Matt Yglesias

Palin: If Israel Wants to Bomb Bomb Bomb, Bomb Bomb Iran That’s Okay By Me

Yesterday’s Guardian reported that “Israel gave serious thought this spring to launching a military strike on Iran’s nuclear sites but was told by President George W Bush that he would not support it and did not expect to revise that view for the rest of his presidency, senior European diplomatic sources have told the Guardian.” Tyler Cowen says people should “give some thought” to the question of “Who should make this decision come January 20?”

During her interview with Katie Couric, however, Sarah Palin reiterated her absurd view that the President of the United States shouldn’t “second-guess” Israeli policy under any circumstances:

Palin is okay at repeating various “pro-Israel” buzzwords, but she can’t run away from the fact that her underlying position on this topic is stupid. Allies are allies and you need to give them some deference in forming their own views about what their security requires. But the United States and Israel are separate countries and our government needs to make an independent judgment about the implication of actual or potential Israeli policy initiatives.

34 Responses to “Palin: If Israel Wants to Bomb Bomb Bomb, Bomb Bomb Iran That’s Okay By Me”

1. jvg Says:
   September 26th, 2008 at 1:56 pm

   Your headline says “Iraq.” I think we have no problem bombing there.

2. MagnoliaFan Says:
   September 26th, 2008 at 2:02 pm

   Your headline reminds me of an Ali G sketch, where Sascha Cohen was questioning some U.S. state department official, and asked if Iran and Iraq weren’t playing a dangerous game by having such similar names.

   “I mean, what if a pilot is flying over and only hears ‘attack Ira-’? What do they do then?”

   Maybe you need Joe Lieberman to help remind you who Israel wants to attack…

3. Kent Says:
   September 26th, 2008 at 2:02 pm

   Hey, I’m all in favor of Israel bombing Iraq so we don’t have to.

   Let the Israelis take over the occupation and see how well that plays.

   In any event, if Israel and the US are such great allies, tell me the last time Israeli and US troops have fought together on the ground. The Brits have joined the US in pretty much every major action since WW-II. I don’t think Israeli and American troops have ever fought together.

4. J Says:
   September 26th, 2008 at 2:04 pm

   Has anyone ever written an Yglesias Text Translator? You’d give it a sentence, and it would randomly replace words with others that either (a) sound similar, or (b) are somehow associated.

   “Biden: If Ishmael Wants to Bomb Bone Bong, Boon Bang Iraq That’s Oxen by You”

5. ben Says:
   September 26th, 2008 at 2:15 pm

   The lady is an idiot. That said, your title doesn’t help your case.

6. J Says:
   September 26th, 2008 at 2:19 pm

   How odd. He changed it.

   That, like, never happens.

   Maybe we should all go out and buy lottery tickets or something.

7. msw Says:
   September 26th, 2008 at 2:20 pm

   I wish Palin’s mistakes were on the level of saying Iraq when she intended to say Iran.

8. Jake Says:
   September 26th, 2008 at 2:25 pm

   K-Lo is suggesting that asking for Palin to step down isn’t a crazy idea. Go figure.

9. Greg Scoblete Says:
   September 26th, 2008 at 2:33 pm

   Hey Matt,

   Also a case (admittedly rare) of Bush being right!

10. Abe Bird Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 2:41 pm

    Kent (3): Where do you want Israel to fight? The US delayed and rejected all suggestion for Israeli combatant help in any former battles from political reasons.
    Instead, Israel helped the US by supplying the US with extra means of battle and special ammunition, missiles and other army enforcing equipments.

11. Jim W Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 2:55 pm

    I remember that Hillary said essentially the same thing during the primaries, saying in effect that the job of the U.S. President is to do what Israel tells them to do.

    Yes, she sounded smarter than Palin while saying it, but her message was basically the same.

    I am so glad Obama is going to win.

12. Shoals Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 3:06 pm

    Wait, wouldn’t a second Holocaust get rid of the Israelites who run the banking and economic sectors, and thus free those jobs up for people of strong, anti-witchcraft Christian faith? Isn’t she at cross-purposes here?

13. otto Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 3:36 pm

    Superficially it may look as if the US political system is captured by a lobby aimed at enabling Israeli militarism even at severe costs to wider US interests, but fortunately we are constantly reassured that me this is not the case.

14. SLC Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 3:44 pm

    Re Jim W

    Would Mr. Jim W care to provide a source for his claim that Senator Clinton said or implied that the US should do what Israel commands. Actually, it’s the other way around. Prime Minister (soon to thankfully be former Prime Minister) Olmert doesn’t go to the bathroom without getting permission from
    Bush and Cheney.

