Arlene Kushner On Impressions After Netanyahu's UN Speech

From Arlene Kushner
September 29, 2012

The Season of Our Gladness

Motzei Shabbat (After Shabbat)

That gladness does not, in any way, refer to the current political situation (it should only be).  It is, rather, a reference to the holiday of Sukkot, which begins tomorrow night and lasts for a week.  It is, truly, a joyous time, with gathering of family and friends to eat within the temporary walls of the festively decorated sukkah, and, most properly, sleeping there as well.  (More easily done in Israel than in colder climes, I know.)

 A time, as well, for blessings said daily over the lulav and etrog, which are rich in symbolism and meaning.

Credit: nnhs65

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Sukkot is my very favorite holiday, and I will be posting, at most, intermittently, in the week ahead.

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I pick up here with an apology (and thanks to Buddy): in my rush to post about Prime Minister's speech at the UN last week, immediately after he spoke, I inadvertently picked up a URL for an old speech of his and not the one he had just given.

Here you have the proper link:
PM Netanyahu Speech to the UN General Assembly in New York 27/09/2012   

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I will mention here, as well, that, for reasons not clear, transmission of my last post failed to just a handful of my recipients.  If you did not receive my posting about the speeches at the UN, you can find it here: The Speeches

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Now I would like to return to that speech by Netanyahu.  First, to restate my original response, that it was an excellent speech.

Videos: How Netanyahu Could Have Improved His Iranian Bomb Presentation

Considering some of the negative reviews Netanyahu's speech to the UN is getting, maybe the problem is that the speech was too dry.

Sure, it had a diagram, but still --



Love of the Land quotes Alana Goodman, who summarizes Netanyahu's Iranian Red Line (in One Chart):

As you can see, that is a drawing of a bomb. It is divided into three stages. Iran has completed the first stage (amassing enough 70 percent-enriched uranium for a bomb), and, according to Netanyahu, can complete the second stage (amassing enough 90 percent-enriched uranium) as soon as next summer. The key here — and this is important — is to stop Iran before it enters the final stage, i.e. the completion of the bomb. Let’s hope the White House was paying attention.

Well, if the whole point was to get the White House to pay attention (no small feat), maybe Bibi could have utilized his other skills.

Here is how Netanyahu should have presented his chart to the UN:

Arlene Kushner On The Netanyahu and Ahmandinejad Speeches At The UN

From Arlene Kushner:
September 27, 2012:

The Speeches

It's the season of speeches at the UN.  As some of what has been going on coincided with my preparations for and observance of Yom Kippur, I will need to back-track a bit before moving forward.  And forward is where I truly want to go (see the last of this posting!).

Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad actually spoke twice at the UN this week. He kicked off his visit with an address on Monday at a UN session on the rule of law -- itself a travesty of everything fair and reasonable.  And his comments there were every bit as vile as might have been expected.  He said that Israel had "no roots" in the Middle East. "We don’t even count them [Israelis] as any part of any equation for Iran,” he declared.  "They represent minimal disturbances that come into the picture and are then eliminated." Eliminated.

Read: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad describes Israel as an annoyance that can be ‘eliminated’

The Iconoclast: The Theme Netanyahu Dropped Smack Into The Middle Of The U. N.

The Theme Netanyahu Dropped
Smack Into The Middle Of The U. N.

Brian of London has pointed out the most important part of Netanyahu's speech at the U.N.. It was the mention of "militant Islam" six times. One example is here:

"And these critics continue to press Israel to make far-reaching concessions without first assuring Israel’s security. They praise those who unwittingly feed the insatiable crocodile of militant Islam as bold statesmen. They cast as enemies of peace those of us who insist that we must first erect a sturdy barrier to keep the crocodile out, or at the very least jam an iron bar between its gaping jaws." [emphasis added]

It was not all the talk about "peace" --