George Friedman
Two major leaks occurred this weekend over the Iran matter.
In the first, The New York Times published an article reporting that staff at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the U.N. nuclear oversight group, had produced an unreleased report saying that Iran was much more advanced in its nuclear program than the IAEA had thought previously. According to the report, Iran now has all the data needed to design a nuclear weapon. The New York Times article added that U.S. intelligence was re-examining the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) of 2007, which had stated that Iran was not actively pursuing a nuclear weapon.
The second leak occurred in the British paper The Sunday Times, which reported that the purpose of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s highly publicized secret visit to Moscow on Sept. 7 was to provide the Russians with a list of Russian scientists and engineers working on Iran’s nuclear weapons program.
The second revelation was directly tied to the first. There were many, including STRATFOR, who felt that Iran did not have the non-nuclear disciplines needed for rapid progress toward a nuclear device. Putting the two pieces together, the presence of Russian personnel in Iran would mean that the Iranians had obtained the needed expertise from the Russians. It would also mean that the Russians were not merely a factor in whether there would be effective sanctions but also in whether and when the Iranians would obtain a nuclear weapon.
We would guess that the leak to The New York Times came from U.S. government sources, because that seems to be a prime vector of leaks from the Obama administration and because the article contained information on the NIE review. Given that National Security Adviser James Jones tended to dismiss the report on Sunday television, we would guess the report leaked from elsewhere in the administration. The Sunday Times leak could have come from multiple sources, but we have noted a tendency of the Israelis to leak through the British daily on national security issues. (The article contained substantial details on the visit and appeared written from the Israeli point of view.) Neither leak can be taken at face value, of course. But it is clear that these were deliberate leaks — people rarely risk felony charges leaking such highly classified material — and even if they were not coordinated, they delivered the same message, true or not.
The message was twofold. First, previous assumptions on time frames on Iran are no longer valid, and worst-case assumptions must now be assumed. The Iranians are in fact moving rapidly toward a weapon; have been extremely effective at deceiving U.S. intelligence (read, they deceived the Bush administration, but the Obama administration has figured it out); and therefore, we are moving toward a decisive moment with Iran. Second, this situation is the direct responsibility of Russian nuclear expertise. Whether this expertise came from former employees of the Russian nuclear establishment now looking for work, Russian officials assigned to Iran or unemployed scientists sent to Iran by the Russians is immaterial. The Israelis — and the Obama administration — must hold the Russians responsible for the current state of Iran’s weapons program, and by extension, Moscow bears responsibility for any actions that Israel or the United States might take to solve the problem.
We would suspect that the leaks were coordinated. From the Israeli point of view, having said publicly that they are prepared to follow the American lead and allow this phase of diplomacy to play out, there clearly had to be more going on than just last week’s Geneva talks. From the American point of view, while the Russians have indicated that participating in sanctions on gasoline imports by Iran is not out of the question, Russian President Dmitri Medvedev did not clearly state that Russia would cooperate, nor has anything been heard from Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on the subject. The Russian leadership appears to be playing “good cop, bad cop” on the matter, and the credibility of anything they say on Iran has little weight in Washington.
It would seem to us that the United States and Israel decided to up the ante fairly dramatically in the wake of the Oct. 1 meeting with Iran in Geneva. As IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei visits Iran, massive new urgency has now been added to the issue. But we must remember that Iran knows whether it has had help from Russian scientists; that is something that can’t be bluffed. Given that this specific charge has been made — and as of Monday not challenged by Iran or Russia — indicates to us more is going on than an attempt to bluff the Iranians into concessions. Unless the two leaks together are completely bogus, and we doubt that, the United States and Israel are leaking information already well known to the Iranians. They are telling Tehran that its deception campaign has been penetrated, and by extension are telling it that it faces military action — particularly if massive sanctions are impractical because of more Russian obstruction.
If Netanyahu went to Moscow to deliver this intelligence to the Russians, the only surprise would have been the degree to which the Israelis had penetrated the program, not that the Russians were there. The Russian intelligence services are superbly competent, and keep track of stray nuclear scientists carefully. They would not be surprised by the charge, only by Israel’s knowledge of it.
This, of course leaves open an enormous question. Certainly, the Russians appear to have worked with the Iranians on some security issues and have played with the idea of providing the Iranians more substantial military equipment. But deliberately aiding Iran in building a nuclear device seems beyond Russia’s interests in two ways. First, while Russia wants to goad the United States, it does not itself really want a nuclear Iran. Second, in goading the United States, the Russians know not to go too far; helping Iran build a nuclear weapon would clearly cross a redline, triggering reactions.
A number of possible explanations present themselves. The leak to The Sunday Times might be wrong. But The Sunday Times is not a careless newspaper: It accepts leaks only from certified sources. The Russian scientists might be private citizens accepting Iranian employment. But while this is possible, Moscow is very careful about what Russian nuclear engineers do with their time. Or the Russians might be providing enough help to goad the United States but not enough to ever complete the job. Whatever the explanation, the leaks paint the Russians as more reckless than they have appeared, assuming the leaks are true.
