Bolton: Netanyahu Doesn’t
Have Much Time Left
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has a “very short period of time” to decide whether to strike Iran’s nuclear infrastructure before Tehran possesses nuclear weapons, warned former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton in a radio interview.
“Obviously in the short term Israel is focused on forming its own government,” stated Bolton.
“But I think assuming it’s Prime Minister Netanyahu forming that government he has a very short period of time in which to determine whether Israel will use military force knowing that the United States will not or whether Israel is prepared to allow Iran to get to the point where it has nuclear weapons.”
Continued Bolton: “I don’t know what Netanyahu’s decision will be but I do think he is very limited in how much time he has because every day that goes by allows Iran to put its nuclear capabilities beyond Israel’s powers to destroy.”
Bolton made these comments on “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio” on New York’s WABC Radio.
The former diplomat told Klein he doesn’t believe the Obama administration will take any military action against Iran.
“I don’t think it will come from the United States, that’s for sure,” Bolton said. “The question is whether at some point Israel acts in its own self defense as it has twice before when it struck Saddam Hussein’s reactor in 1981 and the Syrian reactor in September of 2007.”
Der Spiegel Confirms KleinOnline Report
A story generating worldwide attention by the German weekly Der Spiegel reporting how the U.S. is training Syrian rebels in Jordan was actually first exclusively exposed by this column thirteen months ago.
Quoting what it said were training participants and organizers, Der Spiegel reported on Sunday it was not clear whether the Americans worked for private firms or were from the army but the newspaper said some organizers wore uniforms.
The training in Jordan reportedly focused on the use of anti-tank weaponry.
The newspaper reported some 200 men received such training over the past three months and that the U.S. plans to provide training for a total of 1,200 members of the Free Syrian Army in two camps in the south and the east of Jordan.
Britain’s Guardian newspaper also reported that U.S. trainers were aiding Syrian rebels in Jordan along with British and French instructors.
Reuters reported that a spokesman for the U.S. Defense Department declined immediate comment on the Spiegel report. The French foreign ministry and Britain’s foreign and defense ministries also would not comment to Reuters.
In February 2012, this column quoted knowledgeable Egyptian and Arab security officials who claimed the U.S., Turkey, and Jordan were running a training base for the Syrian rebels in the Jordanian town of Safawi in the country’s northern desert region.
Government Funding Behind ‘Mortality Index’
A government-funded “mortality index” study – which helps doctors determine whether a patient has a “good chance” of dying within the next 10 years – raises renewed concerns about health-care rationing under Obamacare.
Federal grants from the National Institute on Aging and the American Federation for Aging Research helped pay for researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, to create a mortality index designed to aid doctors in decision-making about “preventive intervention” for older patients.
The index provides doctors with 12 measures to assign points to an elderly patient. The lower the patient’s total points, the better his or her odds of survival. The highest score, 26 points, represents a 95 percent chance the patient will die within 10 years.
The index assigns all male subjects 2 points automatically because men on the average have a lower life expectancy than women, the study noted. Men and women aged between 60 and 64 get 1 point; ages 70 and 74 get 3 points, while 85 or over get 7 points.
Two points are further assigned for the following: current or a previous cancer diagnosis, excluding minor skin cancers; lung disease impacting on physical activity or requiring oxygen; heart failure; smoking; difficulty bathing; difficulty managing money because of health or memory problems; and difficulty walking several blocks. One point is assigned for diabetes or high blood sugar; difficulty pushing a large object; being thin or of abnormal weight.