Obama said to believe Israel will attack Iran if sanctions fail

US presidential hopeful quoted as saying Arab states understand nuclear Iran will be "game changer" for entire region due to likely Israeli action.

By JPOST.COM STAFF
ehud barak obama 224 88 (photo credit: Ariel Hermoni\Defense Minister's Office [file])
ehud barak obama 224 88
(photo credit: Ariel Hermoni\Defense Minister's Office [file])
US presidential hopeful Barack Obama believes Israel will attack Iran if sanctions fail to halt the Islamic Republic's nuclear program, ABC News reported on Wednesday. The remark was reportedly made in a meeting late Tuesday between Obama and Democratic members of the House of Representatives. "Nobody said this to me directly, but I get the feeling from my talks that if the sanctions don't work, Israel is going to strike Iran," someone who attended the meeting quoted Obama as saying. Obama's national security spokesman Wendy Morigi declined to comment on the report. She emphasized, however, that "Obama has always said that Iran must end its illicit nuclear program. "He has advocated tough, direct engagement, backed by stronger sanctions to pressure Iran. And, he has made it perfectly clear that Teheran should not wait for a new administration to reach agreement to end its program," she said. The UN Security Council has imposed three sets of sanctions on Iran over its refusal to halt uranium enrichment. According to another attendee at the meeting quoted by ABC, Obama also said that the Arab states understand that a nuclear Iran would be a "game changer" for the entire region because of a likely Israeli action. Meanwhile, Reuters quoted British Foreign Secretary David Miliband as saying Thursday that the UK does not want to get to the point of an Israeli strike on Iran and is focused on a diplomatic solution to the nuclear crisis. When asked during an interview to BBC radio whether the UK would support an Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear facilities, Miliband said: "We don't want to get there... we are 100 percent focused on the diplomatic track. "It's a diplomatic resolution that must be found to this issue. It's massively in everybody's interest," he said. "This is a very, very dangerous situation. It's one that can be resolved by diplomacy, but the costs of the Iranian course need to be made very, very clear."