LET THE UN INSPECTORS IN

The recent conference of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) opened with an announcement that Cuba would become a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The last three hold-outs in the world are Israel, India, and Pakistan. The Arab states, led by Iraq, have proposed that Israel should sign on as part of a framework for peace in the Middle East, but the Israelis want to hold on to their weapons of mass destruction. As Ha'aretz reports:

"Gideon Frank, director-general of the Atomic Energy Commission in the Prime Minister's Office, told the International Atomic Energy Agency's 46th General Conference in Vienna yesterday that Israel opposes Iraq's proposal to the conference agenda that it discuss 'Israeli Nuclear Capabilities and Threat.' Frank said that 'many dangerous proliferation developments in our region and in other regions have occurred in recent years, none of which involve Israel. On the contrary: Israel has neither threatened any of its neighbors nor has it acted in defiance of international commitments.' He added that the Iraqi proposal for the agenda lacks 'factual justification' and that 'there is no need to single out Israel.'"

A better question is: why not single out Israel, a country that we know has nukes – and the will to use them – instead of Iraq, which doesn't have fissionable material or the technology to create and deliver a nuclear warhead?

Remember the case of Pat Roush and her two daughters, supposedly "kidnapped" by their Saudi father and held "incommunicado" in the desert Kingdom? The Wall Street Journal tried to create an international incident out of what was basically a family feud, and even Congress got involved, with grandstanding lawmakers passing resolutions and neoconservative polemicists denouncing "Arabists" and "appeasers" in the State Department.