In meeting, Obama to warn Netanyahu against military strikes on Iran – The Washington Post
In meeting, Obama to warn Netanyahu against military strikes on Iran – The Washington Post.
By Scott Wilson,
President Obama is heading into a critical week in his drive to contain Iran’s nuclear ambitions, as he meets with Israel’s hawkish leader to caution him against military strikes until international economic sanctions have had time to take full effect.
Obama’s meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday will come amid public differences between the allies over the intent of Iran’s nuclear program, although not over the principle that Iran must be prevented from developing a weapon with its enriched uranium.
The Oval Office session will provide a chance for both leaders, who have had a tense relationship at times, to clarify their thinking on the need for and the timing of a potential military operation against Iran’s nuclear facilities.
For Obama, there is a political backdrop, as well. With his approval ratings finally rising on the strength of an improving economy, he faces intertwined political threats in an election year: rising gas prices and the possibility of a military confrontation involving an oil-rich Iran. The issue preoccupies the White House but does not resonate as urgently among Israelis.
How Obama intends to convey that message to Netanyahu, who faces political pressures of his own, will entail a measure of public showmanship and private diplomacy.
Israeli leaders are operating on a far shorter timeline for military action. They have concluded, unlike the Obama administration, that Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapon, and their ability to strike it is hindered by munitions that are less powerful than those in the U.S. arsenal.
As Iran steps up its enrichment of uranium and places more of its installations underground, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak has warned that Iran is approaching what he calls “the zone of immunity,” a milestone after which an Israeli attack would prove far less effective in setting back the Iranian program.
Iranian leaders have said the enrichment program is for civilian power purposes, although international inspectors have uncovered evidence to suggest a military intent. Israel has its own undeclared nuclear program, including a large nuclear weapons arsenal. But Obama has declined to call on Israeli leaders to declare the program, a source of frustration and fear in the Middle East.
In an interview published Friday in the Atlantic magazine, Obama said that “the Israeli government recognizes that, as president of the United States, I don’t bluff.”
But he suggested that any Israeli strike on Iran before international oil and gas sanctions take effect this summer would undermine the tenuous unity the United States and its allies have built to oppose Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Privately, White House officials say any sense of unity would explode with the first Israeli airstrike.
“At a time when there is not a lot of sympathy for Iran and its only real ally [Syria] is on the ropes, do we want a distraction in which suddenly Iran can portray itself as the victim?” Obama said in the interview.
That probably will be the message Obama delivers Sunday when he addresses the American Israel Political Affairs Committee, the Jewish state’s most conservative and politically influential U.S.-based advocacy group.
Obama’s challenge, administration officials and outside analysts say, will be to send a strong signal to Iran that the United States and Israel will do what it takes, including military action, to prevent the Islamic Republic from developing a nuclear weapon.
At the same time, he must make clear to Israel and its most ardent supporters in the United States that he does not favor an Israeli strike at this time, and do so in a way that doesn’t reveal a split with his ally that Iran could exploit.
A Washington Post-ABC News poll in January showed that nearly half of Americans — 48 percent — disapproved of Obama’s handling of the Iranian nuclear issue. But the poll also found that very few respondents, including Republicans, favored a U.S. military operation against Iran over allowing time for diplomatic efforts such as the oil and banking sanctions to take effect.
Most Americans also say that the United States should stay neutral in a conflict between Israel and Iran over the nuclear program.
A Pew Research Center poll published in February found that 39 percent of respondents say the United States should back Israel in such a war, while 51 percent said the country should stay out of it. The results were sharply partisan, with Republicans, by a 2 to 1 margin, saying the Obama administration should support Israel.
U.S. and Israeli officials acknowledge privately that there is diplomatic value in Israel’s public threats of war.
Israel’s anxiety and declared readiness to strike Iran give the Obama administration leverage in persuading Japan, Russia and other relatively rich countries to rally behind sanctions and tighten them as necessary — or risk a military confrontation with potentially devastating consequences for a fragile global economy.
“People really don’t want war,” said an administration official, who like others spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal thinking on Iran. “They really don’t.”
