But, it takes two to engage in diplomacy, and we have not seen from Iran a willingness to do that at this point. Earlier on Wednesday, the US special envoy, Robert Malley, said that Iran is sending daily signals that it may already have reject a return to talks, requiring the US and European powers to consider all other options. The US warnings came as the EU chief negotiator Enrique Mora travels to Iran with a message that the talks are in deep crisis, in the latest attempt to convince Tehran to return to talks.
Israel is convinced that Iran is secretly working towards developing a nuclear warhead and the means to deliver it with a ballistic missile. Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons.. With this belief in mind, Israel has long been carrying out a series of covert, unilateral and undeclared actions to try to slow down or cripple Iran's nuclear programme.
These include the insertion of a computer virus codenamed Stuxnet, first discovered in , that incapacitated Iran's centrifuges. Earlier this century a number of key Iranian nuclear scientists died in mysterious circumstances and then in November there was the high-profile assassination near Tehran of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.
He was not only Iran's leading nuclear technical expert but he carried a senior rank in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps IRGC and Israel believed he was the person running the covert "military" aspect of Iran's nuclear programme. That programme is now at a potentially dangerous stage.
But in President Donald Trump pulled the US out of it, slapping draconian sanctions on Iran, which has responded by incrementally breaking the terms of the deal, most notably enriching uranium - the chemical element that can be used for nuclear energy or, potentially, weapons - beyond the permitted limits. President Joe Biden wants to bring the US back into the deal but only if Iran returns to full compliance.
Iran is basically saying: "No, we don't trust you, you go first. We will comply fully once sanctions are lifted. To try to break this deadlock, negotiators from several countries are meeting in Vienna. But Israel doesn't believe the nuclear deal is worth reviving in its current form.
First, these Israeli efforts could undermine the US negotiating position as it seeks to re-enter the nuclear deal with Iran. Israel has proved it can disrupt the Iranian programme, but at what cost? Strange things have been happening at sea recently. Iran denied any involvement. In April the Saviz, an Iranian vessel anchored in the southern Red Sea, suffered damage to its hull believed to have been caused by limpet mines.
The political and military constraints on Israeli decision-makers suggests such a military showdown is highly unlikely. To speak of an imminent and undisguised IDF strike deep inside Iranian territory is to overlook a long-established norm that has for decades governed U.
Here, Barak spelled out the paradigm that has shaped—and will likely continue to shape—the contours of Israeli action against Iran. Even during the military interventionism of the George W. Bush presidency, Israel did not have a blank check to do as it pleased. As Barak notes in his memoirs, when Bush learned in of Israeli efforts to purchase heavy munitions from the United States, he confronted Barak and then-premier Ehud Olmert. We expect you not to do it. I wanted it to be clear. He recalls how then-U.
These political realities make it unlikely Israel will pursue an overt strike on Iran. Just as important, however, are the military constraints that Israel faces. But this prodigious superiority will be rendered far less consequential in the event of an all-out war that lures the IDF ground forces into the battlefield.
Army , the day war with Hezbollah demonstrated that the IDF ground forces had been woefully ill-prepared to fight a real war with a formidable foe. Since then, there have been some signs of remedial measures undertaken by the IDF to address its shortcomings.
Still, there is little reason to believe its ground forces have undergone a drastic improvement since the war. Such threats are partly tailored for domestic consumption.
By continuously breathing life into the specter of striking Iran—a source of great unease in Western capitals due its catastrophic ramifications—Israeli leaders can offer to forgo their non-existent plans to enter an all-out war with Iran in return for other gains: Biden dropping his opposition to illegal settlement expansion in the occupied territories a secondary issue for the United States as well as more military and financial aid.
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