by Jasmin Ramsey

Another Israeli expert has contradicted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s assessment of Iran’s nuclear program.

“The Iranian nuclear program will only be operational in another 10 years,” said Uzi Eilam, the former head of the Israel Atomic Energy Commission, during an interview with Ronen Bergman published today in the Israeli [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Jasmin Ramsey

Another Israeli expert has contradicted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s assessment of Iran’s nuclear program.

“The Iranian nuclear program will only be operational in another 10 years,” said Uzi Eilam, the former head of the Israel Atomic Energy Commission, during an interview with Ronen Bergman published today in the Israeli daily, Ynet.

“The main issues are still ahead of us, but it is definitely possible to be optimistic. I think we should give the diplomatic process a serious chance, alongside ongoing sanctions,” said Eilam, who has held senior roles in the Israeli defense establishment.

“And I’m not even sure that Iran would want the bomb — it could be enough for them to be a nuclear threshold state — so that it could become a regional power and intimidate its neighbors,” he added.

Netanyahu has implored the international community to set a “red line” on Iran’s nuclear program, which he says is aimed at a nuclear weapon. The Israeli PM used a “cartoon bomb” prop to make this argument during his Sept. 27, 2012 UN General Assembly speech. Two weeks earlier, Netanyahu had said that Iran was 6-7 months from being 90% of the way to building a bomb during an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press” program.

The next year, during his Oct. 1 2013 address to the UNGA, Netanyahu admitted that Iran had not crossed the line he had drawn on his diagram, but said Tehran was still positioning itself to be able to create a bomb and that this “vast and feverish effort has continued unabated” under Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.

Netanyahu has also called the interim deal on Iran’s nuclear program that was reached on Nov. 24, 2012 between Iran and the P5+1 (the U.S., Britain, France, China, and Russia plus Germany) a “historic mistake.”

The Israeli PM, who has been warning about an impending Iranian nuclear bomb for almost 20 years, has been relatively quiet during this year’s round of talks toward a comprehensive deal with Iran, which are set to resume on May 13 in Vienna Austria.

US officials have also detected a shift in Tel Aviv’s position toward a somewhat more reasonable stance, according to a report in Al-Monitor.

Several current and former Israeli defense and intelligence officials have cast doubt on Netanyahu’s statements on Iran’s nuclear program, which Tehran, a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, insists is peaceful.

“[Israel's leadership] presents a false view to the public on the Iranian bomb, as though acting against Iran would prevent a nuclear bomb. But attacking Iran will encourage them to develop a bomb all the faster,” said Israel’s former Internal Security Chief, Yuval Diskin, at an Israeli forum on Apr. 26, 2012.

“[Iran] is going step by step to the place where it will be able to decide whether to manufacture a nuclear bomb. It hasn’t decided to go the extra mile,” noted the head of the Israeli military, Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, during an interview with Haaretz on Apr. 25, 2012.

“I don’t think [Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei] will want to go the extra mile. I think the Iranian leadership is composed of very rational people,” he said.

“[Attacking Iran is] the stupidest thing I have ever heard…It will be followed by a war with Iran,” said Meir Dagan, the former head of the Mossad, during a May 2011 Hebrew University conference.

“It is the kind of thing where we know how it starts, but not how it will end.” he added.

by Marsha B. Cohen

Two celebrations brought Lockheed Martin’s CEO, Marilyn A. Hewson, to Israel on April 9.

Hewson officially opened Lockheed Martin’s office in Beersheba, the closest major city to where IDF technical units are being consolidated at new bases in the Negev Desert, which will be supporting the defense contractor’s ”growing [...]]]> via LobeLog

by Marsha B. Cohen

Two celebrations brought Lockheed Martin’s CEO, Marilyn A. Hewson, to Israel on April 9.

Hewson officially opened Lockheed Martin’s office in Beersheba, the closest major city to where IDF technical units are being consolidated at new bases in the Negev Desert, which will be supporting the defense contractor’s ”growing presence” in Israel. “By locating our new office in the capital of the Negev we are well positioned to work closely with our Israeli partners and stand ready to: accelerate project execution, reduce program risk and share our technical expertise by training and developing in-country talent,” Hewson said in her speech.

Then was the arrival of the first C-130J Super Hercules airlifter at Nevatim Air Base in Israel. The state of the art Super Hercules, fitted with “Israeli-specific, post-production modifications,” has been dubbed Shimshon (Samson) by the Israel Defense Forces, about which Hewson waxed rhapsodic:

This aircraft is worthy of its given name, Shimshon…[sic] a leader whose power was thought to be as mighty as the sun. Shimshon used his power to combat the enemies of Israel and perform heroic feats.In the same way, this aircraft will support the defense of Israel and the men and women who are the heroes of the Israeli Defense Force.

(Apparently Ms. Hewson is unaware that the biblical Samson/Shimshon (Judges 13:1-17:31), for all his strength, actually met a rather unenviable end — in Gaza — using his final surge strength to destroy himself along with the enemy. Yet the Philistines lived to fight another day and were still around a hundred years later.)

