WarSclerotic

Romney: Obama should tell Iran military option not on table, but in our hand – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

Speaking at the Republican Debate in Arizona, Newt Ginrich says would support a pre-emptive strike on Iran at Israel’s request.

By Natasha Mozgovaya

Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney critizised the approach of U.S. President Barack Obama vis a vis Iran on Wednesday, saying he should have communicated that a military option is not only on the table, but “in our hand.”

Speaking at the Republican Debate in Arizona, Romney said Obama, who has tightened sanctions against Iran several times including recent measures against its central bank, could have imposed “crippling sanctions” on Iran, but chose not to.

	U.S. Republican presidential candidates U.S. Rep. Ron Paul (left), Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney (right), in Arizona, Feb. 22, 2012.
	Photo by: Reuters

“Every communication we’ve had so far is that he does not want Israel to take action; that he opposes military action. This is a president who should have, instead, communicated to Iran that we are prepared, that we are considering military options; they’re not just on the table, they are in our hand.”

Romney warned of the danger a nuclear Iran would pose in light of its proxies. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad could give fissile material to Hezbollah and Hamas, who, in turn, could bring it into Latin America and potentially across the border into the United States to let off dirty bombs or more sophisticated bombs, said Romney.

Joining Romney at the Republican Debate on Wednesday were the three other remaining GOP candidates, Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul. The event marked the final debate before Arizona and Michigan vote on February 28, and before Super Tuesday, when ten states will vote on March 6.

Fellow Republican Newt Gingrich referred to a comment made by Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey, who described Iran as a “rational actor” in an interview with CNN on Sunday. Gingrich said he could not imagine why Dempsey described Iran as “rational”. “The fact is,” said Gingrich, “this is a dictator, Ahmadinejad, who has said he doesn’t believe the Holocaust existed. This is a dictator who said he wants to eliminate Israel from the face of the Earth. This is a dictator who said he wants to drive the United States out of the Middle East. I’m inclined to believe dictators. I think that it’s dangerous not to.”

Gingrich added that he would support a pre-emptive strike if an Israeli prime minister, “haunted by the history of the Holocaust”, were to call him and say, “I believe in the defense of my country.” “If you think a madman is about to have nuclear weapons and you think that madman is going to use those nuclear weapons, then you have an absolute moral obligation to defend the lives of your people by eliminating the capacity to get nuclear weapons,” said Ginrich.

Former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum said Obama was not doing enough with regards to a Iran, and reminded Americans of his bill at the Senate that encouraged sanctioning Iran’s nuclear program, which “our intelligence community said didn’t exist and that the president of the United States, President Bush, opposed me for two years.”

Rep. Ron Paul was the voice of dissent on the topic, arguing that not even Israel claims Iran has a nuclear weapon. “I think what we’re doing is encouraging them to have a weapon, because they feel threatened. If you look at a map of Iran, we have 45 bases around their country, plus our submarines. The Iranians can’t possibly attack anybody. And we’re worrying about the possibility of one nuclear weapon. If you want to worry about nuclear weapons, worry about the nuclear weapons that were left over from the Soviet Union. They’re still floating around. ”

When the topic of expanding women’s roles in the military came up, the Republican candidates turned it into an opportunity to slam Obama.

Romney said Obama’s decisions regarding the U.S. military were “seriously awry.” “This is a president who is shrinking our Navy, shrinking our Air Force, wants to shrink our active-duty personnel, is cutting our military budget by roughly a trillion dollars. The world is more dangerous, it is not safer,” he said, pointing at Syria, the Arab Spring which “has become the Arab winter,” Hezbollah in Latin America and Mexico, North Korea’s nuclear development and Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.

“The right course is to add ships to our Navy, to modernize and add aircraft to our Air Force, to add 100,000 troops to our active- duty personnel and to strengthen America’s military,” he said.

Gingrich questioned what defines today’s war. “Anybody serving our country in uniform virtually anywhere in the world could be in danger at virtually any minute”, he said. “The truck driver can get blown up by a bomb as readily as the infantryman. We live in an age when we have to genuinely worry about nuclear weapons going off in our own cities,” he said, adding that all Americans are at more risk now than ever in U.S. history.