And whatever their veracity, the leaks — the content of which clearly was discussed in detail among the P-5+1 prior to and during the Geneva meetings, regardless of how long they have been known by Western intelligence — were made for two reasons. The first was to tell the Iranians that the nuclear situation is now about to get out of hand, and that attempting to manage the negotiations through endless delays will fail because the United Nations is aware of just how far Tehran has come with its weapons program. The second was to tell Moscow that the issue is no longer whether the Russians will cooperate on sanctions, but the consequence to Russia’s relations with the United States and at least the United Kingdom, France and, most important, possibly Germany. If these leaks are true, they are game changers.
We have focused on the Iranian situation not because it is significant in itself, but because it touches on a great number of other crucial international issues. It is now entangled in the Iraqi, Afghan, Israeli, Palestinian, Syrian and Lebanese issues, all of them high-stakes matters. It is entangled in Russian relations with Europe and the United States. It is entangled in U.S.-European relationships and with relationships within Europe. It touches on the U.S.-Chinese relationship. It even touches on U.S. relations with Venezuela and some other Latin American countries. It is becoming the Gordian knot of international relations.
STRATFOR first focused on the Russian connection with Iran in the wake of the Iranian elections and resulting unrest, when a crowd of Rafsanjani supporters began chanting “Death to Russia,” not one of the top-10 chants in Iran. That caused us to focus on the cooperation between Russia and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on security matters. We were aware of some degree of technical cooperation on military hardware, and of course on Russian involvement in Iran’s civilian nuclear program. We were also of the view that the Iranians were unlikely to progress quickly with their nuclear program. We were not aware that Russian scientists were directly involved in Iran’s military nuclear project, which is not surprising, given that such involvement would be Iran’s single-most important state secret — and Russia’s, too.
But there is a mystery here as well. To have any impact, the Russian involvement must have been under way for years. The United States has tried to track rogue nuclear scientists and engineers — anyone who could contribute to nuclear proliferation — since the 1990s. The Israelis must have had their own program on this, too. Both countries, as well as European intelligence services, were focused on Iran’s program and the whereabouts of Russian scientists. It is hard to believe that they only just now found out. If we were to guess, we would say Russian involvement has been under way since just after the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, when the Russians decided that the United States was a direct threat to its national security.
Therefore, the decision suddenly to confront the Russians, and suddenly to leak U.N. reports — much more valuable than U.S. reports, which are easier for the Europeans to ignore — cannot simply be because the United States and Israel just obtained this information. The IAEA, hostile to the United States since the invasion of Iraq and very much under the influence of the Europeans, must have decided to shift its evaluation of Iran. But far more significant is the willingness of the Israelis first to confront the Russians and then leak about Russian involvement, something that obviously compromises Israeli sources and methods. And that means the Israelis no longer consider the preservation of their intelligence operation in Iran (or wherever it was carried out) as of the essence.
Two conclusions can be drawn. First, the Israelis no longer need to add to their knowledge of Russian involvement; they know what they need to know. And second, the Israelis do not expect Iranian development to continue much longer; otherwise, maintaining the intelligence capability would take precedence over anything else.
It follows from this that the use of this intelligence in diplomatic confrontations with Russians and in a British newspaper serves a greater purpose than the integrity of the source system. And that means that the Israelis expect a resolution in the very near future — the only reason they would have blown their penetration of the Russian-Iranian system.
There are two possible outcomes here. The first is that having revealed the extent of the Iranian program and having revealed the Russian role in a credible British newspaper, the Israelis and the Americans (whose own leak in The New York Times underlined the growing urgency of action) are hoping that the Iranians realize that they are facing war and that the Russians realize that they are facing a massive crisis in their relations with the West. If that happens, then the Russians might pull their scientists and engineers, join in the sanctions and force the Iranians to abandon their program.
The second possibility is that the Russians will continue to play the spoiler on sanctions and will insist that they are not giving support to the Iranians. This leaves the military option, which would mean broad-based action, primarily by the United States, against Iran’s nuclear facilities. Any military operation would involve keeping the Strait of Hormuz clear, meaning naval action, and we now know that there are more nuclear facilities than previously discussed. So while the war for the most part would be confined to the air and sea, it would be extensive nonetheless.
Sanctions or war remain the two options, and which one is chosen depends on Moscow’s actions. The leaks this weekend have made clear that the United States and Israel have positioned themselves such that not much time remains. We have now moved from a view of Iran as a long-term threat to Iran as a much more immediate threat thanks to the Russians.
The least that can be said about this is that the Obama administration and Israel are trying to reshape the negotiations with the Iranians and Russians. The most that can be said is that the Americans and Israelis are preparing the public for war. Polls now indicate that more than 60 percent of the U.S. public now favors military action against Iran. From a political point of view, it has become easier for U.S. President Barack Obama to act than to not act. This, too, is being transmitted to the Iranians and Russians.
It is not clear to us that the Russians or Iranians are getting the message yet. They have convinced themselves that Obama is unlikely to act because he is weak at home and already has too many issues to juggle. This is a case where a reputation for being conciliatory actually increases the chances for war. But the leaks this weekend have strikingly limited the options and timelines of the United States and Israel. They also have put the spotlight on Obama at a time when he already is struggling with health care and Afghanistan. History is rarely considerate of presidential plans, and in this case, the leaks have started to force Obama’s hand.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is visiting Washington for his first official visit with U.S. President Barack Obama. A range of issues — including the future of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, Israeli-Syrian talks and Iran policy — are on the table. This is one of an endless series of meetings between U.S. presidents and Israeli prime ministers over the years, many of which concerned these same issues. Yet little has changed.
That Israel has a new prime minister and the United States a new president might appear to make this meeting significant. But this is Netanyahu’s second time as prime minister, and his government is as diverse and fractious as most recent Israeli governments. Israeli politics are in gridlock, with deep divisions along multiple fault lines and an electoral system designed to magnify disagreements.
Obama is much stronger politically, but he has consistently acted with caution, particularly in the foreign policy arena. Much of his foreign policy follows from the Bush administration. He has made no major breaks in foreign policy beyond rhetoric; his policies on Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Russia and Europe are essentially extensions of pre-existing policy. Obama faces major economic problems in the United States and clearly is not looking for major changes in foreign policy. He understands how quickly public sentiment can change, and he does not plan to take risks he does not have to take right now.
This, then, is the problem: Netanyahu is coming to Washington hoping to get Obama to agree to fundamental redefinitions of the regional dynamic. For example, he wants Obama to re-examine the commitment to a two-state solution in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. (Netanyahu’s foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, has said Israel is no longer bound by prior commitments to that concept.) Netanyahu also wants the United States to commit itself to a finite time frame for talks with Iran, after which unspecified but ominous-sounding actions are to be taken.
Facing a major test in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Obama has more than enough to deal with at the moment. Moreover, U.S. presidents who get involved in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations frequently get sucked into a morass from which they do not return. For Netanyahu to even request that the White House devote attention to the Israeli-Palestinian problem at present is asking a lot. Asking for a complete review of the peace process is even less realistic.
The foundation of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process for years has been the assumption that there would be a two-state solution. Such a solution has not materialized for a host of reasons. First, at present there are two Palestinian entities, Gaza and the West Bank, which are hostile to each other. Second, the geography and economy of any Palestinian state would be so reliant on Israel that independence would be meaningless; geography simply makes the two-state proposal almost impossible to implement. Third, no Palestinian government would have the power to guarantee that rogue elements would not launch rockets at Israel, potentially striking at the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem corridor, Israel’s heartland. And fourth, neither the Palestinians nor the Israelis have the domestic political coherence to allow any negotiator to operate from a position of confidence. Whatever the two sides negotiated would be revised and destroyed by their political opponents, and even their friends.
For this reason, the entire peace process — including the two-state solution — is a chimera. Neither side can live with what the other can offer. But if it is a fiction, it is a fiction that serves U.S. purposes. The United States has interests that go well beyond Israeli interests and sometimes go in a different direction altogether. Like Israel, the United States understands that one of the major obstacles to any serious evolution toward a two-state solution is Arab hostility to such an outcome.
The Jordanians have feared and loathed Fatah in the West Bank ever since the Black September uprisings of 1970. The ruling Hashemites are ethnically different from the Palestinians (who constitute an overwhelming majority of the Jordanian population), and they fear that a Palestinian state under Fatah would threaten the Jordanian monarchy. For their part, the Egyptians see Hamas as a descendent of the Muslim Brotherhood, which seeks the Mubarak government’s ouster — meaning Cairo would hate to see a Hamas-led state. Meanwhile, the Saudis and the other Arab states do not wish to see a radical altering of the status quo, which would likely come about with the rise of a Palestinian polity.
At the same time, whatever the basic strategic interests of the Arab regimes, all pay lip service to the principle of Palestinian statehood. This is hardly a unique situation. States frequently claim to favor various things they actually are either indifferent to or have no intention of doing anything about. Complicating matters for the Arab states is the fact that they have substantial populations that do care about the fate of the Palestinians. These states thus are caught between public passion on behalf of Palestinians and the regimes’ interests that are threatened by the Palestinian cause. The states’ challenge, accordingly, is to appear to be doing something on behalf of the Palestinians while in fact doing nothing.
The United States has a vested interest in the preservation of these states. The futures of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states are of vital importance to Washington. The United States must therefore simultaneously publicly demonstrate its sensitivity to pressures from these nations over the Palestinian question while being careful to achieve nothing — an easy enough goal to achieve.
The various Israeli-Palestinian peace processes have thus served U.S. and Arab interests quite well. They provide the illusion of activity, with high-level visits breathlessly reported in the media, succeeded by talks and concessions — all followed by stalemate and new rounds of violence, thus beginning the cycle all over again.
One of the most important proposals Netanyahu is bringing to Obama calls for reshaping the peace process. If Israeli President Shimon Peres is to be believed, Netanyahu will not back away from the two-state formula. Instead, the Israeli prime minister is asking that the various Arab state stakeholders become directly involved in the negotiations. In other words, Netanyahu is proposing that Arab states with very different public and private positions on Palestinian statehood be asked to participate — thereby forcing them to reveal publicly their true positions, ultimately creating internal political crises in the Arab states.
The clever thing about this position is that Netanyahu not only knows his request will not become a reality, but he also does not want it to become a reality. The political stability of Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Egypt is as much an Israeli interest as an American one. Indeed, Israel even wants a stable Syria, since whatever would come after the Alawite regime in Damascus would be much more dangerous to Israeli security than the current Syrian regime.
Overall, Israel is a conservative power. In terms of nation-states, it does not want upheaval; it is quite content with the current regimes in the Arab world. But Netanyahu would love to see an international conference with the Arab states roundly condemning Israel publicly. This would shore up the justification for Netanyahu’s policies domestically while simultaneously creating a framework for reshaping world opinion by showing an Israel isolated among hostile states.
Obama is likely hearing through diplomatic channels from the Arab countries that they do not want to participate directly in the Palestinian peace process. And the United States really does not want them there, either. The peace process normally ends in a train wreck anyway, and Obama is in no hurry to see the wreckage. He will want to insulate other allies from the fallout, putting off the denouement of the peace process as long as possible. Obama has sent George Mitchell as his Middle East special envoy to deal with the issue, and from the U.S. president’s point of view, that is quite enough attention to the problem.
Netanyahu, of course, knows all this. Part of his mission is simply convincing his ruling coalition — and particularly Lieberman, whom Netanyahu needs to survive, and who is by far Israel’s most aggressive foreign minister ever — that he is committed to redefining the entire Israeli-Palestinian relationship. But in a broader context, Netanyahu is looking for greater freedom of action. By posing a demand the United States will not grant, Israel is positioning itself to ask for something that appears smaller.
What Israel actually would do with greater freedom of action is far less important than simply creating the appearance that the United States has endorsed Israel’s ability to act in a new and unpredictable manner. From Israel’s point of view, the problem with Israeli-Palestinian relations is that Israel is under severe constraints from the United States, and the Palestinians know it. This means that the Palestinians can even anticipate the application of force by Israel, meaning they can prepare for it and endure it. From Netanyahu’s point of view, Israel’s primary problem is that the Palestinians are confident they know what the Israelis will do. If Netanyahu can get Obama to introduce a degree of ambiguity into the situation, Israel could regain the advantage of uncertainty.
The problem for Netanyahu is that Washington is not interested in having anything unpredictable happen in Israeli-Palestinian relations. The United States is quite content with the current situation, particularly while Iraq becomes more stable and the Afghan situation remains unstable. Obama does not want a crisis from the Mediterranean to the Hindu Kush. The fact that Netanyahu has a political coalition to satisfy will not interest the United States, and while Washington at some unspecified point might endorse a peace conference, it will not be until Israel and its foreign minister endorse the two-state formula.
Netanyahu will then shift to another area where freedom of action is relevant — namely, Iran. The Israelis have leaked to the Israeli media that the Obama administration has told them that Israel may not attack Iran without U.S. permission, and that Israel agreed to this requirement. (U.S. President George W. Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert went through the same routine not too long ago, using a good cop/bad cop act in a bid to kick-start negotiations with Iran.)
In reality, Israel would have a great deal of difficulty attacking Iranian facilities with non-nuclear forces. A multitarget campaign 1,000 miles away against an enemy with some air defenses could be a long and complex operation. Such a raid would require a long trip through U.S.-controlled airspace for the fairly small Israeli air force. Israel could use cruise missiles, but the tonnage of high explosive delivered by a cruise missile cannot penetrate even moderately hardened structures; the same is true for ICBMs carrying conventional warheads. Israel would have to notify the United States of its intentions because it would be passing through Iraqi airspace — and because U.S. technical intelligence would know what it was up to before Israeli aircraft even took off. The idea that Israel might consider attacking Iran without informing Washington is therefore absurd on the surface. Even so, the story has surfaced yet again in an Israeli newspaper in a virtual carbon copy of stories published more than a year ago.
Netanyahu has promised that the endless stalemate with the Palestinians will not be allowed to continue. He also knows that whatever happens, Israel cannot threaten the stability of Arab states that are by and large uninterested in the Palestinians. He also understands that in the long run, Israel’s freedom of action is defined by the United States, not by Israel. His electoral platform and his strategic realities have never aligned. Arguably, it might be in the Israeli interest that the status quo be disrupted, but it is not in the American interest. Netanyahu therefore will get to redefine neither the Palestinian situation nor the Iranian situation. Israel simply lacks the power to impose the reality it wants, the current constellation of Arab regimes it needs, and the strategic relationship with the United States on which Israeli national security rests.
In the end, this is a classic study in the limits of power. Israel can have its freedom of action anytime it is willing to pay the price for it. But Israel can’t pay the price. Netanyahu is coming to Washington to see if he can get what he wants without paying the price, and we suspect strongly he knows he won’t get it. His problem is the same as that of the Arab states. There are many in Israel, particularly among Netanyahu’s supporters, who believe Israel is a great power. It isn’t. It is a nation that is strong partly because it lives in a pretty weak neighborhood, and partly because it has very strong friends. Many Israelis don’t want to be told that, and Netanyahu came to office playing on the sense of Israeli national power.
So the peace process will continue, no one will expect anything from it, the Palestinians will remain isolated and wars regularly will break out. The only advantage of this situation from the U.S. point of view it is that it is preferable to all other available realities.
Benjamin Netanyahu and Barack Obama have already had one good meeting, last summer, but they were not in power yet.
Now that they are prime minister and president, they will have to get down to business and there are concerns about a clash between the two leaders who do not see eye to eye on key issues.
The last time Mr Netanyahu was in Washington as Israel's prime minister was almost 10 years ago and two key factors mean he will be dealing with a very different dynamic when it comes to peace talks.
Iran's nuclear programme and regional ambitions will be topping the agenda.
Iranian overtures
Ten years ago, the issue was not really on anyone's radar.
Now it is a major concern for the US and Israel, and even some Arab countries.
Israel is worried about the Obama administration's diplomatic overtures to Tehran and Mr Netanyahu will want reassurance from Washington and may seek to tie starting talks with the Palestinians to concrete signs that Iran is being kept in check.
But the sequencing will be key.
On his way to Washington, Uzi Arad, Mr Netanyahu's national security advisor, seemed to signal Israel's patience on Iran was running thin.
However, Mr Netanyahu will also have to contend with a new, popular American leader who made Palestinian statehood and peace in the Middle East one of his top foreign policy priorities, right from the start.
Mr Obama appointed a special envoy to the region, retired Senator George Mitchell, who is credited with sealing the Good Friday peace deal in Northern Ireland.
The US president is also hoping he can count on support at home for this difficult mission.
"The American public supports a two-state solution, supports America driving that process forward and increasingly understands this will require tough love for both sides, certainly with the Israeli ally," said Daniel Levy, a former Israeli negotiator now with the Washington liberal think tank, New America Foundation.
"Interestingly what we also see, what is also being expressed now is that this applies to the Jewish community. Barack Obama got 78% of the American Jewish vote and polling shows the support has remained solid," Mr Levy adds.
During Mr Obama's visit to Israel last summer, he banked some political capital: meeting Israeli leaders, showing support and sympathy for America's top ally.
Parallel ambitions
He also made strong statements in support of Israel at last year's conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). So at this year's gathering of the pro-Israel lobby, there was already some of that tough love.
"Israel has to work towards a two-state solution," said Vice-President Joseph Biden.
"You're not going to like my saying this, but not build more settlements, dismantle existing outposts, and allow the Palestinians freedom of movement based on their first actions. This is a "show me" deal, not based on faith, show me."
In return Israel will want reassurances from Washington about containing Iran and its growing regional ambitions.
But Hillary Clinton last month warned Israel that the Obama administration will not agree to handling with Iran first before addressing the issue of Palestinian statehood - the two issues will have to be dealt with in parallel.
"For Israel to get the kind of strong support it is looking for vis-a-vis Iran, it cannot stay on the sidelines with respect to the Palestinians and the peace efforts. They go hand in hand," she said during a testimony in Congress on 23 April.
Though the circumstances have changed, Mr Netanyahu's done this all before and he has proved a tough, sometimes frustrating partner.
Setting tone
Many officials in the Obama administration are former members of the Clinton administration and will remember the Israeli leader from those days.
American leaders are reluctant to pressure Israel into peace and have faced a lot of heat whenever they did, whether Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan or George H W Bush who in 1991 tried to block loan guarantees for Israel and tied them to Israel freezing settlement activity on occupied Palestinian territory.
"If you want to take on Israel, you have to prepared to take the heat, it can get awfully intense," said Richard Haass, who was a senior advisor to Bush Senior from 1989 until 1991 and is now president of the Council on Foreign Relations."
"But today the pressure would probably not be what people often think about, things like aid and so on, Israel's economy is too large, the US is not going to do anything that would endanger Israel's security," he says.
"The real pressure would probably come in the way of words. Israel is a democracy, what the US says echoes around," Mr Haass says.
But at the meeting on Monday, it will still be about smiles and handshakes and a showdown is unlikely, even if there might be some tension.
