Prepare to Listen to P.M. Netanyahu Speech before the U.S. Congress

Tuesday, March 3, 2015 
Tuesday, March 3, 2015 is the date scheduled for the American people and others around the world to hear more from the Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu. His views and hopes regarding Iran and Israel have a wide audience as Iran claims to negotiate with the U. S. on its preparations for the development of a nuclear weapons program. 

The context of current U.S. negotiations with Iran
The context of U.S. negotiations includes Iran’s never-retracted label for the U.S. as “the Great Satan” and its ally, Israel, as “Little Satan.”  Iran long-ago chanted against the U. S. and Israel: Death to America! Death to Israel! 

U.S. history with Iran since its 1979 revolution should inform American thoughts. In these days, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry tries to negotiate successfully with Iran on its nuclear weapons development, with disappointing results thus far.

Soon after the Iranian revolution, 1979, American citizens were taken hostage and were not released until early 1981. I was in Washington, DC, when the yellow ribbons of welcome clung to trees and rooftops, especially around the White House and Farragut Square. The American spirit of strength, hope, and resilience seemed to fill the streets.  

Two years later, 1983, Iran branded its imprint on our history again, in a bombing attack on the U. S. Embassy in Ain el-Mreisseh, Lebanon, killing 52 people. The explosion reached the ambassador's desk, according to reports. 

As noted decades later by U. S. Ambassador to Lebanon Maura Connelly on the 30^th anniversary of the attack: The bombing of Embassy Beirut in 1983 opened a new chapter (emphasis added) in America’s history in the Middle East.  The first of what would be three attacks on Americans, and Lebanese colleagues in Beirut in 17 months, it was a bloody rite of passage. (April 13, 2013) 

America remains in that chapter of history with Iran. The American people are at risk, and this fact goes against how we wish to think. Our politicians and officials will make existentially wrong decisions if they ignore who and what Iranian leadership is. The religious-political government has never taken back its vows against the United States of America.  At this moment, it prepares the capability to wreak unthinkable destruction. Its inflexibility in “diplomacy” reinforces this view.

If Diplomacy, Negotiate from Strength
Originally, I expected the Secretary of State to negotiate firmly against Iran’s nuclear weapons development, allowing only for domestic use of nuclear power.   

I now think that his meetings with Iranian officials, if they continue, can at best only delay an inevitably bad outcome. Stopping an Iranian nuclear weapons program appears to be a lost or, worse, discarded goal.

However, there may be some in congress who could convince others to take second look at diplomatic circles and speak up more for the U.S. to do whatever it takes, short of war, to halt Iran’s preparations in that area.

Netanyahu's Role from a Jewish Historical View

Preparing to listeni to P.M. Netanyahu’s speech before the U.S. congress, I returned to the biblical book of Nehemiah. Nehemiah was, in his day, Jerusalem's hope for leadership. His strategy, in rebuilding the war-torn walls of Jerusalem, employed wisdom against those who declared themselves his enemies.

Nehemiah's prime enemy was named Sanballat, and at first, regarding Nehemiah, he “was angry and greatly enraged, and he mocked the Jews.” (Neh. 1:1) (See Iran's record, above.)

Later, as Nehemiah's work progressed, Sanballat and company threatened the Jews. (See Iran's record.)

Unsucessful with that, they plotted and prepared to make war on the Jews.
(Consider Iran's avowed plans.)

Still unsuccessful, Sanballat and company resorted to negotiation efforts (see above, Iran and U.S.): 

“Let’s meet in one of the villages, at Ono.”
("Let's meet in Geneva" equivalent today.)

Nehemiah's enemies sought meetings five times, and five times Nehemiah refused. 

(Not in the record above, because Nehemiah believed the enemy's mocking and threatening words.)

The enemy prepared to fight. (See Iran's record, above.)

Then was when one of Nehemiah friends proposed safety behind closed doors of the house of God. 

Nehemiah refused his friend, too.

Nehemiah continued to work, true to his mission to rebuild the walls, doing it with intense loyalty

to God and his people.

When the Nehemiah 's people completed the work, the surrounding nations feared. 

(Then, their eyes were opened.)

Is it too late? 
Is it too late for the U.S. to make clear once and for all that meetings with Iran must return to the original starting point--no  nuclear weapons development for Iran. 

Iran’s mocking and threats usually, if not always, join the U.S. with Israel. The U. S. is strong and Israel’s situation amidst Arab enemies is tenuous. Israel is the prime enemy; therefore, weaken Israel by discouraging and removing U.S. as Israel’s ally. (Sanballat and company all over again.)

