The Israeli party pooper arrived in Washington, walked into the White
House and seemed to have learned some manners and etiquette in the
interim. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has shown that you
can still change after turning 60. After all, he was responsible for the
horror show with US President Barack Obama at the White House when he
gave the American president a learned and reproachful tirade in front of
the media. This traumatic event, which took place in 2009 at their
first meeting during the first term of both leaders, has been dubbed
“The Lecture” in the United States. Obama must have felt the way
President Bill Clinton felt after his first meeting with Netanyahu in
1996.
Summary :
Israeli
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would gladly embrace employing a
military threat to convince Tehran to halt its nuclear program.
Original Title:
Netanyahu supports the Syrian model
Author:
Ben Caspit
Posted on:
October 1 2013
Translated by:
Simon Pompan
|
But this is 2013, and
Obama and Netanyahu have
built a certain kind of trust. The Israeli premier was careful on Sept.
30 to show reverence toward the American president, emphasizing their
points of agreement while elegantly glossing over the moot issues. He
was careful not to be a wet blanket on Obama’s party, especially with
fallout over the US federal budget expected the next day, an issue of
much greater interest to the American president and public than the
centrifuges in Natanz.
That being the case,
Netanyahu still planned to relish the opportunity to
ruin the world’s party during his address to the UN General Assembly on
Oct. 1. This article was written before the speech, and the information
provided here is based on discussions, assessments and positions voiced
in the backrooms of the offices of the prime minister and members of
the top echelon of Israeli politics prior to Netanyahu's departure for
the United States.
My assumption is that some of these things came up during the
tête-à-tête between Netanyahu and Obama while some did not. Even the
terminology used
by defense chiefs and senior ministers at meetings with Netanyahu
radically changes when the prime minister steps into the Oval Office.
Presumably, the atmosphere at the meeting between the two leaders was
most probably less relaxed than what they displayed at their joint press
conference.
From Netanyahu’s standpoint, his entire worldview, his life’s calling
and vocation were weighing heavily on his shoulders when he faced the
president who seeks to embark on negotiations with Iran, which is on the
cusp of acquiring a nuclear military capability. Netanyahu has no room
for maneuver or mistakes. All he has is Obama.
What emerges from talks with his associates is that Netanyahu feels
that he is bearing the heavy burden of the Jewish people’s history on
his shoulders when he is sitting there, trying to convince the president
that the Iranians are planning to deceive him, fritter away time, “talk
and enrich” until they find the right time to announce a fait accompli,
a done deal — Iran is nuclear and henceforth untouchable.
In the backrooms in Jerusalem, allegations are leveled at America’s
“lack of leadership,” vacillation, zigzagging and weakness. Iranian
President Hassan Rouhani, Israelis are saying, is coming to these
negotiations on all fours, but it is the Americans who are actually
crawling, wooing him, offering “water-cooler meetings.” They dance to
the Persian flute, whose sole purpose is to fool the West and loosen the
tight economic noose around Iran’s neck, even at the price of somewhat
delaying their progress toward acquiring a nuclear military capability.
Iran’s President Rouhani, Israelis are saying, is the “master of
deception,” having himself coined the phrase “talking and enriching” and
having written a book on his tenure as the head of the Iranian nuclear
negotiation team. His smile conceals cunning, determination and
perseverance. We must not be led on. We must not let up. We need to take
advantage of the momentum. This is the moment of truth. If the Iranians
understand that there is no intention to cut them any slack at this
juncture, it is possible that this watershed will take place. But if
they pick up signs of weaknesses, fatigue and a desire to tick a box and
move on, they will exploit this situation to the fullest extent, as
world champions at noticing this kind of situation.
Israel will be prepared to buy into a copy of the
Syrian model.
Netanyahu was supposed to say that to Obama. Here, Syria has pledged to
fully dismantle its weapons of mass destruction. It agreed to do so
only because there was a real, credible military option on the table.
Only when the American destroyers started converging on Syria’s shores
and the aircraft carriers moved at full steam toward the country did the
Syrians, as well as the Russians, understand that it was time to let
go. Just as the Americans did not agree to let the Syrians put up
cameras in front of the chemical weapons depots, but demanded (and were
given) a commitment to have the weaponry fully removed, dismantled and
destroyed, a similar insistence should be made in the Iranian case. Iran
should not be allowed to enrich uranium on its soil.
Notwithstanding, Netanyahu had something new to say at the Oval Office.
He talked about Iran’s “nuclear military program.” This might suggest
that Israel is prepared to consider the American position as outlined in
Obama’s UN speech, namely allowing Iran to keep nuclear technology for
peaceful purposes. Does that include the enrichment of a limited
quantity of uranium at a low grade? This remains unclear.
The key question remains what will happen once the talks between Iran
and the five large nuclear powers—the United States, Russia, China, the
United Kingdom and France — resume in the middle of October. Israel
suspects that Iran will make a few gestures, expecting more lenient
sanctions in return. This must not be allowed to happen. The easing of
sanctions should occur only when truly concrete measures are
implemented, ones that can be verified, supervised and guaranteed.
Jerusalem knows that the Iranians are the most skilled people in the
world at sniffing out and sizing up the perplexed client in front of
them at the bazaar. They will exploit any moment of weakness, using
every trick in the book to stall while trying to rescue their crumbling
economy without giving up true assets. In the wake of the American
zigzag in the Syrian case, Tehran is not really deterred and does not
really buy into the military option facing it. The Israeli one has
eroded while the American one has been proven to be empty. As noted,
however, Netanyahu would buy, with open arms, the Syrian model provided
that the end result is that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is disarmed
of his chemical weapons.
As of Sept. 30, the model appears to be successful. By some Israeli
accounts, the initial list of the chemical weapons arsenal that the
Syrians submitted to the West seems to be more or less authentic. This
is the less important list. Over the coming few days, the Syrians were
to submit a more detailed list. This is where they will be put to the
real test.
At this stage, these indications suggest that Assad has come to the
realization that his chemical weapons pose a threat to his life and his
regime and not the other way round. He has come to terms with the fact
that in the overall cost-benefit analysis, he has lost this tool. The
reports about his attempts to transfer some of the weapons to Hezbollah
are incorrect.
It is possible that Assad will try to keep some small quantities for
himself, but even Hezbollah has realized that it neither needs nor is it
interested in the chemical weapons. At this stage, the
Russian-brokered agreement is
a rare diplomatic success, which was accomplished by chance, following a
demonstration of soft power and zigzagging by the American
administration.
Israel hopes that Obama will not arrive at the wrong conclusion from
what had transpired here. To solve the Iranian problem, Jerusalem says,
he will need to demonstrate much greater resolve, creativity and a much
larger stick than the one he flashed at Syria.
Ben Caspit is
a contributing writer for Al-Monitor's Israel Pulse. He is also a
senior columnist and political analyst for Israeli newspapers, and has a
daily radio show and regular TV shows on politics and Israel. On
Twitter: @BenCaspit
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