Although it is usually not my purpose here to get involved in current political issues, I read a commentary in the “Chicago Jewish News” by its editor Joseph Aaron, that I think people should see. The Jewish community is divided on whether the Iran agreement was the best achievable deal or the “historically bad deal” proclaimed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin (Bibi) Netanyahu.
Despite the divide, for which I’ve seen figures giving each side the majority, most of the articles and comments I’ve seen have been against the agreement. This is an exerpt from a commentary (July 31, 2015) that is for the agreement. I personally had mixed feelings about the agreement and still do. Trump pulled out of the agreement and now President Biden is hoping to re-enter it, hopefully on better terms, though Iran is posturing itself as intransigent. Since we do not know what will happen, I will repeat an article written before the prior agreeement was entered into so you can see the rationale for that.
“Jews who are so afraid of this deal seem to forget two things. One is that even if, in 15 years or so, Iran does get a nuke that does not mean they will use it. There are other crazy countries in the world that have a nuke, such as North Korea and Pakistan, and yet since the dawn of the nuclear age, the only country to have ever dropped a nuke is the United States. Indeed, history shows that countries become more responsible once they acquire a nuke.
“But even if Iran is crazier than North Korea, please remember that at this moment Israel has 200 nukes of its own, ready to go, including some on the six submarines it has, submarines, by the way, given to it by Germany, as in the country that actually put Jews through the door of the oven. If Iran even made a move toward launching a nuke, Israel could and would incinerate Iran immediately. It has the means to do so right now.
I tend to agree that even if Iran got nuclear weapons, it would not use them directly on Israel, despite what they proclaim. So I am not so afraid of that. What I am afraid of is that Iran will continue to have billions of dollars to fund Hamas and Hezbollah and other terrorist groups that are, or could be, fighting Israel with conventional weapons.
With a new agreement you may or may not eventually have a nuclear Iran, but it is unlikely we will be able to stop Iran from funding Israel’s other enemies. If we don’t have a new agreement, we will almost certainly will have a nuclear Iran (unless those facilities are taken out and are continually retaken out in the future, causing who knows what kind of other repercussions in the world) but with less money to fund Israel’s enemies because of current economic sanctions. Pay your dime and take your chances. Which scenario do YOU prefer?