Hoenlein: ElBaradei a ‘stooge’ for Iran

Here’s a snippet from the JTA news report:

WASHINGTON (JTA) — The director of the U.S. Jewish foreign policy umbrella called Mohammed ElBaradei, the opposition leader emerging from the Egyptian ferment, a "stooge of Iran."

Malcolm Hoenlein, the executive vice-president of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, accused ElBaradei of covering up Iran’s true nuclear weaponization capacities while he directed the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog.

"He is a stooge of Iran, and I don’t use the term lightly," Hoenlein said in an online recorded interview with Yeshiva World News on the Egyptian crisis. "He fronted for them, he distorted the reports."

ElBaradei, who directed the IAEA from 1997 to 2009, returned to Egypt following his third term. Soon he was touted as a possible challenger to the 30-year autocracy led by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Since protests were launched last week, ElBaradei has emerged as a consensus candidate of various opposition groups for transitional leader.

In addition to slamming ElBaradei, Hoenlein criticized the successive U.S. administrations for failing to achieve an orderly transition to democracy in Egypt. The Bush administration’s democracy initiative was ineffective and then the Obama administration essentially abandoned the cause, Hoenlein said. …

Check out the full report and the audio.