    Re Kent

    Does Mr. Kent seriously think that moving Israeli combat units into Iraq to assist our endeavors there would be an intelligent thing to do? Somehow, I don’t think that the Iraqis would appreciate that assistance.

15. Kent Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 3:51 pm

    Does Mr. Kent seriously think that moving Israeli combat units into Iraq to assist our endeavors there would be an intelligent thing to do? Somehow, I don’t think that the Iraqis would appreciate that assistance.

    Um…guys. I was writing tongue in cheek and playing off Matthew’s typo.

    It’s the neocons who seem to think that every event in the middle east must somehow involve/effect Israel.

16. The Pop View Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 5:21 pm

    I found that to be a peculiar phrasing, to say we shouldn’t “second guess” an attack by Israel on Iran because we can’t “allow a second Holocaust.” Rabidly pro-Israel, beyond all logic, I get. But the Holocaust thing…

    But many Evangelicals, for example, feel they have a special covenant with Jews. They welcome strife in the Middle East as a sign from Revelations.

    So it seems like a perfectly logical foreign policy response for someone who thinks their home state will be a refuge in the End Times.

    If you’re a good strong Christian, you would never EVER second guess Israel. After all, some pre-millennialists call Israel “God’s timepiece.” And who are we to question God’s Word?

17. Richard Steven Hack Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 7:28 pm

    Jim W: “I am so glad Obama is going to win.”

    First, don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched.

    Second, read this:

    Iran: And the Beat Goes On
    http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=13507

    Money Quotes:

    In a last-ditch, all-out effort to pave the way for war with Iran, Israel’s lobby in the U.S. has inaugurated a new front group: United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI). What, “another” neocon front group – why is this important? With Richard Holbrooke, Obama’s most prominent foreign policy advisor – and a likely Secretary of State or National Security Advisor in the Obama administration – joining neocon nutcase James R. Woolsey in the top leadership of this new group, the signal is clear: UANI represents a bipartisan call for war.

    In an op ed piece for what else but the War Street Journal, the four horsemen of the apocalypse – Holbrooke, Woolsey, Dennis Ross, the Israel Lobby’s ace-in-the-hole in the Obama camp, and Mark D. Wallace, formerly U.S. representative to the U.N. for management and reform – mirror the joint statement of Obama and McCain on the economic crisis. This is “not a partisan matter” – the War Party is the only party that really matters. “We may have different political allegiances and worldviews, ” they aver,

    “Yet we share a common concern – Iran’s drive to be a nuclear state. We believe that Iran’s desire for nuclear weapons is one of the most urgent issues facing America today, because even the most conservative estimates tell us that they could have nuclear weapons soon.

    “A nuclear-armed Iran would likely destabilize an already dangerous region that includes Israel, Turkey, Iraq, Afghanistan, India and Pakistan, and pose a direct threat to America’s national security,” etc., etc., etc…

    I suppose it’s just a coincidence that the list of threatened countries starts with Israel and ends with the United States, but I wonder…

    The NIE was issued last year around this time, and afterward Robert Gates spoke to the New York Times Magazine:

    “One afternoon in late November, Defense Secretary Robert Gates was flying back to Washington from the Army base at Fort Hood, Tex., where he had spoken with soldiers and spouses about the future of Iraq. Sitting across from him at his desk in the back of the Pentagon’s jet, I asked him about the possibility of another military conflict: U.S. air strikes on Iran. ‘The last thing the Middle East needs now is another war,’ he said quietly. ‘We have to keep all options on the table,’ he went on, reciting the standard caveat. ‘But if Iraq has shown us anything, it’s the unpredictability of war. Once a conflict starts, the statesmen lose control.’”

    This was supposed to signal that the much-anticipated U.S. strike on Iran – the imminence of which was predicted with near certainty by a number of commentators, including this one – has been successfully aborted. There was a collective and well-nigh audible sigh of relief, from Tehran to Terre Haute, but some of us were not convinced by this display of official caution. After all, the statesmen have lost control before….

    “Iran,” say the four horsemen, “is a deadly and irresponsible world actor, employing terrorist organizations including Hezbollah and Hamas to undermine existing regimes and to foment conflict. Emboldened by the bomb, Iran will become more inclined to sponsor terror, threaten our allies, and support the most deadly elements of the Iraqi insurgency.” One has only to insert “Israel” where Iran sits in those sentences, and the pot-kettle-black aspect of this whole issue is underscored, as is the ridiculous double standard. After all, Israel has surely been emboldened by its possession of nukes, lo these many years, and acted in a manner that could reasonably called irresponsible – and even deadly, now that you mention it. Yet Israel is not only given a pass, but the defining factor of the Middle Eastern strategic environment – Israel’s nuclear arsenal – goes unmentioned by these worthies.

