ZOA: Iran deal is Munich, Obama is Chamberlain

Never an organization to mince words in its criticism of President Barack Obama’s Middle East policies, the right-wing Zionist Organization of America blasted the interim Iran deal in the strongest terms:

The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has described the agreement concluded over the weekend in Geneva between  the P5+1 –– the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (Britain, China, France, Russia, the United States) and Germany –– and the Islamic Republic of Iran as an appeasement deal. This is our era’s new Munich and President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry are the new Neville Chamberlains.

Other prominent Jewish groups — including AIPAC and the Anti-Defamation League — have also expressed strong reservations about the deal, but perhaps none in language quite so barbed as the ZOA. Meanwhile, the Jewish community’s main policy umbrella body struck a tone of very cautious semi-optimism.

But in its blunt expression of dismay, the ZOA’s statement may actually be the closest in tone to the response of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. While Netanyahu refrained from name-calling, he did call the agreement a “historic mistake” that “made the world a much more dangerous place.”