WarSclerotic

Netanyahu to Meet Harper Before Obama – Inside Israel – News – Israel National News.

Netanyahu

Israel news photo: Flash 90

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will make an official visit to Parliament Hill in Ottawa on March 2.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s office officially announced the visit on Monday. The Israeli embassy in Ottawa confirmed on Tuesday that Netanyahu would “stopover” in Ottawa before heading to Washington.

Netanyahu is set to meet US President Barack Obama on March 5 where the two leaders are expected to discuss the “full range of security issues of mutual concern.”

Iran’s nuclear program, the deteriorating situation in Syria, and the Islamic rise to power in northern Africa – especially Egypt – are widely believed to top the agenda.

Of key concern are tensions between Jerusalem and Washington over how to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. The Obama administration insists sanctions will succeed, while Netanyahu last week said sanctions are “not working.”

His statement was echoed by a senior US intelligence official who told US lawmakers that Iran was “nowhere near” giving up its nuclear weapons program.

Several members of Netanyahu’s government – including Defense Minister Ehud Barak – are said to favor a pre-emptive strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Netanyahu will also speak at the annual American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) policy conference, as is customary Israeli leaders. The conference runs from March 4-6.

Netanyahu met with Harper and Obama at the opening of the United Nations General Assembly in September.

Netanyahu’s early March visit follows a high-profile Middle East tour by key Harper cabinet ministers in late January. Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty met with top Israeli financial, trade and defense officials during the visit.

The upcoming Ottawa visit by Netanyahu is widely seen as a public show of thanks for the strong support Harper’s government has shown for the Jewish state during a time when the US – long Israel’s strongest ally – is increasingly seen as unreliable in Jerusalem.

Baird in particular spoke positively of Netanyahu’s leadership and Israel’s position vis-a-vis negotiations with the Palestinian Authority, going so far as to tell officials in Ramallah that their unilateral bid for statehood at the United Nations was “profoundly wrong.”

He also spoke enthusiastically of his support for Israel at the Herziyah conference saying, “Canada does not stand behind Israel; Canada stands shoulder to shoulder with Israel.”

Baird told Israeli reporters during his visit, “whether it is rockets raining down on Israeli schools, or the constant barrage of rhetorical demonization, double standards and delegitimization, Israel is under attack.”

‘Strike on Iran inevitable’ – Hindustan Times.

Officials in key parts of the Obama administration are increasingly convinced that sanctions will not deter Tehran from pursuing its nuclear programme, and believe that the US will be left with no option but to launch an attack on Iran or watch Israel do so.
The president has made clear in public, and in private to Israel, that he is determined to give sufficient time for recent measures, such as the financial blockade and the looming European oil embargo, to bite deeper into Iran’s already battered economy before retreating from its principal strategy to pressure Tehran.

But there is a strong current of opinion within the administration – including in the Pentagon and the state department – that believes sanctions are doomed to fail, and that their principal use now is in delaying Israeli military action, as well as reassuring Europe that an attack will only come after other means have been tested.

“The White House wants to see sanctions work. This is not the Bush White House. It does not need another conflict,” said an official knowledgeable on Middle East policy. “Its problem is that the guys in Tehran are behaving like sanctions don’t matter, like their economy isn’t collapsing, like Israel isn’t going to do anything.

“Sanctions are all we’ve got to throw at the problem. If they fail then it’s hard to see how we don’t move to the ‘in extremis’ option.”

The White House has said repeatedly that all options are on the table, including the use of force to stop Iran obtaining a nuclear weapon, but that for now the emphasis is firmly on diplomacy and sanctions.

But long-held doubts among US officials about whether the Iranians can be enticed or cajoled into serious negotiations have been reinforced by recent events.

If Obama were to conclude that there is no choice but to attack Iran, he is unlikely to order it before the presidential election in November unless there is an urgent reason to do so.

The question is whether the Israelis will hold back that long.

Earlier this month, the US defence secretary, Leon Panetta, told the Washington Post that he thought the window for an Israeli attack on Iran is between April and June. But other official analysts working on Iran have identified what one described as a “sweet spot”, where the mix of diplomacy, political timetables and practical issues come together to suggest that if Israel launches a unilateral assault it is more likely in September or October, although they describe that as a “best guess”.

Obama to address AIPAC, as well as Netanyahu.

CAPTION

By Pool, Getty Images

President Obama will address the nation’s most powerful pro-Israel lobbying group next month, a day before he speaks to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Obama speaks to AIPAC on March 4, amid global concern that Israel may attack Iran over its nuclear program, a move that the U.S. is urging the Netanyahu government not to make.

“The president welcomes this opportunity to speak to the strength of the special bonds between Israel and the United States,” said White House spokesman Jay Carney.

Netanyahu is also attending the annual AIPAC conference.

Noted the Associated Press:

The president’s election-year remarks to AIPAC come as Republican presidential candidates question his support for Israel and his handling of Iran’s nuclear threat. Obama says he is a staunch supporter of Israel.

Obama’s appearance at the conference also comes as the international community grows increasingly concerned that Israel could soon launch an attack on Iran’s nuclear program. The U.S. is urging Israel not to take that step.

McCain decries ‘daylight’ between… JPost – Diplomacy & Politics.

Iran threatens pre-emptive action against Israel – Telegraph.

Iran has threatened to launch pre-emptive action against Israel in the event of an attack on its nuclear facilities, raising the tempo in an increasingly bellicose exchange of rhetoric with the Jewish state.

Image 1 of 2

Mohammad Hejazi Photo: AFP

By Adrian Blomfield, Middle East Correspondent

7:51PM GMT 21 Feb 2012

A Diplomatic Solution to the Iran Nuclear Standoff? That May Depend On Achieving Compromises | Global Spin | TIME.com.

AFP / Getty Images

A handout picture released by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s official website shows him (R) listening to an expert during a tour of Tehran’s research reactor on Feb. 15, 2012.

Sanctions on Iran are beginning to work, goes the argument from the Obama Administration, and they should be given more time to bring Tehran to heel. The primary audience for this argument is the leadership of Israel, whom the U.S. and other Western powers are working hard to dissuade from launching a military attack on Iran. Tehran is showing renewed willingness to negotiate about its military program and this is taken, by some, as evidence that sanctions could achieve an acceptable outcome without risking a potentially catastrophic military confrontation. Whether that proves true, however, may ultimately depend on whether the players can be reconciled diplomatically — it’s extremely rare that any party to international conflict gets all of what it wants at the negotiating table unless its adversary has been forced to surrender.

Talks are certainly the focus of the moment. A high-level delegation of inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) arrived in Tehran on Monday, to test Iran’s willingness to allow inspectors to visit sensitive sites and interview key personnel. Tehran’s response to the IAEA’s requests will be an important indicator of the prospects for talks expected to be scheduled soon between Iran and the “P5+1″ — a group comprising the U.S., Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany.

Meanwhile, U.S. National Security Adviser Tom Donilon is in Israel, amid Israeli media reports of tensions over public statements by some U.S. officials warning Israel against a military strike. The Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, will meet President Barack Obama on March 5, during his visit to Washington to address the annual conference of a large pro-Israel lobbying organization, the America Israel Political Action Committee (AIPAC) — an audience important to Obama as he seeks reelection in November.

But whether diplomacy — backed by sanctions and Israeli military threats on the one side, and Iranian defiance on the other — resolves the standoff will depend on all parties finding a formula with which they can live. This would require uncomfortable compromises all round.

If Iran’s expressed readiness to negotiate is genuine, the Financial Times gave warning in an editorial last week, that it becomes essential to clarify ”what level of Iranian nuclear capability the world can live with, subject to intrusive external monitoring to verify Tehran is not running a weapons program”. If, once IAEA concerns about past activities are satisfied, Western powers aren’t willing to accept Iran’s maintenance of the internationally monitored uranium enrichment capability to which the Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) entitles it “there will be nothing to negotiate.”

Iran has agreed to discuss its nuclear program with the P5+1, although its nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili insisted that it would do so “without preconditions” — by which he means without necessarily accepting Western demands. Indeed, Jalili promised that Iran would bring new initiatives of its own to the table.

Former Iranian diplomat Hossein Mousavian suggested last week that a plausible diplomatic solution would need Western powers to recognize Iran’s right to nuclear technology, including enrichment, and lift sanctions. Meanwhile Iran would accept maximum transparency requirements under the NPT, including intrusive monitoring of all of its nuclear work, accept limits on its  enrichment levels and on the amount of low-enriched uranium it can stockpile, and other limits on its nuclear activities during a confidence-building period.

There’s no sign that Moussavian’s views would have the support of Iran’s leaders (he is currently a scholar at Princeton University) although they dovetail with other proposals to which some of them have responded positively. Then again, Iran’s Supreme Leader remains suspicious of and hostile to the intent of Western powers, and it remains to be seen what degree of compromise he will allow. If, however, he were amenable to the path outlined by Moussavian, it could create a headache for Western powers.

The civilian nuclear infrastructure to which Iran would be entitled under the NPT framework for peaceful nuclear power (once concerns over its previous activities are resolved) would nonetheless give it the capability to build nuclear weapons — if it expelled inspectors and broke out of the NPT. The same is currently true for Japan, Brazil, Argentina and other less controversial nuclear-energy states. Iran is not currently compliant with all of its NPT obligations, of course, but it is quite possible for Tehran to put itself fully in compliance with the Treaty and at the same time retain the capability to build nuclear weapons.

Until now, the bottom line for Israel, and of the more hawkish elements in the West (particularly France), has been that Iran can’t be allowed to maintain even peaceful enrichment capability because of the dual-use potential of that technology. The Bush Administration did, in fact, vow to prevent Iran acquiring the know-how to manufacture nuclear fuel, although that was rendered moot in April 2006 when Iran produced its first enriched uranium. Still, the Bush Administration had a position that Iran would have to give up all enrichment of uranium.

The Obama Administration’s stance has been more ambiguous on whether it would accept Iranian enrichment as part of a diplomatic solution that satisfied concerns over Iran’s intent and substantially strengthened safeguards against weaponization. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ruled out the prospect of Iran retaining any enrichment capability in July 2009. More recently she has stressed that the U.S. seeks a “negotiated solution that restores confidence in the exclusively peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear program while respecting Iran’s right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy consistent with its obligations under the Non Proliferation Treaty.” If NPT compliance is the only benchmark, of course, Iran would be able to enrich uranium under international scrutiny once it has satisfied concerns raised by the IAEA over its previous activities.

The political pressures on the Administration are made obvious, not only by the Israeli threats to take unilateral military action, but by moves such as the bipartisan effort in the Senate to pass a resolution that would draw the line not at any Iranian move to weaponize nuclear material, but at Iran having the capability to build a bomb. That’s a capability Iran already has, of course, even if it hasn’t yet decided to use it. At a Senate Armed Services committee hearing last week, Defense Intelligence Agency chief Lt. General Ronald Burgess noted “Iran today has the technical, scientific and industrial capability to eventually produce nuclear weapons.” At the same hearing, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told the Senate Armed Services committee that the consensus of the U.S. intelligence community remains that Iran has not yet decided to build nuclear weapons, even as it steadily accumulates the means to do so. (Pentagon officials suggest that it would take two to three years from breaking out of the NPT for Iran to develop a nuclear device that could be delivered via a missile.) Clapper said that he believed that Iran was a rational actor, and that Supreme Leader Ayatullah Ali Khamenei would make that decision based on a cost-benefit analysis.

While Israel and the more hawkish voices in Washington insist on a solution that rolls back Iran’s nuclear capacity, there’s no sign, thus far, that even the most punishing sanctions have changed Iran’s mind. Despite that pressure, Lt. Gen. Burgess told the senators “we assess that Iran is not close to agreeing to abandon its nuclear program.”

By that assessment, a diplomatic solution right now would require a measure of mutual trust (backed, following Ronald Reagan’s dictum, by verification) that has thus far been absent. Putting that in place (or even simply avoiding a dangerous confrontation) during a domestic election season in which Iran is the primary foreign policy issue, remains the most distinctive foreign policy challenge of Obama’s presidency.

Republican Candidates See Opening on Israel and Iran – NYTimes.com.

