Concerning my request that The Washington Post correct David Ignatius's opinion piece entitled "How the Iran deal became the most strategic success of Obama’s presidency," I received the following gracious response from WaPo op-ed editor Michael Larabee:
Hi, Jeffrey, thank you for your note. I’ve connected with David Ignatius on this, and I don’t believe a correction is warranted here. On the Israeli national security establishment, he bases his conclusion on having been a close observer of the process and press coverage of it from the beginning, not just on Tharoor’s article. If you want to argue that’s he’s mistaken, that could be fodder for a good letter, but it’s not a correction.
On Netanyahu, in the full paragraph you flag, he writes that the PM is an outlier in the world, not just in Israel, which seems like fair comment to me.
My reply to Mike:
I am still a reserve officer in the Israeli army, and I know more than a "bit" about the views of the Israeli "national security establishment," particularly at a time when Iran and Russia are sending troops into Syria (something Mr. Ignatius remarkably failed to mention in his opinion piece). Mr. Ignatius cited the Tharoor article, which had to be corrected. If he is indeed a "close observer of the process," I would be pleased if he could provide me with the names of some current senior officers (army, Shin Bet or Mossad) who see the deal as "preferable to any realistic alternative."
The Israeli prime minister is an outlier in the world, which includes North Korea, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, Eritrea, Somalia, Turkmenistan, in addition to the various European countries which have been busy sending trade delegations to Iran over the past few months?
Do you remember Mr. Ignatius's claim that we had heard the last of "Death to America!" coming out of Iran? His contentions today are equally risible.
Remarkable . . .
Thanks for sharing this correspondence so we can be privy to additional layers of blindness and denial. With each layer, I sleep less and less soundly.
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