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15 Mar, 2015

In Washington Post column, Jewish neocon calls for more war in Middle East

Following up on the anti-Iran speech by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the U.S. Congress earlier this month, another Jewish neocon has called openly for an attack on Iran.

Reeking with shameless arrogance and shoulder-shrugging nonchalance about advocating more conflict and human suffering in an explosive and volatile region, Joshua Muravchik, a fellow at the Foreign Policy Institute of Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies, writes in a March 13 column in the Washington Post that sanctions and negotiations will not deter Iran from trying to acquire a nuclear weapon.

“What if force is the only way to block Iran from gaining nuclear weapons? That, in fact, is probably the reality,” says Muravchik, who, according to his profile on Wikipedia wrote another article headlined “Bomb Iran,” in The Los Angeles Times, November 19, 2006.

Not satisfied with the mayhem and violence still raging in Iraq, 12 years after Jewish neocons such as Paul Wolfowitz and Bill Kristol championed an attack on the false pretext of ridding the Saddam Hussein regime of weapons of mass destruction that were never found, they are still continuing their calls to attack Islamic countries at the expense of the American taxpayer.

The article tries to rebut all the arguments being presented by the Obama administration to achieve a negotiated settlement. It casts aspersions on the Iranian regime, comparing it to the “communist, fascist and Nazi regimes that set out to transform the world.”

It says sanctions have not done any good. “Only military actions — by Israel against Iraq and Syria, and through the specter of U.S. force against Libya — have halted nuclear programs.”

Muravchik writes, “Does this mean that our only option is war? Yes, although an air campaign targeting Iran’s nuclear infrastructure would entail less need for boots on the ground than the war Obama is waging against the Islamic State, which poses far smaller a threat than Iran does.”

He also raises in a very matter-of-fact tone some hypothetical questions:

“Wouldn’t an attack cause ordinary Iranians to rally behind the regime? Perhaps, but military losses have also served to undermine regimes, including the Greek and Argentine juntas, the Russian czar and the Russian communists.

“Wouldn’t destroying much of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure merely delay its progress? Perhaps, but we can strike as often as necessary. Of course, Iran would try to conceal and defend the elements of its nuclear program, so we might have to find new ways to discover and attack them. Surely the United States could best Iran in such a technological race.”

As for objections that airstrikes might not reach all the important facilities and that Iran would then proceed unconstrained by inspections and agreements, a very simple solution, according to Mr Muravchik: “The United States would have to make clear that it will hit wherever and whenever necessary to stop Iran’s program.”

Finally, wouldn’t Iran retaliate by using its own forces or proxies to attack Americans? Another simplistic solution: “We could attempt to deter this by warning that we would respond by targeting other military and infrastructure facilities.”

As for the possibility of retaliation, more simplistic solutions: “Nonetheless, we might absorb some strikes. Wrenchingly, that might be the price of averting the heavier losses that we and others would suffer in the larger Middle Eastern conflagration that is the likely outcome of Iran’s drive to the bomb.” A small war now will prevent a bigger war later on, he argues.

Commentary such as this is making it increasingly clear who is really behind much of the destabilisation of the Middle East where innocent people are already dying by the hundreds and suffering by the thousands. Calling for more violence and conflict seems to be the exclusive prerogative of pro-Israeli Jewish neocons, especially when communicated via newspapers such as the Washington Post, in the guise of fair comment.

The fact that they can get away with it, and never be held accountable by the American people or the rest of the world, only emboldens them. Unless and until the global public begins to turn the tables on these warmongers, who supposedly come from a “civilised” part of the world, there will be neither peace nor stability.

Read the full commentary here.