If Israel Can’t Bomb the Iranian Nuclear Program to a Halt, What About the U.S.? | Battleland | TIME.com.

The New York Times on Monday spelled out just how much of a challenge it would be for Israel to try to derail Iran’s nuclear program using military force. Reports Elizabeth Bumiller:

…an Israeli attack meant to set back Iran’s nuclear program would be a huge and highly complex operation…The possible outlines of an Israeli attack have become a source of debate in Washington, where some analysts question whether Israel even has the military capacity to carry it off.

This is all part of a huge mind game designed to keep Iran – as well as Pentagon war-planners – off balance. So let’s ask the question that’s being batted about whenever a handful of military geeks have gotten together in recent weeks: how much more successful would a U.S.-led strike be against Tehran’s nuclear infrastructure?

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has warned that attacking Iran’s nuclear sites would, “at best, it might postpone it [Iran joining the nuclear-weapons club] maybe one, possibly two years.” If he’s right – and most U.S. experts concur with his view – the U.S. probably can wound, but not kill, Iran’s nuclear dreams with military force.

But U.S. military experts say Washington could do far more to damage Iran’s nuclear program than Tel Aviv. Israel “has a much smaller air force and further to fly,” says Michael O’Hanlon at the Brookings Institution. “I worry most about its ability to robustly deal with Iranian air defenses.”

Jeffrey White, a former analyst with the Defense Intelligence Agency, says it’s not the initial punch that would set a U.S. attack apart from an Israeli one, but the ability to keep it going. “We have a lot more capability than Israel does, in terms of the number of aircraft, the kinds of attacks we could carry out, and the kinds of ordnance we could put on the targets,” says White, now at the Washington Institute for Near East Studies.

“But more important that anything is that we could sustain attacks. We’ve got B-1s, B-2s, carrier aviation, we might be able to launch out of the gulf states, we’ve got cruise missiles to knock down the air-defense system before we launch,” White says. “We have all kinds of capabilities that Israel doesn’t have.”

But an Israeli attack would not be puny — it could involve, as the Times noted, as many as 100 aircraft. “They could get enough aircraft up there to hit a number of targets,” White says, “but it would probably be a one-shot deal.”

That’s because its smaller military would have to dedicate itself to the blowback sure to come: “The Israelis are pretty creative, but my tendency is to think of it as a one-time event, and then the forces used in that operation would be reconfigured to prepare for anything coming out of Hezbollah or Hamas,” White says. “The real difference is our ability to sustain these attacks,” White says. “I’m thinking it would be an air campaign of attacks lasting days, versus a single operation.”

And it might – if the U.S. were serious about stopping Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons – have to be repeated again and again.

That’s why at least some national-security heavyweights are urging military restraint by both Israel and the U.S. “Proponents of rushing to war now, before we’ve exhausted all other options, tend to replay the mistakes made by proponents of the 2003 Iraq war,” says Colin Kahl, who until December served as the deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East. “They hype the threat, exaggerate the benefits of war, and downplay the risks and costs.”

Why an Israeli attack on Iran doesn’t make sense – latimes.com.

(A lefty, wishful thinking piece… JW )

Worse than a nuclear-armed Iran would be a nuclear-armed Iran that has been attacked by Israel.

By Dalia Dassa Kaye

February 21, 2012

Talk of a military strike on Iranian nuclear facilities is not subsiding. If diplomacy can’t head off Iran’snuclear ambitions, advocates for a military strike in Israel and the United States will only gain strength. While proponents may believe that Israel can endure the short-term military and diplomatic fallout of such action, the long-term consequences are likely to be disastrous for Israel’s security.

Those believed to favor a military option, such as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, argue that the Middle East with a nuclear-armed Iran would be far more dangerous than a military attack to prevent it. But their position rests on a faulty assumption that a future, post-attack Middle East would indeed be free of a nuclear-armed Iran. In fact, it may result in the worst of both worlds: a future nuclear-armed Iran more determined than ever to challenge the Jewish state, and with far fewer regional and international impediments to do so.

