Lessons From The Israeli Comptroller’s Report

June 13, 2012 § 1 Comment

Israeli Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss released a report earlier today slamming Bibi Netanyahu and Ehud Barak for their shoddy preparation, decision-making, and faulty assumptions in the lead up to the violence aboard the Mavi Marmara two years ago. Lindenstrauss detailed the way in which Netanyahu ignored warnings to convene the cabinet and hold a group discussion about how to prepare for the flotilla, did not consult with the National Security Council (a body first created by Netanyahu when he served as prime minister in the 1990s and with which the PM is required by law to consult), and along with Barak ignored warnings from military officials that boarding the boat would be a violent and potentially fatal enterprise. The picture painted here is one of two men making decisions in isolation without involving any other people with expertise and experience, rejecting or downplaying warnings that contradict their previously formed opinions, and forming plans without all the necessary information because they either couldn’t be bothered to obtain it or willfully ignored it. Unsurprisingly given what the report says about how he processes information contradicting what he already believes, Netanyahu’s response was to essentially ignore it by saying that Israeli security under his watch proves that there are no problems.

Amir Mizroch has a devastating critique of Netanyahu and Barak in which he points out that this behavior is not surprising given the two men’s backgrounds as elite commandos, which leads them to view everything as a military problem to be neutralized rather than looking at the wide range of security and diplomatic implications. This created a terrible problem that is ongoing with Turkey, and it does not inspire confidence on Netanyahu and Barak’s threat assessment regarding Iran, their willingness to legitimately exhaust all other options before striking Iran’s nuclear facilities, or their preparedness and sense of reality for what the aftermath of an attack on Iran will bring. Netanyahu has faced an avalanche of criticism from former defense and intelligence officials, and he or his spokesmen have brushed it all aside by denigrating their motives, their current level of knowledge, their lack of understanding of just how existential the Iranian threat is, and stressing that ultimately only he is responsible for the fate of Israel and the Jewish people. It has been widely reported for months, if not years at this point, that he and Barak are keeping their own counsel and not involving the rest of the security cabinet when it comes to national security decision-making. In short, nearly every mistake that the pair made in the run-up to the flotilla as outlined in Lindenstrauss’s report is being made a second time in the run-up to a decision on Iran. After reading this, does anyone still trust that Netanyahu and Barak have looked at all the angles, considered every possibility, and are listening to the opinions given and information presented by the IDF and the Mossad? Jeffrey Goldberg has just posted a write up of an interview he did with former Mossad chief (and strident Netanyahu critic) Meir Dagan in which the following paragraph appears:

But what angers him most is what he sees as a total lack of understanding on the part of the men who lead the Israeli government about what may come the day after an Israeli strike. Some senior Israeli officials have argued to me that a strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities might actually trigger the eventual downfall of the regime. Dagan predicts the opposite: “Judging by the war Iran fought against Iraq, even people who supported the Shah, even the Communists, joined hands with (Ayatollah) Khomeini to fight Saddam,” he said, adding, “In case of an attack, political pressure on the regime will disappear. If Israel will attack, there is no doubt in my mind that this will also provide them with the justification to go ahead and move quickly to nuclear weapons.” He also predicted that the sanctions program engineered principally by President Obama may collapse as a result of an Israeli strike, which would make it easier for Iran to obtain the material necessary for it to cross the nuclear threshold.

That Netanyahu has brushed off Lindenstrauss entirely is disturbing, since it suggests that he has learned nothing from his previous mistakes and is set in the way he makes decisions. Netanyahu claimed to the comptroller that nobody ever mentioned to him the possibility that taking the Mavi Marmara would end in fighting, but the report details that at least three ministers raised objections and questions along these line and were simply ignored. How many more scathing post-mortems of failed Israeli military operations need to be issued before some lessons are learned? Apparently the Winograd Commission did not do the trick, and the Lindenstrauss flotilla report has already met the same fate less than 24 hours after being released. If Netanyahu sincerely plans on striking Iran, he had better have all of his ducks in a row, since the flotilla blowback is nothing compared to what will happen should Israel be unprepared for an Iranian or Hizballah response. Netanyahu has now used up his last credible excuse, since nobody is going to believe at this point that he has listened to every possible voice and considered a wide range of advice. He needs to firm up his decision-making process to ensure that whatever he choice he eventually makes is an informed one.