Paul said he does not want to see any American men and women at war. “What I fear is the draft coming back, because we’re getting way overly involved. The wars we fight aren’t defensive war; they’re offensive war.”

On the possibility of intervention in Syria, Senator Rick Santorum said “Syria is a puppet state of Iran. They are a threat not just to Israel, but they have been a complete destabilizing force within Lebanon, which is another problem for Israel, and Hezbollah.”

Romney said that amid all the bad news coming from the Middle East, a troubled Syrian regime is one piece of good news. “The key ally of Iran, Syria, has a leader that’s in real trouble. And we ought to grab a hold of that like it’s the best thing we’ve ever seen,” said Romney, adding that the U.S. needs to work with the Alwaites, the ethnic group of Syrian President Bashar Assad, to show them they have a future without Assad. In addition, said Romney, the U.S. needs to work with Saudi Arabia and with Turkey to support the Syrian rebels with weaponry. “If we can turn Syria and Lebanon away from Iran, we finally have the capacity to get Iran to pull back. And we can, at that point, with crippling sanctions and a very clear statement that military action is an action that will be taken if they pursue nuclear weaponry. That can change the course of world history.”

Analysis: Hyper-speculation over… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

By Reuters

To read the headlines and watch the news these days is to walk away with a distinct feeling that the US and Israel are at loggerheads over Iran.

“Senior administration officials are arriving to pressure Israel,” read the overline to a front page Yediot Aharonot headline Sunday.

Two days later the same paper, reporting on the White House’s announcement of a March 5 meeting between US President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu that has been in the works for weeks, headlined their page-two story as follows: “The pressure reaches the presidential level.”

And Yediot Aharonot is not alone by far. The media hysteria of a few months ago about an impending Israeli attack on Iran has now given way to media hysteria about a crisis in US-Israeli relations over how to deal with Iran. The surprise visit over the weekend by White House National Security Adviser Tom Donilon only fed the frenzy.

Donilon’s visit was, indeed, rare. Obama’s top foreign policy adviser does not fly in unannounced for high-level meetings every day. And even if his visit did come fast on the heels of trips to the US by Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman and Mossad chief Tamir Pardo – as well as a visit here by US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin Dempsey – the very fact that Donilon did come for a visit does not necessarily signal tension or US pressure.

Donilon’s visit was extremely hush-hush. Neither Israeli nor American officials reported anything about the discussions. No one outside of the participants, in truth, really knows what was said and what messages were passed on. And those who do know are not telling.

While the conventional wisdom is that Donilon’s talks with his Israeli interlocutors were dedicated to pressuring Israel to refrain from an attack, for all we know, he was mapping out flight routes into Iran with his counterparts.

That no one knows what was really discussed, however, need not get in the way of whipping up an Iran-related frenzy.

Truth be told, Dempsey fed the hysteria with a CNN interview Sunday in which he stated, “We think that it’s not prudent at this time to decide to attack Iran. I mean that’s been our counsel to our allies, the Israelis, well-known, well-documented.”

There are two telling factors in this comment.

Firstly, that the US does not think it is prudent “at this time” to attack. As Intelligence Agencies Minister Dan Meridor noted, that could mean the US will think it is prudent at another time.

Secondly, no one in Israel has said they think it is prudent to attack at this point either.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said in Cyprus last Thursday that the sanctions have not worked thus far. That does not mean Israel is saying they will not work, or cannot work; only that so far the world is imposing sanctions, and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is paying high-profile visits to his centrifuge halls. Saying they have not worked is a lot different than maintaining that they will not be effective, and Netanyahu pointedly did not say Israel would not give them a chance.

Israel and the West are locked in a dangerous dance with Iran. Only a handful of people on the Israeli and US side really know what is going on, and what messages are truly being conveyed between the sides. The rest is speculation.

Even US Senator John McCain (R-Arizona), when talking Tuesday in Jerusalem about “daylight” and “tension” between the US and Israel on the matter, was relying on media reports, having not been privy – by his own acknowledgment – to inside information from the meetings.

And if the crisis is indeed exaggerated, there may be a good reason why. Despite conventional wisdom that it is critical that Israel and the US are on the same page on this issue, perhaps it is beneficial if Iran actually perceives that there is “daylight” between the two allies. Maybe this will keep them guessing as to what Israel will do.

