WarSclerotic

Israel used 17 tons of explosives to destroy Syrian reactor in 2007, magazine says | The Times of Israel.

Mossad agents stole key information on Assad’s nuclear project from Vienna home of Syrian atomic agency head, New Yorker claims

Before and after satellite images of the Syrian nuclear reactor struck during Operation Orchard in 2007 (AP/DigitalGlobe)

Five years ago, Israeli Mossad agents broke into the Vienna home of Syria’s Atomic Agency director, where they found pictures taken inside a nuclear reactor in Syria. A few months later, eight Israeli fighter jets dropped 17 tons of explosives on the Syrian site, destroying it.

These details and the full story of the attack, dubbed Operation Orchard, against Syria’s nuclear reactor near al-Kibar in September 2007, were reported in the New Yorker magazine on Monday. Israel has never publicly claimed credit for the strike, and Syria has never acknowledged that its reactor was destroyed.

In March 2007, according to the magazine piece by David Makovsky, Israeli agents forced their way into the home of Ibrahim Othman, the head of Syria’s nuclear program. The break-in took place in light of growing concerns in the US and Israel over Syria’s nuclear ambitions, and intelligence reports about the facility in the northeastern desert region of Syria.

The raid provided the information Israeli decision-makers were looking for. Dozens of pictures from inside the facility showed North Korean workers in the facility, and the design indicated the structure was, indeed, a plutonium nuclear reactor.

Israel then decided to destroy the reactor, in accordance with a doctrine established by prime minister Menachem Begin in 1981, when it bombed Iraq’s Osirak reactor: never to allow enemy countries to obtain nuclear weapons.

Former Mossad chief Meir Dagan presented the new information obtained in the 2007 break-in to Ehud Olmert, the prime minister. Olmert in turn shared it with security and intelligence officials and the country’s former prime ministers — Shimon Peres, Ehud Barak and Benjamin Netanyahu.

The subsequent decision-making process described in the piece could provide some insight into the possible process of the current debate over an Israeli strike in Iran.

First, all those summoned by Olmert signed a secrecy agreement before being debriefed. “Amir Peretz, the Defense Minister; Gabi Ashkenazi, the Israel Defense Force’s chief of staff; Amos Yadlin, the IDF. head of military intelligence; Yuval Diskin, the head of the Shin Bet, Israel’s security service; and Dagan, of the Mossad — met most Fridays from late March of 2007 through early September. Each member signed a secrecy agreement.”

Next, Olmert discussed the data with the Bush administration in Washington, which started its own investigation. Bush, Makovsky reported, was still traumatized over the lack of proper information regarding Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction. The president reportedly said of the information, and the possible repercussions of action against Syria, “Gotta be secret, and gotta be sure.”

A CIA task force was established. It “compared ‘handheld’ photographs of the site with ‘overheads’ taken by American satellites.” The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency confirmed the two sets of pictures matched, as did American nuclear experts.

Israel wanted to take military action before the reactor was active. It feared a late strike could result in the Euphrates river being heavily polluted. Washington didn’t see eye-to-eye with Jerusalem when it came to the Syrian timetable and nuclear weapons program, even though it agreed on most of the other details.

Two words uttered in June ’07, at the halfway mark between the break-in in Vienna and the attack in Syria, led former president Bush to back down from military action, Makovsky writes: “Recounting that period for a 2011 Washington Post article, former CIA director Michael Hayden said that he ‘told the President that Al Kibar was part of a nuclear weapons program’ and that ‘we could conceive of no alternative uses for the facility.’ But, because they ‘could not identify the other essentials of a weapons program,’ such as a reprocessing plant or active work on a warhead, Hayden wrote, ‘we cautiously characterized this finding as ‘low confidence.’”

Olmert had hoped the US would lead a strike on the reactor, but when Washington decided not to use military action, he decided Israel would act swiftly and unilaterally.

Preparations for military action shifted into a high gear in late-summer. Olmert summoned and briefed cabinet members, always having them sign a secrecy agreement before telling them anything.

“On September 1st, Olmert’s advisor told the White House that preparations were almost complete. Israel informed one other country’s intelligence service before the strike — Britain’s MI6 — but did not share the exact timing of the attack with either country,” the article said.

On September 5, the entire cabinet, with the single exception of Avi Dichter, voted in favor of military action. Barak, Olmert and foreign minister Tzipi Livni were given the authority to decide the exact timing of the strike.

“After the cabinet session, Olmert, Barak, and Livni reconvened in the briefing room adjacent to Olmert’s office. The chief of staff came into the room and recommended attacking that night… After the chief of staff left, Olmert, Barak, and Livni voted unanimously to proceed.” The order was given to the IDF, and the Air Force scrambled.

Just before midnight on September 5, eight fighter jets — four F-16s and four F-15s — took off toward their target. The jets flew along the Mediterranean sea before turning east and following the Syria-Turkish border. Using electronic jamming devices, Israel blinded Syria’s early warning systems.

In the article, the moments leading up to the attack are described as follows: “In Tel Aviv, in a room of the underground IAF command-and-control center known as ‘the pit,’ Olmert, Barak, Livni, and senior security officials followed the planes by radar. The room would serve as a bunker for Olmert in the event that the strike sparked a war; the Israelis had also prepared a military contingency plan.

Air Force commander Eliezer Shkedi “tracked the pilots by audio in an adjacent room. Sometime between 12:40 and 12:53 A.M., the pilots uttered the computer-generated code word of the day, ‘Arizona,’ indicating that seventeen tons of explosives had been dropped on their target. ‘There was a sense of elation,’ one participant recalled. ‘The reactor was destroyed and we did not lose a pilot.’”

The article reports: “As the planes returned to their bases, Olmert went to his secondary office, at the Kirya defense complex, in Tel Aviv, and asked to be connected to Bush, who was in Australia. ‘I just want to report to you that something that existed doesn’t exist anymore,’ Olmert told him. ‘It was done with complete success.’”

Since the attack five years ago, Syria has denied the site was intended for nuclear purposes. Israel has never officially confirmed it carried out the bombing. “Three weeks after the strike, President Assad told the BBC that Israeli warplanes had attacked an unused military building,” the report notes.

“Even as confirmation of some sort of strike came out in the world press, Syria did not strike back. This reinforced Israel’s initial psychological reading: as long as Assad could deny the existence of the reactor, he would not feel pressured to retaliate. The Israelis helped secure that zone of denial. They briefed their regional allies, including Egypt and Jordan, and urged their leaders to refrain from making public statements about the strike.”