Obama and Netanyahu have had an up-and-down relationship, which the president, in his interview with the Atlantic, described as “very functional.”
Much of the friction has emerged from the administration’s management of the Israeli-Palestinian peace issue — and the Israeli response to its requests. But officials from both countries say that, on matters of military cooperation and intelligence-sharing, the relationship is strong.
Early in his term Obama embraced the long-standing Israeli security policy — used as the standard for acquiring U.S. military aid — of preserving a “qualitative military edge” in the region. U.S. officials from Obama on down have also said repeatedly that, regardless of Israel’s response to the Iranian program, the American commitment to its security is “unshakable.”
Even amid their rough patches, Netanyahu has turned first to Obama in seeking support in times of crisis, whether during the angry aftermath of the deadly Israeli raid on a Turkish flotilla bound for Gaza or amid the Palestinian push for statehood at the United Nations last fall that Obama opposed.
“When the chips are down and there’s a lot at stake, the Israeli prime minister still calls the president of the United States,” said Dennis Ross, a counselor at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who served as Obama’s senior adviser on Israel and Iran before leaving the National Security Council staff at the end of last year. “There is still a high degree of trust.”
Administration officials say that no formal agreement has been reached with Israel over how a strike would be conducted — or when Obama would be informed about it.
Some officials said the assumption inside the White House and Pentagon is that Israel would not give the United States warning, allowing the administration to deny prior knowledge but also limiting its ability to defend U.S. military assets in the region.
Whether the subject will come up during Obama’s meeting with Netanyahu is unclear. But administration officials say there is some fear that talking about the logistics of an Israeli strike might be seen by the Israeli government as a tacit green light — not a signal Obama wants to send.
Outside analysts say that Israel, known for fiercely protecting its right to make its own national security decisions, might also want to avoid too many specific conversations and agreements that could restrain its ability to act later.
“They’ve always wanted to preserve their own freedom of action,” Ross said. “The more explicitly you begin to seek certain kinds of commitments, the more you are going to be asked to make commitments of your own.”
Instead, Ross and others outside the administration believe Obama and Netanyahu will seek an understanding on the “zone of immunity” concept — that is, when Israel believes it must attack to effectively damage the Iranian program.
U.S. intelligence agencies have yet to conclude that Iran’s leaders have decided to pursue a nuclear weapons, a central point of disagreement with Israeli officials, who argue that, given Iranian advances, the time between that decision and the construction of a workable bomb is likely to be very short.
Israeli officials have told their American counterparts that it is impossible to know the full scope of the Iranian intent and the reaches of its program, even though Western intelligence has exposed Iranian subterfuge before. The Israeli message is: We don’t know what we don’t know.
But Obama told the Atlantic that “our assessment, which is shared by the Israelis, is that Iran does not yet have a nuclear weapon and is not yet in a position to obtain a nuclear weapon without us having a pretty long lead time in which we will know that they are making that attempt.”
“In that context, our argument is going to be that it is important for us to see if we can solve this thing permanently, as opposed to temporarily,” Obama said.
A European Union embargo on Iranian oil and fresh American sanctions against its energy sector are due to kick in this summer, strong diplomatic tools that could push up gasoline prices during the peak summer driving season in the United States.
The price per gallon in the United States has already jumped 47 cents in the past two months, and a new Post-ABC News poll found that Obama gets the most blame for this development.
The sanctions law does give Obama some flexibility in implementing it if he determines that the world oil market to unable to absorb a decrease in supply.
A report released Thursday by the U.S. Energy Information Administration, which will provide much of the data Obama will rely on in making his sanction implementation decisions, said the impending sanctions are already disrupting Iranian oil exports. It also said that “spare oil production capacity is currently quite modest,” meaning it will be difficult to make up for the drop in Iranian supply.
Obama has the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to draw on to make up for significant shortfalls, and any decision to weaken the sanctions against Iran probably would alarm Israel and undermine the administration’s message.
As a second administration official put it, “We’re trying to make the decision to attack as hard as possible for Israel.”
Polling analyst Scott Clement contributed to this report.
© The Washington Post Company
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