Re: war with iran?....nostrodamus 27 year war
Sharon: Won't attack Iran's nuke program
Israeli leader wants international action
Associated Press
Published April 14, 2005
JERUSALEM -- Israel will not attack Iran to destroy its nuclear program, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Wednesday, two days after meeting President Bush in Texas.
Sharon told CNN he did not see "unilateral action" as an option. He said Israel does not need to take a leading role in attempts to deny nuclear weapons to Iran and called again for an international coalition to deal with the issue.
Sharon said Iran was years away from possessing a nuclear weapon but only months away from overcoming "technical problems" in building one.
"Once they will solve it, that will be the point of no return," he said.
In Washington, the Bush administration affirmed its commitment to diplomacy with Iran and sought to play down differences with Israel over the urgency of the threat, which the U.S. thinks is not so immediate.
Iran insists its nuclear program is designed to produce only electrical power.
The Israelis argued during the meetings in Texas that Iran is nearing a "point of no return" in developing a weapon that could be used against Israel, U.S. and Israeli officials said after the meeting.
Sharon pressed Bush to threaten Tehran with penalties, an approach Bush favored until recently.
As part of Bush's second-term effort to repair ties with European allies, the White House agreed last month to support arms control negotiations that three European countries have begun with Iran. Those talks have not moved quickly, and Sharon argued that European negotiators may be softening their stance.
`Diplomatic efforts'
"We want to see this resolved through the diplomatic efforts of the Europeans. We want to see it resolved in a peaceful way," White House press secretary Scott McClellan told reporters Wednesday.
At the State Department, spokesman Richard Boucher noted that U.S. intelligence agencies, in assessing Iran's nuclear program, have used "an estimate that said that Iran was not likely to acquire a nuclear weapon before the beginning of the next decade. That remains the case."
He added, "We certainly understand Israel--other governments--are concerned about nuclear developments in Iran, and we talk to many governments about it."
The latest U.S. assessment on Iran's nuclear program was laid out in March by the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency.
"Unless constrained by a nuclear non-proliferation agreement, Tehran probably will have the ability to produce nuclear weapons early in the next decade," Vice Adm. Lowell Jacoby told the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Jacoby told senators that Iran is probably "continuing nuclear weapon-related endeavors in an effort to become the dominant regional power and deter what it perceives as the potential for U.S. or Israeli attacks."
Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice have said the U.S. has no intention of attacking Iran but have refused to take the option off the table.
Vice President Dick Cheney has raised the possibility that Israel might make the first military move if it became convinced that Iran had significant nuclear capability.
"Given the fact that Iran has a stated policy that their objective is the destruction of Israel, the Israelis might well decide to act first and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterward," Cheney said in a January interview with MSNBC.
In 1981, Israel launched a unilateral strike on a suspected Iraqi nuclear site.
On another front, Jewish settlers in the Gaza Strip were stockpiling food and preparing for an influx of supporters against their removal from their homes this summer.
Tents, sleeping bags
An Associated Press reporter saw piles of hundreds of tents, sleeping bags and cans of food in a Gaza warehouse Wednesday, and settlers said more is on the way.
Settlers expect huge crowds to gather in Gaza to show solidarity during the weeklong Jewish holiday of Passover this month, and organizers are preparing for many of them to stay and oppose the evacuation, scheduled for July.
The army says it has no intention of stopping the influx, even though the presence of thousands of protesters would further complicate the operation. There are plans to close the area in the weeks before the pullout.
Settler spokesman Eran Sternberg said organizers hope to bring 100,000 supporters to Gush Katif, the main Gaza settlement bloc, for Passover. He said police have issued permits for the gatherings, including concerts and marches.
Copyright ? 2005, Chicago Tribune
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