Defense Minister Sha'ul Mofaz and Finance Minister Binyamin Netanyahu are in Washington for talks with U.S. government officials. Mofaz met with his counterpart Defense Secretary Colin Powell and with National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice yesterday, and Netanyahu will talk with the latter today. Netanyahu says he is not concerned about the possibility that Rice will inform him that the U.S. is deducting the cost of the partition fence from its loan guarantees to Israel.
Mofaz, who visited the Washington Institute, a Middle East policy think tank, warned that within a year, Iran will reach "the point of no-return" in its efforts to build nuclear weapons. This contrasts with the findings of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which concluded that there is no evidence that Iran has a nuclear-weapons program. The agency acknowledged that Iran had produced small amounts of material, including plutonium, that could be made into weapons, but said only that because of Iran's past pattern of concealment, it would take some time before it could be determined if Iran's nuclear program was intended exclusively for peaceful purposes.
John Bolton, the U.S. Undersecretary of State for Arms Control, said last night that these findings are "impossible to believe. Iran has tried and is trying to obtain nuclear weapons in the guise of a civilian nuclear program." Gary Milhollin, director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, agrees. "The report is a stunning revelation of how far a country can get in making the bomb while pretending to comply with international inspections," he told Reuters. "This is a classic case of a bomb in the basement."
Mofaz spoke out on other issues as well. Responding to the swearing-in of the latest Palestinian Authority government, he said, "It will be very difficult, from the situation that we are facing today, to reach in a month or a few years a permanent agreement [with the PA]." He proposed, instead, working towards an interim arrangement - apparently something other than the Road Map. There are reports that Prime Minister Sharon will meet with Abu Ala in ten days' time. Sharon is said to be willing to make some good-will gestures to Abu Ala, although he has no faith in the new PA leadership. Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom took the most hawkish position today, saying, "How many times will we allow [Arafat] to deceive us?"
Minister Mofaz said in Washington that the prisoner exchange deal, which the Cabinet voted on so dramatically and narrowly this past Sunday, may take "weeks or months" to come to fruition. The deal would see the Hizbullah terrorists return kidnapped Elchanan Tenenbaum and the bodies of three soldiers they murdered, in exchange for over 400 Arab terrorists and prisoners. Hizbullah has said, however, that it demands the return of murderer Samir Kuntar, a Lebanese Druze who took part in the murder of an Israeli father, his young daughter, and a policeman in
Mofaz, who visited the Washington Institute, a Middle East policy think tank, warned that within a year, Iran will reach "the point of no-return" in its efforts to build nuclear weapons. This contrasts with the findings of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which concluded that there is no evidence that Iran has a nuclear-weapons program. The agency acknowledged that Iran had produced small amounts of material, including plutonium, that could be made into weapons, but said only that because of Iran's past pattern of concealment, it would take some time before it could be determined if Iran's nuclear program was intended exclusively for peaceful purposes.
John Bolton, the U.S. Undersecretary of State for Arms Control, said last night that these findings are "impossible to believe. Iran has tried and is trying to obtain nuclear weapons in the guise of a civilian nuclear program." Gary Milhollin, director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, agrees. "The report is a stunning revelation of how far a country can get in making the bomb while pretending to comply with international inspections," he told Reuters. "This is a classic case of a bomb in the basement."
Mofaz spoke out on other issues as well. Responding to the swearing-in of the latest Palestinian Authority government, he said, "It will be very difficult, from the situation that we are facing today, to reach in a month or a few years a permanent agreement [with the PA]." He proposed, instead, working towards an interim arrangement - apparently something other than the Road Map. There are reports that Prime Minister Sharon will meet with Abu Ala in ten days' time. Sharon is said to be willing to make some good-will gestures to Abu Ala, although he has no faith in the new PA leadership. Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom took the most hawkish position today, saying, "How many times will we allow [Arafat] to deceive us?"
Minister Mofaz said in Washington that the prisoner exchange deal, which the Cabinet voted on so dramatically and narrowly this past Sunday, may take "weeks or months" to come to fruition. The deal would see the Hizbullah terrorists return kidnapped Elchanan Tenenbaum and the bodies of three soldiers they murdered, in exchange for over 400 Arab terrorists and prisoners. Hizbullah has said, however, that it demands the return of murderer Samir Kuntar, a Lebanese Druze who took part in the murder of an Israeli father, his young daughter, and a policeman in