Friday Gallimaufry

June 1, 2012 § Leave a comment

Since there isn’t any one particular subject that I feel compelled to write about today, I thought I’d pay tribute to my all-time favorite website and share some brief thoughts on a bunch of interesting items in the news.

Israeli politicians this week can’t seem to keep their feet out of their mouths. First Kadima MK Yulia Shamalov-Berkovich called for “all human rights activists” to be arrested, imprisoned, and then “transported to camps we are building.” The camps she is referring to are detention centers the government is building for migrants who are entering Israel illegally, but Shamalov-Berkovich apparently thinks they can be put to better use for people whose views she simply doesn’t like. Not to be outdone, Shas MK and Interior Minister Eli Yishai called South Tel Aviv – which has become an African immigrant stronghold – the garbage can of the country and claimed that many Israeli women have been raped by African migrants but are not coming forward and reporting it because they are afraid of the stigma of AIDS. He did not provide any evidence for this assertion, and was immediately rebutted by those who would know better. Somehow I get the feeling that Eli Yishai might be an Antoine Dodson fan.

The New York Times has a long report on President Obama’s efforts to launch an all-out cyber war against Iran’s nuclear program, detailing his decision to accelerate the cyber attacks in order to prevent an Iranian nuclear weapon. I look forward to the spin from the usual quarters explaining how this demonstrates that Obama hates Israel, has no desire to prevent a nuclear Iran, and is selling out Israel’s security in order to curry favor with Muslims.

Also in the NYT today is a story about the Russian Orthodox Church’s opposition to intervention in Syria and how this in some ways guides Russian policy. Vladimir Putin has turned to the church for political support, and the church’s mission of protecting Christian minorities in the Middle East is bumping up against any Russian will to get rid of Assad (to the extent that any really exists at all). This is a useful reminder of what an immensely powerful religious lobby actually looks like and how it affects a state’s foreign policy, as opposed to an intellectually lazy and factually questionable argument along the same lines.

Finally, this op-ed by New York-based Turkish reporter Aydoğan Vatandaş on how U.S.-Israeli relations and its impact on American Jews affects the U.S. presidential race was interesting for a bunch of reasons. First, the reasons that Vatandaş lists for why the Israeli government is disappointed with the Obama administration includes the U.S. relationship with Turkey and focuses on Turkey’s request for Predator drones. I don’t think that Israel expects the U.S. to ditch Turkey, and I also don’t think that Israel is overly concerned about the U.S. selling Predators to Ankara for strategic reasons, since if Turkey and Israel ever actually exchanged hostilities, drones would not play a role. Israel does not, however, want the U.S. to sell Predators to Turkey simply as a way of pressuring Turkey to reconcile, and Vatandaş is strangely optimistic that the sale will occur, which has almost no chance of getting through Congress at the moment. The other thing that jumped out at me was some of the questionable or overly simplistic analysis, capped off by the conclusion, which reads, “It may sound strange, but what I have observed in America is that most American Jews today define themselves as Jews but also tend to be very secular. And, in terms of politics, they tend to be very liberal.” This is a fairly obvious point to any American who follows politics, but to a Turkish audience it might not be, and it got me wondering about whether my own analysis of Turkey reads as simplistically (or perhaps wrongly) to a Turkish audience. Something to think about…

Which Of These Two Things Is More Important?

