Foreign Minister Penny Wong has waffled enough to let Iran think it was the victim, rather than a lunatic regime which got what it deserved
Penny Wong must know how much Iran wants Israel destroyed, even if she foolishly treats its leader as people open to “dialogue”.
Andrew Bolt
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Israel on Friday bombed Iran’s banned nuclear weapons sites, and all we’ve heard since from our government is wah, wah, wah.
The shame of it, these hand-wringing demands from Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for both sides to “de-escalate”, as if Israel was as much to blame for having to stop Iran launching a nuclear Holocaust.
Wong even called Iran’s foreign minister to confirm the Albanese government’s witlessness.
The way Seyed Abbas Araghchi tells it, Wong almost seemed sorry Israel used force to stop this Jew-hating, terror-sponsoring, fanatically Islamist regime building nuclear bombs.
He said Wong “voiced deep regret and serious concern over the escalation of tensions” and “stressed that such developments risk further regional destabilisation”.
Wong probably remembers that call differently, but from what she told the ABC I’m guessing she still waffled enough to let Iran think it was the victim, rather than a lunatic regime which got what it deserved.
“I said, … ‘We are saying to you, exercise restraint, return to diplomacy and dialogue’, … and I think that is a position that so many countries in the world are putting to not only the Iranians, but also to the Israelis.”
What?
“Return to dialogue”?
The fake “dialogue” that left these maniacs just months from building nuclear weapons?
There’s only one thing Wong and Albanese should tell Israel right now. It’s: “Thank you.”
Just check the timeline.
Last April, 63 days before Israel’s attack, the Politico website reported US president Donald Trump had sent Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, a letter with a warning: “a 60-day deadline for Iran to make progress on talks over its nuclear program or face potential military retaliation”.
No wonder.
Iran has been secretly developing nuclear weapons, and you don’t need much imagination – even as an Israel-hating Labor minister – to know a nuclear-armed Iran would need just a couple of bombs to effectively destroy Israel, which is just a third the size of Tasmania.
The Ayatollah wouldn’t listen, and the day before Israel’s attack, the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed Iran had been lying for years about its banned attempts to build nuclear weapons.
Traces of enriched uranium had been found at three undeclared sites.
The IAEA concluded Iran now had enough uranium enriched to near weapons grade to potentially make nine nuclear bombs.
Surprise!
The next morning, Israel attacked, killing many of the heads of Iran’s military and nuclear weapons programs, and blasting the suspected nuclear weapons facilities, deep underground.
How can Israel be criticised for “escalating” this crisis?
Consider the real “escalation” had Iran been left by Wong and the hand-wringers to build its bombs.
Iran has made clear what it would like to do then.
Just after the September 11 terror attack 24 years ago, Iran’s then president spelled it out: “If one day, the Islamic world is also equipped with weapons like those that Israel possesses now, then the imperialists’ strategy will reach a standstill because the use of even one nuclear bomb inside Israel will destroy everything.”
Five years later, Iran’s new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was even clearer: “Thanks to people’s wishes and God’s will, … the Zionist regime will be wiped out soon.”
Iran’s current president was sworn in last year to chants in Parliament of “Death to Israel, Death to America”, and Hossein Salami, head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, vowed to remove Israel “from the face of existence”.
Except it’s Salami who’s now been wiped out, in Friday’s attack.
Iran doesn’t just talk the talk.
It’s already attacked US military targets, and arms Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis, all Islamist terror groups which have hit Israel with missiles since Hamas slaughtered 1200 Jews in 2023.
Iran itself has fired hundreds of missiles at Israel.
Imagine just one of them with a nuclear warhead.
Wong herself must know how much Iran wants Israel destroyed, even if she foolishly treats its leader as people open to “dialogue”, rather than as extremists who think the hidden Mahdi won’t return and redeem Islam until Israel is eradicated.
Even Iran’s ambassador to Australia last year called for the “wiping out” of the “Zionist plague” by 2027, and praised Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah’s assassinated leader, as a “blessed martyr”.
And let’s not forget Iran is part of the new alliance of authoritarian regimes, including China, Russia and North Korea, that’s trying to replace the West.
So how can Wong suggest that Israel, as much as Iran, is putting us in danger?
Babes among barbarians.
Originally published as Foreign Minister Penny Wong has waffled enough to let Iran think it was the victim, rather than a lunatic regime which got what it deserved
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