The so-called Begin Doctrine, meanwhile, may again be relevant in 2012, with Israel reportedly considering a strike at Iran’s nuclear facilities. The likelihood of a unilateral resort to force, believed to have been high earlier this summer, is said to have receded of late. American politicians and military chiefs, and key Israeli figures including President Peres, have publicly opposed an imminent Israeli strike.

“Yet the situation in Iran differs fundamentally from the Syrian case,” the New Yorker piece notes. “The Syrian affair was known to only a small number of officials in Damascus, Israel, and Washington, whereas the prospect of striking Iran’s nuclear program has been vigorously discussed in public. Experts have pointed to the risk of civilian casualties and prolonged retaliation. What’s more, a key Iranian site lies deep underground outside the holy city of Qom, and it is strongly fortified; an attack on it would run a higher risk of failure. A strike might set back the Iranian program, but for how long, and at what cost? Some Israeli officials have expressed concern that a strike would only provide Iran with justification to pursue its nuclear program.”

Makovsky quotes Olmert as saying, “Each case must be examined separately… The Iraqi case was different from the Syrian case, and the Syrian case is different from the Iranian case… Worse comes to worst, and all options have been tried, then, naturally, it may force Israel to act to defend its existence… But it must be clear that we tried with the international community, and particularly with the United States, to act together before we resort to the last option of an Israeli military operation.”

Iran is already a nuclear power, but it can’t deliver a bomb, says one of Israel’s leading nuclear experts | The Times of Israel.

Professor Uzi Even believes Tehran has covertly created enough highly enriched uranium for a successful underground test. But it is several years shy of being able to deploy a weapon, he says, and should not be targeted

Professor Uzi Even at his Tel Aviv University office (Photo credit: Mitch Ginsburg/ Times of Israel)

Professor Uzi Even, one of the founders of Israel’s nuclear reactor in Dimona, has a history of being correct about foreign countries’ nuclear capacities.

In 1969, after six years of service at the Nuclear Research Center Negev, he wrote a paper estimating when India would be able to conduct its first underground nuclear test. Then a doctoral candidate in physics at Tel Aviv University, Even came up with a document, distributed far and wide in the relevant circles, that gave a specific date five years ahead — in the spring of 1974. He was three weeks off the mark.

Even was also deeply involved in Israeli assessments of Saddam Hussein’s reactor at Osirak, drawing conclusions that remain controversial to this day — of which more later.

Most recently, Even privately studied two new nuclear programs in the Middle East. The first, in Dir a-Zur, Syria, was a sophisticated and isolated “plutogenic reactor par excellence,” he said, and “without any doubt, it had to be destroyed. And I am glad that it was” (by Israel, according to foreign reports in 2007).

The second, in Iran, is a different story. In a recent interview with The Times of Israel, Even said that he had no doubt about Iran’s intention to create a nuclear arsenal. As opposed to Saddam’s Iraq, he said, the Iranians have gone about the pursuit of man’s most deadly weapon in an extremely sophisticated manner — by sectioning the operation and advancing in stages.

In fact, in contrast to the International Atomic Energy Agency’s August 30 report, which stated that Iran has 189 kilograms of partially enriched uranium fuel — inadequate for a nuclear explosion — Even believes that the regime has already, covertly, created the 20-25 kilograms of highly enriched uranium necessary to conduct a successful underground test. In other words, he believes Iran is already a nuclear power.

But crucially, he said that Iran — in thus far choosing the scientifically less challenging track of producing a solely uranium-based nuclear explosive device, based on the prototype provided by Pakistan’s A. Q. Khan — remains several years shy of being able to deploy a weapon.

The main obstacle in the Iranians’ path, Even said, is weight. Uranium is five times heavier than plutonium. Creating a nuclear warhead and winnowing down the complex infrastructure necessary to detonate it effectively — to, say, the one-ton maximum payload of Iran’s best ballistic missile, the Shahab-3 — “requires sophistication that neither Iran nor Pakistan have.”

Professor Uzi Even (Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons)

Iran is well aware of this limitation. In article 30 of the IAEA’s most recent report, the director general mentions that the Iranians are planning to begin operating a plutonium-based reactor in the third quarter of 2013, in Arak. Progress on that reactor, Even said, and its march toward operability — forming the plutonium needed for a single bomb would take one year from the moment the facility was working properly — was the true sand in the hourglass.

In an interview that ranged from nuclear history to nuclear science for dummies, Even, a professor at Tel Aviv University’s School of Chemistry who was also Israel’s first openly gay Knesset member (with Meretz, from 2002-3), discussed all the region’s nuclear programs, peaceful and otherwise, and also made clear his staunch opposition to an Israeli strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities at this time.

He also briefly discussed Israel’s nuclear reactor at Dimona. It is, he said, the oldest in the region and one of the oldest of its kind in the world, and should have been shut down 10 years ago. Shutting the plant, he noted with deliberate vagueness, would have no wider bearing.

Western safety protocols give such reactors a 40-year life span. Similar reactors in the United States, Even said, “were all shut down during the Carter administration.” Some parts erode, others cannot be replaced. The chance of an accident rises with the years.

Iraq

“One day they called me into reserves and placed before me the dossier that the intelligence had managed to compile about the reactor in Iraq,” he said.

The document was six inches thick. Even was told to study it and tell his bosses in IDF Military Intelligence whether in his expert opinion the Iraqis were close to attaining a nuclear weapon. He spent two weeks holed up in an office in IDF Headquarters in Tel Aviv poring over the material.

The first thing he noticed was the superb quality and scope of the intelligence that had been amassed. There seemed to be nothing that Israel did not know about the reactor that the French had sold Iraq — a 300-million-dollar deal larded with millions of dollars of oil and arms agreements and sealed during Saddam Hussein’s September 1975 visit to Paris.

The next thing he internalized was the degree to which the French had deceived the Iraqi dictator. “The French sold them a reactor that could not do what they wanted. It was a white elephant. And the Iraqis didn’t know that.”

The reactor at Osirak was too small to create plutonium; it required highly enriched uranium, which was supplied, in insufficient doses, exclusively by the French. He reported back to his superior officers: “There is no way to create nuclear weapons from this reactor.”

The government convened a larger panel of scientists. Even would not reveal who sat on this committee or even the number of scientists involved. He maintained, however, that they went over the material and came back with an identical response to his own.

“I thought that was the end of the story,” he said.

Several months later, in 1981, he was called back to reserves. Again he was given an office and presented with a similar dossier. The officer wanted to know, Even said, “where to throw the bombs in order to destroy the reactor.”

Even was surprised. He believed that the best course of action was to let the Iraqis, who still didn’t know how little they knew, “choke on that reactor of theirs.” Attacking Osirak could put them on a different track — where, perhaps like Iran, they would enrich their own uranium or, as Syria apparently tried to do, actually create and chemically separate plutonium.

Disturbed but still obedient, Even instructed military intelligence how best to destroy the reactor. After further contemplation, though, he found he was unable to shake the thought of this attack being a monumental mistake. Knowing that he was endangering his future, and risking many years in prison, he contacted the head of the Knesset opposition, Labor leader Shimon Peres, and set up a meeting on Yarkon Street in Tel Aviv. The two men had known each other since the early sixties, when Peres had presided over the acquisition and construction of the nuclear reactor in Dimona.

Peres agreed wholeheartedly with Even and wrote then-prime minister Menachem Begin a letter, warning him that the deadlines are not “realistic” and that “what is intended to prevent can become a catalyst,” according to Rodger Claire’s book “Raid on the Sun,” which details the entire operation to destroy Saddam’s reactor. Peres meant that the destruction of the reactor would only spur the Iraqis on.

The courier delivered the letter to Begin on the morning of May 10, 1981. Neither Peres nor Even had any way of knowing that Israel’s attack planes were scheduled to take off for Iraq that very afternoon. According to Claire’s account, the F-16s had already rolled onto the tarmac, engines roaring in the desert heat.

Prime Minister Menachem Begin arriving in the United States (Photo credit: USAF/ Wikimedia Commons)

Begin, fearing that the mission had been compromised, called off the strike and rescheduled it for June 7, 1981 — when it went ahead successfully. Internal security agents in Israel hunted for the source of the leak for years. Claire wrote that many fingered former air force commander and defense minister Ezer Weizman. Only recently, since the statute of limitations has expired, has Even revealed that it was he who tipped Peres off about the planned strike, although he did not know about the timing.

It is a decision he does not regret. He said that Saddam increased the Iraqi nuclear budget tenfold after Osirak was destroyed, switched to a more effective model, and that only the combination of the Iran-Iraq War and the ill-conceived invasion of Kuwait stopped the program in its tracks. Hitting Osirak, Even summarizes — widely hailed to this day as a clinical and vital Israeli operation — was a mistake that could have had catastrophic consequences. Far from stopping Saddam, it actually prompted the start of a potentially viable Iraqi nuclear weapons option, which the Osirak reactor could never have provided.

Iran

Even most certainly does not oppose attacks on nuclear facilities in principle. He strongly supported the destruction of Syria’s reactor in 2007. But with Iran — as with Osirak, though for very different reasons — he firmly opposes an attack now.

Speaking softly and only occasionally looking up from the page on which he doodled, Even first pointed out the obvious: Iran is far away from Israel, roughly 1,000 miles, which is a significant difference when compared to the 600-mile flight to Baghdad in 1981. Presumably, however, this is a limitation rather than an immovable obstacle when planning a strike.

Iran is also a regional superpower. He likened the Iranians to the ancient Assyrians, Mesopotamians and Romans and said that engaging in an armed struggle with such a large power could lead to the “economic ruin” of Israel.

Only then did he speak about the significant issues of science and deterrence.

In terms of science, he said that Iran — which, it is largely forgotten, launched its own failed attack against the Iraqi nuclear reactor on September 30, 1980 – has learned many of the lessons of Iraq’s debacle. The Iranians mined their own uranium ore, turned it into a uranium gas and then enriched that gas out in the open, at the facility in Natanz, bringing the uranium from its original 0.7 percent state to a low-enriched state of 20 percent.

This process requires several thousand centrifuges – the spinning centrifuges split the uranium-235 atoms from the uranium-238 ones – and could feasibly be used for, say, the creation of a medical isotope to fight cancer, as Iran has claimed. The final stage of enrichment, to weapons-grade fuel, can be done in a small space, far from the public eye. “The critical stage can be done underground, in something the size of a storage room, and no one would know,” he said. Even believes Iran has done precisely this already.

The Iranian facility near Arak, which may begin separating plutonium in late 2013 (Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons)

“They have the motivation, they have the knowledge, and I believe we’ve missed the opportunity to stop them from conducting a test. They could do one today,” Even said, adding that the space needed for the final stage of enrichment is something like 3,000 square feet, a chamber that could easily be tucked underground somewhere near the facility in Qom.

(Foreign sources indicate that Israel has experience with this sort of subterfuge. According to Seymour Hersh’s “The Sampson Option,” in 1960 Israeli scientists duped Atomic Energy Commission inspectors into thinking that the nuclear project in Dimona was nothing more than a 24-megawatt research reactor; an elevator shaft had been covered with bricks, concealing a laboratory situated some six stories underground, where plutonium was extracted from spent nuclear fuel and then, several years later, shaped into a perfect ball and fashioned into an atomic warhead. M.G)

The United States and the Soviet Union, Even said, required 1,000 tests each before they were able to create a uranium-based bomb that could be sent on an intercontinental ballistic missile

The Iranian program, thus far, is based on uranium. The United States and the Soviet Union, Even said, required 1,000 tests each before they were able to create a uranium-based bomb that could be sent on an intercontinental ballistic missile. China eventually abandoned the uranium track because even after years of trying it was unable to concoct a nuclear payload that could reliably reach American shores.

The mechanism that activated the uranium-based bomb that was dropped over Hiroshima, Even said, weighed six tons. “The Iranians may be able to cut that in half, but that is still far too heavy to deliver to Israel.”

The plutonium-uranium divide is also significant in terms of deterrence. In 2001, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the fourth president of Iran and the nation’s de-facto military commander during the Iran-Iraq War, said that the “application of an atomic bomb would not leave anything in Israel, but the same thing would just produce damages in the Muslim world.” The brutal logic of Rafsanjani’s argument is not to be dismissed. Certainly not in the age of the suicide bomber. But the asymmetry in size is offset by the potency of the thermonuclear weapons that foreign reports have attributed to Israel. Each of those weapons is potentially hundreds if not thousands of times more powerful than an ordinary atom bomb of the type Iran is pursuing. A thermonuclear weapon, from a uranium-based track, Even said, “is simply not doable.”

Iran has not yet actively pursued the plutonium extraction method. The process of creating plutonium — a substance not found in any significant quantity in nature — is complex and currently beyond the capability of the Iranians. Still, Even said he does not “belittle” their abilities and he was concerned by the IAEA report indicating that the reactor in Arak would begin operations in late 2013.

Asked about the Iranian willingness to sacrifice life by sending an anonymous nuclear device in a suitcase to, say, a port in Ashdod — a scenario that the defense minister has frequently mentioned as one of the threats of a nuclear Iran — he said that the Iran-Iraq War proved that in the end “they do care about human life.” Khomeini did ultimately sign a peace treaty, he noted. As for the suitcase scenario, that would leave the exact same trail as a missile, since the fallout would reveal “a post-mortem signature” indicating precisely where and when the material was made.

“Look,” Even said, summing up his argument, “I don’t trust their good will. But we have capabilities of our own, and they know that, or at least they think they do… There is no one in the Arab world who thinks Israel does not have nuclear weapons.”

Israel’s Dilemma Over A Strike On Iran.

Israel has many options to consider if they decide to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities – including whether to act unilaterally.

Target: Bushehr nuclear power station, south of Tehran

A joint Israeli-US attack on Iran’s nuclear programme would be devastating, and that is also putting it mildly. Therein lies a problem for the Israelis as they ponder the wisdom of striking alone.

Last month’s flurry of media speculation about an Israeli strike seemed a carefully orchestrated warning by Israel’s government that it is deadly serious, but there were few other signs that war was about to break out.

The Israeli government appears to have pressed several buttons guaranteeing media attention. The most obvious was the heavy-handed statements by ministers and the handing out of gas masks to the population.

This is indeed a precautionary measure, but the timing, and the other measures taken, point to deliberate Israeli signalling.

The huge naval military exercise in the Gulf at the end of the month is also signalling, this time by the Americans. They are saying to the Israelis, “Hang on” and, to Iran, “Be warned”.

The “hang on” advice will be listened to carefully. Israel really does not want to go it alone; some argue they are incapable of a meaningful unilateral strike.

The Israeli cabinet has to ponder the unknown. Firstly, if they go in before the US election, would President Barack Obama fully involve the US military in a war just weeks before the vote?

Post-election, would a re-elected president feel less constrained? Would a President Romney throw his weight behind the view that Iran’s nuclear programme must be stopped at any cost?

There is also the option of somehow coming to terms with a nuclear-armed Iran and the inevitable expansion of its regional power this would bring.

A nuclear-armed Iran would be emboldened to push on with its bid to become the de-facto leader of the Muslim world. An increasingly nervous Saudi Arabia would probably try to counter this by obtaining its own nuclear arms. Other countries might follow suit.

Given the constraints on Israel, it seems unlikely it will launch a unilateral strike this side of the US presidential election in November, and even afterwards it has reason to hesitate.

Consider a unilateral attack. How do the Israelis get to the targets?

Route 1 is a straight line – across Jordan, Iraq, into Iran. Jordan would probably not be able to react in time, and Iraq does not have an effective air force or air defences.

Baghdad would tell Tehran the attack was coming and the Iranians would be waiting. This still might be the safest route for the Israeli Air Force (IAF), at the possible expense, though, of its diplomatic relations with Jordan.

Route 2 takes the IAF up the Mediterranean, with a sharp right turn along the Turkish/Syrian border, through Iraq and on to Iran. This carries dangers from the Syrian Air Defences, but the bigger problem is that Tehran will be given an even earlier warning.

Route 3 takes the IAF straight across Saudi Arabia and the Gulf. The Saudis might want Iranian power destroyed, but they might still send their air force up to counter the Israelis because a failure to do so would make them complicit in the attack and thus likely to suffer Iranian retaliation.

All routes requires refuelling for the IAF’s planes, which  puts more Israeli jets as risk.

If the IAF ever does get that far east, it has another problem – firepower. Israel has neither the number nor type of weapons available to the Americans. Its first strike might cause significant damage, and set back the Iranian nuclear programme, but it would not smash it.

As each IAF sortie went in, it would be in increasing danger, and the IAF could not sustain more than a few missions over a few days.

Now add the Americans. Not only do they have their aircraft carrier fleets available in the Gulf, next to Iran, they have B-2 bombers armed with Massive Ordnance Penetrator bombs designed to get through the type of bunkers the Iranians have built inside mountains.

The US has enough cruise missiles and fighter bombers to sustain air attack over several weeks, which may be enough to effectively break the nuclear programme for years to come. The USA is also the only country which could attempt to keep the Strait of Hormuz open.

All this points to the Israelis waiting until after the US election in November and then hoping the new or newly re-elected President will support them if they took what would be a monumental decision – to attack Iran.

If it ever happens, the Iranians would be likely to retaliate in many areas. Tehran’s conventional navy may not be much of a threat, but its tactic of “swarming” enemy ships with small, fast boats has the potential to be devastating.

It has a battery of missiles capable of reaching across the Middle East, including all the way to Israel.

Iran’s allies in Syria, Lebanon and Gaza have the ability to reach Israel, and given what happened in the 2006 war against Hizbollah, Ehud Barak’s estimation of 500 Israeli civilian casualties seems very low.

Iran’s reach does not stop there. It has the ability to hit Western targets in Latin American, Africa and Europe via its own agents and its proxy militia, Hizbollah.

Doing nothing is one of several decisions he could take, but doing nothing will also have its long-term effect. This is a pivotal moment in Israel’s history.

:: Tim Marshall’s article was originally published in the Jewish Chronicle.

Steps to Disempower Iran :: Gatestone Institute.

by Christine Williams

September 10, 2012 at 4:30 amThe spokesman foreign policy for German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party in the Bundestag, Philipp Missfelder, also advised that the Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Hezbollah should be placed on the European Union’s list of terrorist groups. The EU continues to categorize the Hezbollah as a charitable organization and a charitable group, thereby enabling them to raise millions of dollars to inspire, recruit and train terrorists.

Canada has expelled Iranian diplomats and shut down its embassy in Iran, citing the regime as “the most significant threat to global peace and security in the world today.” Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird condemned Iran on many fronts: its military assistance to Syria, its nuclear program, threats to Israel’s existence, and incitement to Jewish genocide; and he also announced that Canada has now formally listed Iran as a state sponsor of terrorism under the country’s Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act. While the many infractions of the regime were pointed out, the decision also stems an internal security threat: that the Iranian embassy in Canada was being used to promote a fifth column in Canada.

The West would do well to take note as to how far the tentacles of the Iranian regime have spread into global and regional affairs as delegates from Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s office impose strict expectations on their embassies to find the weaknesses in each country as well as to increase and empower their own supporters there politically, economically and culturally.