May 18, 2012 § Leave a comment

Bibi Netanyahu and Ehud Barak are both abroad and are, among other things, engaged in their usual efforts to keep the pressure up on Iran. Netanyahu is in Prague while Barak was in Washington, but there are mixed signals coming from their dual diplomatic missions. After bringing seven cabinet members with him (including Avigdor Lieberman, who is apparently allowed to engage in actual diplomacy on rare occasions) and meeting with the Czech president yesterday, Netanyahu today said that he sees no evidence that Iran is about to halt its nuclear program, and compared its negotiation strategy to that of North Korea with the ultimate goal of delaying and buying more time. In doing so, he threw a bucket of cold water on the P5+1 talks scheduled for May 23 by making it clear that he views them as a farce. This is of course not surprising, but coming on the eve of the NATO summit and less than a week before the negotiations in Baghdad, it certainly reads as Netanyahu communicating his desire to strike Iran sooner rather than later, and unilaterally if need be. He also emerged with some support from his hosts, as Israel and the Czech Republic issued a joint statement expressing concern over Iran’s uranium enrichment program and the Czech foreign minister reiterated that the Czech Republic plans on continuing to support Israel within the EU. Combined with the story in Yediot that Israeli military and defense officials have suddenly gone quiet on Iran, it points to Israel preparing to attack on its own timetable and by itself if need be.

Meanwhile, Barak was in the U.S. meeting with Leon Panetta to request more money for the Iron Dome missile defense system and undoubtedly to talk about Iran as well. This comes on the heels of Israeli military intelligence chief Aviv Kochavi’s secret visit to Washington a couple of weeks ago to talk about Iran as well. Barak’s meeting with Panetta must have gone well, because it was announced afterward that not only is the U.S. committing more money to Iron Dome down the road, it is providing an immediate extra boost of $70 million so that Israel can fund more Iron Dome batteries in 2012. It seems unlikely to me that the funding guarantees for Iron Dome do not come with a promise of Israeli restraint in return, since this is a crucial component of Israel’s defense strategy and this is an area where the U.S. has leverage over the Iran issue. It is widely presumed that the U.S. does not want Israel to attack Iran, and it certainly does not want Israel to do so before the U.S. strategy of sanctions and P5+1 negotiations is exhausted, so the fact that top Israeli officials are still shuttling to Washington for close consultations and emerging with money for Israeli military priorities indicates that the U.S. and Israel are on the same page with regard to a strike on Iranian facilities.

So which of these two events has more explanatory power in thinking about what is going to happen next with Iran? As my regular readers know, I think that actions speak louder than words here, and I don’t believe that we are going to see an Israeli strike on Iran this summer. There are obviously electoral considerations in play that make some think that Israel will launch an attack before November, which is presumed to then tie President Obama’s hands and leave him no choice but to fully support Israel irrespective of the strike’s consequences. While this makes sense, I don’t think that the Pentagon would be authorizing extra money for Iron Dome that was not in the original defense budget if Obama and Panetta thought that Israel was going to flout their wishes, and so my money is on Barak’s itinerary being a lot more consequential than Netanyahu’s this week.

The Likud-Kadima Deal Is Not About Iran

May 8, 2012 § 10 Comments

Last night right after the news broke that Shaul Mofaz and Kadima were joining Bibi Netanyahu’s governing coalition and that the early elections that had been announced for September 4 are now off, I wrote this post on the implications of the deal for Israeli domestic politics. On the morning after, I have a few more thoughts pertaining to how the new unity government will affect changes in Israeli foreign policy. The short version is, it won’t.

The area in which some people are expecting Israeli policy to shift with the new government is Iran. Jeffrey Goldberg thinks that the larger coalition and unity government might make it easier for Netanyahu to strike Iranian nuclear sites should he be so inclined. I think it is true that it makes doing so easier since the new coalition comprises 93 out of 120 MKs, and a unity government deciding to launch an attack takes some of the bite out of the recent cascade of criticism coming from former defense and intelligence leaders. Kadima joining the coalition, however, does not alter the basic realities that were preventing Netanyahu and Barak from carrying out a strike months ago. Israeli public opinion is still ambivalent on a unilateral Israeli strike, U.S. and world pressure to wait and give sanctions more time has not disappeared, four out of the eight Shminiya (Octet) members are still opposed, and the security and intelligence establishment have raised legitimate concerns that cannot be waved away just because Kadima joined the government. Add to all this the fact that Israel has serious renewed security concerns on its southern border with Egypt and is keeping an eye on its northern border following reports that Scud missile installations being moved closer to the border in Syria, and attacking Iran appears to be a dicey proposition.

There is also the Mofaz factor, which does not necessarily weigh in favor of a strike. Looking at Mofaz’s position on Iran, a little over a month ago he blasted Netanyahu for pushing for a strike that he deemed would be premature and ineffective, and said that he would stand with any PM who ordered an attack as the last resort but that Israel was not yet at that stage. Just yesterday, he accused Netanyahu of politicizing the issue of a strike and endangering the relationship with the U.S. Now, anything Mofaz said in the guise of campaigning must be taken with a grain of salt, but that he chose to hit Bibi hard on Iran cannot just be brushed aside so easily. It is also important to remember that Mofaz was not campaigning primarily on security or defense issues but rather donned the mantle of social justice, and was particularly targeting preferential treatment for Haredim. The deal with Likud gives Mofaz and Kadima the task of leading the committee charged with coming up with a Tal Law alternative, which is again not a security-related issue. It is easy to think that bringing a former defense minister and IDF chief of staff on board must mean that Netanyahu is seeking to add another buffer against criticism should he choose to attack Iran, but the details of Mofaz’s campaign and the particulars of the unity deal do not necessarily point to this conclusion. There are now three former chiefs of staff in the cabinet – Barak, Mofaz, and Yaalon – and based on what we know, only one of them is on board for an imminent unilateral strike on Iran. Just because the cabinet is full of generals does not mean that they are all gung ho to launch a new military adventure.

There is, however, one important way in which Israeli foreign policy might change with this unity deal, and that is the renewed empowerment of the foreign minister should Avigdor Lieberman be indicted, which I expect will happen in light of Zeev Ben Arie’s indictment and plea bargain last week. If Lieberman has to leave the government, it is safe to assume that Mofaz will take his place, and Israel will then once again have a foreign minister who is actually trusted to carry out the state’s diplomacy. This would undoubtedly be a good development should it occur, since Israel’s Foreign Ministry is too important to be left in incompetent hands.

When all is said and done, I do not think this deal is about Iran. I think it was done for domestic political considerations first and foremost. Let’s remember that while Netanyahu has faced no real challenges, Likud has not been on nearly as solid footing as its party leader. It is right now the second largest party in the Knesset – and that Kadima is the largest but is only getting one minister slot out of this deal tells you all you need to know about its long term prospects – but had been facing a new threat from Yesh Atid, a Labor bump following summer social justice protests, and a rightwing revolt within its own ranks led by Moshe Feiglin, Danny Danon, and others who do not find Netanyahu sufficiently committed to the settlement cause. The deal with Kadima eliminates these problems or gives Netanyahu more time to deal with them. By bringing Kadima and Mofaz into the coalition, it increases the chances that an increasingly unpopular Kadima (polls had it coming in fourth or fifth were elections to be held in September) will simply merge back with Likud before October 2013 and undo the rift that Ariel Sharon created in order to pull out of Gaza. It also cuts the legs out from under Yair Lapid and his new party before it can really get off the ground, and while Yesh Atid might stick around and build support, October 2013 is a long ways away for a party that has no seats in the Knesset. A newly stabilized government gives Netanyahu more time to quell the growing backbench rebellion within Likud as well, and he can expect Kadima to now back him full-tilt on settlements once he backs Mofaz’s Tal Law alternative. In sum, this is move to bring in Kadima and cancel the early elections is a no-brainer that eliminates potential rival parties, strengthens Likud internally, and probably increases its vote share over what it would have gotten in September. Does it make it easier to attack Iran? Sure – Mofaz might now become Netanyahu’s Colin Powell inasmuch as his known reticence about a strike and his presence in the cabinet make it more credible should Netanyahu decide to act. But I don’t think that is the correct prism through which to view yesterday’s political machinations.

P.S. Related to all of this, Brent Sasley has a great post over at Mideast Matrix that is well worth a read because it gets to the root causes of Israel’s political dysfunction. The casual observer familiar only with the American form of government looks at the fact that the Israeli prime minister just decided on a whim to cancel his own call for early elections and put them off for over a year as a gross violation of democracy, when in fact it is par for the course in a parliamentary system. That does not mean, however, that all is well with Israeli politics, and Brent makes a great counter-intuitive argument that yesterday’s events actually strengthen Israel democracy by temporarily papering over some of the immense structural problems that exist in the system.

Israeli Politics Blows Up, Part 1

April 30, 2012 § 4 Comments

Lots of big news happened over the weekend with far-reaching consequences, so let’s start with Friday’s Yuval Diskin speech. Diskin, the former head of the Shin Bet, slammed Netanyahu and Barak – and did so in a particularly insulting manner tinged with class-based resentment by referring to them as the “messiahs from Akirov [the expensive high end apartment building in Tel Aviv where Barak resides] and Caesaerea” – as being unfit to lead the government and for presenting Israelis with a false choice on Iran. Diskin said that he does not trust either of them, and that they are wrong to declare that striking Iran will set back its nuclear program when in fact it might accelerate it. He also warned about right wing extremists on both sides of the Green Line and said that something like the Rabin assassination could easily happen again, and charged Netanyahu with not wanting to conduct peace talks with the Palestinians because it would break apart his coalition. Diskin’s broadside launched a round of recriminations, with the pro-Bibi camp charging Diskin of petty score-settling over the fact that he was not appointed head of the Mossad following his time as head of the Shin Bet, and ex-Mossad chief Meir Dagan – himself a strident critic of Netanyahu and Barak over the Iran issue – and ex-IDF chief Gabi Ashkenazi both publicly supporting Diskin.

Let’s sort this all out. What precisely is going on here? To begin with, there is no doubt that personality issues are part of this very public feud. Diskin’s strikingly sneering personal tone is unusual for a critique solely based on the merits, and he is clearly still upset about not getting the Mossad job. It is also well known that the trio of Diskin, Dagan, and Askenazi were all pushed aside and replaced by Netanyahu partially to clear the way for a strike on Iran since all three of them were opposed to such a move, and this is coming back to haunt Bibi as they are now getting their revenge. That does not mean, however, that they are wrong, although Diskin is the least qualified to register such a strong objection given that his portfolio had him dealing mainly with Palestinian issues and not with Iran.

It’s tough to say why Diskin decided to speak up now and do it so harshly, but it definitely fuels speculation that he wants to enter politics and that this was his opening salvo. I also wonder, given his area of expertise and the fact that he was critical on a host of topics, if he meant for the Iran issue to be front and center or if he instead expected his criticisms of Netanyahu’s stance toward the Palestinians to be the headline in the weekend papers. Diskin holding forth on Iran is unusual because it would be analogous to the FBI director attacking the White House over drone policy in Pakistan – he certainly knows more about it than most people, but it falls far outside his portfolio. More appropriately, Diskin went after Bibi pretty hard on the Palestinian front, essentially accusing him of negotiating in bad faith and insisting that Netanyahu rather than Abbas was the person responsible for the lack of progress due to his having no interest in altering the existing status quo. Diskin also stressed his bona fides on the topic by pointing out that he knows what is going on from being up close to the Palestinian issue and dealing with it personally, and that the West Bank is primed to explode in frustration over the lack of progress toward a Palestinian state. The news has a way of spiraling out of people’s control, and I’ll bet that Diskin did not necessarily expect his Iran comments to be the ones dominating the airwaves.

It is also interesting to see who spoke up in defense of Netanyahu and Barak and who did not. Likud ministers went after Diskin, including Yuval Steinitz (Finance), Limor Livnat (Culture and Sport), and Yisrael Katz (Transportation), but there were some mixed signals from people who actually matter when it comes to Iran. Avigdor Lieberman criticized Diskin for serving out his full Shin Bet term if he had such major issues with Netanyahu and Barak, but in the same sentence praised Diskin as an excellent Shin Bet head and stressed that the entire security cabinet and not just Bibi and Barak would be making decisions on Iran. Silvan Shalom, who is the vice PM, also praised Diskin’s tenure at the Shin Bet and stressed that the decision to strike Iran is not Netanyahu and Barak’s alone to make. Most importantly (and ominously for Netanyahu), the silence from Moshe Yaalon, Dan Meridor, Benny Begin, and Eli Yishai was deafening. These four, as faithful readers of this blog may recall, are the members of the Shminiya believed to be opposed to attacking Iran, and they did not come out swinging in Netanyahu or Barak’s defense. Combined with the fact that current IDF head Benny Gantz is evidently bearish on the idea as well, and that Netanyahu is historically an extremely cautious political actor, it signals that Bibi is still fighting an uphill battle and confirms my longstanding belief that a strike is nowhere near imminent.

