Posted on 03/04/2014 3:48:04 PM PST by SoFloFreeper
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was surprised by a forthright expression of support for the Jewish state from Russian President Vladimir Putin during a meeting last month in Moscow, Israeli daily Ma’ariv reported on Friday.
Netanyahu had flown to meet the Russian leader in a last minute effort to prevent an interim nuclear deal between Iran and world powers from being signed.
During the meeting, Netanyahu asked Putin to withhold support for the convening of a Nuclear Non Proliferation Conference the stated purpose of which would be to rid the entire Middle East of nuclear weapons, according to the report. In 2010, President Barack Obama first announced plans for the convening of this international meeting. However, due to Israeli pressure, America pulled its support for the initiative late in 2012.
Russia was and remains one of the Conference’s chief backers. Ma’ariv said that in his meeting with Putin, Netanyahu explained that a meeting with effectively the chief aim of dismantling Israel’s nuclear capability – the existence of which has never been confirmed by Israel – will harm the country’s vital national interests.
Netanyahu went on to explain to the Russian President that there will only be a place for the convening of such a meeting after peaceful relations have been established between Israel and Arab countries across the Middle East, Ma’ariv said.
At this point in their hour-and-a-half conversation, Putin surprised the Israeli Premier. “Russia will slow all efforts to convene the conference,” Putin promised Netanyahu, according to Ma’ariv. Putin went even further, making it clear to Netanyahu that Russia will not do anything to harm Israel. He added that despite the alliance between Israel and the United States, Russia stands by Israel.
The reported comments come as somewhat of a policy about -face, as four short months ago Putin stated that Israel should dismantle its nuclear capability. However, the devil is in the details of this apparent change in the official Russian position vis-a-vis Israel’s nuclear program. Specifically, Putin told Netanyahu that Russia supports the ‘slowing’ of efforts to convene an international Nuclear Non Proliferation Conference, not a complete cessation of such efforts.
In short, while Putin is taking the Israeli position into account, he fully intends to keep all options on the table.
1) Putin wants to maintain Russia's monopoly on natural gas exports to Europe. Israel's Leviathan deposit is going to weaken that, but if Putin has Israel as a dependent ally, he can still use control of the natural gas as a political weapon.
2) Russia has a huge land area and an abundance of resources, but is suffering from the same population crash as Europe. Ergo, Putin needs a technological edge in order to be a military power. Israel is the world's single greatest exporter of new technology.
3) Putin is allied with the Iranians over the Arabs. The Persians have historically been among the friendlier peoples to the Jews, current politics aside. Moreover, there have been rumors of overtures between the Arabs and Israel as Iran has developed its nuclear technology. If Putin can diplomatically neutrilize the threat of Israel taking out Iran's nuclear program, it leaves his Shi'a Persian allies in a great position to dominate and even take their revenge on the Sunni Arab states. This in turn gives Putin the chance to control not only the Eurasian natural gas supplies, but its oil supplies as well, including Israel's Tamar deposit.
4) Given his ambitions, I have to imagine that Putin would like to have Mossad working for him rather than against him and his allies.
All of which would accord very neatly with Gog and Magog.
Shalom
“Can Bibi trust Putin?”
More than he can trust Obama and Kerry.
It will be very interesting to see if that pipe-line will be directed north or south, Europe or Asia.
Putin is a master statesman playing chess with an adolescent child.
Putin is a master statesman playing chess with an adolescent child - Obama.
Yea, but Obama is "good at killing." Said so himself.
This is all very confusing, isn't it?
I have read that 20% of the Israeli population speak Russian.
It would be interesting to see what would happen if Russia changed course and allied with Israel. It's not impossible, since Israel's creation was originally supported by the Soviet Union, and with Obama's sympathy for Muslims, Israel is probably looking for any allies it can find. Moreover, Putin is an ex-KGB thug, but unlike most ex-KGB thugs, he is not anti-Semitic and has good relations with members of the Israeli right like Lieberman.
I’m too late to this post to have my comment have any impact but how can Israel trust Putin on any issue if Putin was the one who facilitated one of the most egregious acts of global destabilization when providing Iran with the technology to acquire nuclear weapons?
Good question.
Was Putin the one? I thought it was North Korea.
1,The size of Tehran's initial nuclear weapon is purported to be three times the size of the ones used on Hiroshima, Nagasaki
2.Tehran, bitter religious adversary of Saudi Arabia, has made the public statement that the first thing it will do when it acquires nuclear weapons is to incinerate the oil fields of Saudi Arabia, the very point of which validates what I've read about the vituperative animus that the main branches of Islam, Shi'it versus Sunni, have for each other, in the belief the other is more odious, more antithetical to Islam than Jews.
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