Let’s consider a post-attack Middle East. The risk factors are well known: potential Iranian retaliation in the Levant, the Persian Gulf and perhaps against Israeli and American interests abroad, as well as destabilizing consequences for global oil markets. Those Israelis who favor a strike believe that such retaliation would be limited and in any case less harmful than facing a nuclear-armed Iran.

Those opposed to an attack, such as former Israeli Mossad head Meir Dagan, believe the risks are too uncertain and potentially too costly to justify a strike; in their view, covert actions will be more effective in slowing Iran’s program, with fewer repercussions.

The consensus among Western analysts is that a military attack against Iran would at best delay Iran’s nuclear development, not stop it. This is because Iran’s nuclear facilities are believed to be widely dispersed and deeply buried, and because the nuclear expertise that Iran has developed so far cannot be eradicated through military strikes. On top of that, military attacks could push Iran to weaponize its program.

Thus, what the region’s future may hold is not an Iran that has or hasn’t acquired nuclear weapons, but rather a nuclear-armed Iran that has or hasn’t been attacked by Israel.

Why should Israelis be worried about these alternatives? Because while a nuclear-armed Iran that hasn’t been attacked is dangerous, one that has been attacked may be much more likely to brandish its capabilities, to make sure it does not face an attack again. That could lead to escalation between two nuclear adversaries that have no direct lines of communication. Cold War-style deterrence is not likely to work well under such circumstances.

Absent an attack, there is at least the possibility Iran may seek only a “virtual” capability — reaping the benefits of deterrence by possessing the technology necessary to build a weapon but not actually doing so. Such a posture would still be worrisome and would require intrusive inspections to maintain, but it would be far less destabilizing than an openly nuclear-armed Iran. It would also decrease the incentives for neighboring countries to consider a nuclear option.

A unilateral attack by Israel would also diminish the determination of the international community to challenge Iranian transgressions of its Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty commitments, or to continue to support Israel. The Obama administration has left “all options on the table,” but it clearly does not want a military strike.

Key players in Europe, not to mention smaller powers in Asia, would view military action as undermining diplomatic and economic options to solve the problem. Russia andChina’sresponse would be more hostile, jeopardizing Israel’s growing political and economic relations with both countries.

Regional reactions would also be negative, further inflaming anti-Israel sentiment in Arab nations. Iran has been losing ground with Arab populations disillusioned with its repression at home and its support for President Bashar Assad’s brutal repression in Syria, but an Israeli strike could allow Iran to bounce back as it plays the victim and fuels popular hatred toward Israel.

Likewise, Israel’s relationship with key neighbors Egypt and Jordan, more beholden to popular sentiment in the aftermath of the Arab uprisings, could be severely strained, putting at risk vital peace treaties. Any prospect of shared anti-Iranian sentiment forging quiet common cause between Israel and Arab Persian Gulf states or Israel and Turkey would dissipate.

Israel has never been integrated into the Mideast. But Israel has rarely faced total isolation. When Israel has confronted Arab nationalist adversaries in the past (Egypt and Iraq), it had the non-Arab “periphery” to turn to (Iran and Turkey). When Israel perceived a rising threat from Iran, it turned to peacemaking with its Arab neighbors. Israel has not faced a strategic situation in which it is isolated from Arabs and non-Arabs alike, while at the same time facing growing international isolation.

To many in Israel, nothing could be worse than a future with a nuclear-armed Iran. But a future with a nuclear-armed Iran that has been attacked by Israel could actually be a lot worse

Dalia Dassa Kaye, a visiting fellow at the UCLA Burkle Center for International Relations and a senior political scientist at the Rand Corp., is coauthor of “Israel and Iran: A Dangerous Rivalry.”

Crossed Signals Between Israel, U.S. on Iran Nuclear Program – Tablet Magazine.

And question linger: can Israel successfully pull off an attack?

