Obama, NYT keep Israeli nuke secrets

Overall, the New York Times praises President Barack Obama's revised policy on when to launch nuclear attacks, though agreeing with some critics that it was a mistake to continue brandishing nukes at Iran, the only non-nuclear-armed state still being threatened. So why did Obama carve out a special exception intended for Iran, claiming that any nation not "compliant" with the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty -- even one without nuclear weapons -- can be targeted for nuclear annihilation by the United States? Though Iran is an NPT signatory and asserts that it wants to use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes only, Obama's position is that since Iran arguably violated some technical provisions of the treaty, it is not "compliant" and thus open to U.S. nuclear attack. Not only have Israeli leaders refused to declare their nuclear arsenal–and have harshly punished whistleblowers who have spoken up–but U.S. presidents have fallen in line, too, playing along with the charade. [For a brief history of the Israeli nuclear program, click here.] To a great extent, major U.S. news outlets like the New York Times have joined the game as well, avoiding references to Israeli nuclear bombs even when that reality is relevant to a larger discussion of Middle East security. But this conspiracy of silence has another downside. It makes the United States and its major news media appear to the rest of the world hopelessly hypocritical, an albatross that Obama has just wrapped around his own neck.