Despite the news of Canada’s decision and Baird’s justification for breaking diplomatic ties with Iran, much more action needs to be taken by Western nations. Baird, for example, referred to Iran’s blatant disregard for the Vienna Convention, which defines diplomatic relations between countries, forms the legal basis for diplomatic immunity and enables diplomats to perform functions without fear of being coerced or harassed by the host country.

Baird said he was worried about the safety of diplomats in Tehran following recent attacks on the British embassy in the country. A mob of Iranian students stormed the British embassy in Tehran last November. They tore down the Union Flags and threw documents from windows in a show of civil disobedience that followed London’s support of upgraded Western sanctions on Tehran over its nuclear program. The attack on the British embassy was not only illegal and brutal but it revealed something disturbing about Iran: that the regime is now willing — through violence and destruction — to take extreme risks on the international stage.

Baird has advised Canadian citizens in need of services in Iran to contact the Canadian Embassies in Ankara , Turkey and anywhere else that might provide it. He also issued a safety warning for Canadian travellers to Iran.

In the the Syrian crisis to which Baird referred, Iran has shipped hundreds of tons of military equipment to Syria to ensure that the Assad regime survives the threat to its survival, and to aid Assad’s strategic offensive against rebel strongholds in Damascus and Aleppo. As Syria is Iran’s most important regional ally, Western intelligence officials have credited the Iranian regime’s elite Quds force and other high ranking members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard with creating the devastation there.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, a month ago also ordered renewed terror attacks on Western targets for supporting an overthrow of the Syrian regime, issuing a directive to Qassem Suleimani, commander of the elite Quds Force unit. An emergency meeting was called of Iran’s National Security Council in Tehran to discuss the implications for Iran in the event of the overthrow of Assad’s regime.

The survival of Syria’s Assad regime is regarded as critical to sustain the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia, which controls southern Lebanon. A report commissioned by Khamenei concluded that Iran’s national interests were being threatened by U.N. sanctions over Iran’s nuclear program and the West’s support for the Syrian opposition.

Qassem Suleimani is apparently the mastermind behind the killing of more Americans than anyone, according to a Telegraph article in the U.K. that alleges this man to be the world’s most dangerous terrorist since Osama bin Laden. As head of the Quds Force, Suleimani not only works with Hezbollah in Lebanon, he has also plotted and executed mass murder in dozens of countries; and what Hezbollah has in mind for Israel is no secret, according to its leader who once said he hoped that the Jews would gather in Israel so he would not have to hunt them down globally. According to the Telegraph, however, the EU continues to categorize the Iranian-backed Hezbollah as a charitable organization, thereby enabling supporters to raise millions of dollars to inspire, recruit and train terrorists.

In July, Hezbollah was implicated in the bombing of a bus carrying Israeli tourists in Bulgaria . Yet despite the massive evidence of global terrorism by Hezbollah, one EU foreign minister has said a change in policy would be considered if and when “tangible evidence existed” that Hezbollah is engaging in acts of terrorism. Yet Iran and Hezbollah have slaughtered men, women and children in bombings “from Argentina to Saudi Arabia to Bulgaria;” and have targeted US servicemen in direct attacks, and through proxies in Iraq and Afghanistan.

So long as Europe remains in denial, it remains vulnerable to attacks and serves as a partner in Iran’s terrorism buildup. Even the head of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, recently admitted that being on the European terrorist list would “destroy Hizbollah,” drying up sources of financial, political and moral support. Nasrallah also disclosed that Iranian officials will drag America into war if it fails to stop Israel from taking military action. He threatened that, “American bases in the whole region could be Iranian targets. ”

As tensions mount in the Middle East, the world remains divided: the UN Security Council is at a loss for what to do about Syria, yet Canada has taken a stand. The United States is focussed on an election campaign but still keeping its eye on Iran, as it prepares to escalate pressure on the regime by mounting the largest ever multi-national minesweeping exercise in the Persian Gulf later this month. The exercise will focus on a hypothetical threat from Iran to place mines in the strategic international waterways in the Middle East, including the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden and the Gulf of Oman.

There is an organized plot in Iran against the West and against Israel. The plot is growing in magnitude and force, and is heavily backed by the Iranian propaganda and military machine; and it is multifaceted, working from home base as well as on the soil of Western nations. Although many “deniers” minimize the threat of Islamists to the West, sadly, this is no conspiracy theory. Even though Canada’s decision captured world attention, and serves as a model for all Western nations, there is another occasion to applaud: before the heads of state and delegates of the 120 members of the Non-aligned Movement, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon recently denounced Iran for its “outrageous” comments denying the Holocaust and Israel’s right to exist. Ban Ki-Moon was heavily criticised for attending, but his unexpected vehemence succeeded in undermining Iran.

While it is expedient to castigate Iran for its many violations, a coordinated approach is lacking between Western nations. A Foreign Policy article, “This Week At War: The Pentagon Doesn’t Have the Right Stuff ,” by Robert Haddick, highlights the evolving approach in dealing with Iran and other security issues relevant to America. It points out that General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, revealed a new American approach to security, stretching from Egypt to Afghanistan. It is one of defense, a breakaway from the Bush era offensive strategy, and apparent in Obama’s escalation in the war in Afghanistan. The article also refers to Dempsey’s remarks, which suggest that distance is being created between between the U.S. and Israel, as well as between the American view of indefinite waiting and the Israeli view of a potential Israeli strike against Iran. Unsurprising, but how will that distance serve the free world as the Iran continues its menacing nuclear program?

A coordinated effort is required by all Western allies, and these nations need to pull their weight; with the goal of isolating Iran. There is an urgent need for an approach of zero tolerance to Iran’s terrorist strategies practiced both within its boundaries against dissidents and Westerners, and those exported by means of a fifth column in Western democracies. Taken straight from the Hezbollah’s Secretary General, Hassan Nasrallah: Being on the European terrorist list would “destroy Hizbollah,” drying up its financial, political resources and moral support.

The foreign policy spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party in the Bundestag, Philipp Missfelder, also advised that the Iranian-backed Lebanese Hezbollah should be placed on the European Union’s list of terrorist groups. Western citizens are accustomed to civilized negotiations and dialogues, but terrorist states use these to buy time as they coordinate and execute their plans. Canada has done well to shut down its embassy in Iran in the interests of safety and as a moral, political and policy statement. Hopefully other states will quickly follow.

Israel discussing Iran red line with U.S.: Netanyahu | Reuters.