The three-hour-long talks including a lunch will, however, set the tone for the weeks to come.
President Obama is expecting to meet the Palestinian and Egyptian leader next week and he will give a speech to the Muslim world in Cairo next month.
His talks with Mr Netanyahu will help him determine what he can expect from the Israel, how much progress he might be able to make in the Middle East and how fast.
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ASKED about the hardy perennial of Palestinians and peace, officials in Israel’s new government now reply with dire talk about Iran and the threat of nuclear war. “However much progress we might make on peace,” says one, “it would all disintegrate if Iran achieved the ability to make a bomb and proliferate it.”
That could be a diversionary tactic. After all, Binyamin Netanyahu, the new prime minister, spent much of his previous term in the job (1996-99) wriggling out of Israel’s obligations under what was known as the Oslo peace process on various pretexts, to gratify his rightist-religious supporters. But it could also signal a readiness to consider a grand bargain: Iran defanged for Palestine decolonised.
Israelis and Americans, preparing for a first encounter between Mr Netanyahu and President Barack Obama next month, are increasingly focusing on the Iran-Palestine equation. Mr Obama’s policy of trying to talk to Iran worries some Israeli policymakers. But there is also a growing awareness in Israel that the policy’s chance of success, as well as the strength and effectiveness of Sunni Arab opposition to Shia Iran’s nuclear ambitions, may hinge on America’s ability to show progress on Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking.
That puts modest but unusual pressure on Mr Netanyahu from the Americans. Indeed, the Israelis may have to get used to being treated a little differently by Mr Obama’s administration than they were by the previous one. For example, there had been plenty of indications that Mr Netanyahu might be visiting Mr Obama early in May, but the White House let it be known that the president was not available then. Jordan’s King Abdullah, on the other hand, was hosted at the Obama White House on April 21st.
Peeved, Mr Netanyahu has embarked on a month-long “policy review”. This, his aides say, means he cannot answer for the moment such niggling questions as whether he accepts the very concept of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
In his campaign for the election in February, he spoke of “economic peace” rather than full political peace between two proper states. While not endorsing the Palestinians’ right to a state, earlier this month Mr Netanyahu told George Mitchell, the new American special envoy to the Middle East, that he would insist on explicit Palestinian recognition of Israel as a “Jewish state”. Mahmoud Abbas, head of the Palestinian Authority, has been loth to make this pronouncement. Mr Netanyahu says it is not a precondition for talking, but it is a “fundamental condition” for reaching agreement. His aides explain that recognition of Israel’s Jewishness would imply a final renunciation of the claim to an unrestricted “right of return” for Palestinian refugees. Israelis, left and right alike, insist that any “return” must be severely limited—by Israel—in order to protect the Jewish majority and Jewish national character of their country.
President Obama and Mr Mitchell have carefully woven “Jewish state” into their own recent public statements. But the Americans have reportedly reacted coldly to this early demonstration of Israeli casuistic recalcitrance, finding it reminiscent of the pretext-finding and foot-dragging of Mr Netanyahu’s first administration.
This time, however, unlike then, Mr Netanyahu’s team is not of one ideological stripe. It includes the Labour party, with its leader, Ehud Barak, as minister of defence. Mr Netanyahu was determined to bring Mr Barak in, so as to escape the political and arithmetical thrall of his own hardliners. Mr Barak for his part, say insiders, is determined to vindicate his decision to join, bitterly criticised within his own party, by vigorously pushing for peace. A former prime minister from 1999 to 2001, who offered Israel’s boldest-yet concessions in an abortive negotiation for peace with the Palestinians brokered by President Bill Clinton, Mr Barak now advocates a “regional peace” effort.
Mr Barak does not need the spur of Iranian nuclear pretensions, say these insiders, to promote his peace agenda. But he assured Mr Mitchell that he is available to help persuade Mr Netanyahu of the merit of an Iranian bomb-for-Palestinian peace bargain.
This week, meanwhile, the Iranian connection loomed large and ugly, with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s tirade against Israel at a UN conference on racism triggering a walkout of delegates (see article).
As bad luck or perverse planning would have it, the incident came just before a ceremony at the Yad Vashem memorial to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust in Jerusalem, on Holocaust Day. “We will not allow Holocaust deniers to carry out another holocaust against the Jewish people,” Mr Netanyahu said.
Mr Netanyahu’s officials say that Iran, because of the drop in oil prices and its consequent economic troubles, is now more than ever susceptible to international pressure to forgo its nuclear ambitions. He himself, more than any other Israeli politician, has harped since the mid-1990s on the threat to Israel of an Iranian bomb. Might that make him especially susceptible, despite his tough talk on the Palestinians, to American-led diplomacy that would seek to wrap Iran and Palestine in a grand regional peace bargain? Mr Obama and his advisers will be wondering as they brace themselves for a bout of Middle East diplomacy.
