Israelis, Iranians pay the same price for nuclear ambitions

The discussion surrounding Netanyahu’s Congress speech presumes that Iran does not have a right to nuclear weapons but that Israel does. Another way of looking at things is a nuclear-free Middle East, and an alliance between the oppressed citizens of Iran and Israel.

By Mati Shemoelof

IAF fighter jet during an exercise (photo: IDF Spokesperson)
IAF fighter jet during an exercise (photo: IDF Spokesperson)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s trip to the United States, which was ostensibly meant to address the danger of Iran’s nuclear program, has a hidden angle that goes unspoken in the Israeli media.

The discussion surrounding Iran deals mainly with whether the Islamic Republic has nuclear capabilities. This angle does not deal with Israel itself, or with nuclear proliferation of the entire Middle East. In light of the upcoming elections, it is especially important to note the exorbitant price that Israeli citizens pay (a quarter of whom live below the poverty line) for Israel’s choice to be a nuclear power, according to foreign sources. Those same sources claim Israel has Jericho missiles, tactical delivery systems, ballistic missile submarines and nuclear-armed fighter jets, as well as hundreds of nuclear bombs that continue to be developed.

Do nuclear weapons protect Israel? Is the investment worth it? These issues are never spoken about. Preventing the enemy from obtaining similar weapons is practically axiomatic in this country. According to the West, the Jews are allowed to have an unsupervised, unlimited nuclear arsenal with no environmental regulations. Think about the danger such an old nuclear reactor poses to the nearby city of Dimona. Is the reactor carcinogenic for its workers and the people who live in the area? Where does Israel bury its nuclear waste?

According to the West, Israel can have nuclear weapons because of the Holocaust, but the Iranians are dangerous because their previous leaders have called for the elimination of Israel. And here? Both the Right and the Left adopt this premise.

The West encourages Israel to arm itself with nuclear weapons; Germany sells us nuclear submarines; the United States sells us fighter jets. But are the Germans and the Americans aware that Israel’s arms industry, and the generals who control Israeli politics, are actually starving their citizens while they become rich? Are they even concerned by the sale such a dangerous weapon to a third world country such as Israel? Why is there no parity between Israel and Iran’s potential nuclear arsenal?

The Iranian people also suffer due to their leaders’ desire for the doomsday weapon, despite the societal costs that it brings about. Two years before the Arab Spring, the Iranian people tried, unsuccessfully, to revolt against the regime. Here is what Israeli social activist Barak Cohen told the Iranian people on Facebook, with the help of a Jewish-Iranian :

Netanyahu is heading to the United States in order to frighten the world over a nuclear Iran. We want to tell the Iranian people that as opposed to a prime minister who does not represent us, the people here are not in conflict with the Iranian people. We have terrible rulers who use war in order to harm our freedoms, equality and ability to live a decent life. We know that your regime is also terrible, and uses the same tools to harm your ability to live a decent life.

This is not a conflict between the Jewish people and the Iranian people. This is simply two forms of dictatorship that abuse you and us in order to continue ruling. The Jewish holiday of Purim is upon us, and there are Jews in Iran, and we want to say that with the help of God, who is one, just as in Purim our luck changed, we will defeat the dictatorship here, and you will defeat the dictatorship there. With the help of God, we will be able to visit Iran and you will be able to visit us here, and the walls will crumble!

Cohen’s message to the Iranians does not differentiate between Jews and Persians (unlike in Purim, there is no need to kill Haman). This is the same Jewish-Arab message that we sent in 2011 with our letter to the young people of the Arab World who were fighting for freedom. This message is the exact opposite of what the government is doing through its nuclear arsenal, its weapons and its societal abuse. This is the message we need to send to Washington, Iran and the Arab world. A message of social democracy that worries about its citizens, and does not invest everything it has in a doomsday weapon, which only weakens and endangers its own citizens.

Mati Shemoelof is a writer. His first storybook was published by Zmora Bitan PublishersThis article was first published on +972’s Hebrew-language sister site, Local Call. Read it in Hebrew here.