking points off word for word like they were in some kind of a Manchurian Candidate trance. The silver lining is that it has attracted much more attention to the political espionage problem we suffer in Washington, DC. Our corporate media has always censored any public discussion of it at all.
I am getting calls every day from long time skeptics, admitting that I had been right all of these years, that Israel had been co-opting our own people as part of their long term plans for fleecing Americans forever. It remains to be seen if the grassroots army that rose up against the Syrian attack will do so to take on the 5th column here.
We pray for deliverance…but some good bayonet work in the trenches would by a big help. Dear Santa, that is my wish.
Jim W. Dean, managing editor for VeteranToday.com, producer/host of Heritage TV Atlanta, specially for “New Eastern Outlook”.
