An obvious conclusion: Iran and peace don't mix

Israel: Halt Iran to allow Mideast peace efforts

 

By AMY TEIBEL – 5 hours ago

 

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said Wednesday that Iran must be reined in if Israel and the Palestinians hope to move along the path to peace.

 

Ayalon made it clear, however, that this was not an Israeli condition for going ahead with peacemaking, though Israel charges that Iran is the main backer of the violent Islamic Hamas rulers of Gaza as well as Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.

 

"We should continue on the path of peace with the Palestinians as if there is no Iran threat," Ayalon told The Associated Press in an interview Wednesday.

 

"Simultaneously, we should move forward on stopping Iran as if there was no Palestinian issue," added Ayalon, a former Israeli ambassador to the U.S.

 

Tehran is working hard to derail any possibility of effective peacemaking through its backing of anti-Israel militants in the Gaza Strip, West Bank and Lebanon, he said.

 

"Realistically and effectively, if we want to go on the path without additional obstacles and dangers to the process, we have to rein in Iran" because of its nuclear program, its dissemination of extremist ideology and its support of terrorism, Ayalon said.

 

"But this is not a condition for going ahead with the Palestinians," he said....