President Bush’s Press Conference
Charles Johnson
Thu Feb 17, 2005 at 3:44 pm PST • Views: 209
At today’s press conference the President issued a very clear statement of support for Israel, and a very clear warning to Iran:
Q: Mr. President, I recall a conversation a small group of us with a very senior administration official about a year ago, and in that conversation, the subject of Iran and Israel came up. And I’m just wondering, what’s your level of concern that if Iran does go down the road to building a nuclear weapon, that Israel will attack Iran to try to prevent that from happening?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, of course the — well, first of all, Iran has made it clear they — that they don’t like Israel, to put it bluntly. And the Israelis are concerned about whether or not Iran develops a nuclear weapon, as are we, as should everybody.
And so the objective is to solve this issue diplomatically, is to work with friends, like we’re doing with France, Europe, and — I mean, France, Germany, and Great Britain, to continue making it clear to the Iranians that developing a nuclear weapon will be unacceptable.
But clearly, if I was the leader of Israel, and I listened to some of the statements by the Iranian ayatollahs about — that regarded my security of my country, I’d be concerned about Iran having a nuclear weapon, as well. And in that Israel is our ally, and in that we’ve made a very strong commitment to support Israel, we will support Israel if — if there’s a — if their security is threatened.
Frank says: