President Obama sounded what was for him a hard line position when he noted during a press conference in Cannes, France about the need to convince the recalcitrant ayatollahs that they should abandon their nuclear program. With a new report on Iranian nukes due next Tuesday from the International Atomic Energy Agency, Obama said he and French President Nicolas Sarkozy intend to “maintain the unprecedented pressure on Iran to meet its obligations.”
But with Russia and China set to block any effort to toughen international sanctions on Iran, it’s likely Tehran was a bit more impressed with the rumblings out of Israel this past week about the possibility of an attack on their nuclear sites than anything Obama said. There is no way yet of knowing whether the rumors about an impending decision from Israel to strike Iranian targets are true yet even the possibility that Jerusalem will not just sit back and wait while the Western powers waste another year or two or three pretending to do something about the problem has to be worrying the Khameini/Ahmadinejad regime. But it may be worrying the U.S. and Europe even more.
In the past week there has been a frenzy of speculation in the Israeli media about the possibility of an Israeli attack. A number of reports claimed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak have already made their decision to hit Iran. The understandable interest in the topic was only heightened today by the testing of a long-range missile from an Israeli air base.
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman blasted the press debate about Iran as irresponsible yet it is far from clear what was the intent of the leakers.
Given the existential threat to Israel that a nuclear weapon in the hands of a radical Islamist regime that has already vowed to annihilate the Jewish state would pose, the need for Netanyahu and Barak to consider a military option is clear. Such a decision could be based on intelligence that saw the Iranians as closer to a weapon that many had thought. The Israeli government knows that the chances of stronger sanctions being voted by the United Nations — even after the publication of a frank IAEA report on Iran next week — are slim. The possibility of a Western strike on Iran in the foreseeable future is virtually nil. So if anyone is going to do something to prevent the creation of an Iranian nuclear umbrella for Hamas and Hezbollah it may have to be the Israelis.
Netanyahu also knows that the United States will, as it has in the past, seek to prevent an Israeli strike, which could, at the very least, complicate America’s position in Iraq an Afghanistan. It should also be conceded that the consequences to Israel of a war with Iran — and the extended bombing campaign that would be required to have any hope of putting a dent in Iran’s program cannot be characterized as anything less than a war — would be awful. While Iran’s ability to hit Israel with missiles might not scare the IDF, it is certain that both northern and southern Israel would come under missile attack from Iran’s terrorist proxies in Lebanon and Gaza and have a terrible impact on the nation’s economy and morale. That, and not the possibility of the avalanche of condemnation from the West, might be enough to deter Netanyahu from pulling the trigger on an attack.
A more reasonable explanation for the leaks might be an Israeli attempt to scare the world into thinking it will attack Iran so as to force the hand of Russia, China and a reluctant Western Europe on the sort of draconian sanctions that might finally make an impression on Tehran.
This highlights an interesting conundrum in this standoff. As a result of three years of alternating appeasement disguised as “engagement” with ineffectual diplomatic activity on behalf of sanctions, Obama’s “tough talk” doesn’t scare the ayatollahs. They think he is a weak sister who hasn’t the will to stand up to them and believe Russia and China will never be persuaded to vote for real sanctions.
On the other hand, the Israelis scare the heck out of the Western Europeans and other Iranian business partners who regard an Israeli strike with more horror than the possibility of an Iranian nuke.
It is just possible that Israel’s saber rattling might be enough, along with the IAEA report, to jolt the UN into doing a bit more on Iran than it might otherwise have done. Rather than the Israelis actually being in interest about an attack or seeking to scare some sense into Tehran, the real audience for the speculation may be the Jewish state’s timorous Western friends.
