Netanyahu could use Iran vote in policy speech

JERUSALEM — Israel's prime minister delivers a highly anticipated policy speech Sunday in which he could use the re-election of Iran's hard-line president to boost his argument that Tehran poses a bigger threat to Mideast peace than his refusal to endorse Palestinian statehood.

Benjamin Netanyahu has been pushing that argument as he publicly defies President Barack Obama's appeals to freeze settlement construction in the West Bank and start negotiating the creation of a Palestinian state.

The re-election Friday of hard-line Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the street protests by opponents who think the vote was rigged will make the international audience more receptive to Netanyahu's position on Iran, said Iran expert David Menashri.

"For Netanyahu, it could not be better. The world will be in a better position to accept Netanyahu's position on Iran after having seen the pictures coming out of Iran in recent days," said Menashri, who heads the Center for Iranian Studies at Tel Aviv University.

Ahmadinejad is reviled in Israel for repeatedly saying the country should be "wiped off the map" and for his defiance of international demands to curb its nuclear program. Ahmadinejad "represents the face of Iran as Israel tries to portray it," Menashri said.

Israel, like the U.S., doesn't believe Tehran's claims that its nuclear program is designed to produce energy, not bombs. Netanyahu has said Israel would not tolerate a nuclear Iran and is thought to be mulling a military strike.

A poll for an Israeli think tank published Sunday showed that 59 percent of the Jewish public would support a military strike should Israel determine that Tehran possesses nuclear weapons. But less than one-fifth said they would consider leaving Israel should Iran develop nuclear weapons, said the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University.

The survey questioned 616 adult Jews and had a margin of error of 3 percentage points.

But while Netanyahu sees Iran and its anti-Israel proxies in Lebanon and Gaza as the crux of the Mideast's problems, Obama thinks serious effort toward resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict could weaken Tehran.

The Israeli leader has been under intense pressure from Washington to enter into negotiations on Palestinian statehood and end all settlement expansion in the West Bank — positions he opposes and whose adoption would almost surely fracture his hawkish governing coalition.