While many believe leaders in Tel Aviv are bluffing, the Jewish state gains a lot by threatening to strike Tehran.
What kind of coercion is it when the guy with the gun says: “Do this or I’ll shoot myself in the head?” Not much at all, unless you believe that Israel is hell bent on inflicting great pain on itself, as Seymour Hersh implied back in 1991, in The Samson Option: Israel’s Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign Policy. Despite the fact that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, and a panoply of American backers of Israel have ratcheted up their much-hyped threat to bomb Iran, doing so would explode in Israel’s face. Which is why it won’t happen.
How so? For starters, by attacking Iran – even in the midst of a U.S. election campaign – Israel would run the risk of angering and alienating Washington, its main patron, in a manner likely to forever change the U.S.-Israeli relationship for the worse. Second, with nearly the entire Israeli national security establishment strongly opposed to striking Iran, Netanyahu and Barak would isolate themselves politically, collapse their own government, and perhaps propel a much more dovish coalition into power. Third, striking Iran would trigger devastating counterattacks from Tehran and its allies, including the well-armed Hezbollah movement in Lebanon, leading to hundreds if not thousands of Israel civilian casualties. Fourth, already isolated internationally, Israel would turn itself into a global pariah, a kind of rogue state blamed for the subsequent spike in oil prices, economic carnage, and military conflict in and around the Persian Gulf that could roil the region for a decade or more.
Perhaps most important, nearly all military analysts, in Washington and in Israel itself, believe that even an all-out Israeli attack on Iran would not eliminate its ability to produce a nuclear weapon, Indeed, as Martin Dempsey, the Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, stated last week, “I think that it's a fair characterization to say that they could delay but not destroy Iran's nuclear capabilities.” Worse, as Israel knows, an attack would solidify the power of hawks in Iran’s government.
Not to mention that Iran has no bomb, it isn’t likely to get one for a few years (even if that’s Iran’s intention), and it has no means of delivering a weapon – meaning that the dire threat that Israel says might require a unilateral strike doesn’t exist.
Still, that hasn’t dissuaded Netanyahu and Barak from scaremongering about Iran, nor did it prevent a former Mossad chief, Efraim Halevy, from declaring that Iran should “be very fearful of the next 12 weeks,” i.e., between now and the November Presidential election in the United States.
So, why have Israel’s leaders escalated their rhetoric in recent weeks to a fever pitch? Because they, and their allies – including the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and its spinoff, the Washington Institution for Near East Policy (WINEP), and other, likeminded groups and think tanks – believe that even an outlandish set of threats against Iran can accomplish important objectives for Netanyahu.
What objectives? Let’s consider them in turn.
Photo Credit: U.S. Department of Defense
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Mahboob Khan
Quite a thought provoking article. It's a blackmail of high standards. Are our leaders ready to call an oppressor as an oppressor? It's time for the world's leaders to take a principled stand against oppressor .. any oppressor.
Ahemm
Shouldn't the question be "Why hasn't Iran attacked Israel?"
russell lee
They call it Israel but it's Palestine really.
Ifeanyi Akaolisa
'israel' can hardly attack anything these days. they barely escaped exposure by hamas through a brokered settlement…
Gali
I cant wait for the Day our Lord and Saviour gathers all the nations to their destruction. How can we say without USA there will be no Israel.
get the facts right Without God USA would not even excist and who is the Living God? Yes the God of Israel. Mark my words the moment USA forgets Gods word and joins the nations in dividing his land which he made a covenant with Abraham there Day of Judgement is numbered just as all the other nations read his word all his Prophecys have been spot on.
When will the people of Israel call upon our Lord when will they Trust he will defend them alone without weapons of any sort.
God is in control for everything happening is all part of his plan yes what he has revealed in revelations Israel will become isolated why because God alone will defend his people believe it.
Malcolm
I'm Not Jewish, I am English, and how the Americans have become so poisoned against the Jews, there again I shouldn't Be surprised, it Is the same here In the UK,The Press and all the Media criminalize Israel, but People look to your Bible God will defend Israel.??? how??? I don't know, but because he said it he will do it, Look at Israel now, bible, Can a nation be born In one day???? Israel was, and people say because of the Holocaust ,the Bible didn't' say exactly how,did it, it says he would put hooks in there mouths and turn them around and Gather them from the four corners of the earth.which he did, other words Israel became a sovereign country,In May 1948, and God said no nation who rise up against you shall prosper,and the Arabs tried on two occasions to destroy Israel and failed, Critics say : If it wasn't' for America and the British Israel would be wiped off the face of the earth,Gods word say different,Even if the world turned against Israel God almighty would go to its defense, How I don't no, we have seen the past to the present day how things have turned out,and the future will reveal the answer to this one as well. So I say to any Nation who Attack Israel you will lose,and God bless those who bless Israel and Curse those who curse Israel, you have been warned, Gods word doe's not tell Lies.
Joel Sidney
If and when Iran develops a Nuke the first one they will unload on is Saudi Arabia that's right S.A., with S.A. out of the picture they own the Gulf.
My
Does Custer's Last Stand mean a thing to Israel?
emma
This article is really awesome!
Carlos Eduardo Dantas
Hi friends, there`s another war that nobody knows at all. In Sao Paulo City, the traffic dealers killed 85 police officers from day 1 to day 15 november…and the goverment still says to the people: don`t worry, we have the control of situation`…so, is this not a terrorism attack? a school bus burning is not an attack?
Elias Benayon
And so…