Unbearable Irony at the UN

The specter of Israeli prime minister Benyamin Netanyahu standing at the podium addressing the UN General Assembly regarding the dangers of an Iranian nuclear bomb is so ironic and hypocritical as to make one's skin crawl and eyes roll. This is the same Netanyahu that, in an earlier age, arranged for nuclear triggers stolen from the US Navy to be delivered to Israeli intelligence.

 It is important to remember that Israel has it's own, renegade nuclear program that has now produced, by most reliable reports, over 200 nuclear weapons. This program was secretive, denied for years by lying, Israeli politicians. Tens, perhaps hundreds, of concerned UN resolutions regarding the matter were summarily ignored - as Israel pressed forward in the face of International condemnation. And, Israel has NEVER signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty - even though it has been urged to do so by countless US administrations and leaders worldwide.

What that means is that Israel has never allowed international inspection of its nuclear facilities. That's precisely what's been going on in Iran for some time now, and so the irony is magnified. Perhaps it's time to re-visit the secret agreement made between then president Richard Nixon and then Israeli PM Golda Meir to keep Israel's nuclear capacity a secret.

 It is also important to remember another country with nuclear weapons potential, built with Israeli technology, that chose to go another way... to take another, more honorable path. South Africa had a bomb, during its Apartheid years when it was governed by an elite minority that feigned democracy while keeping the majority native population in chains. Sound familiar? Kind of like what the Israeli's have been doing with the Palestinians? But in the case of South Africa, the country voluntarily gave up its nuclear weapons program in response to international concern and condemnation. Not the Israelis. So please pardon me if I observe that on this issue, and a host of others like settlements and Jerusalem, Bibi Netanyahu simply cannot be trusted. He's always been a liar and a thief, and he remains one.