Israel's Credibility Problem on Iran

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been campaigning for an unambiguous red line to stop Iran's nuclear advance. In an infelicitous foray into American politics last month, he took to the Sunday morning television shows to insist that Barack Obama act to stop Iran, saying, "You have to place that red line before them now." Smarting from the Obama administration's refusals, he challenged the U.S. president with the zinger: "Those in the international community who refuse to put red lines before Iran don't have a moral right to place a red light before Israel." Then, at the U.N. General Assembly meeting, he held up a cartoon of a bomb and with a marker drew a red line, declaring that Iran could not be allowed to produce a stockpile of 20 percent enriched uranium sufficient (after further enrichment) for its first nuclear bomb. On the current trajectory, as laid out in the public reports of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran will reach that point in about six months.