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Netanyahu’s Dishonesty and Delusion on the Nuclear Deal

Obviously no deal could ever satisfy Netanyahu.
netanyahu

This exchange in Netanyahu’s interview on Face the Nation yesterday captures both the delusion and dishonesty of opponents of the nuclear deal:

JOHN DICKERSON: The allies to the agreement believe that changing it in fact breaks it.

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU: No. In fact if you don’t change it, you break it [bold mine-DL]. That’s what the president told them. That if they don’t change it, if they don’t fix it, if they don’t prevent Iran from automatically getting in a decade to a nuclear arsenal [bold mine-DL], then he’ll change it.

He’ll cancel the deal. So I think that once they realize that this is the American position, they should join forces with the United States and with the president and work to change this [bold mine-DL].

Our European allies are well-aware of what the U.S. position under Trump is on this issue, but they have no desire to “join forces” with our government to undermine an agreement that they know is working as planned. It is delusional to think that the U.S. can change the allies’ position by taking unilateral steps that the allies oppose, and there is nothing to support the idea that they will collaborate in wrecking the deal in order to prevent U.S. withdrawal. In fact, our allies have made clear that they will stick by the agreement regardless of what the U.S. does.

The dishonesty of deal opponents is on display when Netanyahu when he says that Iran is going to “automatically” obtain a nuclear arsenal within a decade. The latter is practically impossible because of the restrictions imposed on their program. Indeed, the first of those restrictions just start to be lifted after ten years, others last much longer than that, and some never expire at all. Netanyahu would have us believe that Iran will have a nuclear arsenal before any of the deal’s restrictions expire. That’s a lie, and it’s remarkably sloppy one at that. (Regrettably, his interviewer never really challenged any of these specious assertions.) The prime minister also claims that leaving the deal as it is will “break” it, but this is as false as can be. Leaving an agreement intact can’t cause a break. Making arbitrary changes after the deal has been settled will. Like many other hawks, Netanyahu simultaneously wants to trash an important agreement without owning the consequences that would follow.

At another point in the interview, he worries that Iran will adhere faithfully to the agreement: “I’ve always said that the greatest danger of this deal is not that Iran will violate it but that Iran will keep it.” Attentive readers will recall that this is not what Netanyahu has “always” said about the deal, but emphasized that Iran couldn’t be trusted to honor its obligations. Now that Iran is doing what he said they would never do, suddenly Iranian compliance is a problem that needs “fixing” by making new demands that they will never accept. Obviously no deal could ever satisfy Netanyahu, and that is why he has consistently been a die-hard, implacable opponent of negotiations from the start. His goal has never been to achieve a “better” non-proliferation agreement. It has been to use the nuclear issue as a cudgel with which he can beat Iran and as a bogey that he can use to scare Western audiences and his own people.

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