
While Benjamin Netanyahu says technology is not necessarily the key to economic growth, modern gadgetry certainly helped keep the former Israeli prime minister safe when he visited Penn yesterday.
Netanyahu, who is the chairman of Israel's conservative Likud party and served as the country's minister of finance in 2003, spoke at Huntsman Hall to an audience of several hundred amid dozens of police officers and Israeli secret-service agents. All who attended the event were required to arrive early to undergo a thorough security inspection.
In his address, Netanyahu argued that conservative economic policies are essential to stimulate growth.
"The crucial thing for economic growth is an environment where it pays to innovate, invest and work," he said.
Such an environment, he said, is attainable through tax cuts, radical reform to enhance market competition and government spending reduction.
"Global economy tells us we can reduce taxes now with tolerable pain or do it later with intolerable pain," Netanyahu said. "If radical reform happens, spectacular growth can occur."
Netanyahu said he is confident that globalization is a positive factor and the development of a global market offers "unimaginable prosperity."
Standing in the way, he said, is militant Islam.
"Certain portions of the Islamic world have a seething resentment of Western growth," he said. "We can no longer rely on our Western assumption that religious wars have passed from the world."
Netanyahu warned the audience of Iran's potential nuclear capability and suggested that Israel is merely one potential target of Iranian aggression. He stressed a need for economic vision, power and political will to combat an Iranian threat.
"The power ultimately comes from the people who transcend partisan interest and realize that lives are at stake," he said.
Yoram Wind, a Wharton professor, said he organized the event as part of Wharton's SEI Center Distinguished Lecture Series to "expose the Wharton community to current [economic] development in the world."
"There is not a more articulate spokesman in terms of understanding the economic needs for reform around the world and the global challenge facing nations and companies," he said.
Zach Fuchs, a sophomore in Wharton and the College, said he was impressed with Netanyahu.
"He is the Winston Churchill of our times," he said.
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