What a difference in two speeches. On Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu devoted his entire speech to the United Nations imploring that body to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons.
Two days earlier, the president of the United States addressed the same body and devoted two paragraphs of his speech to the nuclear threat posed by Iran.
The president also refused to meet with Netanyahu while they were in New York.
Netanyahu has asked both the United States and the United Nations to draw "red lines" for the nuclear enrichment program - basically, a strict timeline for Iran to abandon it or face even stricter sanctions or military action.
The Israeli prime minister emphasized to the General Assembly that Iran must be stopped now because the enrichment process is visible. Once there is enough material to build weapons, building a detonator for nukes can be done in small workshops that will be impossible to locate.
USAToday.com quoted Netanyahu as saying:
"For more than two years we didn't know Iran was building an enrichment plant under a mountain" at Fordo. "Do we want to risk not being able to find a small workshop in a country half the size of Europe?"
The story went on to speak of the mistrust between Netanyahu and President Obama.
The administration should put aside past disagreements with Israel and help draft actions that will halt Iran's nuclear ambitions. The problems arising out of the Arab Spring will seem like nothing if Iran's finger is on a nuclear trigger.
* Editorials reflect the opinion of the publisher.