At the end of the day, no matter what Diskin’s motives or his credibility level, his speaking out is not a good development for Netanyahu and Barak’s freedom of action on Iran. Israel has great respect for its military, security, and intelligence leaders, many of whom later enter politics with great success, including current Cabinet members Barak and Yaalon and Kadima head Shaul Mofaz and Kadima MK Avi Dichter. The current and previous four IDF chiefs (Gantz, Ashkenazi, Dan Halutz, Yaalon, and Mofaz) are all on record as opposing a strike or are believed to oppose a strike at this point in time, and while Mofaz clearly has political reasons for being opposed given his status as opposition leader, the other four do not. All of this carries weight with Israelis, and it should carry weight with Netanyahu and Barak as well. This Yediot article quotes a bunch of anonymous state and defense officials trashing Diskin, including one “senior minister who has a close relationship with Netanyahu” saying that Diskin fits into a legacy of “moronic Shin Bet chiefs,” but it cannot escape notice that not one of the people questioning Diskin’s intelligence or abilities was willing to go on record. The fact that the security and military officials who matter primarily appear to view attacking Iran right now as a bad idea is not a small problem that Netanyahu and Barak can wave away. In the grand scheme of things, Yuval Diskin’s opinion might not matter, but he stands as a proxy for a larger group of people whose opinion does.

Turkey and Iranian Oil

April 26, 2012 § 6 Comments

One of the obstacles, if not the largest obstacle, to peeling Turkey away from Iran is the economic ties between the two, particularly when it comes to energy. Turkey imports 90% of its oil, and Iran was its largest supplier until 2007 when Russia took the top spot. Through March of this year, Turkey was importing 200,000 barrels per day from Iran, which accounted for 30% of Turkey’s oil imports and 7% of Iran’s oil exports. This is obviously a huge barrier for the U.S. to gaining closer cooperation from Turkey in pressuring Iran over its nuclear program, and the announcement last month that Turkey was slashing its oil purchases from Iran by as much as 20% was accordingly a big deal.

Turkey does not import oil from Iran because it is necessarily a supporter of the regime, but because Iran has been a convenient source. There are, however, real bilateral energy issues between the two that make Turkey receptive to U.S. entreaties to get its oil from elsewhere. Turkey consumes around 1.3 trillion cubic feet of natural gas annually and it imports 24% of its gas from Iran, but Iran charges Turkey more than $500 per 1000 cubic meters of gas, which is more than it charges any other country and $100 more than the market price. In contrast, Turkey pays $350 for gas from Azerbaijan and $400 for Russian gas. Turkey is stuck because it signed a 25 year deal with Iran in 1996 and because it has no way of replacing Iranian gas imports, which Tehran knows full well, and in the last few weeks Turkey has taken Iran into international arbitration over its natural gas price gouging. The gas price has become an even bigger problem in the past year as energy prices have risen across the board fueled by insecurity about global energy supplies, which led to a 40% increase in Turkey’s energy imports in 2011 as compared to 2010. The point here is that Turkey may very well be actively looking into ways to reduce its reliance on Iranian oil anyway, U.S. pressure or not. The agreement to buy oil from Libya in conjunction with reducing Iranian imports is a good first step, since it gets Turkey’s foot in the door with the new Libyan government, and might eventually lead to Saudi concessions on price as well.

