Israel consistently wants US to attack Iran: Alison Weir
Press TV has conducted an interview with Alison Weir, executive director of If Americans Knew, about Iran's deputy ambassador to the UN condemning anti-Iranian remarks made by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the UN General Assembly as “inflammatory”, and accusing him of “saber-rattling.”
- Report after report by the IAEA shows that Iran has not deviated toward a military nuclear program and yet Netanyahu comes and as the Iranian representative put it, there was a lot of saber-rattling and a lot of threats. What do you make of that?
- Well there certainly was. This is typical of Mr. Netanyahu and of the Israeli government in general. They consistently want to get the world and specially my country the United States to attack Iran, to damage Iran financially and economically. This is part of that pattern and Mr. Netanyahu has really thrown stones at a very glass house.
Even the BBC suggest that Israel has about four hundred nuclear warheads. So that is the danger to the world, the fact that Israel has so many nuclear weapons while at the same time even the US intelligence agencies consistently tell us that they have found no evidence that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.
- Now as Iran does give a response to these words by Netanyahu saying, warning Netanyahu against any miscalculation by planning to attack Iran, how far do you think this is going to go in the sense that do you think Israel is isolated in its position with regards to Iran specifically in the recent events?
- Well it is isolated except for the United States. The Israel lobby here is still very powerful; the media are largely dominated by an Israeli-centric reporting to put it mildly.
So Israel is not entirely isolated. It does have the United States possibly in its corner although the majority of the Americans are truthfully very tired of these wars that Israel pushes us into in the Middle East and the fact that Israel wants us to attack Iran, they wanted us to go after Syria, they did succeed in getting us to attack Iraq which has been a huge quagmire and tragedy for people in the region, also for Americans.
So the really unknown here is what the United States will do and the problem is that the Americans are largely being misinformed on the issue of Israel. So it is a little bit difficult to say what will happen.
- Well speaking of which, Iran has said that it is willing to come to the negotiating table and show flexibility. However its rights towards peaceful nuclear technology must be recognized. And then there is the US, as you said it’s dominated by Israeli lobbies. How do you think it is going to fare from here as we wait and see if a resolution can be hammered out?
- Well as I said I think Americans are starting to wake up to the power of this lobby. Most people still, for many years will not be aware of it. To most people Israel seemed far away and confusing. They knew very little about Palestinians but now because of the internet and because more people have gone to the region and they are looking into this and we have now alternative sources of information, the American public is a little bit more informed.
And we see, I believe that the Iranian leaders have made strong, very rational, very logical statements about the situation. Certainly the fact that Iran is a party to the Non-Proliferation Treaty is a very positive reality whereas Israel has not signed that treaty and has been in violation of even US laws in the way it has used chemical weapons in the past and cluster bombs.
So Israel has a very poor record and I do not think it would have the support of the American public if Americans knew more about what is going on there.