The dream and the nightmare

On January 20, 2009, I represented Israel at the inauguration ceremony of President Obama. In freezing temperatures, when Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” became a reality, I felt I was living in a dream. For more than six years since then, I have kept on my desk the American flag that was flown that day over the United States Capitol. However, this week, after Obama’s deal with an Iranian regime advocating death to America and destruction for Israel, I feel like I am living in a nightmare. The world is becoming a much more dangerous place.

Usually, we tend to say that the devil is in the details. However, when the deal is made with the devil, and as a result the devil is enhanced, rather than transformed or weakened, the big picture matters more. While every article in the agreement will now become a subject for interpretation and manipulation, one should try to see the forest for the trees.

{mosads}What are the major implications of this deal for “our forest”?

First – a terrible lesson that the bad guys win. You can be a terror state, threaten to annihilate your neighbor, continuously and openly violate UN Security Council resolutions, grossly cheat and defy, and not only get away with it, but also receive a green light to continue. This may not be found in the details of the agreement, but every criminal in this world will read the unwritten clear 3P headline: perpetrate, persevere, prevail.

Second – Terror will increase. Now emboldened by the agreement and with coffers filled with billions, Iran will further promote violence and incitement throughout the region and beyond. The murderers of Americans, Israelis, Iraqis, Yemenites, Syrians, Argentinians, and more, will now be getting lots of money to murder more. While America may now offer its “allies” fire extinguishers, those, by nature, will be far from sufficient to offset the fire fueled by the agreement. 

Third, while Iran may be kept months from a bomb, the whole Middle East could turn nuclear. When this Iranian regime gets a license to be a nuclear threshold state, many other countries in this region will most likely do the same. As long as Iran’s violations triggered a huge penalty and while there has still been some hope that the nuclear program would be rolled back, other countries waited. Now, with no more hope, no fear and clear license, we are on the verge of a Middle East nuclear race. Nobody understood this better than Senator Obama. When I had the honor, as Israel’s ambassador to the U.S., to accompany him in his visit to Israel during his 2008 presidential campaign, I heard him brilliantly explaining the Iranian nuclear threat to Israel’s leaders. Let me explain to you, he said, why a nuclear Iran is not only a threat to Israel, but a real threat to America’s national security. If Iran gets nuclear, he suggested, many others in the region will do the same, and when that happens, in this terror soaked region, it may be only a matter of time until nuclear capability will fall in the hands of terrorists. And then, when a nuclear device is put on a ship, why would that ship be directed at an Israeli port and not an American one?, concluded, so eloquently, Senator Obama. Well, what was true in 2008 is so much more so today, after the “Arab spring” turned into an endless stormy winter, with states collapsing, terror flourishing and innocent beheaded.

Lastly, based on credit history, is it entirely impossible that the Iranian regime, left so close to the target, will cheat and sneak to a bomb? And is there no precedent of a failure by our intelligence services to have real time information on such hidden activities? This is another reason, beyond deterrence, why significant roll back and forbidding further related R&D were so important to achieve in the agreement, but those are hard to find even in the details.

January 20, 2009 was a great day for humanity, beyond party lines. July 14, 2015 is a dangerous moment for the future of mankind. Our children, Democrats, Republicans and independents, Likud and Labor, are all much less safe.

Meridor served as Israel’s ambassador to the U.S. from 2006 to 2009. He is currently the chairperson of a cyber security-focused venture capital fund.