Editorial: Pushing the doomsday button

Jordan Times Aug 19 2002

IT IS comprehensible that Israel would like to push the US into war with Iraq and do so sooner rather than later. From the Israeli perspective, war with Iraq would serve its immediate interests. As long as Iraq is viewed as or suspected of having weapons of mass destruction, Israel will always feel threatened. That's why Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has been advising US President George Bush that postponing the strike against Iraq would only allow Iraqi President Saddam Hussein more time to develop an atom bomb. Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres has been echoing the same warning lately. In an interview with CNN on Friday, Peres said that attacking Iraq is certainly dangerous but not attacking it would be even more dangerous because the additional time would be exploited by the Iraqi leadership to develop nuclear weapons. The Israeli foreign minister also expressed the view that the stance of the Iraqi president would only change to the worse with time. Most Israelis appear to agree.

This doomsday projection would make war against Iraq all the more palatable for the Israelis, and they seem to be preparing themselves for the inevitable. But sober people must pause and reflect. They must consider what such cries for war would mean for the entire region and its peoples. If Iraq indeed possesses various forms of weapons of mass destruction, then no matter what sort of war preparations Israel makes for an attack against Iraq, there is no doubt that an exchange of fire of such weapons between Israel and Iraq would take a heavy toll on Israelis and non-Israelis alike. There are more rational methods to deal with the alleged Iraqi threats than launching an all-out war certain to be so devastating that few innocent people would be spared.

The warmongers in the world need to be stopped and stopped fast. As His Majesty King Abdullah said during his address to the country on Thursday, there is still something that Iraq can and should do to avert war. On balance it would be in the better interest of the country to comply fully with the UN demands for free and unfettered inspection of Iraq. There is a price that Iraq can and should pay no matter how painful it is in order to avert a war that aims to destroy its very existence as a country and people. It is complete cooperation with the UN system so that all warmongers would lose all pretexts or excuses to destroy an important Arab country.

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