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Middle East

Beat the Clock

The White House has put the squeeze on Iran with a serious sanctions regime in the past few months. But for Israel, it may be too little, too late.

By Lee Smith|February 23, 2012 7:00 AM|8comments
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A Iranian man looks at a wanted poster with portraits of U.S. President Barack Obama, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, and British Prime Minister David Cameron during the funeral of Iranian nuclear scientist Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan in Tehran on Jan. 13, 2012, two days after he was killed by a bomb in his car. (Atta Kenare/AFP/Getty Images)

From an American perspective, it seems that the White House has finally gotten serious about bringing the Iranian nuclear program to a halt. After President Obama’s policy of engagement came up empty, the administration, pressed by Senate leaders, finally implemented sanctions against the Central Bank of Iran and the Iranian energy sector on Dec. 31 and then leveled more sanctions against the bank earlier this month. The sanctions have sent the Iranian currency into freefall.

The squeeze continues: This month, Congress pressured the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, which provides tens of thousands of financial institutions with a system for transferring money around the world, to block Iranian institutions from using the service. SWIFT announced last week that it “stands ready to act and discontinue its services to sanctioned Iranian financial institutions as soon as it has clarity on EU legislation currently being drafted.”

From the American point of view, all this is a clear sign, as Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said recently that “The United States … does not want Iran to develop a nuclear weapon. That’s a red line for us.”

But for Israel, this still falls way short of the mark.

If you want to understand how the Jewish state sees the nascent Iranian nuclear arms program, you need to stop thinking like a superpower with vast resources that inhabits a virtual island several thousand miles from the Persian Gulf—and start thinking like a tiny state with limited resources, formed in the aftermath of the Holocaust, and within ballistic missile range of Iran. You’re going to go along with your American patron as far as you can, but in the end, you’re going to keep your own counsel.

***

Last month at the annual Herzliya conference, which brings Israel’s top political, military, and security echelons together with their colleagues from around the world, the majority of Israeli officials and analysts I spoke with said they believe the sanctions have come too late. Perhaps five years ago, economic suffering might have forced the Iranian regime to reconsider its plans. But now with Iran enriching uranium to 20 percent, moving it closer to producing weapons-grade uranium, and even Panetta admitting that the Iranians are a year away from building a nuclear weapon, there are two choices: Either accept that the Islamic Republic has joined the nuclear club, or bomb the country’s nuclear facilities in the hope of setting the program back, at least by a few years. If it’s become increasingly clear to Israel that the Obama Administration is not going to take military action, the question is: When does Israel pull the trigger?

Some experts make the case that Israel’s war against Iran’s nuclear program is already well under way. “Over the last decade Israel has spent a lot of money to prepare for all sorts of options on Iran,” David Wurmser, formerly Vice President Dick Cheney’s Middle East adviser, told me this week. Such options include computer worms, like Stuxnet, and covert operations, like the assassination of nuclear scientists and sabotaging military installations, as well as possible commando raids and air raids.

Now the head of a consulting group called Delphi, which has a few sensitive projects in Israel, Wurmser says it is crunch time for Israeli leaders. He’s seen a marked shift in Israel’s security establishment over the last few months. Perhaps the surest sign is that President Shimon Peres, not typically perceived as a hawk on Iran, has begun warning that a nuclear Iran poses an existential threat to Israel and is “a real danger to humanity as a whole.” Said Wurmser: “It’s not just about Bibi and his historical legacy anymore. He doesn’t need to be a leader in a Churchillian mode, because the consensus on attacking Iran is broad based.”

Continue reading: Covert warfare

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Lee Smith is a senior editor at the Weekly Standard, a fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and the author of The Strong Horse: Power, Politics, and the Clash of Arab Civilizations.
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  • Carl

    What I don’t understand is why Israel should be worried more than Europe or the US. The Iranians could fairly easily detonate a “suitcase” nuclear bomb anywhere in the world. Also they have been able to launch satellites into orbit which means that they can shoot a ballistic missile anywhere they want.

  • JCarpenter

    As with our current 10-year debacle, I am concerned with our equating a nation, a people (most of whom are powerless to voice any effective protest or cause any lasting change in their govt.) with the nefarious powers who rule. Military action of any nature may be purposed to punish or depose govts./rogue leaders,but the “collateral damage” of hundreds of thousands of human lives is as despicable as the powers to be taken out—

  • http://theolivebranch.myfastforum.org/forum46.php Jacob Blues

    Two reasons Carl. The first is that Iran, since the days of Khomenei, voiced a political platform that called for the destruction of Israel. All the hype about whether or not Iranian President Achmadinejad said this or that is really just a small cog in a larger political construct. Iranian leaders, including those labelled as so-called political moderates have voiced the same destructive rhetoric.

