COMMENTARY/CONTENTIONS
Jonathan S. Tobin | @tobincommentary
Jonathan S. Tobin | @tobincommentary
Looking for a new cause focused on saving an endangered minority group? Then your search is over. According to Iran’s ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iranian scientists working on the Islamist regime’s nuclear weapons program are now the moral equivalent of the Komodo Dragon or the Snow Leopard. The plea for the future happiness of those seeking to give the ayatollahs genocidal power should provide a cue for the proverbial world’s smallest violin.
Of course, the Iranian envoy is right. Iran’s nuclear scientists do have a bull’s eye on their backsides. One can only hope both American and Israeli agents are doing all in their power to make sure these hard-working agents of evil are having accidents at work or mishaps on their morning commutes. But though the plea for the scientists’ safety is the stuff of satire, Iran’s successful stalling tactics in international forums have left the West with no choice but to resort to covert action to halt Tehran’s push for nukes.
We can all laugh at the Iranian ambassador’s demand for compensation from the UN agency for the inconvenience suffered by any scientist who was named in the damning IAEA report on the Islamist regime’s push for a military application of nuclear power. But thanks to Russian and Chinese support for Iran, the UN is more likely to pay such damages than it is to enact stringent economic sanctions that might bring Tehran to its senses. The ayatollahs have been able to string along the West for years as they play for more time–during which their researchers have gotten ever closer to their goal. And because the Obama administration appears to be unwilling to contemplate the use of force against Iran and to ensure Israel can’t hit them either, attacks on the scientists and their computers are the only method left to deal with the problem.
Let’s also be clear about whether or not the scientists deserve any sympathy. These scientists are not innocent civilians. Anyone who lends his expertise and knowledge to a program designed to give a nuclear weapon to a repressive Islamist regime that aids terrorism and which has threatened Israel with genocide is, by definition, a combatant, if not a war criminal. It would be preferable for Iran and its nuclear servants to stop their activities. But since they are determined to persist, the West and Israel have no choice but to go after them. While some at the UN may lament the sad fate of the endangered Iranian nuclear scientists, our only message to the CIA, the Mossad and any Western agency aiding their efforts is simple: Good hunting.