President Barack Obama "totally misled the American people" by saying Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, during his Tuesday address to a joint session of Congress, presented no new ideas about striking a deal with Iran over nuclear weapons, Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz said Wednesday on
Newsmax TV's "America's Forum."
"The prime minister said, 'If the world leaders are not prepared to insist that Iran changes behavior before a deal is signed, at the very least, they should insist Iran changes behavior before a deal expires,'" said Dershowitz.
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"His proposal, and it's a very sound one, is that the sunset provision doesn't kick in unless Iran does three things — it has to stop being the world's greatest exporter of terrorism, it has to stop bullying neighboring countries like Syria and Lebanon, and it has to stop calling for the destruction of Israel.
"That's new, Mr. President and you have an obligation to respond to that instead of name-calling and invoking protocol. The marketplace of ideas is now open. He went further and said a better deal that won't give Iran an easy path to the bomb, a better deal that Israel and its neighbors might not like, but which we could live with, literally," said Dershowitz, author of
"Terror Tunnels: The Case for Israel's Just War Against Hamas."
"The president also said there was no compromise. Here we have a compromise. We have the prime minister saying
he could accept a deal, even though he might not like it, which would require Iran to at least give up its radical elements before it gets the bomb.
"Now, the ball is in the administration's court and it must respond on the merits to the prime minister's very sound, new proposal."
Netanyahu's call to require that any deal with Iran — a country with a history of "cheating, cheating, cheating" — not terminate unless Iran changes its conduct is both wise and rational, according to Dershowitz.
"What would be wrong with requiring Iranians to give up terrorism, give up attacking Israel, give up interfering with other nations before the deal is allowed to lapse?" he asked.
Obama, according to Dershowitz, is irritated not by the White House's "excuse" that the invitation to Netanyahu by Republican House Speaker John Boehner constituted a "breach of protocol," but because Netanyahu disagrees with him.
"When the president sent David Cameron, the prime minister of England, into the Senate to lobby the Senate in favor of not having increased sanctions, he was thrilled with having a prime minister talk to the Senate," Dershowitz said.
Members of both political parties could be seen
nodding in agreement with Netanyahu during his 40-minute speech, said Dershowitz, who was in attendance.
"Congress seems to agree with him on the merits, not because of who he is, but because his arguments are more persuasive than the president's," he said.
Dershowitz characterized the tone and tenor of Netanyahu's speech as "very positive," noting that he "praised the president, the administration and Congress, and went on to show how he differs with the administration."
The security and survival of the entire Middle East is at risk if Iran becomes nuclear, Dershowitz added.
"This is one issue where the Palestinians and the Israelis have the same stake," he said. "An atomic bomb from Iran won't distinguish between Arab and Jew, it will destroy everything. Other Arab countries are in support of the Israeli position and against the American position.
"This is one issue in which the Arabs and the Jews are jointly committed against an Iranian, Muslim radical regime that would not only destroy the Jews and the Palestinians of Israel, but would also destroy Jordan and other neighboring countries."
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