Israel between rhetoric and reality over Iran

By Abid Mustafa

The recent American overtures to induct Iran in any political settlement
over Iraq have immensely troubled the Israel. So perturbed has been the
government in Tel Aviv that she has mounted a concerted campaign in America
to keep alive the notion that Iran poses a grave danger to the US and must
be thwarted at any cost. On 12/11/2006 The Jerusalem Post reported that an
Israeli Self-Defence Force (IDF) spokesperson told the newspaper that “Only
a military strike by the U.S. and its allies will stop Iran obtaining
nuclear weapons.” While Israeli Defence Minister Ephraim Sneth was more
blunt about attacking Iran. He said, “I am not advocating an Israeli
pre-emptive military action against Iran and I am aware of its possible
repercussions. I consider it a last resort. But even the last resort is
sometimes the only resort.” The Israeli Prime Minister on his visit to
Washington earlier this month said in an interview on NBC’s “Today” show. “I
know that America will not allow Iran to possess nuclear weapons because
this is a danger to the whole Western world.”

American think tanks also joined in the foray against Iran. In an opinion
editorial piece in the Los Angeles Times, Joshua Muarvchik, resident scholar
at the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute said, “We must bomb
Iran. The path of diplomacy and sanctions has led nowhere. Our options
therefore are narrowed to two: we can prepare to live with a nuclear-armed
Iran, or we can use force to prevent it. John Pike, director of
Globalsecurity.org, a military issues think-tank, said. “They are going to
bomb WMD facilities next summer. It would be a limited military action to
destroy their WMD capabilities.”

Clearly uncertainty has permeated the corridors of power in Washington
regarding Iran. On the one hand the Bush administration is prepared to
entertain the idea that force against Iran cannot be ruled out. While at the
same time the Bush administration is warming to the idea of reaching out to
Iran to help US extricate itself from the quagmire in Iraq. The muddled
signals stem from the ongoing conflict between the realists who are in
ascendancy and the neoconservative who are in bitter retreat. The
neoconservatives believe that America’s strategic interests in the Middle
East are intertwined with Israel’s security. Therefore any of Israel’s
neighbours that pose a danger to Israel’s security must be neutralised. This
not only involves disarming the so called menacing country, but also
dividing the country along ethnic and sectarian lines—a sort of
Lebanonisation (term first used by Barnard Lewis the chief patron of the
neocon movement) — where new countries curved out from the bloodshed
perpetrated by the US Army pledge their allegiance to serve the American
Empire. From Israel’s perspective, the Muslim populace surrounding her
borders must be kept busy in perpetual conflicts manufactured by exploiting
ethnic and sectarian tensions, and thereby creating new countries that are
weak and incapable of threatening Israel’s security— this is commonly known
as the Kivunim plan.

The desire to Lebanonise the Middle East came to the fore in US foreign
policy with the emergence of the neoconservatives in the Bush
administration. Their rise to power neatly fitted with Israeli aspirations
and hence their respective interests converged.  With the debacle in Iraq,
the realists have regained the upperhand and are exerting their influence
over all foreign policy matters—included in this revision is Iraq, Palestine
and Iran. What this means for Israel’s supporters inside the Bush
administration is that time is running out for neconservatives likes of
Bolton and Abrams and they will soon be replaced with realists. A more
calibrated approach that is inclusive of the concerns expressed by America’s
allies will be adopted.

Thus the belligerent statements emanating from US and Israeli officials
regarding Iran should not be interpreted as the manifestations of a hostile
US policy towards Iran. Rather, it should be read as the vestige of a
discredited neoconservative theory that is in its last throes. This was
aptly summed up by US Foreign Secretary Rice who mentioned three reasons why
the United States is currently unable to carry out a military operation
against Iran: the wish to solve the crisis through peaceful means; concern
that a military strike will be ineffective - that it would fail to
completely destroy Iran’s nuclear capabilities; and the lack of precise
intelligence on the targets’ locations.

Without US assistance, it is very unlikely that Israel would carry out such
strikes. Leaving the military capability aside, there is another major
factor that makes its difficult for Israel to contemplate military action
against Iran. The Iraq war, the re-occupation of Palestinian territories and
Hizbollah’s stiff resistance has not made Israel any safer. On the contrary,
these events supported and engineered by the neoconservatives have not only
shattered the myth of Israel’s invincibility, but also exposed her
population to perpetual insecurity.

November 25 2006

Abid Mustafa is a political commentator who specialises in Muslim affairs