If one man sees someone else coming in his direction with a pitbull on a leash, it is good if he knows the leash is tight. All this noise might be to get the Iranians wondering whether the US does indeed have a tight leash on Israel. And if not, maybe Jerusalem really will attack.

When engaging in speculation – and all talk about an Israeli attack, and tension between the US and Israel at this point, is speculation – it would be wise to keep the following in mind: When Israel, according to foreign reports, took out a nascent nuclear installation in Syria in September 2007, no one had any inkling of what was going to happen beforehand, and no one knew about it for days afterward. Not until the Turkish media reported that fuel tanks jettisoned from Israeli fighter jets were found in Turkish territory did it become known that Israel had struck inside Syria.

Which only proves the dictum from the classic 1966 spaghetti western, “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”: “When you have to shoot: shoot. Don’t talk.” There is way too much talking going on, quite possibly an indication that the shooting is not as close as the media frenzy would have us fear.

If Israel strikes Iran, it’ll be because Obama didn’t stop it – Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News.

While our prime minister won’t say so out loud, he is deeply scornful of his predecessors for spending so much time on the Palestinian issue while neglecting the Iranian issue.

By Ari Shavit

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has dealt primarily with three things over the past three years: Iran, Iran, and Iran.

In the first instance, Netanyahu was busy making sure Iran was on top of the international agenda. While our prime minister won’t say so out loud, he is deeply scornful of his predecessors for spending so much time on the Palestinian issue while neglecting the Iranian issue.

Netanyahu has indeed succeeded in reversing the order, and has made the centrifuges at Natanz the primary concern of the Western world. With the generous help of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, British Prime Minister David Cameron and various Arab leaders, he has succeeded in convincing the international community that the Iranian issue is of utmost importance. In Tokyo, Beijing, Moscow, Berlin, Paris, London, and Washington, everyone is now addressing what Netanyahu has been dealing with for a decade. And the diplomatic world is now holding its breath: Will Israel attack or not attack? Will Iran go nuclear or not go nuclear? Will an Israeli-Iranian war inflame the whole Middle East?

In the second instance, Netanyahu made sure that the Iranian threat would top the national agenda. Ten years ago we were still arguing about peace. Five years ago we were arguing about dividing the land – about a permanent settlement, an interim settlement, disengagement, convergence, and the like.

But today the only diplomatic-security issue that people talk about at their Friday night get-togethers is the Iranian issue. Nothing good is happening in the Middle East. As long as the shadow of the Shi’ite bomb casts a pall over all of us, there won’t be any diplomatic breakthrough.

In the third instance, Netanyahu was busy building up Israel’s abilities to face the Iranian threat. Netanyahu thinks that until he took office, Israel hadn’t been preparing properly to confront Iran’s cement-lined bunkers. Both Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert felt comfortable believing that the “invisible hand” would resolve the problem. But the invisible hand did no such thing.

Yes, Iranian scientists were assassinated and Iranian centrifuges exploded, but at any given moment Iran had more fissionable material than the previous moment. One red line was crossed, and then another, and another. Thus, our prime minister’s primary preoccupation over the past few years has been sharpening the Israeli sword. He has made the whole world truly worried that the sword might be unsheathed.

A few years ago Netanyahu held an in-depth discussion with Middle East expert Bernard Lewis. At the end of the talk he was convinced that if the ayatollahs obtained nuclear weapons, they would use them. Since that day, Netanyahu seems convinced that we are living out a rerun of the 1930s.

He hasn’t forgotten for a moment that two leaders he happens to admire, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, didn’t lift a finger to save European Jewry during the Holocaust. He is convinced that U.S. President Barack Obama won’t lift a finger to save Israeli Jewry. Thus he believes solely in the Israeli sword, seeing it as a deep expression and the last defense of the Zionist revolution.

As of now, the military option is proving to be a diplomatic success. It managed to shake the international community out of its apathy and made a definitive contribution to the tightening of the diplomatic and economic siege on Iran.

But the time for playing diplomatic games with the military option is drawing to a close. There’s a limit to how many times one can cry wolf. There’s a point at which a “hold-me-back” policy exhausts itself. And that’s a very dangerous point, because suddenly the military option turns into a real option.

