Binyamin Netanyahu has been tirelessly pounding the airwaves and talk circuits with dire warnings about the impending Holocaust facing Israel.
Binyamin Netanyahu, speaking at the 4th Annual Jerusalem Conference Monday morning, repeated his call for the world to prove that now is not like the 1930s and that the world knows how to respond this time.
Of course, what he is asking for is the West to fight a war against Iran on Israel’s behalf.
In Washington, the usual suspects, like Joe Lieberman, never waste an opportunity to remind Americans that Iran is the greatest threat to Western civilization. Importantly, most Americans aren’t buying it
Only 10 per cent of respondents think Iran is a threat to the United States that requires military action now, down 11 points since mid-February. This is surely cause for concern and consternation for AIPAC, who flexed their muscle more brazenly than ever by bringing more than 6,000 activists to Washington for its annual policy conference.
The rest of the world however, is getting on with their business, with or without the blessing of the US.
Dow Jones Newswires reports that a second Chinese oil company is close to signing a memorandum of understanding to invest $3.6 billion in an Iranian gas field. This is despite U.S. pressure for China to cancel a similar deal.
And:
Five of the world’s largest oil producing countries -Venezuela, Algeria, Qatar, Iran and Russia- are launching an “OPEC of gas” during an energy conference to be held next April 9 in Doha, Monday said Russian Kommersant newspaper quoting Arab diplomatic sources.
Most unexpectedly, the US has granted Iranian President Ahmadinejad a visa to enter the US to attend a UN meeting. We can only hope that these developments are a sign that US efforts to goad Iran into a war may be stalling, though it is also possible that this will only force the hand of the extremists within the Bush administration into doing something reckless.