Barak to Haaretz: Iran won't drop nuclear bomb on Israel

Published 00:42 05.05.11Latest update 00:42 05.05.11
Barak to Haaretz: Iran won't drop nuclear bomb on Israel
Though the Iranian government seems to have largely eluded the wave of revolutions in the Arab world, the defense minister thinks it too could collapse.

If Iran succeeds in developing nuclear weapons, it is unlikely to bomb Israel, Defense Minister Ehud Barak told Haaretz in an Independence Day interview.

Barak said Israel should not spread public panic about the Iranian nuclear program − a position that seems to put him out of step with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who in recent years has repeatedly compared the Iranian push to develop a nuclear bomb to the Third Reich’s development of increasingly sophisticated weapons.

When asked whether he thinks Iran would drop a nuclear bomb on Israel, Barak said: “Not on us and not on any other neighbor.”

“I don’t think in terms of panic,” he said. “What about Pakistan, some political meltdown happens there and four bombs wind up in Iran. So what? So you head for the airport? You close down the country? Just because they got a shortcut? No. We are still the most powerful in the Middle East.”

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Commenting on his wealth, he said he was indeed a millionaire but “not a tycoon.”

“I’m no wealthier than Bibi Netanyahu or Arik Sharon,” he said. “I don’t feel that I’m more hedonistic than Ehud Olmert, or Yitzhak Rabin, or Shimon Peres.”
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