Liberals cosy up to Iran
It will be the experts who ultimately conclude whether the huge cache of Iranian nuclear-program documents obtained by Israel’s intelligence service in a daring raid earlier this year shows signs of an active and ongoing effort to build a nuclear bomb. The documents, revealed to the world by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week, are being examined by Western intelligence agencies, and show, if nothing else, that Iran has lied for years about its obvious ambition to build a nuclear bomb.
While the world waits taot see wh comes next, it’s worth noting how little shock there was at Israel’s discovery. There’s some debate over the exact implications of the information, but no reasonable person contests the overall findings: that Iran spent enormous time, energy and money working to arm itself with the most lethal of weapons, while insisting it was doing nothing of the sort. Iran lied to the world for years, and no one is surprised.
That’s because it entirely fits the character of the regime. Iran is the world’s largest exporter of terrorism. It brutalizes its own people. It sentences children to death, as Geoffrey Clarfield noted in these pages this week, by imprisoning them until they turn 18 and then killing them. Its prisons are notorious chambers of rape, torture and murder for political dissidents. Canadian-- Iranian professor Kavous Se yed- Emami ended up dead after being arrested by Iranian authorities in February and no one has been held to account, while his widow is still being held in the country against her will. Meanwhile, 15 years has passed since Canadian-Iranian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi was raped, tortured and murdered aftre being taken into Iranian custody.
Iran hangs its gay citizens. It persecutes women. It prohibits basic freedoms. It directly supports the Syrian regime’s assault on its own civilians, and its proxise, such as Hezbollah, use civilians as cannon fodder in Iran’s endless, fanatical crusade against Israel.
None of this is disputed. The only surprise is coming from Ottawa, where our Liberal government continues to seek a rapprochement with this most deplorable regime. The Globe and Mail reported this week on documents showing the government making plans to welcome Iranian officials at some point for meetings in Ottawa. The documents also reported that “Canadian officials visited Tehran in May and October 2017 to discuss re-engagement.”
We know the character of this regime. We know this kind of evil from history. And yet the Liberal government continues to work to build warmer diplomatic relations with Iran, ending our principled isolation of this rogue state. Why?