19 comments

• Comment Link Monday, 14 January 2013 10:53 posted by Chris

  It's a statement because that's how the debate is structured. A statement is provided and participants choose to agree or disagree and explain why. Every debate is the same.

• Comment Link Thursday, 10 January 2013 15:54 posted by Aaron

  Regardless of what side you take on this debate why is the title of the debate a declarative statement as opposed to a question?

• Comment Link Thursday, 10 January 2013 15:21 posted by Steven Brant

  If the US and USSR could survive their nuclear stand-off, I think Israel and Iran could too.
  
  What would be required, in my opinion, is for Israel's government to more accurately reflect the desire of a significant portion of its citizens for peace. We Americans are shown a unified, hard-line Israel in the news we see on the major networks, but Israeli society is not that monolithically conservative. There is a large peace movement there, which our mainstream media never tells us about.

• Comment Link Saturday, 05 January 2013 03:07 posted by Anwar H.

  I am for the motion and i draw my conclusion from two points of perspective.
  1) Many say if Iran gets the weapon it would/will trigger an "arms race" in the region. But Israel itself is the only country in the region that has the weapon, but that hasn't triggered an "arms race," despite the fact that the countries in the region are all technically at war with Israel.
  2) And second, do you really think that a country (Iran) which has endured so much pressure (sanctions, scientists killed, etc.) would, after getting the weapon, just use it in an instant. It's like a man who gambles away all in his possessions (money, car, house), and after years of hard labour finally earns back all he's lost, only to gamble it away again. And really do we think the leaders of Iran are demented enough to use the weapon, knowing full-well that it would also mean the end of them.
  So, many believe Israel disapproves of Iran getting the weapon not because of a fear that it will be used on them, but rather because it will shift the balance of power (militarily) in the region, from one dominated by Israel to one no longer dominated by Israel.

• Comment Link Friday, 04 January 2013 17:33 posted by Carlos Deegan

  The issue in my opinion is proliferation. Just as with gun ownership in the US, the odds are that the more people who have arms, the greater the likelihood that an accident will happen. It is in the interest of the world that no new members of the nuclear club be permitted.

• Comment Link Thursday, 03 January 2013 19:18 posted by Mujtaba Roozbahani

  As a Iranian in exile, I have to say that the Iranian regime is brutal dictatorship and this regime continued a useless war with Iraq in 8 years just to stay in power. The result of that war was more than one thousand billion dollars in damage and one million dead and injured only on the Iranian side. A regime that is killing its people every day and robbing the whole country will start a nuclear war against its neighbors whenever it feels a threat from its people. So the world most stop this regime from getting the nuclear bomb, and the best way is to support Iranian opposition not to attack Israel.

• Comment Link Thursday, 03 January 2013 15:45 posted by Daniel R. Martin

  I don't believe that the Iranian regime, despite its odious rhetoric, is demented or suicidal. Its awareness of its own instant annihilation if it were ever to use a nuclear weapon will keep it from attacking anyone else; doing so would gain it nothing.

• Comment Link Thursday, 03 January 2013 14:32 posted by Francis Corry

  The importance of our jewish population to our culture has been so great that the United States is obligated to defend them if anyone should consider annihilation. Iran leadership has repeatedly confirm this as a basic principle..Israel cannot tolerate a nuclear Iran. The U.S. has to help Iran in a regime change.

• Comment Link Monday, 31 December 2012 05:46 posted by Anwar Hassan

  I have recently been introduced to Intelligence Square Debates by a family member who himself, while one night "channel surfing" (as they call it) stopped at a channel that was hosting the debate. And this family member, knowing that I am one who loves debates regardless of the topic/s that are beating debated, reported (what was to him a boring event but to me is an event greater than having court side sets in an NBA playoffs game) to me. And I have, ever sense, been a fan and a well satisfied one after each debate, as well. I have, regardless of what topic is being debated, always loved the debates. For they offer me knowledge and also a deeper understanding of each topic brought up for debate, something the media at times fails to do.
  
  Wise men argue cases, fools decide them.
  -Anacharsis.
  
  P.S. If ever the debaters start speaking over each other, to calm them down just remind them of the quote by Epictetus:
  
  "We were given two ears and one mouth so that we may listen more and speak less."