Netanyahu sounds the alarm

How do you translate the Talmudic phrase "Mimah nafshecha" ("All actions will yield the same result")? U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry claims that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may not be aware of all the details of the draft agreement with Iran. But his undersecretary, Wendy Sherman, who heads the negotiations, explained in Geneva that Israel was up to date on every detail. So what is the official American version? So did Netanyahu know everything or not-

He did not know. On Wednesday they told him they might give the Iranians access only to frozen funds. On Friday he learned that strategic material goods were also on the table.

This contradiction is typical, but not very crucial. The problem is in the essence of the agreement. Concessions made in interim agreements or goodwill gestures can never be reversed. A similar dogma can be found in Israel's release of Palestinian terrorists. Whether the negotiations with the Palestinians yield an agreement or not, the prisoners will not go back to prison unless they are caught taking part in new terror activity.

Same with the sanctions. If, at the end of the day, they talk and talk and babble on and nothing comes of the talks, the sanctions that are lifted will not be reimposed, not to mention that no new sanctions will be put in place.

The alarm that Netanyahu sounded echoed across the world's capitals. The head of the Anti-Defamation League, Abe Foxman, attacked Kerry; the French were deterred by the weak agreement; the U.S. Congress woke up; Saudi Arabia cried out, and so did Egypt. What is U.S. President Barack Obama doing to his country's own interests-

He is losing Egypt. He did not depose the Iranian vassal in Syria. The Gulf countries no longer rely on the American umbrella. But worst of all is the U.S.-Saudi relationship. In 1945, then-U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt met with then-Saudi King Ibn Saud on a boat in Great Bitter Lake, and after that point his relationship with the Zionist enterprise was no longer as friendly as it had been before. For decades, America looked to Saudi Arabia each time it made a move in the Middle East. Now it is abandoning Saudi Arabia all at once.

From Israel's perspective, this is not an internally controversial topic. It is not about two states for two peoples. It is not about one state for two peoples. The Israeli and global interest is to prevent a nuclear Iran, and the American interest, which is no different, is that the White House will operate with the same spirit it had before Obama was elected for a second term.

One can argue that an interim deal is required before a final deal can be achieved, to ensure that Iran does not develop a nuclear bomb, but that is not the proper way to do things. That is not how you manage negotiations. It is not too late for the West to determine two basic conditions for an interim six-month agreement: suspension of Iranian uranium enrichment and the dismantling of a significant part of the program in exchange for unfreezing Iranian assets and perhaps lifting a minor sanction.

This could be the basis for an interim agreement, after which negotiations can continue to reach a permanent deal. Even this is not a good deal. But not bad. Not horrible. It is the minimum.

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