The Netanyahu-Obama meeting in two weeks will be definitive. If the U.S. president wants to prevent a disaster, he must give Netanyahu iron-clad guarantees that the United States will stop Iran in any way necessary and at any price, after the 2012 elections. If Obama doesn’t do this, he will obligate Netanyahu to act before the 2012 elections.

The moral responsibility for what may happen does not lie with the heirs of Chaim Weizmann and David Ben-Gurion. The moral responsibility will be borne by the man sitting in the chair that was once Franklin Roosevelt’s.

Race team could give boost to Israel at … JPost – National News.

Congress Tackles Iran | The Jewish Exponent.

WASHINGTON

Is America’s red line on Iran moving?

A new bipartisan resolution introduced last week on Capitol Hill is part of a growing effort to shift the longstanding U.S. red line from Iran acquiring a nuclear weapon to having the capability to build one. Such a shift would bring U.S. policy in line with Israel’s approach.

The resolution — a nonbinding Senate statement backed by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee — calls on the United States to prevent Iran from acquiring even the capability to build nuclear weapons.

Sen. Lindsey Graham

It was introduced by Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Robert Casey (D-Pa.) and has 29 other co-sponsors, roughly evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans. In order to garner Democratic support, the resolution’s authors had toned down its original language.

“I’m trying to build a bipartisan consensus around something we all believe in,” Graham said when asked by a reporter why he had removed language that seemed to threaten Iran with military force.

But the bill is already provoking jitters among Democrats anxious over the specter of war.

As it now stands, the resolution “affirms that it is a vital national interest of the United States to prevent the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapons capability.”

The language that was removed would have affirmed “that it is within the power and capabilities of the United States Government to prevent the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapons capability.”

Noting the “power and capabilities” of the United States seemed too close to saber rattling for some Democrats, insiders said. A number of senators asked Graham to include an explicit denial that the resolution authorized military action; he flatly refused.

Capitol Hill insiders say that if Graham had not changed the language at all, he likely would have failed to garner more than nominal Democratic support.

“They couldn’t find any Democratic co-sponsors until they addressed those concerns,” said Heather Hurlburt, executive director of the National Security Network, a think tank allied with foreign policy realists and liberals, and one of a number of groups that made representations to Democratic senators in recent weeks to tone down the resolution.

The threat of military action is key to the resolution’s potency, Lieberman said, but he stressed the resolution did not seek to authorize such action.

“We 32 original sponsors of this U.S. Senate resolution want to say clearly and resolutely to Iran: You have only two choices — peacefully negotiate to end your nuclear weapons program or expect a military strike to end that program,” Lieberman said at a news conference Feb. 16.

Were it not for the back and forth over the language, the resolution would have been introduced the week before. The delay and the sensitive negotiations over language may presage tensions with Democrats as AIPAC leads the drive among pro-Israel groups to ratchet up pressure on Iran this year.

Jewish Democratic insiders note that Democrats remain spooked over their acquiescence a decade ago in the buildup to the Iraq War.

“There are clearly plenty of people, especially in the Democratic Party, who are reluctant to drive to war with great rapidity,” said a Jewish Democratic activist who asked not to be identified.

AIPAC is expected to make the resolution an “ask” in three weeks when up to 10,000 activists culminate its annual conference with a day of Capitol Hill lobbying.

As it is, the resolution has failed so far to attract the support of some key Democrats on the committees critical to its passage, Foreign Affairs and Armed Services. Among those missing are pro-Israel stalwarts like Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, and Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) on the Foreign Affairs Committee. Fifteen of the resolution’s 32 backers are in the Democratic caucus, a figure that includes Lieberman, who caucuses with the party.

The resolution’s sponsors seemed eager to suggest that the resolution reinforces Obama administration policy. Graham began the news conference by sounding a note that others would repeat: “President Obama has stated that it’s unacceptable for Iran to obtain a nuclear capability.”

In fact, Obama has never used the “nuclear capability” phrasing, speaking instead of Iran “getting,” “obtaining” or “acquiring” a nuclear weapon as a red line.

“America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal,” Obama said last month in his State of the Union address.

Senators sponsoring the bill said capability is the more sensible red line when it comes to a belligerent regime like Iran’s.

