Clinton, Palin rip Iran

By · September 22, 2008

U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin both harshly criticized Iran.

Clinton (D-N.Y.), who was scheduled to speak at Monday’s anti-Iran rally in New York before pulling out when Palin was invited, told an Israel Bonds dinner in New York on Sept. 18 that “U.S. policy must be clear and unequivocal. We cannot, we should not, we must not permit Iran to build or acquire nuclear weapons. And in dealing with this threat, as I have said repeatedly, we cannot take any option off the table.”

She added that as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad “travels to New York to meet at the United Nations, and once again to use the General Assembly as a launching pad for his attacks on Israel and the United States, we must raise our voices together in opposition to the message he carries and the threat Iran poses.”

Palin, the governor of Alaska, said Ahmadinejad “must be stopped” in the speech she would have given at the rally – it was printed Monday in the New York Sun. Palin, the running mate for Republican presidential nominee John McCain, was disinvited from the rally on Sept. 18 after organizers decided not to have any elected officials present.

“Senator McCain has made a solemn commitment that I strongly endorse: Never again will we risk another Holocaust,” she wrote. “And this is not a wish, a request or a plea to Israel’s enemies. This is a promise that the United States and Israel will honor against any enemy who cares to test us. It is John McCain’s promise and it is my promise.”

Palin also praised Clinton’s tough stance on Iran.