Robberson: Turns Out Obama Got It Right on Iran Sanctions

If I were President Obama, or any other president regardless of party, I would have done exactly the same thing and snubbed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the United Nations this week because Netanyahu clearly crossed the line. Foreign leaders are not supposed to meddle in the political affairs of sovereign nations, and Netanyahu meddled bigtime in U.S. politics with his recent remarks heavily implying criticism of Obama for weakness on Iran.

Netanyahu timed his remarks to coincide with equally critical remarks leveled by Mitt Romney against Obama. There was an odd similarity in what both conservative politicians had to say: Iran is too close to having a nuclear bomb capability. The time is now for action. The Obama administration keeps talking about letting a stiff new regime of international sanctions take effect. Time’s a wastin’, Netanyahu and Romney said. We must take action now.

That’s fine, except for three problems: First, Romney and Netanyahu are close friends and closer political allies. Netanyahu has a political ax to grind against Obama that exceeds his differences, as prime minister of Israel, with standing U.S. policy across multiple administrations. Second, neither Romney nor Netanyahu have spelled out the next steps. Do they actually think Obama should order air strikes or some other kind of attack, or unquestioningly support Israel if it attacks unilaterally? If so, they need to be very specific about the many enormous consequences of such an action, and how they would deal with the aftermath. The entire region would be thrown into a level of turmoil that would make the past decade of war in Iraq seem like child’s play by comparison.