Unlike a great leader, the U. S. appears to court a better relationship with Iran in spite of “Death to America!” threats. Ignore the mocking, the threats, the preparations for attack…agree to meet more and more. Every delay is a move against the U.S. mission and goals, not against Iran’s. 

It's puzzling why any Secretary of State would not believe Iran’s threats and publicly admit them.

Face the Unimaginable

I am convinced that to think that Iran's goal of nuclear weapons is impossible to reach or can be weakened by delay is a false assumption. 

I think we have solid reasons, based on decades of publicly available reports, to believe that many Iranian people want peace and change, that they hope and pray that the U.S. will not play dangerous, yielding diplomatic games with Iran. Many hope that the U.S. will show clear resolve, even if an agreement cannot be reached and sanctions on Iran continue, with continued inspection efforts. 

I want to hear Prime Minister Netanyahu's perspectives about these serious matters on Tuesday.

Please, Do Not Read if Your Mind is Closed on Subject of "Women's Health" as "Abortion" Euphemism

MD Sen. Mikulski stands alongside. Senator Boxer Speaks Out Against Continued GOP Assault on Women's Health (Photo credit: Senator Boxer)

"Women's Health" is one politically correct way to refer to "abortion for any reason or for no reason." Terms, like "women's health," that are used in order to "clean up" the shock of "deliberate ending of the life of an unborn human being" are euphemisms. Euphemisms help some people feel less uncomfortable than saying what they really mean or propound.  Another popular euphemism of our time is the phrase "death with dignity," increasingly used in place of "suicide" or "deliberately assisted suicide." (I agree that death can be helped along by another person; I do not think that anyone who has watched many people die would say that, overall, death is a "dignified" thing to watch during or to stay admire, in its natural, pre-funeral state, after.)
     But let's get back to "women's health." I am a pro-life person who understands and respects the frightening dilemma that the woman or young girl faces when she learns that her decision to have sex, or her victimization through a rape, has resulted in an "unplanned" or "unwanted" pregnancy. Here, I am not addressing rape, which I could speak to another time, yet without claiming to propose easy answers. But here, in this writing, I an speaking about members of the majority of females that consider abortion. They include the girl or woman that chooses to engage in sex, as a single or married woman...following her free choice/decision to have sexual intercourse with or without contraceptive restraint. 
     I look at the innocent human life that has begun to grow in such a girl or woman. That life, now seen mainly as a threat to an unwilling "mother's" future or comfort, nevertheless is not a monster but a being in formation possessing all major human features. 
     I have counseled, in the past, at a free pregnancy center for women. Many of the adolescents and adult women who came to the center learned for the first time facts about newly suspected human life, helpless and most vulnerable. Most had chosen freely to engage in sexual intercourse. Yet, afraid they were pregnant, they began to learn, at the center, that human life at that point has its own human DNA, heartbeat, blood type, gender, and so on...of its own, not solely or necessarily exactly or even only remotely like that of the biological mother. Certain identity factors belong in unique patterns to that specific, unique, unborn human life, and to no other--past, present, or future.      
     
Our human lives before we were born shared and continue to possess similar facts of our uniqueness. Including, that when you and I were in utero, where we began to thrive...if someone--medical or otherwise--had done something to harm us, we would have felt distress and pain. Deep physical pain if deliberately applied to attack or to threaten your life or mine would have had to be a result. Any threat to our being, that is...deliberate effort to prevent you or me from being born...would have caused distress and/or pain. Which is, by the way, why I take for granted that surgery done upon human life in utero--for example, heart surgery, which has been done in utero--assumes use of anesthetics, for the unborn child as well as for the mother, as needed. 
     The beating of the human heart in the womb used to be thought to begin much later than it is now known to exist' we know it is beating by three weeks, at least, after conception. We also know that pain can be recorded in life in utero, experienced by the nonverbal yet fully human life, male or female, by 20 weeks. That is scientific record. 
     In the U. S. Congress, there was debate about killing (scientifically speaking) human life in the womb after 20 weeks. One U. S. congressperson from my state of Maryland (go to the page linked, scroll down for MD representative) presented his arguments on YouTube, based not on morals but on science and basic human tolerance, concern, pity, mercy, and compassion. Here is his presentation about pain of human life before birth, in the womb. I believe that women's psychological health depends upon knowing these facts, as well.I believe that any female having sex or considering that choice deserves to know all the facts...for their health and beyond.



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