Israel Delivers "Or Else" Demands to Obama

"Caspit suggested that the new 'bomb Iran' talk wasn't based on any qualitative shift in the nature of Iran's nuclear work. The U.S. intelligence assessment until now has been that despite steadily accumulating the means to build nuclear weapons, Iran has not thus far moved to enrich uranium to weapons grade or to begin the process of actually building a bomb. Nor has it taken a strategic decision to do so as yet.

"The problem is that the 'red lines' adopted by Israel and the U.S. for triggering a military response are different: President Obama has vowed to take military action to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, whereas Israel has insisted that Iran can't be allowed to maintain the capability to build such weapons -- a technological capacity it essentially already has."

Despite this difference in perspective described by Karon, Netanyahu is depending on his U.S. allies to support him as he makes his demands on Obama during the politically sensitive final months of President Obama's reelection campaign.

Should Obama be reelected, Netanyahu's threat may prove to be a major misstep. A second term Obama would be free to proceed at his own pace to make his own demands on Israel. Assuming that is, Obama does not give in to the arrogance of Netanyahu's demands, which appears unlikely, given the strong lead Obama currently has over his opponent.

Of course, anything could happen between now and November 6. Elections do have consequences.

The picture of Netanyahu at a cabinet meeting above, is a pool photo taken by Abir Sultan. It is from Reuters.