I smell a whole lot of back peddling

[Jesse Hemingway]

Israel urged US to attack Iran - not Iraq
By Gareth Porter

WASHINGTON - Israeli officials warned the George W Bush administration that an invasion of Iraq would be destabilizing to the region and urged the United States instead to target Iran as the primary enemy, according to former Bush administration official Lawrence Wilkerson.

Wilkerson, then a member of the US State Department's policy planning staff and later chief of staff for secretary of state Colin Powell, recalled in an interview that the Israelis reacted



immediately to indications that the Bush administration was thinking of war against Iraq. After the Israeli government picked up the first signs of that intention, said Wilkerson, "The Israelis were telling us Iraq is not the enemy - Iran is the enemy."

Wilkerson describes the Israeli message to the Bush administration in early 2002 as being, "If you are going to destabilize the balance of power, do it against the main enemy."

The warning against an invasion of Iraq was "pervasive" in Israeli communications with the US administration, Wilkerson recalled. It was conveyed to the administration by a wide range of Israeli sources, including political figures, intelligence, and private citizens.

Wilkerson noted that the main point of their communications was not that the US should immediately attack Iran, but that "it should not be distracted by Iraq and Saddam Hussein" from a focus on the threat from Iran.


http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/IH30Ak04.html

[Gregorian]

1. These are some of the very words Scott Ritter used on Cspan a couple of days ago.

Almost word for word. He said the administration wanted to get to Iran by way of Baghdad. And that the only safe way for Israel to deal with Iran was not through war but through peace.