Why do we condemn Iran for developing nuke energy but not Israel?

Question

Israel has had nukes since the 1960s. We were strangely quiet about that. Why are we so insistant that Iran give up her nukes? And please don't say "It's because Iran has threatened to wipe out Israel." Ahmedinajad NEVER SAID that. What he said was that Israel should be moved to Europe and therefore wiped off the map of the Middle East. Big difference in interpretation.
Sort of like when the Allies wiped East Prussia off the map in 1946 in Europe. Remember that?

Answer 1

Actually. the US was not particularly keen on Israel until the lates 1960s/early 1970s.The answer which said it helped set it up is wrong - the US did no such thing Israel was viewed as a troublesome little state with no future during the 1950s/early 1960s. Don't forget that the US was instrumental in stopping the UK and France invading the Egyptian Suez Canal zone. President Kennedy was far more pro-Arab than Israeli. The US virtually ignored the Holocaust before 1970. It was only when administrations began to see how strong the Jewish lobby was after the Six day War of 1967 that the US adminitrations began to see what side their bread was buttered on and began to pay attention to Israel. Also, the surrounding Arab states were then being seen as Soviet satellites and to side with Israel in the Cold War was the natural thing to do.

Answer 2

Originally, the USA did not want Israel to have nukes, but France did (still entertaining delusions of grandeur about re-establishing its colonies in the Middle East). France gave Israel nuclear technology. However, once France became a minor player and very dependent on Arab oil, and especially after the Six Day war, the USA began to see Israel as its major cop against the Soviet Union's proxies in the Middle East, and so was willing to go quite a long way to helping Israel. As long as the Israelis pretended they didn't have nukes. Meanwhile, the USA (and some Europeans and China to some extent) were helping Pakistan with similar nuclear technology to counter India, which was more of a Soviet client in the 50s - 80s. Obviously that's all changed now, but the radioactive cat was out of the bag, and via Pakistan (and Russia and China) it found its way to Iran. Now that the biggest challenge to U.S. control of oil are Islamic pan-nationalists, you can see why the "West" is the biggest complainer when it comes to Iran having nukes. Let's remember that Nukes are a political weapon (and we hope it remains that way), only used by one country so far in a war (the USA on Japan), and probably wouldn't be used except as a last resort because it implies total destruction. Iran nuke Israel? Do people know how tiny Israel is? How radiation does not respect borders? How many Muslims would suffer? How Muslim holy sites would be contaminated? This is not about Iran attacking Israel. This is about Iran moving up a level in geopolitics.

Answer 3

It's because Israel is our ally, and Iran is not. It's that simple. If the Israeli government was connected to Al Quaida (or if our government thought they were), we would try to take their nukes away, too.

Answer 4

maybe because we helped create Israel and are allies with them.