(Reuters) – Israel and the United States are in discussion on setting a “red line” for Iran’s nuclear program, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.

“We’re discussing it right now with the United States,” Netanyahu said in an interview with Canada’s CBC television aired late on Sunday.

In the interview, two days after Canada suspended diplomatic relations with Tehran over its nuclear project, Netanyahu again signaled that a clear boundary – which he has yet to define publicly – could obviate the need for military action.

Netanyahu’s recent calls for world powers to set a “clear red line” that would show they were determined to stop Tehran’s nuclear drive has suggested a growing impatience with the United States, Israel’s main ally.

Washington, which has resisted the idea of laying down red lines for Iran in the past, has been pressing the Israeli leader to give diplomacy and sanctions imposed on the Islamic Republic more time to work to rein in Iran’s nuclear work peacefully.

Recent heightened Israeli rhetoric has stoked speculation that Israel might attack Iran before the U.S. elections in November, believing that President Barack Obama would give it military help and not risk alienating pro-Israeli voters.

DIFFERENCES IN ISRAELI LEADERSHIP

But Netanyahu has faced opposition to any go-it-alone attack from Israeli security chiefs and its popular president, Shimon Peres. Opinion polls show a majority of Israelis do not want their military to strike Iran without U.S. support.

“I don’t think that they (Iran) see a clear red line, and I think the sooner we establish one, the greater the chances that there won’t be a need for other types of action,” Netanyahu said, appearing to refer to military steps.

“If Iran saw that, there’s a chance, I won’t say it’s guaranteed, but there’s a chance they might pause before they cross that line.”

Israel and the West believe Iran is working toward nuclear weapon development capability. Israel, widely thought to be the Middle East’s only atomic power, says a nuclear-armed Iran would be a threat to its existence. The Islamic Republic says its nuclear work is for peaceful energy purposes only.

A senior Israeli government official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said talks were being held with “the American administration,” as to the red lines. He declined to elaborate.

Israeli newspaper Haaretz said on Monday Netanyahu had told German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle that if Iran enriched uranium above 20 percent, that would provide a red line as it would prove Tehran had chosen to exceed the level of refinement suitable for civilian energy and “break out” with an atom bomb.

Enrichment to 90 percent fissile purity is the typical threshold for weapons-grade nuclear fuel. Haaretz said Netanyahu stressed that from the moment Iran decided to make a nuclear bomb, it would need only six weeks to enrich to 90 percent.

Many independent analysts say, however, that Iran would need additional time – from several months to a year or more – to fashion weapons-grade material into a nuclear warhead and fit onto a missile capable of delivering the payload.

Netanyahu, who met Westerwelle on Sunday in Jerusalem, is scheduled to travel to the New York and address the U.N. General assembly about Iran later this month.

A meeting with Obama, who is deep in his re-election campaign and due to speak to the forum two days before Netanyahu arrives, has not been finalised, the Israeli official said.

(Editing by Jeffrey Heller and Mark Heinrich)

A principled decision against a pariah regime | iPolitics.

John Baird’s surprise decision to pull the plug on diplomatic relations with Iran is a decision that was long overdue. But it is a principled decision against a pariah regime that sends the simple message: Enough is enough.

The fact that Baird made the announcement on his way to Vladivostok just before the APEC summit struck some as impulsive and has prompted widespread speculation that Canada has received secret warnings about an impending Israeli attack on Iran. An attack may be imminent given Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s publicly expressed fears about a fast closing window to halt Iran’s nuclear ambitions. But it is unlikely Israel would share its strategic intentions with us notwithstanding Ottawa’s close ties with Jerusalem. It would have little to gain by doing so.

Still, Baird may be shrewd enough to see the writing on the wall and the risk posed to our diplomats as tougher sanctions take another bite out of a regime that has flaunted every accepted norm and principle of civilised nations, including the principle of diplomatic immunity.

Iran’s ayatollahs threw such diplomatic niceties aside a long time ago when, at their instigation, student protestors stormed the American embassy in Tehran and kept U.S. diplomats hostage in a saga that sealed the fate of the Carter presidency. Their contempt for diplomacy was reaffirmed when a mob of “students” attacked the British embassy and diplomatic compound at Gulhak Garden last November and all its leaders could summon was phoney expressions of “regret.”

Canada’s relations with Tehran have been on the skids for a long time. Its leaders showed no remorse for the brutal murder of the Iranian-born Canadian journalist Zahra Kazemi. Tehran has consistently refused to recognize Canadian passports held by those who are Iranian born.

The argument by some that Ottawa should maintain its diplomatic presence so that it can serve the interests of Iranian Canadians when they travel to Iran holds no water. Our diplomats in Tehran have consistently had the door slammed in their faces when they tried to act on behalf of Canadians who ran afoul of the regime.

The simple message to all expats must be: “Don’t go back. Your lives may be at risk.” And those who parlay the old saw that Canada can play the “honest broker” between Tehran and Washington are little red riding hoods. Think Chamberlain at Munich not Pearson at the UN on this one.

There is a time to talk and a time to be tough. This is a time to be tough. That is because talk with Iran’s regime has been cheapened by its constant prevarications and deceptions.

There is every indication that Iran has been secretly smuggling uranium and centrifuge technology to produce enough weapons grade fissile material to build a bomb. The IAEA has sounded the tocsin more than once that Iran is not coming clean when its inspectors try to look under the hood. The arrest last month in Germany of four individuals charged with smuggling special valves for a heavy water reactor the Iranians are trying to build at Arak is yet another instance of Iran’s deception.

Iran is also a well known sponsor of terrorist attacks in other countries including by its proxies like Lebanon-based Hezbollah. It has carried out assassinations abroad against prominent critics of its regime. It is trying to destabilize Turkey through its support for the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party). There has been a major upsurge in attacks by the PKK in those provinces where there are large Kurdish communities. Iran’s unflinching support for Bashar Assad, the ruthless despot of Syria, shows that it plays for keeps and doesn’t give a fig about human rights and basic liberties. This alone should give pause to those who assert we must still maintain ties with Tehran. To what end or purpose and according to what principle?

We also tend to forget that the “great awakening” against the despots of the Islamic world began, but was stillborn, in the streets of Tehran in 2009-10 following President Ahmadinejad’s disupted election. When those streets ran red with the blood of Iran’s youth and others who had courageously risen up against the regime, the West could have done more to support Iran’s champions of freedom, human rights, and democracy.

