WarSclerotic

American Thinker Blog: WH Counterterror advisor: Jihad a ‘legitimate tenet’ of Islam.

I know what he was trying to say; that there are some schools of Islamic thought that defines “jihad” as unarmed “struggle” by the pious Muslim against his own weaknesses.

So what?

That’s not how our enemies describe Jihad. The Islamists combine religious fervor with a fanatical political ideology that instructs them to kill those who won’t submit. It really is that simple and the idea that we have top officials (Brennan isn’t the only one who holds this view) in the Obama White House who pretend that Islamists don’t believe what they actually believe is worse than self-delusion; it is bordering on criminal negligence:

The president’s top counterterrorism adviser on Wednesday called jihad a “legitimate tenet of Islam,” arguing that the term “jihadists” should not be used to describe America’s enemies.

During a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, John Brennan described violent extremists as victims of “political, economic and social forces,” but said that those plotting attacks on the United States should not be described in “religious terms.”

He repeated the administration argument that the enemy is not “terrorism,” because terrorism is a “tactic,” and not terror, because terror is a “state of mind” — though Brennan’s title, deputy national security adviser for counterterrorism and homeland security, includes the word “terrorism” in it. But then Brennan said that the word “jihad” should not be applied either.

“Nor do we describe our enemy as ‘jihadists’ or ‘Islamists’ because jihad is a holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam, meaning to purify oneself or one’s community, and there is nothing holy or legitimate or Islamic about murdering innocent men, women and children,” Brennan said.

Please note in the second paragraph above where Brennan describes violent extremists as “victims.” What does that make the targets of their fanaticism? Do we have victim on victim crime? Or perhaps the jihadists targets had it coming? You cannot have a terrorist attack without someone being at fault. And if Brennan is going to excuse the jihadists because they are suffering oppression or something, then he must believe that those who die horribly in those attacks deserved it.

This is the same naive fool who wants to look for and promote Hezb’allah “moderates.” Michael Totten, who has forgotten more about Hezb’allah than this fool will ever learn, applies the necessary take down:

There are no moderates within Hezbollah, at least not any who stand a chance of changing Hezbollah’s behavior. Sure, the terrorist militia has sent a handful of its members to parliament, as Brennan says, and once in a while they sound more reasonable than its secretary-general, Hassan Nasrallah, but these people are employees. They don’t make policy.

If you want to catch a glimpse of Hezbollah’s org chart, just rent a car in Beirut and drive south. You’ll see billboards and posters all over the place in the areas Hezbollah controls. Some show the portraits of “martyrs” killed in battle with Israel. Others show the mug shots of Hezbollah’s leadership, most prominently Nasrallah and his deceased military commander, truck bomber, and airplane hijacker Imad Mugniyeh. Alongside the pictures of Hezbollah’s leaders, you’ll also see Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the two “supreme guides” of the Islamic Republic regime in Iran.

Sun Tzu famously made the first rule of war “Know your enemy.” Brennan has taken that adage a step further. He is pretending there is no enemy, no war – only victims who who need us to address the “root causes” of their fanaticism.

I am not confident that we will escape the next three years without a massive terrorist attack. At this level of denial comes extreme danger. Seeing the enemy as potential welfare customers will not win any battles and will probably get a lot of innocent people killed.

First step toward last resort: No case to attack Iran before trying sanctions..

The United States has at least two reasons for trying everything short of preemptive attack to keep Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Sanctions might work, in the unlikely event that Iran’s leaders develop more than a fleeting case of rational thinking. If sanctions don’t work, the U.S. – as was not the case before invading Iraq – will have more international support for that last resort.

Such a strategy, however, doesn’t mean letting Iran play us and the United Nations for chumps. Iran was trying to do that when, to avoid a fourth round of U.N. sanctions, the country suddenly announced a deal last week with Turkey and Brazil to export 2,640 pounds of low-enriched uranium and receive, in return, fuel rods suitable for use in a medical research reactor but not suitable for use in a nuclear weapon.

President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton quickly and correctly called that deal a sham. Though the uranium-out/fuel-back model once could have halted Iran’s drive to produce the enriched uranium necessary for making bombs, that strategy works only if Iran sends away most of its enriched uranium and stops enriching more. Under the Turkey/Brazil deal, Iran would give up only half its enriched uranium and didn’t promise to stop producing it. By most estimates, the deal would leave Iran with enough enriched uranium to produce at least one bomb.

One day after Turkey and Brazil declared themselves to be Iran’s enablers, the Obama administration announced that China and Russia – surprisingly – have said that they are open to economic sanctions against Iran. Mr. Obama has courted them because Russia is Iran’s largest trading partner and China buys lots of Iranian oil. If they don’t renege, their agreement clears the way for the five permanent members of the UN Security Council to approve sanctions. Until Dec. 31, Turkey and Brazil are two of the council’s 10 non-permanent members, which explains Iran’s outreach to them.

Proposed sanctions include a tighter weapons embargo, the right to search shipments to Iran and a list of companies and individuals barred from trade. Still, they’re seen as fairly weak. Even though some companies may impose tougher sanctions, Iran still might be able to cheat. But sanctions could delay the day when Iran gets too close to nuclear capability for the West to ignore. Israel has bombed Iraq and Syria to cut off nuclear development. Something like that, perhaps carried out by the United States or a group of allies, could be necessary again.

If sanctions don’t end Iran’s nuclear ambitions, they at least would be a step – if Iran gets too close to building a bomb – toward proving that armed intervention is the only remaining option to avoiding a Middle East nuclear arms race

IsraCast: North Korea and Iran – Connect The Dots.

Thursday, May 27, 2010

North Korea’s Torpedoing Of South Korean Ship Illustrates What To Expect From A Nuclear Armed Iran

North Korea Case Indicates How Problematic It Is To Cope With Nuclear Tyranny

Hezbollah Chief Nasrallah Copies North Korea By Threatening To Sink Ships Sailing For Israel

Iranian missiles (photo: MEHR)

North Korea’s nuclear weapons capability enables that rogue state to literally ‘get away with murder’ – that is one lesson to be drawn from the current crisis. There are others that also reflect on Iran’s current drive to get the bomb. Proof of North Korean startling aggression against South Korea coincides with Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s upcoming visit to France, Canada and the U.S. IsraCast is of the view that the case of nuclear North Korea ‘unacceptable’ killing of forty-six South Korean sailors serves as a preview of what to expect from Iran, if she also acquires nuclear weapons. Netanyahu will likely call on his hosts to take more effective action against Iran before time runs out and to connect the dots between the latest North Korean atrocity and the looming Iranian threat.

Iranian President Ahmadinejad

Kim Jong-il and Vladimir Putin (photo: www.kremlin.ru)

The Iranian Missile Range

Middle East Online.

Moscow hits back at Ahmadinejad’s unprecedented attack on Russia over sanctions.

First Published 2010-05-27


‘There are no 100 percent guarantees’
Russia doubts Iran’s commitment to nuclear deal
Moscow hits back at Ahmadinejad’s unprecedented attack on Russia over sanctions.
MOSCOW – Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov voiced doubt on Thursday about whether Iran would fulfill the terms of a deal brokered by Brazil and Turkey aimed at resolving the Iranian nuclear crisis.

“There are no 100 percent guarantees. Very much will depend on how Iran will approach its commitments. If it strictly abides by them, Russia will actively support the scheme proposed by Brazil and Turkey,” Lavrov said.

Signed last week, the deal calls for Iran to deposit a large part of its uranium stockpile in Turkey in exchange for better-enriched nuclear fuel destined for a research reactor in Tehran.

“We welcome this deal. If fully implemented, it will create very important preconditions not just for the solution of the concrete problem — supplies of fuel for this reactor — but for improving the atmosphere for the renewal of negotiations,” Lavrov said in televised remarks.

But Lavrov gave no indication of how the deal might affect Russia’s stance on a US-drafted resolution in the UN Security Council calling for Iran to be punished with a new round of sanctions.

Russia has continued to back the sanctions resolution despite the signing of the Brazil-Turkey deal, angering Iran and leading to a heated exchange this week between Russian and Iranian officials.

The deal, spearheaded by Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, was seen as a last-ditch bid to avoid the new UN sanctions.

But it was received coolly by the US, who accuses Tehran of seeking to acquire an atomic bomb under the guise of its civilian nuclear energy programme.

Tehran denies the allegations and insists that its nuclear programme is strictly for energy and medical purposes.

Russia on Wednesday accused Iran of indulging in “political demagoguery” after an unprecedented attack from President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Ahmadinejad on Wednesday bluntly accused Russian President Dmitry Medvedev of siding with Tehran’s enemies, like arch-foe the United States, in the crisis over the Iranian nuclear drive.

“Any unpredictability, political extremism, lack of transparency or inconsistency in decision-making… is unacceptable for Russia”, the Kremlin’s top foreign policy advisor Sergei Prikhodko said in response.

“No one has ever managed to retain their authority through political demagoguery,” Prikhodko added in a statement released by state news agencies.

Despite its strong energy and defence ties with Iran, Russia has backed a new sanctions drive at the UN Security Council which has issued repeated ultimatums for Iran to freeze uranium enrichment.

“Our position is Russian, it reflects the interests of all the peoples of Russia and thus it is neither pro-American nor pro-Iranian,” said Prikhodko.

Russia is building Iran’s first nuclear power plant in the southern city of Bushehr, a facility expected to finally come online in August after a series of delays.

It also has a contract to sell sophisticated S-300 air defence missiles to Tehran but has not delivered the weapons amid concerns from Israel and the United States that they could severely impede an air attack.

Western diplomats have suggested that under the text of the resolution against Iran being discussed at the UN Security Council Russia would be unable to deliver the S-300 missiles to Tehran.

Russian lawmakers have disputed this view but this week Tehran’s envoy to Moscow sternly warned Russia its credibility would be undermined if it dropped the deal.

“Refusal to deliver the S-300s will strike a blow to Russia’s reputation as a reliable arms supplier,” Ambassador Mahmoud Reza Sadjadi said.

“It would compel us to question Russia’s reliability at such sensitive moments.”

A question of time – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

By Ari Shavit

The siren that sounded across the country yesterday did not signal a genuine emergency. No rockets fell in the center of the country, and no skyscrapers collapsed in central Tel Aviv. The Kirya defense compound wasn’t damaged, and Israel Air Force bases weren’t paralyzed. The army’s emergency storehouses weren’t torched, and no power plant was wiped out. Underground parking garages were not swamped with masses of people seeking shelter. The roads were not blocked by hundreds of thousands of urbanites pouring out of the cities. And Ben-Gurion International Airport was not overrun by frightened Israelis fleeing their country.

But let’s not delude ourselves: The national security situation is not good. Thanks to the unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000, Israel now faces a strategic threat from the north. Due to the unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in 2005, Israel faces the threat of rocket fire from the south as well. The Olmert war in Lebanon a year later strengthened Hezbollah to an unprecedented extent, and the Olmert war in Gaza in 2008-09 led to a dangerous erosion of Israel’s legitimacy.

As a result of these four lamentable events, as well as the development of rockets and missiles, the Israel of 2010 is under far greater threat than the Israel of 2000. Its ability to use decisive force against those who threaten it has been greatly restricted. The quiet is deceptive. The ice is thin, and there is no way of knowing when or where it will break.

The threat of the occupation is no less severe than the threat of rocket fire. The settlers are extending their reach by the day, as the complexities of the territories grow ever more complex. The Palestinians are slowly pulling back from the two-state solution, and the implementation of that solution is growing increasingly more difficult. The international community is showing increasingly more impatience with one of the two states. Because of the occupation, the demographic situation of the state of the Jews is intolerable, and the state’s moral situation is disgraceful. Because of the occupation, the political threat looms ever larger. Time is working against the State of Israel.

That’s not what the right thinks, though. The right is still spreading the word that, apart from one or two things, everything’s just fine. After all, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu managed to put the brakes on U.S. President Barack Obama for a time. After all, Israel was approved for membership in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The economy is flourishing, summer’s almost here, and life is grand. Just as immigration from Russia saved us in the 1990s and high tech saved us in the following decade, the natural gas fields that have been discovered and those yet to be discovered will save us in the next decade. Israeli vitality will prove itself yet again. It will soon become clear that we can live perfectly well even in an impossible situation. The doomsayers can talk all they want, but everything will be fine. There’s nothing to worry about, nowhere to rush off to. If we don’t give in, Abu Mazen will give up. If we don’t blink, Obama will disappear. Don’t worry, promises the right, the State of Israel has time on its side.

The real argument is the one concerning time. The right believes that Israel has plenty of time, because time gives Israel the opportunity to create facts on the ground. The right believes that Israel was established as a fact on the ground, and will succeed as a fact on the ground.

But that is wrong. Israel was established because its founders created facts on the ground with one hand and won diplomatic recognition of those facts with the other. Israel was established because its founders recognized when time is on the side of Zionism and when time is working against it. But over the last few decades, that insight into time has gotten lost, as has the wisdom of equilibrium. The illusion has sprung up that military might and economic prosperity are enough to assure our future. A dangerous dissonance has developed between visible reality and its invisible counterpart. The relative quiet that the Israel Defense Forces, the Shin Bet security service and high tech have granted us has become a toxic quiet. It has allowed us to celebrate our lives without seeing the circumstances of our lives. It has allowed us to ignore the threats that are closing in on us.

The argument about time is an argument about life and death. On the eve of the Yom Kippur War, the right thought there was still time. On the eve of the intifada, the right thought there was still time. Today, too, when the threat of rocket fire and the threat of the occupation are tangible and immediate, the right thinks there is still time. But the truth is that there is no time. If we don’t act in time, time will beat us. It is only the silent siren that warns us of the genuine emergency.

DEBKAfile, Political Analysis, Espionage, Terrorism, Security.

Syrian missiles on the move

The night before Israel’s exercise for defending the home front against missile attack entered its fifth and last day on Thursday, May 27, the Syrian Chief of Staff placed all Syrian military units on standby, followed in the morning by a second directive for missile units to go on a war footing and take up firing positions. Reporting this, debkafile‘s military sources disclose that missile battery commanders were given “target updates,” meaning new Israeli targets for attack.

Western intelligence sources report that Wednesday night, long military convoys carrying mobile missiles were sighted rolling down Syrian highways – especial in the North.

In Athens, Greek military sources announced a joint Israeli-Greek naval and air force two-day exercise beginning next Tuesday, June 1, over the mainland and the Aegean and Ionian Seas. Exercise Minoas 2010 would serve Israeli Air Force F16s and F15s (five each) for drilling long-range flights covering roughly the same distance as between Israel and Iran and new in-flight refueling methods using Israeli KC-807 flying fuel tankers. Greece will deploy 15 F16s.
With all parties on the move, including the boosting of Lebanese army units on the Israeli border, the war tensions swirling around Israel’s northern borders show no signs of early dissipation.

Two years ago, 100 Israeli Air Force bombers of different types covered the distance between Israel and Greece and back to demonstrate that Iran and its nuclear sites were within reach. Then, Athens permitted Israeli jets to practice strikes against the Greek Army’s sophisticated S-300 interceptor missiles of the type Iran expects to procure from Russia.

The same drill may be repeated in the coming joint maneuver.
debkafile‘s military sources have learned that across the border the just-boosted Lebanese army units Wednesday afternoon practiced firing anti-air missiles and other weapons against Israeli warplanes near the village of Kuzah in southern Lebanon.

They also report that, back in March, Iran, Syria, Hizballah and Hamas prepared for the current war escalation by setting up a joint staff center for coordinating their missile and rocket attacks on Israeli military and civilian locations. The center which is staffed with liaison officers of the four participants was installed at Syrian Military General Headquarters in Damascus.

As debkafile reported May 26, a colossal Iran-funded and directed armament program has permitted Syria to field 1,000 ballistic missiles and Hizballah 1,000 rockets – all pointed at specific Israeli military and civilian locations, including the densely populated conurbation around Tel Aviv.

Op-Ed Columnist – As Ugly As It Gets – NYTimes.com.

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

I confess that when I first saw the May 17 picture of Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, joining his Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and the Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, with raised arms — after their signing of a putative deal to defuse the crisis over Iran’s nuclear weapons program — all I could think of was: Is there anything uglier than watching democrats sell out other democrats to a Holocaust-denying, vote-stealing Iranian thug just to tweak the U.S. and show that they, too, can play at the big power table?

No, that’s about as ugly as it gets.

“For years, nonaligned and developing countries have faulted America for cynically pursuing its own interests without regard for human rights,” observed Karim Sadjadpour of the Carnegie Endowment. “As Turkey and Brazil aspire to play on the global stage, they’re going to face the same criticisms they once doled out. Lula and Erdogan’s visit to Iran came just days after Iran executed five political prisoners who were tortured into confessions. They warmly embraced Ahmadinejad as their brother, but didn’t mention a word about human rights. There seems to be a mistaken assumption that the Palestinians are the only people that seek justice in the Middle East, and if you just invoke their cause you can coddle the likes of Ahmadinejad.”

Turkey and Brazil are both nascent democracies that have overcome their own histories of military rule. For their leaders to embrace and strengthen an Iranian president who uses his army and police to crush and kill Iranian democrats — people seeking the same freedom of speech and political choice that Turks and Brazilians now enjoy — is shameful.

“Lula is a political giant, but morally he has been a deep disappointment,” said Moisés Naím, editor in chief of Foreign Policy magazine and a former trade minister in Venezuela.

Lula, Naím noted, “has supported the thwarting of democracy across Latin America.” He regularly praises Venezuela’s strongman Hugo Chávez and Fidel Castro, the Cuban dictator — and now Ahmadinejad — while denouncing Colombia, one of the great democratic success stories, because it let U.S. planes use Colombian airfields to fight narco-traffickers. “Lula has been great for Brazil but terrible for his democratic neighbors,” said Naím. Lula, who rose to prominence as a progressive labor leader in Brazil, has turned his back on the violently repressed labor leaders of Iran.

Sure, had Brazil and Turkey actually persuaded the Iranians to verifiably end their whole suspected nuclear weapons program, America would have endorsed it. But that is not what happened.

Iran today has about 4,850 pounds of low-enriched uranium. Under the May 17 deal, it has supposedly agreed to send some 2,640 pounds from its stockpile to Turkey for conversion into the type of nuclear fuel needed to power Tehran’s medical reactor — a fuel that cannot be used for a bomb. But that would still leave Iran with a roughly 2,200-pound uranium stockpile, which it still refuses to put under international inspection and is free to augment and continue to reprocess to the higher levels needed for a bomb. Experts say it would only take months for Iran to again amass sufficient quantity for a nuclear weapon.

So what this deal really does is what Iran wanted it to do: weaken the global coalition to pressure Iran to open its nuclear facilities to U.N. inspectors, and, as a special bonus, legitimize Ahmadinejad on the anniversary of his crushing the Iranian democracy movement that was demanding a recount of Iran’s tainted June 2009 elections.

In my view, the “Green Revolution” in Iran is the most important, self-generated, democracy movement to appear in the Middle East in decades. It has been suppressed, but it is not going away, and, ultimately, its success — not any nuclear deal with the Iranian clerics — is the only sustainable source of security and stability. We have spent far too little time and energy nurturing that democratic trend and far too much chasing a nuclear deal.

As Abbas Milani, an Iran expert at Stanford University, put it to me: “The only long-term solution to the impasse is for a more democratic, responsible, transparent regime in Tehran. It has been, in my view, a great con game successfully played by the clerical regime to make the nuclear issue the almost sole focal point of its relations with the U.S. and the West. The West should have always followed a two-track policy: earnest negotiations on the nuclear issue and no less earnest discussion on the issues of human rights and democracy in Iran.”

I’d prefer that Iran never get a bomb. The world would be much safer without more nukes, especially in the Middle East. But if Iran does go nuclear, it makes a huge difference whether a democratic Iran has its finger on the trigger or this current murderous clerical dictatorship. Anyone working to delay that and to foster real democracy in Iran is on the side of the angels. Anyone who enables this tyrannical regime and gives cover for its nuclear mischief will one day have to answer to the Iranian people.

The Associated Press: Israeli prime minister to visit White House.

By ARON HELLER (AP) – 31 minutes ago

JERUSALEM — President Barack Obama’s chief of staff on Wednesday invited the Israeli prime minister to the White House next week, in a sign that strained relations between the two allies are beginning to thaw.

Rahm Emanuel, who was in Israel for a private visit, extended the invitation during a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Officials in Netanyahu’s office said the White House meeting would take place next Tuesday, after the Israeli leader wraps up a previously scheduled trip to Canada.

Emanuel told reporters the talks would focus on security issues, a likely reference to the Iranian nuclear program, as well as the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

The president is “asking to extend an invitation to you to come visit him at the White House for a working meeting to discuss both our shared security interests as well as our close cooperation in seeking peace between Israel and its neighbors.”

The meeting will give Obama and Netanyahu a chance to repair a relationship that has been strained since the two men took office last year.

Obama gave Netanyahu a cool reception during his last visit to Washington, even skipping the usual photograph session with reporters at the start of their March 23 meeting.

Relations between the U.S. and its top Mideast ally took a hit earlier that month when Israel announced plans to build 1,600 new homes in a Jewish neighborhood in east Jerusalem during a visit by Vice President Joe Biden. The announcement infuriated the U.S. and temporarily derailed plans to restart peace talks under American mediation.

Obama has pressured Netanyahu, who leads a conservative nationalist government, to halt Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank and east Jerusalem — captured territories that the Palestinians claim for a future state along with the Gaza Strip.

Under heavy pressure, Israel has since put the housing project on hold and imposed an unofficial construction freeze in east Jerusalem. Netanyahu has also announced a 10-month slowdown on construction in West Bank settlements.

The Israeli gestures helped clear the way for the launch of the U.S.-brokered, indirect peace talks earlier this month.

Next week’s meeting is expected to address shared concerns about Iran’s nuclear program, which Israel, the U.S. and much of the international community believe is ultimately aimed at the development of nuclear weapons — a charge that Tehran denies.

Both countries have reacted skeptically to an Iranian proposal — brokered by Brazil and Turkey — to swap low-enriched uranium for fuel rods to power a research reactor. A similar plan proposed by the U.N. in October was intended to deprive Iran — at least temporarily — of the opportunity to use its stockpile of enriched uranium to build a bomb.

On Tuesday Netanyahu called the deal “a transparent Iranian trick meant to distract world public opinion from sanctions by the Security Council against Iran.”

In Washington, White House spokesman Tommy Vietor said Wednesday that Obama will also meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas “in the near future,” but no date has been set.

In a related development, Israel said Wednesday it would begin compensating West Bank settlements for damages incurred because of the construction slowdown.

Interior Ministry spokesman Roi Lachmanovich said the state will send around $10 million to settlements to make up for lost revenues from families who would have come to live there had the construction proceeded.

Also Wednesday, the Israeli parliament gave preliminary approval to bills that would strip privileges, like family visits and televisions, from Hamas prisoners held by Israel.

The measures are meant to pressure Gaza’s Islamic militant Hamas rulers to free an Israeli soldier captured nearly four years ago by Hamas-linked militants.

Sgt. Gilad Schalit’s captors have barred any access to him and have allowed him to send messages only a few times since he was seized in June 2006.

In violence early Wednesday, Israeli warplanes pounded suspected militant targets in the Gaza Strip, wounding 15 people, including seven Hamas police, Palestinian hospital officials said.

The Israeli military said it scored direct hits on a pair of tunnels that militants were planning to use to attack Israel.

The airstrikes came hours after Gaza militants fired several mortar shells toward southern Israel and blew up an explosives-laden donkey cart near the border. No Israelis were wounded in the attacks.

Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

BESA Center for Strategic Studies.

by Chuck Freilich

EXECUTIVE SUMMERY: The Iranian nuclear threat has obscured the possibility of waging nuclear terrorism against Israel. There is a clear rationale for employing nuclear terrorism and countering it needs calibrated policies of prevention and possibly US-Israeli cooperation. The time to prepare for the Armageddon scenario is now.

For the past 15 years, Israel’s focus on the Iranian nuclear threat has been nearly all-encompassing, eclipsing virtually all other threats. While understandable, this preoccupation may have distracted Israel from a threat which may be no less likely and actually far more dangerous; nuclear terrorism. Unlike “traditional” terrorism, nuclear terrorism poses a catastrophic threat to the state.

Moreover, those most likely to conduct nuclear terrorism (al-Qaeda, Hizballah, Hamas, Iran, and others) may be fundamentally nihilistic and thus undeterrable. As millennial movements who believe that Israel’s destruction is a sacred mission, they may view a nuclear attack, even assuming a devastating Israeli response, to be a worthy means of ushering in a messianic era.

A nuclear terrorist threat against Israel might be designed for:

• Actual Use ג€“ to deal Israel a devastating blow
• Deterrence ג€“ to counter Israel’s conventional superiority and purported nuclear capability, to deter Israeli attacks, or to conduct attacks with relative impunity
• Compellence ג€“ to exert a decisive influence on Israeli decision making during crises or over fundamental issues, holding it hostage by the threat of an attack
• Weakening ג€“ to severely erode Israel’s national resilience due to the ongoing need to live in the shadow of nuclear terrorism
• Back Up ג€“ to strengthen the deterrent value of a state-based (Iranian or Syrian) capability
• Decapitation ג€“ to remove the Israeli political and/or military leadership

The potential means of conducting nuclear terrorism against Israel would be similar to those applicable to other countries (sea, air, and land-based), with one important addition: rockets. Rockets, such as those already in Hizballah’s possession, could be fitted with nuclear warheads. Though unsuited for ordinary military purposes, they could be effective weapons of terror.

Policy Options

Prevention

Prevention includes a variety of intelligence, interdiction, and other offensive measures to detect and prevent a nuclear terrorist capability from being developed or used. If still under development, Israel will have sufficient time to pursue a range of preventative options, alone and in conjunction with the US, from targeted to massive military operations. Once a capability exists, the window for action will be severely attenuated and preventative efforts will have to include any and all capabilities to guarantee success at all costs. While a unilateral Israeli operation might be sufficient if the capability is still being developed, the need for immediate and guaranteed success to thwart an operational capability may require American involvement. The challenges posed by detection and elimination of a terrorist nuclear weapon are hugely difficult.

Deterrence

Deterrence is commonly thought to be ineffective against nuclear terrorism, due to the presumed nihilistic nature of potential perpetrators. However, Hizballah and Hamas, while certainly extremist, have populations for which they take responsibility and have proven over the years to be deterrable. Although their acquisition of a nuclear capability would pose severe threats, such as the ability to terrorize Israel’s population with relative impunity, it does place them in the appropriate context.

Iran would presumably be willing to suffer great losses in pursuit of Israel’s destruction, but would have to take into account that Israel is considered by the international community to be a nuclear power and that a nuclear crisis could lead to a devastating exchange. While a precise assessment of Iran’s cost-benefit analysis is unknowable, it does appear to be fundamentally rational and thus deterrable.

The biggest question mark is in regard to al-Qaeda, whose presumed nihilism may indeed make it undeterrable. It is questionable whether this would truly be the case in the face of threats of annihilation of their leadership and families, Muslim population centers, and sites of major importance to the Muslim world.

Potential perpetrators of nuclear terrorism must be convinced that Israel will preempt/retaliate devastatingly. For Israel, this means a ג€�hoot first, no questions askedג€�policy. Both those clearly responsible for an actual attack (if any) and those reasonably suspected of involvement must be held accountable, and Israel must retaliate with all the means at its disposal. In the absence of irrefutable and immediate evidence to the contrary, Israelג€™s retaliatory policy should hold Iran and/or al-Qaeda responsible with an absence of irrefutable and immediate evidence to the contrary. In the event of a declared nuclear terrorist capability, a stated intention to acquire one, or an advanced suspected one, the known or suspected perpetrator and host country should be attacked in advance with the amount of all of the force necessary to prevent the threatג€™s materialization.

As a global power, the US will be unlikely to adopt such a ג€�o questions askedג€�policy and will require nuclear forensics. Nevertheless, American determination to prevent nuclear terrorism and retaliate devastatingly against those responsible must be beyond question. US declaratory policy on the nuclear terrorist threat to Israel would not need to be significantly different from its posture on nuclear terrorism generally, but could be further elucidated.

US-Israeli Cooperation

As with so many other areas of Israeli national security, cooperation with the US is a primary option for dealing with nuclear terrorism. In this case, however, the US would only be able to provide limited assistance. ג€�xtended deterrenceג€�would have little if any value in the face of nihilistic terrorists. Heightened cooperative preventative efforts, while important, may not suffice when the US lacks a satisfactory response to nuclear terrorism.

Conversely, global American efforts to minimize the threat of nuclear terrorism might be of significant indirect benefit for Israel. These efforts include, inter alia: heightened diplomacy to make better international use of existing diplomatic tools and to adopt new ones; intensified pressure on states to deny terrorists assistance and sanctuary; improvements in control over nuclear facilities, stockpiles and personnel; strengthening the NPT; heightened international cooperation regarding border security, export controls, intelligence sharing, and interdiction; and a variety of covert operations.

Ending Nuclear Ambiguity

Israel is widely thought by foreign observers to be nuclear and any potential perpetrator of nuclear terrorism must take this into account. It is doubtful whether ending nuclear ambiguity would be of significant deterrent value.

Defensive Measures

Israel has an extensive operational homeland security system (Arrow and Iron Dome) and an attacker must consider the probability of interception and massive retaliation. However, if ג€�nlyג€�one nuclear warhead got through, this would constitute unacceptable failure for Israel, rendering defensive measures an insufficient option.

Conclusion

To date, no terrorist group has apparently acquired a nuclear weapon or the materials needed to make one. Al-Qaeda has tried repeatedly, but currently the technical challenges are daunting. This good news comes with a crucial caveat; it is true only ג€�s far as we know.ג€�Even if the risk may be low at this time, the potential costs are monstrous and the threat assessment is likely to change significantly in the coming years. Israel must take into account that a nuclear terrorist threat could emerge in the foreseeable future and therefore devote greater attention and resources to it, in order to develop the necessary doctrine and undertake the preparations possible. The time to act is now.

Chuck Freilich is a Senior Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School, an Adjunct Professor at New York University, and a former Deputy National Security Adviser in Israel. This perspective is based on a more comprehensive study to be published by the Begin-Sadat (BESA) Center for Strategic Studies.

BESA Perspectives is published through the generosity of the Greg Rosshandler Family.