It is in this context that today’s news that Turkey is starting oil and gas drilling in northern Cyprus should be viewed. Obviously this is partly a response to Cyprus’s own oil and gas exploration, but TPAO’s drilling is not merely symbolic. Turkey’s energy needs are enormous and growing, and the question is whether it will have to continue relying on Iran or if it can fill the gap somewhere else. If the answer ends up being the latter, it will have the effect of isolating Iran further and making a resolution to the nuclear issue that does not involve military strikes more likely. To that end – and to continue beating a dead horse from previous posts – a Turkish-Israeli rapprochement would help Turkey soften the blow from Iranian natural gas once the Tamar and Leviathan natural gas fields are up and running in 2013. In any event, keep an eye out for Turkey exploring any possibility open to it as far as oil and gas are concerned, since that will yield clues as to how the Iranian nuclear standoff is likely to be resolved.

Misreading Benny Gantz

April 25, 2012 § Leave a comment

Andrew Sullivan’s takeaway from the Benny Gantz interview is that the Israeli military does not view Iran as an existential threat, and he implies that much like many Israeli military leaders were opposed to the Iraq War, Gantz’s comments might mean that the same applies here too. Certainly Gantz is clear that he does not think Iran is developing nuclear weapons yet, but the quote that Andrew pulls out has to be read in its proper context, which is sorely missing. The full quote on Khamenei’s rationality is as follows:

“If the supreme religious leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei wants, he will advance it to the acquisition of a nuclear bomb, but the decision must first be taken. It will happen if Khamenei judges that he is invulnerable to a response. I believe he would be making an enormous mistake, and I don’t think he will want to go the extra mile. I think the Iranian leadership is composed of very rational people. But I agree that such a capability, in the hands of Islamic fundamentalists who at particular moments could make different calculations, is dangerous.”

Two important points to note in here. First, Gantz is open to the possibility that because the Iranian leader is unquestionably an Islamic fundamentalist, he might at any point make a different decision that would not fall under the category of being rational. This means that Gantz does not have the same cocksure certainty about what Iran is ultimately going to do as Andrew does. It is trite to imply that Gantz does not see Iran as threatening or favor military action under the right circumstances when he leaves his reading of Khamenei’s actions open to revision. This leads to the second important point, namely that Gantz thinks Khamenei will pursue a bomb if the supreme leader believes that he can get away with it because Iran’s nuclear facilities are impervious to attack. This is in line with something that Gantz says earlier in the interview:

“The military option is the last chronologically but the first in terms of its credibility. If it’s not credible it has no meaning. We are preparing for it in a credible manner. That’s my job, as a military man.”

And on the question of whether the threat is existential for Israel as compared to America:

“We aren’t two oceans away from the problem – we live here with our civilians, our women and our children, so we interpret the extent of the urgency differently. “

The problem here, and the point that Sullivan misses, is that only the threat of serious military action transforms the threat from Iran from an existential, life-altering one into the kind of ordinary adversarial threat with which Israel is used to dealing, but Sullivan generally thinks that Israeli threats are an unquestionably bad thing. Gantz is not downplaying the possibility of an Iranian nuclear weapon that might be used against Israel, but stressing that just because Iran does not appear in his view to be developing nuclear arms right now does not foreclose completely the possibility that it will happen down the road. And the best way of making Iran stick to this path is by keeping the sword of Damocles hanging over its head. Does this mean that the Israeli military does not view Iran as an existential threat? I don’t think it does. It means that Gantz has a hard-eyed view of what it takes to contain this threat and ensure that it does not become unmanageable. As always, context is king. Even Abdullah Gül concedes the tough spot the Israelis are in with Iran in an interview in the current issue of Foreign Policy in which he says, “I don’t mean to in any way disregard the threat perception on the part of Israel either,” while expressing his opinion that Israel should not attack Iran.

Given all this, I think the Gantz interview actually makes me a bit more charitable toward Netanyahu, as shocking as that may be. Bibi’s constant threats and warnings certainly fulfill Gantz’s desire to make Israeli military action appear to be as credible as possible. I have written a bunch of times that I think Israel is bluffing and does not intend to strike Iran, and to the extent that this is true, it plays directly into what Gantz says has to be done to prevent Iran from trying to develop a nuclear weapon.

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