Apparently, the article is completely omitting to mention anything about the new head of Israeli diplomacy. As the choice of the new US administration to engage at least at non-official level with Iran and the progressive opening towards Syria. Or the coming elections in Lebanon and the impact of the results on the whole peace process in the area.
LIKUD:
Prime Minister: Benjamin Netanyahu
Vice Premier and Regional Cooperation Minister: Silvan Shalom
Vice Premier and Minister of Strategic Affairs: Moshe Ya'alon
Finance: Yuval Steinitz
Education: Gideon Sa'ar
Justice: Yaakov Neeman (Likud-appointed)
Transportation: Yisrael Katz
Diaspora Affairs and National Public Relations: Yuli Edelstein
Communications: Moshe Kahlon
Environmental Protection and Ministerial Liaison to Knesset: Gilad Erdan
Science, Culture and Sport: Limor Livnat
Minister without portfolio (for citizens' services, computerization and Internet): Michael Eitan
Strategic Affairs: Moshe Ya'alon
Minister without portfolio (for intelligence agencies): Dan Meridor
Minister without portfolio: Benny Begin
Minister without portfolio: Yossi Peled
Yisrael Beiteinu:
Foreign Affairs: Avigdor Lieberman
Public Security: Yitzhak Aharonovitch
National Infrastructures: Uzi Landau
Tourism: Stas Meseznikov
Immigrant Absorption: Sofa Landver
Labor:
Defense: Ehud Barak
Industry, Trade and Labor: Benjamin Ben-Eliezer
Welfare and Social Services: Isaac Herzog
Agriculture: Shalom Simhon
Minister without portfolio (for minorities): Avishay Braverman
Shas:
Interior: Eli Yishai
Construction and Housing: Ariel Atias
Religious Affairs: Ya'acov Margi
Minister without portfolio in Prime Minister's Office: Meshulam Nahari
Habayit Hayehudi:
Science and Technology: Daniel Herschkowitz
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU: The new prime minister became the country's youngest leader in 1996 before being driven out of office three years later by Ehud Barak, who will now answer to him as defense minister. Netanyahu's swearing-in Tuesday crowns a decade-long comeback.
Long a hawkish opponent of territorial withdrawal, which he says only emboldens Israel's enemies, Netanyahu has been taking a notably conciliatory line since the February election. He now says he will continue peace talks, though he has still not uttered the words "Palestinian state."
Netanyahu, 59, comes from a prominent Israeli family — he's the son of a well-known historian and the brother of a war hero who died in Israel's daring 1976 hostage rescue in Entebbe, Uganda.
He spent years in the U.S., holds two degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and speaks fluent, American-accented English, a background that could play an important role as he works to maintain Israel's vital strategic relationship with Washington.
EHUD BARAK: Defense minister in the outgoing government, the Labor Party chief will retain his job in the new administration after leading the venerable but ailing centrist movement into a coalition with Netanyahu.
The son of Eastern European immigrants, he was born on a communal farm in 1942 and spent 36 years in the army, becoming Israel's most-decorated soldier and the military chief of staff. He joined the government under Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, and in May 1999, he ousted Netanyahu as prime minister.
Barak boosted his image with the recent Gaza campaign, but saw his party's support slip to a historic low — just 13 seats in Parliament.
AVIGDOR LIEBERMAN: An immigrant from Moldova who was once a marginal political player, he will serve as foreign minister and Israel's face abroad — an almost unthinkable proposition just a few months ago for a polarizing politician widely criticized as a racist.
Lieberman's election platform has drawn allegations of racism for a proposal that could end up stripping Israeli Arabs of their citizenship unless they declare their loyalty to the Jewish state.
But Lieberman's policies are not those of traditionally hard-line parties like Netanyahu's Likud, and he says he supports the creation of a Palestinian state.
Instead, his focus has on Israel, particularly on the perceived disloyalty of the country's Arab minority, which he sees as a fifth column. He supports redrawing Israel's borders and pushing areas with heavy concentrations of Arabs out of the country and into Palestinian jurisdiction.
MOSHE YAALON: A political newcomer, Yaalon will serve as deputy prime minister and a minister in charge of strategic affairs. That will give him a voice in important decisions about Israeli actions toward its archenemy, Iran, which Israel says is building a nuclear weapon that could pose an existential threat.
Yaalon served as the military chief of staff between 2002 and 2005, leading operations in the West Bank that helped crush armed Palestinian opposition to Israel there.
He was critical of Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, and has taken a hard line on security issues. Widely seen as a straight shooter not tainted by politics, he spent time at a think tank in Jerusalem before joining the Likud ahead of the elections.
Benjamin Netanyahu had previously the job from 1996 to 1999 and took a tough line on the Palestinians and the economy.
This year he led the right-wing Likud party back to power by promising a new approach to peace efforts and ways to stimulate the economy. Here are some of Netanyahu's ideas, and clues to their implementation:
* The U.S.-backed peace process has gone around in circles. Israel should instead focus on creating a generation of Palestinians with a real stake in peace, by actively building up the Palestinian economy.