This Iranian regime flouts all basic principles of diplomacy and human rights. It deserves to be isolated and sanctioned. Canada has little leverage on the security concerns, which are most acute, but our decision to suspend diplomatic relations is correct in principle and more powerful than hand-wringing. Those who cherish the values we live by at home should applaud actions that respect those values. Talk alone is just that.

Derek Burney, an Officer of the Order of Canada, is a senior strategic advisor to Norton Rose Canada LLP. Mr. Burney is a senior research fellow at the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute and a visiting professor and senior distinguished fellow at Carleton University. He is also a director of several Canadian companies including TransCanada Corp., builders of the Keystone XL pipeline.

Report on Iran Nuclear Work Puts Israel in a Box – NYTimes.com.

By JODI RUDOREN and DAVID E. SANGER

JERUSALEM — For Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the International Atomic Energy Agency on Thursday offered findings validating his longstanding position that while harsh economic sanctions and diplomatic isolation may have hurt Iran, they have failed to slow Tehran’s nuclear program. If anything, the program is speeding up.

But the agency’s report has also put Israel in a corner, documenting that Iran is close to crossing what Israel has long said is its red line: the capability to produce nuclear weapons in a location invulnerable to Israeli attack.

With the report that the country has already installed more than 2,100 centrifuges inside a virtually impenetrable underground laboratory, and that it has ramped up production of nuclear fuel, officials and experts here say the conclusions may force Israel to strike Iran or concede it is not prepared to act on its own.

Whether that ultimately leads to a change in strategy — or a unilateral attack — is something that even Israel’s inner circle cannot yet agree on, despite what seems to be a consensus that Iran’s program may soon be beyond the reach of Israel’s military capability.

“It leaves us at this dead end,” said a senior government official here, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he is involved in the decision-making process. “The more time elapses with no change on the ground in terms of Iranian policies, the more it becomes a zero-sum game.”

The report accentuates the tension with Washington during the hot-tempered atmosphere of a presidential election. President Obama and Mr. Netanyahu often say they have a common assessment of the intelligence about Iran’s progress. What they do not agree on is the time available.

American officials have repeatedly tried to assure the Israelis that they have the country’s back — and to remind them that Israel does not have the ability, by itself, to destroy the facility, built beneath a mountain outside Qum. The United States does have weaponry that it believes can demolish the lab, but in Mr. Obama’s judgment there is still what the White House calls “time and space” for diplomacy, sanctions and sabotage, a combination the Israelis say has been insufficient.

“They can’t do it right without us,” a former adviser to Mr. Obama said recently. “And we’re trying to persuade them that a strike that just drives the program more underground isn’t a solution; it’s a bigger problem.”

The report comes at a critical moment in Israel’s long campaign to build Western support for stopping Iran from developing a nuclear weapon, which virtually every leader here regards as an existential threat. Military professionals concede the potential effectiveness of an Israeli strike is decreasing as Iran moves more of its operations underground. (Already, the best Israel might be able to accomplish, they say, is to close the tunnel entrances around the underground plant, called Fordow, rather than destroy what is inside.)

Politically, Israeli leaders are concerned they will lose leverage after the November presidential election — regardless of the result — but are also worried about a pre-election strike that angers Washington, whose support would be all the more critical in its aftermath.

A month after a blitz of visits by high-ranking American security officials, the frenzy of public discussion here over the imminence of an attack has quieted, as Israelis have returned from summer vacation and begun preparing for the High Holy Days. But several high-ranking government officials said the study, debate and lobbying in the tight circle of decision-makers has intensified, and Israel has taken steps to shore up the home front and prepare its citizens.

Many inside the government, along with independent analysts, say the status quo is not sustainable. Unless the international community finds new ways to apply diplomatic pressure, or the United States issues a clear ultimatum to Iran about its intentions to act militarily, they say, the chances of an Israeli attack this year will climb.

“If the U.S. makes it clear to the Iranians that they may go to war, there will be no need for anyone to go to war,” one top Israeli official said.

Asked about the report, Mr. Obama’s spokesman, Jay Carney, said, “The president has made clear frequently he is determined to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.” But he set no deadlines, and officials said Mr. Obama was not likely to specify a date or exact set of conditions that would provoke a military response.

Several leaders and analysts in Israel are pinning their hopes on a possible meeting between Mr. Obama and Mr. Netanyahu when the prime minister travels to the United Nations General Assembly in late September.

“The tragedy is the failure of these two to get over their grudges and the bad blood and work in an intimate, serious way together,” said Ari Shavit, a columnist for the left-leaning newspaper Haaretz. “Rather than the great democracy and the small democracy working together, they seem to be working with deep suspicion of each other.”

The critical difference between the American and Israeli views of the situation has long been one of timing. In Jerusalem, the clocks are ticking — and, as a senior government official put it, “all of them are now ticking at a higher speed.”

“Every week they get closer,” this official said of Iran, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he, too, is involved in the high-level deliberations. “While our side can, every week, seem to be in the same place, their side every week gets closer to this target.” (Iran contends its nuclear work is for peaceful purposes.)

Though Mr. Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak are crucial to making the final call, attention has turned to a group of 14 ministers known as the inner cabinet, or security cabinet. Yossi Melman, an author of “Spies Against Armageddon,” a history of Israeli intelligence, said military actions typically required “a solid majority” of 12 or 13 members of this group, which is currently divided.

Three or four of the ministers are believed to be opposed to an independent Israeli strike, while six seem to be in favor. Two big unknowns are Deputy Prime Minister Moshe Yaalon and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who both declined to be interviewed.

Mr. Netanyahu has been wooing Mr. Yaalon, including him in a small dinner when Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was here in July. In a recent Twitter post, Mr. Yaalon warned, “History will judge whether the U.S. faced up to the Shiite threat in time to prevent Iran from acquiring a military nuclear capability.” But further posts indicated some wiggle room: “Anyone who wants to prevent the exercise of military power must see that additional biting sanctions are applied,” he wrote.

Mr. Lieberman, who frequently diverges from Mr. Netanyahu, said on television last week, “There is no situation in which Israel can accept a nuclear Iran.”

The divisions in the cabinet — and more broadly in Israel — are not along the usual left-right or hawk-dove lines. The disputes are mainly over how best to engage the United States.

“Remember, it’s whether to attack now or attack later; it’s not between peaceniks and warmongers,” Mr. Melman said. “The argument against is don’t hurt the U.S. relationship, don’t risk relations with the president just for the satisfaction of conducting an attack before the election.”

David Makovsky of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, who spent more than a decade in Israel, said “the center of political gravity could shift very quickly” if the Obama administration does not do something more.