“The fact that they could give it to a terrorist and that it would lead to proliferation in that region is reason alone to support this resolution,” Casey said last week.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government reportedly has pressed the Obama administration to adopt Israel’s “capability” standard. According to media reports, Netanyahu refuses to give the United States advance warning of an Israeli strike unless the Obama administration agrees to make capability its red line — to strike before Iran enters an “immunity zone,” in the words of Defense Minister Ehud Barak.

Graham suggested that adopting Israel’s red line would keep Israel from going it alone. He said that when he visits Israel soon, he will convey to Netanyahu: “We expect you never to lose control of your own destiny, but you need to understand there has been a sea change in Washington. Please understand that we share your view that Iran should not have a nuclear weapons capability.”

Obama is slated to meet with Netanyahu when the Israeli premier comes next month to address the AIPAC conference.

In recent weeks, there have been signs that the Obama administration has moved toward Israel’s posture; Defense Secretary Leon Panetta now speaks of the “development” of a nuclear weapon as a red line. Still, gaps remain between the Obama administration and members of Congress. In testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee last week, the director of national intelligence, James Clapper, made clear the administration continues to perceive a strategic difference between capability and acquisition.

“We assess Iran is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons, in part by developing various nuclear capabilities that better position it to produce such weapons, should it choose to do so,” he said in written testimony. “We do not know, however, if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons.”

Graham, in an exchange, pressed him on the point.

“You have doubt about the Iranians’ intention when it comes to making a nuclear weapon?” Graham asked.

“I do,” Clapper answered.

“So you’re not so sure they’re trying to make a bomb?” Graham asked.

“I think they’re keeping themselves in a position to make that decision, but there are certain things they have not yet done and have not done for some time,” Clapper said.

“I guess my point is that I take a different view,” Graham concluded. “I’m very convinced they’re going down the road of developing a nuclear weapon.”

Navy’s new super-sub revealed – Israel News, Ynetnews.

Foreign media say Israel’s navy ready to test advanced, German-made submarine said to be virtually undetectable by radar, able to launch nuclear missiles

Udi Etsion

Israel’s “doomsday weapon” revealed?

The Navy will soon begin its test-deployment of Israel‘s new super-submarine, Yedioth Ahronoth reported Wednesday.

The report quoted various foreign newspapers as saying that the new Dolphin-Class submarine’s systems will enable it to spends prolonged periods of time at sea and fire nuclear missiles.

Related stories:

• Germany OKs subsidized submarine sale to Israel
• ‘Submarine deal achieved through concessions’
• ‘Israel must expand sub fleet amid Iran threat’
  

The submarine, names the “INS Tannin,” is also said to be equipped with special diesel and hydrogen conversion systems that will allow it to produce its own fuel; as well as with a stealth system making its acoustic signature virtually undetectable by radar.

The INS Tannin (“Alligator”) is the namesake of the Israel Navy’s first ever S-Class submarine, which was retired from active duty in 1972.

According to German media, the Tannin – which will be supplied by the end of 2012 – is the first of three super-submarine slated to eventually be deployed by the Navy. A second super-sub – the INS Rahav (“Splendor”) will arrive in 2014 and the third, which has yet to be named, by 2015.

Germany’s Kieler Nachrichten newspaper said that the super-sub is the biggest and most advanced underwater vessel to be constructed in Germany since World War II.

It has also been acquired by the German and Italian naval forces.

The boatyard where the submarine is under construction is said to be under heavy guard. A team of Israeli experts is on-site, assisting their German counterparts.

Israeli threat against Iran must… JPost – Iranian Threat – News.

By IDF spokesperson

Israel must maintain a credible threat of military action against Iran’s nuclear program, analysts said Wednesday, and must follow through on that threat if all other options fail.

“There is a real danger in making a threat if you’re not prepared to follow through on it.

The threat has to be credible,” a former highranking Israeli official said in a closed seminar at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS).

“Israel is independent – it will do what it has to do,” he said. “I would remind you that the Israelis have surprised the world in the past, and we could do the same again.”

