Former US Secretary of State John Kerry has revealed that multiple American presidents turned down a proposal by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to go to war with Iran. Speaking on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Kerry said that Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Joe Biden had all rejected the idea beforeDonald Trump, and stressed that diplomatic options had not been fully exhausted.
Drawing on his experience as a Vietnam War veteran, Kerry also warned against misleading the American public, arguing that both the Vietnam and Iraq wars underscore the dangers of entering conflicts without transparency and due process.
"And speaking as a veteran of the Vietnam War, where decisions like that were so critical, we were lied to about what that war was about, and the lesson of that war and of Iraq is don't lie to the American people and then ask them to send their sons and daughters to fight," he said.
Sharing this clip of Kerry, Iran's Press TV wrote, "Former US Secretary of State John Kerry says that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu had proposed the war on Iran to Presidents Obama, Bush, and Biden, but they all refused. The prediction was regime change, that people would rise up, but we saw that none of that happened."
A report by the New York Times detailed how Netanyahu convinced US President Donald Trump to attack Iran alongside Israel. Kerry said that the presentation by Netanyahu was a "prediction" and that none of his claims of people taking over the country and regime change happened.
"In the Situation Room on Feb. 11, Mr. Netanyahu made a hard sell, suggesting that Iran was ripe for regime change and expressing the belief that a joint U.S.-Israeli mission could finally bring an end to the Islamic Republic," the report noted.
According to the report, Trump said, "Sounds good to me," and subsequently signalled a green light for the joint US-Israeli operation.
Also Read:A 'Tense Phone Call' Between JD Vance and Netanyahu On Iran: 'Bibi Sold It Easy'
Last month, according to a report by Axios, US Vice President JD Vance had a tense phone conversation with Netanyahu. During the conversation, Vance reportedly challenged Netanyahu’s pre-war assessment, describing it as "overly optimistic", particularly regarding the likelihood of regime change in the region.
“Bibi really sold it… as being easy, as regime change being a lot likelier than it was,” one US source told Axios, referring to Netanyahu by his nickname. The source added that the vice president was “clear-eyed” in pushing back against those claims.
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