See if you can follow this: Top U.S. general publicly warns ^[1] against an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, calling it “not prudent;” Israeli Defense Minister Barak demands ^[2] yet further sanctions, saying the current ones aren’t working well enough (implying that in the absence of further sanctions, an attack makes sense); Britain’s foreign minister also says ^[3] an attack right now is not a great idea; the Obama Adminstration sends its national security adviser and is about to send its intelligence chief to Israel to convey ^[3] that the time is not ripe; and finally—breaking the fourth wall!—top Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Netanyahu, scold ^[4] the national security adviser, insisting that these U.S. warnings are not helpful, then leak this scolding. “The Iranians see there’s controversy between the United States and Israel, and that the Americans object to a military act,” a senior Israeli official explained to Haaretz. “That reduces the pressure on them.”

Meanwhile, Iran keeps tip-toeing closer and closer to Israel’s red line—unless we find out tomorrow that they already passed it. Last time, it was that the underground facility in Fordo was ready to enrich uranium … but uranium wasn’t being enriched there, yet. This past weekend, the Islamic Republic announced ^[5] that it has readied the Fordo site—whose ample fortification itself makes it threatening to Israel—for advanced centrifuges … but it hasn’t installed the centrifuges there, yet. It’s like poking a snake with a stick to see how firmly you have to poke it before it lashes out. And, as is Iran’s wont, it matched stick with carrot, sending ^[6] a letter hinting at a willingness to negotiate further. A team of U.N. atomic inspectors is back ^[7] in the country. If you expect much to come out of either development, you are one of the more optimistic observers.

Yesterday, the New York Times published the thoughts ^[8] of U.S. defense experts suggesting that Israel may well lack the capacity to pull off a successful air strike of Iran’s nuclear facilities. The article contained numerous interesting details, such as the fact that Israel’s likely flight path would take it over Iraq, whose airspace the United States is conveniently no longer obligated to defend, and Jordan, which perhaps helps explain why the peace process has evolved ^[9] into a gigantic pro-Hashemite charade over the past couple months. It’s a pretty good tick-tock of how Israel would go about launching a strike, and it doesn’t outright deny the possibility that a strike could achieve Israel’s goals. (Austin Long argued ^[10] in Tablet Magazine that Israel could pull it off.) Apparently revealing classified information, defense expert Edward Luttwak—whom literary editor David Samuels interviewed ^[11] last year—argued ^[12] that a far smaller strike, much more commensurate to Israel’s capabilities, could also do a number on Iran’s alleged weapons program, though I’d feel more comfortable if I saw other people arguing this, too, and if the military hadn’t recommended solely a major air war, and if the argument didn’t rely on Iran’s being likely not to retaliate at all.

But the Times piece, like everything else, is about message-sending: the United States telling Israel (and the public) that it doesn’t think Israel can credibly back up its threats. Indeed, it is one more instance of exactly the sort of thing Netanyahu and company were complaining about.

Of course, intrinsic to the “Israel shouldn’t attack Iran because it probably wouldn’t be successful” argument is the “the U.S. should attack Iran because Israel might not be successful” argument. The layers are dizzying, and ultimately inconclusive, as, for example, this entertaining Politico article ^[13] on Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s maybe-strategic links about Israeli intentions illustrates. Maybe Panetta wants the public to think Israel is about to attack so other countries agree to further sanctions that head off the attack; maybe Panetta wants the public to think Israel is about to attack so that Israel doesn’t attack; maybe Panetta just doesn’t know when to keep his mouth shut.

What is clear is that Israel and the United States are not on the same page and perhaps not necessarily even speaking the same language, something that was apparent last week when Dennis Ross was trying to convince ^[14] Netanyahu and Barak that President Obama would resort to military action if it came down to brass tacks. The next, and perhaps last, best hope for getting the two countries on the same page will come March 5, when Netanyahu, in Washington to address AIPAC, will indeed meet ^[15] with Obama face-to-face for the first time since at the United Nations last September. Or maybe Bibi will be assured that, by the summer, the Republican primaries will be over and Obama will be facing a unified Republican field hammering ^[16] him every day for not being tougher on Iran.

The Israeli official who said this public discord strengthens Iran’s position is probably correct. Yet the administration also believes it is correct that now is a really bad time to attack, and may justifiably feel that that opinion will carry little weight unless it is made publicly, where the U.S. and Israeli publics can see it. A closer relationship between these two governments might not be tipping their respective hands, as the Israeli official feels. It might also have given the U.S. greater leverage over Israeli intentions and actions.