JoeChalupa
04-23-2009, 02:35 PM
US must confront Iran (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0409/21632.html)
President Barack Obama’s visit to Capitol Hill for the Holocaust Day of Remembrance ceremony turned into more than just a solemn memorial event Thursday morning. As the president sat waiting for his turn at the podium, a series of speakers admonished him, in terms both veiled and direct, to confront Iran’s government as a threat to Jews and to Israel.
“Honoring the dead must not be the sole purpose of remembrance. It must help us shape a better future,” said Israeli Ambassador Sallai Meridor. “When a regime is again ... terrorizing its neighbors, threatening to destroy the Jewish people, how will we meet this challenge before it’s too late?”
Meridor kept his message implicit, but the subtext was clear: The world must stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.
Joel Geiderman, the vice chairman of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, was more blunt, drawing a comparison between the Nazis in Germany and the present-day government in Tehran.
“At least one whole nation has been targeted for destruction with the threat to wipe it off the map,” Geiderman said, alluding to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s belligerent remarks toward Israel. “History should have taught us that democracies that let such pledges stand do so at their own peril.”
“In the names of the victims, I call on the assembled leaders and the rest of the world to ensure that no country that threatens such destruction will ever obtain the means to achieve it,” he continued. “Nuclear weapons in the hands of aggressor fanatics can’t be allowed.”
Obama received not just prodding, but also some praise, as Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel lauded his decision to withdraw from the United Nations Durban II conference, where the Iranian president launched a bitter rhetorical assault on Israel.
“Thank you, Mr. President, for deciding that America should boycott that gathering,” said Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, prompting applause from the crowd.
But Wiesel, too, described the Holocaust as a cautionary tale for the world’s leaders, declaring the world could have done more to stop atrocities late in the war, well after they became public knowledge.
“Washington knew. London knew. Switzerland knew. Stockholm knew. The Washington Post and The New York Times knew,” said Wiesel.
The moment recalled a more piercing exchange 16 years earlier, when Wiesel, at a ceremony for the opening of the Holocaust Museum, turned to the seated President Bill Clinton with a message on Bosnia: “As a Jew, I am saying we must do something to stop the bloodshed in that country. ... Something, anything must be done.”
Wiesel’s words Thursday were softer, but still offered in the spirit of counsel as well as remembrance.
In his own remarks, Obama did not directly refer to the Iranian regime, but he mentioned the existence of “those who insist the Holocaust did not happen.”
“Today and every day we have an opportunity, as well as an obligation” to fight those assertions, Obama said, including “doing anything we can to prevent and end atrocities like those that took place in Rwanda” and Darfur.
For the moment, the 44th president was focused on the memorial event at hand.
“How do we assure that ‘Never again’ isn’t an empty slogan?” Obama asked. “I believe we start by doing what we’re doing today: by bearing witness.”
But in closing, he also issued a slightly firmer-sounding message: “May each of us renew our resolve to do what must be done.”
Sometimes you have to do what you have to do.
President Barack Obama’s visit to Capitol Hill for the Holocaust Day of Remembrance ceremony turned into more than just a solemn memorial event Thursday morning. As the president sat waiting for his turn at the podium, a series of speakers admonished him, in terms both veiled and direct, to confront Iran’s government as a threat to Jews and to Israel.
“Honoring the dead must not be the sole purpose of remembrance. It must help us shape a better future,” said Israeli Ambassador Sallai Meridor. “When a regime is again ... terrorizing its neighbors, threatening to destroy the Jewish people, how will we meet this challenge before it’s too late?”
Meridor kept his message implicit, but the subtext was clear: The world must stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.
Joel Geiderman, the vice chairman of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, was more blunt, drawing a comparison between the Nazis in Germany and the present-day government in Tehran.
“At least one whole nation has been targeted for destruction with the threat to wipe it off the map,” Geiderman said, alluding to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s belligerent remarks toward Israel. “History should have taught us that democracies that let such pledges stand do so at their own peril.”
“In the names of the victims, I call on the assembled leaders and the rest of the world to ensure that no country that threatens such destruction will ever obtain the means to achieve it,” he continued. “Nuclear weapons in the hands of aggressor fanatics can’t be allowed.”
Obama received not just prodding, but also some praise, as Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel lauded his decision to withdraw from the United Nations Durban II conference, where the Iranian president launched a bitter rhetorical assault on Israel.
“Thank you, Mr. President, for deciding that America should boycott that gathering,” said Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, prompting applause from the crowd.
But Wiesel, too, described the Holocaust as a cautionary tale for the world’s leaders, declaring the world could have done more to stop atrocities late in the war, well after they became public knowledge.
“Washington knew. London knew. Switzerland knew. Stockholm knew. The Washington Post and The New York Times knew,” said Wiesel.
The moment recalled a more piercing exchange 16 years earlier, when Wiesel, at a ceremony for the opening of the Holocaust Museum, turned to the seated President Bill Clinton with a message on Bosnia: “As a Jew, I am saying we must do something to stop the bloodshed in that country. ... Something, anything must be done.”
Wiesel’s words Thursday were softer, but still offered in the spirit of counsel as well as remembrance.
In his own remarks, Obama did not directly refer to the Iranian regime, but he mentioned the existence of “those who insist the Holocaust did not happen.”
“Today and every day we have an opportunity, as well as an obligation” to fight those assertions, Obama said, including “doing anything we can to prevent and end atrocities like those that took place in Rwanda” and Darfur.
For the moment, the 44th president was focused on the memorial event at hand.
“How do we assure that ‘Never again’ isn’t an empty slogan?” Obama asked. “I believe we start by doing what we’re doing today: by bearing witness.”
But in closing, he also issued a slightly firmer-sounding message: “May each of us renew our resolve to do what must be done.”
Sometimes you have to do what you have to do.