In 2014, as Iran’s nuclear ambitions were racing ahead and its terror proxies were destabilizing the region, the Obama administration was more focused on insulting allies than confronting adversaries. A senior official in the White House dismissed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a “chickenshit,” claiming he lacked the guts to take military action against Iran. At the time, President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry were furiously trying to finalize a nuclear deal with the Islamic Republic—one they claimed would block Iran’s path to a bomb.

They couldn’t have been more wrong.

The 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) did not dismantle Iran’s nuclear infrastructure. It left the centrifuges spinning, allowed weapons research to continue under the radar, and set an expiration date that kicked the can just long enough to get Obama through his second term. Worse, the deal pumped billions into Iran’s economy, fueling the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism—from Hezbollah in Lebanon to militias in Yemen and Syria, and of course Hamas in Gaza.

Today, a decade later, Iran is sitting on enough enriched uranium for multiple nuclear weapons and is acquiring advanced missile technology from China. The nuclear threshold Obama promised to prevent has not only been crossed—it’s being fortified.

At the same time in 2014-5, Kerry was floundering with the Palestinians. He insisted in 2016 that “there will be no separate peace between Israel and the Arab world.” That statement aged poorly. Under President Trump, the Abraham Accords blew apart that diplomatic orthodoxy, normalizing relations between Israel and multiple Arab nations—without Palestinian involvement. It turns out peace was possible, just not with failed ideas and appeasement-driven diplomacy.

Netanyahu, meanwhile, never wavered in identifying Iran as the central threat. In a 2021 interview, he reflected on the Jewish people’s tragic history of failing to recognize danger in time. He saw what others refused to acknowledge—and acted.

The legacy of Obama and Kerry is one of missed opportunities, emboldened enemies, and childish fantasies. The consequences are now unavoidable—and the man they mocked is the one who understood the moment all along.

Related:

Denied No More (September 2020)

John Kerry: The Declaration and Observations of a Failure (December 2016)

Half Standards: Gun Control and the Iranian Nuclear Weapons Deal (September 2015)

The Joys of Iranian Pistachios and Caviar (July 2015)