The ex-official said time remains to explore non-military options against Tehran, including negotiations with Iran’s government, covert action and most importantly, levying harder-hitting sanctions on the Islamic Republic’s ailing economy. Iran has been subject to four rounds of UN Security Council sanctions, and last month the European Union agreed to an oil embargo and a freeze on assets in the Iranian central bank.

“Crippling sanctions can be effective,” he said. “Now the Iranians are paying attention – during the first four rounds of sanctions, they weren’t.”

In October the US revealed it had foiled a suspected Iranian plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington. Last week Tehran was implicated in failed attacks on Israeli diplomats in Georgia, India and Thailand, and on Tuesday authorities in Azerbaijan uncovered the second foiled plot against Israeli officials there within a month.

INSS researchers said Iran’s increasingly erratic – and, they said, amateurish – behavior is evidence of a regime growing desperate under ever-tightening international pressure.

The former official said he believes Iran intends to reach “breakout capacity” whereby it would develop all the capabilities to build an atomic weapon but would remain at the nuclear threshold until a time of its choosing. “Iran will likely be at that threshold for years, not months,” he said.

A policy of containing or deterring a nuclear Iran, he said, is all but impossible: “Are we able to contain a non-nuclear Iran? Hardly. How then will we ever contain or deter a nuclear one?” Critics of an Israeli strike say a military operation would destabilize the Middle East, but the official said that conclusion is predicated on the wrong variables. “The proper comparison is not between the regional stability we have today and what we would have after a military strike,” he said. “The comparison should be between today and the day after Iran gets the bomb.”

The Iranians’ ability to respond to an Israeli strike, he said, falls far short of their leaders’ bluster to eliminate the Jewish state. He acknowledged that while Iran’s nuclear program could not be eliminated in a single strike – as Israel did with those of Iraq and Syria in 1982 and 2008 respectively – a surgical strike could deliver a powerful message of what might be in store should Tehran stay its current course.

“We will not see the doomsday prophecies Iran has warned of,” he said. “That would be against Iran’s interest, and beyond its capabilities. Iran is very vulnerable.”

“If Iran is struck surgically, it will react – no doubt,” he added. “But that reaction will be calculated and in proportion to its capabilities. Iran will not set the Middle East on fire.”

INSS researchers gave contrasting predictions about the scope of an Iranian counterstrike.

The ex-official predicted a response tantamount to the sum total of three attacks on Israel and its interests in the past two decades: Saddam Hussein’s 1991 Scud missile attacks during the Gulf War, the 1992 and 1994 bombings of Israeli targets in Argentina and Hezbollah’s rocket barrage during the 2006 Second Lebanon War.

Two Israeli civilians were killed and more than 200 wounded by Scuds fired from Iraq.

More than 100 people were killed and hundreds were injured in the bombings of the Israeli Embassy and a Jewish center in Buenos Aires, which were later attributed to Hezbollah and Iran. In the 2006 war with Hezbollah, 44 Israeli civilians were killed and more than 100 seriously or moderately wounded. Israel suffered an estimated $3.5 billion in total damages, and had to evacuate more than 350,000 people living in the country’s North to bomb shelters or locations farther south.

The former official said Hezbollah would likely respond to a strike on its patron Iran with another rocket assault, and this time the casualties and damage would be far greater than in 2006. “This time it will also launch missiles on Tel Aviv,” he said. “Is 40 missiles on Tel Aviv nice? No – but it’s better than a nuclear Iran.”

Another INSS researcher disagreed, predicting Hezbollah may stage a limited response or remain on the sidelines altogether.

“Hezbollah is not interested in a confrontation now,” the researcher said, pointing to recent remarks by its leader Hassan Nasrallah that the group would decide for itself – and not under Tehran’s direction – whether to respond and with what method.

The Iranians, the analyst said, are working to expand their ballistic missile range as widely as possible – and it is crucial for the international community to realize a nuclear Iran is not an Israeli problem but a global one.

Last month The New York Times quoted former CIA director Michael Hayden as warning that an effective strike on Iran is “beyond the capacity” of Israel, while this weekend the paper quoted an unnamed US defense official as conceding that the Pentagon does not have “perfect visibility” regarding Israel’s military capacities.

On Wednesday the Israeli ex-official dismissed the idea that Israel is incapable of waging an effective strike by posing a question of his own: “In that case, why is everyone so worried