WarSclerotic

The US sanctions enacted on November 4 will not stop Iran from getting a nuclear bomb, but they willpressure the regime and significantly reduce its ability to finance regional terror, Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said on Sunday night.

Speaking at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategic Studies, Liberman explained that “the first round of US sanctions had a big impact on Iran” causing “inflation [and] reducing foreign investments.”

“So the second round of sanctions will obviously have an even bigger impact. The fact that Iran will not be able to fund terror” is crucial and will negatively impact “Hezbollah, Hamas, proxies in Yemen and proxies in Iraq,” he said.

Still, he believes that Iran has made a political decision to eventually obtain a nuclear weapon and that sanctions alone could not force it to change its mind, although he hoped they would pressure the regime internally.

The defense minister also holds that the current regime of the ayatollahs will fall like many former communist regimes connected with the USSR, but implied this could take time. In that light, he said “we need to deter Iran” from trying to get a nuclear bomb “and be ready for all scenarios.”

Liberman reiterated his position that Israel must “strike a great blow” against Hamas to achieve quiet in Gaza and insisted on evacuating the Bedouin village of Khan al-Ahmar, while leaving room to negotiate the evacuation.

Earlier at the conference, former National Security Council Chief Yaakov Amidror and a JISS fellow proclaimed that the IDF would overcome the challenge of the S-300 antiaircraft missile system that Russia recently provided to Syria.

Amidror was certain when he said Russian President Vladimir Putin had made an uncharacteristic blunder by presenting the S-300 as Russia’s unbeatable answer to the IDF’s air power. He noted this would lead to embarrassment for Russia when the IDF succeeds at striking Syria despite the presence of the S-300.

Amidror continued by saying that in several decades, “there is not a single Russian-made weapon that we have not figured out a technical-tactical solution for confronting. There is no reason to think Israel will not find a solution to the S-300.” Regarding overcoming the S-300, he said “there are different S-300 models. It is a tactical [item] which has never been in the Middle East. We are not familiar with it. We need a deep intelligence process to know exactly which S-300 model was provided” to the Syrians.

He also asked, ”Who is operating the S-300? The Russians? The Syrians? The Iranians?…We will act differently depending on…who pulls the trigger,” implying that the IDF could act more aggressively if those manning the S-300 were not Russians.
Another thing that assured Amidror was that “Israeli intelligence has been doing incredible work with both long-range surveillance and [covert] forces going in and out [of Syria,]…to make sure the IDF hits targets exactly…and without hitting any of the Russian” advisers stationed near Syrian troops.

At the same conference, Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan advocated Israel widen its targets in Syria to include Iranian communication units and not just weapons transfers to Hezbollah and Syria.

Erdan called on the US to publicly announce it will back any Israeli operations against Iran in Syria.

Finally, he expressed hope that from recent talks with England’s new interior minister, once the UK leaves the EU, it will become the first Western European country to declare both Hezbollah’s political and military wings to be terroristic in nature (currently only the EU declares the military wing to be so.)

Speaking at the conference, former national security council official and JISS fellow Micky Ahronson asserted that the Russia-Iran team could be broken with the right set of incentives, like appeasing Russia in other geopolitical areas it remains concerned about, such as Ukraine.

JISS Vice President, former national security council officer and IDF Col. (ret.) Dr. Eran Lerman said that it appears that the Trump administration would keep some troops in Syria, which would help Israel hold back Iran.

However, the US defense establishment would be unlikely to support an attack on Iran if it tried to attain a nuclear weapon in light of the difficult situations in Iraq and Afghanistan. This would leave Israel to attack in a worst case scenario, Lerman said.

The Israel Defense Forces has over the past two years conducted hundreds of attacks in Syria to prevent such arms deliveries.

Meanwhile, Russia last week upped its military support to the Assad regime with the transfer of three S-300PM-2 missile batteries whose radar and communication technologies are more sophisticated than those of the model deployed to Syria at the beginning of the month.

That move, in turn, followed the downing of a Russian reconnaissance plane by Syrian forces, an incident the Kremlin blamed on Israel which minutes before had conducted an aerial operation against an Iranian military installation in Latakia.

“Russia’s delivery of advanced air defense systems to Syria has emboldened Iran to ramp up its shipments of weaponry to Hezbollah,” Meir Litvak, Director of the Alliance Center for Iranian Studies at Tel Aviv University, contended to The Media Line.

“While Israel can deal with the military threat posed by the S-300PM-2,” he elaborated, “the problem is that the government does not yet know how the Russians will operate. Will they tell Syrians when an Israeli jet takes off and will they intercept the planes? Until the reaction becomes clear, Israel is limited.”

Nevertheless, Jerusalem repeatedly has vowed to continue conducting cross-border missions, both to prevent Tehran from establishing a permanent military presence in Syria and to inhibit the Iranians from supplying Hezbollah with arms.

“Most [of Hezbollah’s rockets] are not precise enough, making their potential threat tolerable to Israel,” Dr. Litvak continued. “If Hezbollah succeeds in converting these missiles, the new situation would represent a significant risk to Israeli airports, power stations, the Dimona nuclear reactor, and more.”

During his speech last month to the United Nations General Assembly, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu revealed satellite imagery of three sites in the Lebanese capital where Hezbollah, at the behest of its Iranian masters, allegedly has built underground missile manufacturing facilities. According to analysts, the weapons produced are capable of hitting within a few meters their intended target and can reach almost anywhere in Israel.

Hezbollah has an arsenal of more than 100,000 rockets and missiles, many of them housed in residential areas to protect them from attack.

“The increased Russian presence in Syria and the mounting threats from Lebanon indicate a significant level of danger from a diplomatic point of view,” Jonathan Spyer, a Fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategic Studies, conveyed to The Media Line. “The consolidation of Iranian power in Syria is becoming Israel’s number one priority in the region.”

To this end, Prime Minister Netanyahu is slated to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in the near future to discuss the latest developments.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu discussed ways to continue to challenge Iranian power in the region with US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Sunday.

Netnyahu said the two discussed, “How to stop Iran’s two-pronged aggression: its pursuit of a nuclear arsenal and its pursuit of a conventional arsenal and its plans to takeover the Middle East.”

He also congratulated President Trump’s “courageous step out of the JCPOA,” and hope for increased “pressure on the world’s main terrorist regime, the aggressive regime in Tehran.”

“Instead of blocking their path to a nuclear bomb, it actually paved their way to a nuclear arsenal,” Netanyahu said of JCPOA. “In addition, it gave them hundreds of billions of dollars in cash, credit and investment, enabling them to finance their growing aggression in the region.”

Netanyahu also touted the US and Israeli relationship, saying “The alliance between the United States and Israel under President Trump has never been stronger.”

The two also discussed the local economy in Israel  and American economy, the cooperation between the two.

In response to the a journalist’s question about Khan al-Ahmar, Netanyahu said, “Khan al-Ahmar will be evacuated, this is a decision of the court, this is our policy, and it will also be implemented … I have no intention of postponing this.”