* Creating a genuine "peace partnership" based on mutual economic interest, and avoiding the deadlock over territorial disputes, will enhance Israel's security.
* Creating a Palestinian state is not a priority now, and maybe never. Netanyahu refuses to reaffirm publicly an Israeli commitment to the basic, Western-backed acceptance that there can be no alternative to a "two-state solution."
* He will not try to back out on past treaties. The coalition deal states that "Israel is committed to all the diplomatic and international agreements that Israeli governments have signed throughout the years."
* He has a "strategic goal" of toppling Islamist Hamas from its power base in the Gaza Strip, since Iranian-armed Hamas says it will never recognize Israel in any case.
* Netanyahu -- who quit the Ariel Sharon government in 2005 in protest at its decision to withdraw from Gaza -- says the outgoing government's January offensive to tame Hamas militants stopped too soon and failed to improve Israel's security.
* He regards Iran's suspected drive to build an atomic bomb as a clear and present danger to Israel's survival which cannot be left to fester if Western diplomatic efforts fail. Like his centrist opponents he refuses to rule out an Israeli strike.
* With its ties to Iran, Syria seems an unlikely peace partner for Netanyahu any time soon in his premiership -- unless opening a channel to Damascus promises to pay off diplomatically.
* He will not begin his premiership by ordering any stop to the expansion of certain Israeli settlements on occupied West Bank land, despite the likelihood of United States and European Union criticism of these towns as obstacles to peace.
* His coalition promises to "enforce the law" on unauthorized settler outposts in the West Bank which the previous government promised to evacuate but mostly left untouched.
* His chosen foreign minister, coalition partner Avigdor Lierberman, looks on Israeli Arabs as a fifth column who should be invited to leave Israel and live with the Palestinians if they cannot commit to full loyalty to the Jewish state.
* He avoided forming a government relying too heavily on Lieberman and, after winning more time, secured the alliance of Ehud Barak's Labor party for a balanced "unity" government as he calls it -- a sign he will not be hostage to the far-right.
* Netanyahu impressed investors with free-market policies that took Israel out of recession a few years ago, and he aims to re-inject confidence into the market place by keeping a tight hand on the finance ministry.
* Netanyahu says he will cut taxes to stimulate the flagging economy, which could make the tight control of state spending his toughest task, having to say 'No' to coalition partners. There is already speculation about big defense and education budget cuts.
-- "The government will work to bolster national security and achieve personal security for Israel's citizens through a determined struggle against violence and terror."
-- "The government will move the diplomatic process forward and work for the advancement of peace with all our neighbors, while protecting the historic and national security interests of Israel."
-- "The government will promote a plan to deal with the economic crisis and work toward the creation of the economic conditions that will enable sustainable growth, while creating and protecting jobs."
-- "The government will maintain the Jewish character of the state and Jewish tradition, and also respect the religions and traditions of the country's ethnic communities."
Israel's incoming foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, has stirred controversy over the years with comments about Arabs, notably Arab Israeli citizens and also Egypt. He once suggested Egypt's Aswan Dam might be bombed and last year he said the president of Israel's Arab peace partner could "go to hell."
Following is a selection of quotes from Lieberman, head of the Yisrael Beitenu party:
2009 - "No loyalty, no citizenship" -- Lieberman's election slogan calling for legislation to require Israelis, including Arab citizens, to swear loyalty to the Jewish state.
"What we state unequivocally is that we are completely opposed to what has been and still is the guiding principle of Israel's foreign policy: 'land for peace' ... There is either 'peace for peace' or the exchange of territory and populations."
(Referring to his proposal to trade Arab-populated parts of Israel to a Palestinian state in exchange for Israel annexing Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank)
"You have to be generous to your friends and cruel to your enemies. We are simply a society of wimps."
2008 - "Time and time again our leaders go to Egypt to meet (President Hosni) Mubarak and he has never agreed to make an official visit here as president. If he wants to talk to us, he should come here. If he doesn't want to come here, he can go to hell."
2007 - (To an Israeli Arab fellow member of Parliament:) "You are an ally in the Knesset of terrorists. I hope that Hamas will take care of you and all the rest once and for all. Don't worry, your day will come."
"If Israel has to deal with the Iranian threat by itself, it can do so."
2006 - Speaking of Israeli Arab legislators who support the Palestinian cause: "The fate of the collaborators in the Knesset will be identical to that of those who collaborated with the Nazis. Collaborators, as well as criminals, were executed after the Nuremberg trials at the end of the World War Two. I hope that will be the fate of collaborators in this house."
2001 - "Mubarak continues to act against us and to travel for consultations with Saddam Hussein. If he carries out his threat and puts forces into the Sinai, it would be an example of a (crossing) of the red line to which we would have to respond strongly, including by bombing the Aswan Dam."
