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Posted: 4:51 PM- On a day in which Iran was found to be in defiance of a U.N. Security Council demand to stop enriching uranium, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak said he remains unafraid of his nation's rogue regional neighbor.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has famously called for the destruction of the Jewish state. That task would be made considerably easier if anti-Zionists were in possession of a nuclear bomb, which the Bush administration and others have claimed is Iran's intention.
But Barak, speaking to a crowd of hundreds at the University of Utah on Thursday, said "we shouldn't lose sleep at night because of statements from Iran." He said Iran's destruction would be assured if it were to use a nuclear bomb.
"The real risk is that others will follow," said Barak, saying that if Iran was allowed to join the so-called "nuclear club," then Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and others would follow. In ticking off a list of possible future nuclear states, Barak did not mention his own nation, which has refused to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and is widely acknowledged to have nuclear weapons.
But the more the region is populated with nuclear players, Barak said, the more likely a weapon will fall into the hands of a terrorist group.
"And unlike Iran, they will not hesitate to use it," he said.
Iranian officials repeatedly have insisted their nation has a right to develop nuclear power for peaceful purposes. They say they have no interest in developing a bomb.
Barak appeared unconvinced of that claim, but also expressed skepticism about the Bush administration's largely unilateral diplomatic and military tactics. Barak, who joined with President Clinton and then-Palestinian Chairman Yassir Arafat to try to negotiate an end to the Arab-Israeli conflict even though he considered Arafat a terrorist, said the United States needed more powerful partners in its international efforts.
Turning his attention to the war on terrorism, Barak said "the right way to win this war is to join hands and make partners," specifying Russia, China and India as potential allies.
Barak made his remarks in an hour-long address in which he skipped across the map of the Middle East, spoke of efforts to disarm North Korea, proposed a constitutional change in Iraq that might bring Sunni and Shiite powers together and reveled in stories - including one in which he described, in great detail, having being involved in a firefight while dressed in drag - from his decades-long career in the Israeli Defense Forces. At every turn, he pressed for greater cooperation between world powers to solve a prioritized list of mutual problems while setting less important differences aside.
Wearing wire-rimmed glasses and a dark suit, Barak also noted feeling "at home" in Utah, a deeply religious state "where a River Jordan brings fresh water into a dead lake" and "the biggest local bank is named 'Zion.' " The former prime minister, who last month launched a bid for leadership of the Israeli Labor Party, ended his comments with a plea for a global effort to fight poverty, hunger and disease.
"As human beings, as well as out of self-interest, we have to develop a sense of world community," he said, asking the audience to "lift up other people's children as well as our own." That is be the only long-term solution to ending the conditions that breed terrorism and empower rogue leaders, he said.
Simply killing people, the decorated warrior said, is like swatting "individual mosquitos" to stop Malaria. While making "us all inhabitants of a true global village" is like "draining the swamp." Barak's speech was sponsored by the Tanner Humanities Center and billed as the kickoff of an annual lecture series by world leaders. Barak was to speak to a private dinner and fundraiser Thursday night.
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