    By contrast, Iran has not repeated its calls for the elimination of Europe as a whole, or even a single political European nation. And, while Iran has had its people shout ‘Death To America” on a regular basis, the power disparity between Iran and the US is magnitudes, in favor of the United States. Iran may wonder whether or not Israel has the capacity to fight it, there is no question about the United States. Should it happen that the US finds itself with a legitimate reason to invade Iran, it would, and no power the Iranians have could stop it.

    As for the rocket question, there is a seperate issue between the ability to launch a rocket, and to construct a nuclear warhead that would fit into the nose cone of said rocket.

    It is Iran’s research on the latter part that raised all sorts of red flags in the last IAEA report.

  • http://theolivebranch.myfastforum.org/forum46.php Jacob Blues

    The alternative JC, is that Iran successfully develops a nuclear weapon.

    There are two concerns there. First, that Iran would use its nuclear power to attack Israel.

    Second, Iran has many neighbors that compete with it, and who are concerned about its military capability. Notable among these neighbors is Saudi Arabia and Iraq.

    While the Sauds may not have the brain power to develop a nuclear weapons program on their own, their pockets are deep enough that they could purchase a device (or more) from say Pakistan.

    The Sauds and Egypt compete for the pinnicle of the Arab world. The Sauds getting their hands on a nuke would likely push Egypt to develop a program of their own.

    The rising power of Turkey; NATO member, and long-standing applicant to the EU, would likely push for a nuclear program of its own, to keep up with the Jonses. Turkey continues to fight a long-running guerrilla war with Kurdish seperatists based in Iraq.

    Now surrounded by three nuclear weapon bearing states, including its key competitors, as well as Egypt, Iraq pushes for its own nuclear weapons progrm.

    None of the above states are very stable.

    Add in to this nuclear standoff, the reality that flight-times between these states are mere minutes by rocket. Remember the Cold War. Flight times were about 30 minutes between the US and the USSR. And even with that time line, the two combatants installed the famous ‘Red Line’ in case of an oops to prevent a nuclear exchange from mistakenly happening.

    With decision times substantially shorter, what happens if any one of these states misreads a radar report? Little opportunity to run to a bunker and little possability to launch a second strike.

    Take this back to Israel’s concern, and now it faces a region with five potentially hostile states who’s internal politics leans towards the radical, where the new ‘moderates’ are the Muslim Brotherhood or its equivelent in Turkey.

    No worries?

  • Stella Goldschlag

    As a ataunch Democrat, I welcome a nuclear armed Iran. First, it will deter further US misadventures like Iraq/Afghanistan in the Middle East. Second, it will force Israel to conform to the UN resolutions designed to limit its power and also stimulate the Palestinian Right of Return. I believe Obama will make a deal with Iran shortly after Nov 2012. Our values are much more in common with Iran than israel

  • kafantaris

    It seems that our tolerance for descent is not shared by our closest ally — one for whom we are now ready to start WWIII.
    Apparently this ally also does not share our respect for freedom of speech. Just last week it raided two private TV stations, giving bogus reasons for doing so.
    Or maybe it reasoned as follows:
    When Palestinian TV is on, it shows Sesame Street.
    When it shows Sesame Street, it shows Bert.
    When it shows Bert, it shows it might be OK to be gay.
    When it shows it might be OK to be gay, the TV censors monitoring start to “come out.”
    When the TV censors come out, they get friendly with the Palestinians.
    Don’t let your TV censors get friendly with the Palestinians.
    Go raid Palestinian TV.

  • Lynne T

    Stella:

    “Useful idot” doeesn’t begin to describe a “staunch Democrat” who, among many stupid things” claims to that the US has more in common with Iran than Israel.

    Are you Jules posting under a different handle?

  • Jehudah Ben-Israel

    “The White House has finally gotten serious…”

    And, herein is the problem: The Obama White House attempted, three years ago, to convince Israel that Iran’s drive to achieve nuclear weapons – a process that commenced some 15 to 20 years ago – will cease if only Israel bowed down to the demands of the PLO.

    This is the nature and level of understanding and appreciation of the Obama’s White House: laughable.

    Why should we assume the Obama’s White House has changed in substance as opposed to the fact that we are in a political season…??!!

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Beat the Clock

The White House has put the squeeze on Iran with a serious sanctions regime in the past few months. But for Israel, it may be too little, too late.