    They are full of laughable pronouncements imbued with the solemnity that usually accompanies the argument from authority:

    “The world rightfully doubts Tehran’s assertion that it needs nuclear energy and is enriching nuclear materials for strictly peaceful purposes. Iran has vast supplies of inexpensive oil and natural gas, and its construction of nuclear reactors and attempts to perfect the nuclear fuel cycle are exceedingly costly. There is no legitimate economic reason for Iran to pursue nuclear energy.”

    Aside from the propriety of assuming to speak for “the world,” one has to ask where the war propagandists have been hiding out lately: haven’t they read about those gas lines in Iran? Sanctions and official corruption have contributed to the country’s shortage, while rationing ensured it would continue. Indeed, the more tireless Iran-ophobes were at one point speculating that the resulting riots might well spell the end for the mullahs.

    And I’m surprised they raised the following accusation, considering the context in which it is hurled:

    “By continuing to act in open defiance of its treaty obligations under the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, Iran rejects the inspections mandated by the IAEA and flouts multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions and sanctions.”

    Iran is fully within its rights, under the terms of the treaty, to develop a nuclear energy program, which is what they say they are doing – and, as those gas lines attest, they have a real need for it. At any rate, at least Iran has signed the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, unlike a certain country whose interests seem to be at the heart of the signers’ argument:

    “At the same time, Iranian leaders declare that Israel is illegitimate and should not exist. President Ahmadinejad specifically calls for Israel to be ‘wiped off from the map,’ while seeking the weapons to do so. Such behavior casts Iran as an international outlier. No one can reasonably suggest that a nuclear-armed Iran will suddenly honor international treaty obligations, acknowledge Israel’s right to exist, or cease efforts to undermine the Arab-Israeli peace process.”

    That old canard about wiping Israel off the map has been debunked so many times as a mis-translation of what the Ahmadinejad really said – which was something more akin to predicting that Israel would be washed away by the tides of history and demography – yet it keeps bouncing right back. Just like all the other lies spread far and wide by the War Party’s propagandists. Remember that one about Mohammed Atta meeting a top Iraqi intelligence official at the Prague airport? That one didn’t die until well after the invasion. I wonder how many people still believe Saddam Hussein was behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks? A lie, repeated relentlessly, becomes enmeshed in the public consciousness, and rooting it out is a major operation, with a problematic success rate.

18. Richard Steven Hack Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 7:30 pm

    Obama: Stupid in 2004 – stupid today…

    Chicago Tribune 24 September, 2004 — David Mendell, Tribune staff reporter

    ‘U.S. Senate candidate Barack Obama suggested Friday that the United States one day might have to launch surgical missile strikes into Iran and Pakistan to keep extremists from getting control of nuclear bombs.

    Obama, a Democratic state senator from the Hyde Park neighborhood, made the remarks during a meeting Friday with the Tribune editorial board. …

    Iran announced on Tuesday that it has begun converting tons of uranium into gas, a crucial step in making fuel for a nuclear reactor or a nuclear bomb. The International Atomic Energy Agency has called for Iran to suspend all such activities. …

    “On the other hand, having a radical Muslim theocracy in possession of nuclear weapons is worse. So I guess my instinct would be to err on not having those weapons in the possession of the ruling clerics of Iran. … And I hope it doesn’t get to that point. But realistically, as I watch how this thing has evolved, I’d be surprised if Iran blinked at this point.”

    As for Pakistan, Obama said that if President Pervez Musharraf were to lose power in a coup, the United States similarly might have to consider military action in that country to destroy nuclear weapons it already possesses. …’
    >/blockquote>

19. Richard Steven Hack Says:
    September 26th, 2008 at 7:34 pm

    I will remind everyone here that Iran HAS NO “nuclear weapons program” and most likely never did – in 2008, in 2007, in 2006, in 2005, in 2004, or in 2003, when the NIE stated it was “stopped”.

    Not one scrap of credible evidence exists that Iran has ever had a nuclear weapons development and deployment program. They may have had a military nuclear weapons research program. Probably every significant military service in the world – especially ones threatened by nuclear powers such as Israel – has such a program. That is, a program to know HOW nuclear weapons are built and deployed and the effects of various nuclear weapons, so that the impact on national security strategy can be developed.

    This is not something you go to war over. Obama doesn’t seem to either know the details of the Iran situation – or care.

20. The Pop View Says:
    September 27th, 2008 at 1:10 pm

    Anyone notice last night in the debate that McCain talked about the “existential threat” of Iran to Israel and warned of the threat of a “second Holocaust”?

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