Martin S. Indyk, a former United States ambassador to Israel who is now foreign policy director of the Brookings Institution, said he was struck that Israel had in recent weeks begun to distribute gas masks, examine bomb shelters and enact a text-messaging warning system.

Uzi Arad, a former national security adviser for Israel, recalled accompanying Mr. Netanyahu — then the leader of the opposition — to a meeting with Vice President Dick Cheney in 2007. The Israelis argued that the only thing with “sufficient punch” to stop Iran from developing a weapon, Mr. Arad said, was crippling sanctions, including measures against the energy sector, “coupled with a clear and present credible military option that continuing the program would not succeed because inevitably it will bring military action.”

Five years later, those around Mr. Netanyahu are saying much the same thing, and may be growing tired of waiting.

US-Israel military drill, HFC exercise to be held simultaneously – Israel News, Ynetnews.

( To quote P.W. Bridgeman “Coincidences are what are left over after you’ve applied a bad theory.” – JW )

Home Front Command annual disaster simulation drill, joint Israel-US ‘Austere Challenge 12’ drill set to begin on same day at end of October but officials say date is ‘coincidence’

Yoav Zitun

The Home Front Command and the US and Israeli militaries will hold separate drillswhich will begin at the same time at the end of October.

The Home Front Command will hold its annual drill, Turning Point 6, while the US military and IDF will launch joint military maneuvers.

The Home Front drill will simulate an earthquake scenario but will also include Home Front Command, fire and rescue services, police and Magen David Adom drills which will simulate disaster sites as a result of rocket attacks.  

Home Front Command drill in 2010

The military drill which has been called the “biggest drill both armies have ever held” will simulate a rocket attack on Israel.

The date of both the drills was postponed several times over the past year. Military sources explained that “there was no link between the two drills and the overlapping dates are a coincidence.”

Home Front Command Chief Brigadier General Eyal Eisenberg commented on the symmetry of the two emergency scenarios last week: “The newspaper headlines are focusing on Iran but earthquakes are also national disasters. If we know how to get through that scenario we will be ready for any challenge.”

The military drill “Austere Challenge 12,” will include deployment of a variety of advanced American aerial defense systems which are supposed to dramatically improve the way Israeldeals with missile and rocket barrages and will serve as reinforcements for the Iron Dome and Arrow 2 systems (which are meant to intercept long range missiles).

Home Front Defense Minister Avi Dichter, whose ministry is responsible for the “Turning Point 6” drill said that the date of the national emergency week was determined six months ago: “The purpose of the military drill is preparing the State of Israel for the first time for the consequences of an earthquake with all its repercussions.”

Speaking last week at a meeting with senior Home Front Command officials, Dichter said: “Our goal is to contain the threat so that if we decide to launch an assault – we do it at a convenient time for us. Happily, we have yet to go through a mass casualty catastrophic event that includes hundreds or thousands of fatalities.

“We must do everything within our power to prevent that kind of catastrophe, even if its missiles that will get through the defensive layers we’ve constructed,” Dichter added.

Israel under international pressure not to attack Iran alone – Yahoo! News.

Disappointing Israel, Clinton says US won’t set deadlines for Iran | The Times of Israel.

Netanyahu has been hoping Obama will specify ‘red lines’ that, if crossed by Iran, would prompt US military action

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, in Netanyahu’s office in Jerusalem, in July (photo credit: Ohad Zwigenberg/POOL/FLASH90)

The US will not set deadlines for Iran and still considers negotiations and sanctions the best way to halt it from developing nuclear weapons, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Sunday.

The comments were sure to disappoint Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week welcomed reports that the US was considering setting out “red lines” which, if crossed by Iran, would trigger US military action.

Asked if the Obama administration will lay out sharper “red lines” for Iran or state explicitly the consequences for Tehran of its failing to negotiate a deal with world powers over its nuclear program by a certain date, Clinton told Bloomberg, “We’re not setting deadlines.”

“We’re watching very carefully about what they do, because it’s always been more about their actions than their words,” Clinton said in an interview following visits to China and Russia, where she spoke with leaders of both countries to seek cooperation on Iran.

Clinton said China and Russia share the US’s view that Iran must be stopped from acquiring a nuclear weapon.

The possibility of the US announcing its “red lines” on Iran had appeared to be playing a role in calming tensions in the last few days between Israel and the US, which have been publicly at odds in recent weeks over how best to halt the Islamic republic’s nuclear drive.

Last week, after the New York Times reported that the administration was considering setting out certain red lines that, if crossed by Iran in its nuclear drive, would trigger a resort to military force, Netanyahu welcomed the idea. “The greater the resolve and the clearer the red line, the less likely we’ll have conflict,” he said.

A report on Israel’s Channel 10 news last week went so far as to assert that Israel would not attack Iran this year if President Barack Obama sets out his “red lines” and offers certain other promised assurances to Netanyahu at a meeting between the two tentatively scheduled for Thursday, September 27.

The station reported that the two leaders will meet the day after the Jewish High Holiday of Yom Kippur (which falls on September 26), when Netanyahu will be in New York to address the UN General Assembly.

“If Obama gives Israel the promised ‘red lines’ and his personal commitments, Israel will not attack Iran,” the report detailed.

US efforts to dissuade Israel from a resort to force included a visit last week by Admiral James A. Winnefeld, Jr., the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Winnefeld met with Defense Minister Ehud Barak in Tel Aviv on Thursday. After their talks, Barak said the US and Israel “face the same challenge [on Iran] but the clocks are ticking at different paces.” He said “Israel reserves the right to make sovereign decisions. The US respects this. Israel and Israel alone will take the decisions that affect its future and its security.”

Clinton addressed the differences between Israel and the US in her Sunday interview, saying that while the two countries share the goal that Iran not acquire a nuclear weapon, there is a difference in perspective with the Israelis over the time horizon for talks.

“They’re more anxious about a quick response because they feel that they’re right in the bull’s-eye, so to speak,” Clinton said. “But we’re convinced that we have more time to focus on these sanctions, to do everything we can to bring Iran to a good-faith negotiation.”

Asked what Israel was telling the Obama administration behind closed doors, Clinton said, “I don’t think that there’s any difference in their public and their private concerns.”

“They feel that it would be an existential threat if Iran were a nuclear-weaponized state, and no nation can abdicate their self-defense if they feel that they’re facing such a threat,” she said.

At the same time, Clinton said Israel has supported the Obama administration’s effort to unite the international community behind the toughest sanctions ever.

“The sanctions, we know, are having an effect,” she said.