Darth Vader to our Skywalker, Lex Luthor to our Superman, Tupac to our Biggie — I’m of course talking about Joe Klein — needs help understanding the concept of cause and effect. Andrew Sullivan’s new argument is that Israel has essentially forced Iran to pursue nuclear weapons, because Israel is Iran’s “chief rival” in the Middle East. I say this is nonsense on stilts and asked for a single instance of “unprovoked Israeli bellicosity” against Iran. Joe Klein fashions this answer:

How about Israel’s constant threats of military action against Iran’s nuclear program? How about the disproportionate bellicosity Israel visited upon Iran’s Hizballah surrogate in 2006?

Dear Mr. Klein, the operative concept in this bizarre little debate is provocation. Israel’s threats against the Iranian nuclear program have been provoked by Iran’s promise to annihilate the Jewish state. The war against Hezbollah was provoked on July 12th, 2006 by Hezbollah’s rocket barrages and raid into Israeli territory, in which eight IDF soldiers were killed and two were abducted.

Klein’s sense of history reminds me of Nilufar Ebtekar, the Iranian interrogator of the American hostages in 1979, one of whose sessions with an American embassy official was recounted in Mark Bowden’s book, Guests of the Ayatollah:

Daugherty was listening in one night while Ebtekar lectured Schaefer about the inhuman, racist decision to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

“The Japanese started the war, and we ended it,” Schaefer said.
“What do you mean, the Japanese started the war?” Ebtekar asked.
“The Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, so we bombed Hiroshima.”
“Pearl Harbor? Where’s Pearl Harbor?”
“Hawaii.”
Daugherty heard a moment of silence. Then Ebtekar asked, “The Japanese bombed Hawaii?”

It’s true, Mr. Klein. You can look it up.