Why we must resist Netanyahu and the hawks' reckless push for war on Iran | Murtaza Hussain

Now, just as diplomacy is yielding results, has never been a better time to ignore the lobbying of Israel's prime minister for war

"If Iran were to acquire nuclear weapons, this could presage catastrophic consequences, not only for my country, and not only for the Middle East, but for all mankind … the deadline for attaining this goal is getting extremely close."

The above quote – from a speech given by Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to a joint session of the United States Congress – is notable not only for its sense of urgency and dire threat, but also for the date on which the speech was given: 10 July 1996. That was far from the first time Netanyahu had sounded the alarm for the need to take drastic action against a purportedly imminent Iranian nuclear weapon: in a 1992 address to the Israeli Knesset, he declared, "within three to five years, we can assume that Iran will become autonomous in its ability to develop and produce a nuclear bomb" – an assertion he repeated without irony in 1995, when, in his book Fighting Terrorism, he again predicted full Iranian nuclear weapons capability within "three to five years".

This past Sunday, Prime Minister Netanyahu declared his belief that ongoing nuclear talks between Iran and the P5+1 nations were futile and represented merely an effort by Iran to "buy time" to develop a nuclear weapon. Coming from an individual with nearly 20 years of public statements consistently citing the purported imminence of such a weapon, this is a questionable statement to say the least. But given the present atmosphere of heightened tension surrounding this issue, such comments are particularly dangerous and revealing.

The present round of negotiations between the P5+1 and Iran represent the only meaningful channel left to avoid another potentially disastrous war in the Middle East – and another conflict that would be likely to draw in the United States, as well. By many accounts, the latest round of talks between the two sides this past week in Kazakhstan represented the most significant mutual softening of positions since negotiations began; they were encouraging enough at the end to be described by participants as a "turning point" in a situation that, to date, has most often been characterized by bellicose rhetoric and shared distrust.

Coupled with the recent news that Iran had converted stockpiles of enriched uranium into reactor fuel – a significant step away from any possible weaponization of their program – the past several weeks would seem to indicate the most positive developments towards a peaceful resolution to the standoff in recent memory. The immediate response to this outcome, which would ordinarily be viewed by any rational actor as good news, is revealing for how it identifies the parties such as Netanyahu for