Much of the publicity heralding the Samson’s arrival emphasized the air transporter’s capabilities in carrying out humanitarian missions. According to Lockheed’s product description, “This rugged aircraft is regularly sent on missions in the harshest environments, and is often seen as the first aircraft ‘in,’ touching down on austere landing strips before any other transport to provide humanitarian relief after natural disasters.” Reuters notes that “In non-combat, but harsh, environments, C-130Js are often the first to carry out missions such as search and rescue, aerial firefighting in the United States and delivering relief supplies after earthquakes, hurricanes, typhoons and tsunamis around the world.” A Haaretz article anticipating the Samson’s arrival said that earlier versions of the Hercules aircraft had been used in 1976 to rescue hijacked Air France passengers being held hostage in Entebbe, Uganda and to transport Ethiopian Jews to Israel as part of Operation Solomon in 1991.

The Israeli Air Force website, however, describes the C-130J Hercules as “a tactical transport plane that is mostly used in joint missions with ground forces: supply missions, equipment transfer, airdropping combat forces and special missions.” The long version of the Super Hercules C-130J can carry 92 paratroopers and their equipment, which exceeds the 64 paratroopers the short version can accommodate. Comments by Israeli defense officials quoted in the Times of Israel suggest that Israel isn’t purchasing “Samson” for humanitarian intervention. The IDF Chief of Staff, Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, who also attended the arrival ceremony, declared that the C-130J, which can fly close to the ground and land and take-off on primitive airstrips, was of “decisive importance” and would allow Israel to execute “more complex missions, under any conditions, deeper [within enemy territory], faster and more clandestinely.” IAF Commander Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel said that the “diversity of capabilities that the plane represents borders on the imaginary” [sic].

Israel orders its C-130Js, including the Super Hercules, through a Foreign Military Sale (FMS) contract with the US government. Israel’s annual Foreign Military Funding grant from the US signed in 2007 for a ten year period amounts to $3.1 billion to Israel annually (minus about $155 million due to the US government-mandated sequester). Considering that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu budgeted $2.89 billion for an Israeli military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities for 2013 and again for 2014, that doesn’t go very far, even when assuming that the Samson is being purchased with an eye toward war with Iran.

With Lockheed’s active involvement, Israel has been able to utilize a scheme called a deferred payment plan (DPP), in combination with a Pentagon process known as cash-flow financing, to make current purchases with deferred debt on favorable terms, to be paid with the FMS grants it is scheduled to receive in future years. Israel used this method to fund Pentagon-administered Foreign Military Sale purchases of Lockheed F-16I and F-35I fighters. Through this creative means of financing, Israel has already earmarked nearly all Foreign Military Funding through 2018 for F-35 fighter jets, heavy troop carriers, airlifters and other equipment.

Now Israel wants to buy — and the Pentagon wants to sell — half a dozen V-22 Ospreys, originally intended for the US Marine Corps serving in Afghanistan. What to do?

On March 20, during a visit to Israel, two members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) and Joe Donnelly (D-IN), told Reuters that, in spite of belt-tightening in Washington, the US will  continue providing Israel with military assistance after its current Foreign Military Financing package of $3.1 billion a year expires in 2017. Ayotte said that talks concerning the 2018-2028 package were already underway. Lockheed Martin is rated a “heavy hitter” among campaign donors by the Center for Responsive Politics’ Open Secrets website. Thus far in the 2014 election cycle, Lockheed has contributed over $1.6 million to members of the Senate and the House of Representatives, about two thirds going to Republicans and the rest to Democrats.

Ten days later, Defense News reported that Israel had agreed to take on more than $2 billion in commercial debt for near-term buys of V-22 tilt-rotor aircraft and other Pentagon-approved weaponry, trusting that the US will provide a 2018-2028 FMF package to foot the bill. Under a US-approved DPP, Israel would pay only interest and fees over the course of the current agreement set to expire in September 2018. The principal of the debt incurred to purchase the Ospreys would be covered by a new Obama-pledged package that would extend annual foreign military financing (FMF) aid through 2028. Lockheed loves the idea, even if the first purchase goes to a competitor. Why? Once the new means of proactive financing kicks in — Israel borrowing against an aid package it hasn’t even received yet, which, following approval, won’t go into effect for five years — Lockheed can expect benefits as well. According to Defense News, “Lockheed is expected to play a pivotal role in the new DPP scheme, which government and industry sources here say will facilitate follow-on procurement of Israel’s second squadron of F-35Is.”

Photo: Israel’s Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon inspects the IAF’s newest recruit, the Samson Super Hercules. Credit: IDF Spokesperson’s Office

It’s June 15, 1992. A news nugget on page A-12 of the Washington Post reports that the chief of Israel’s Air Force believes military action might be necessary to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons:

Maj. Gen. Herzl Budinger told Israeli television that if Iran’s intensive effort to develop [...]]]> via Lobe Log

It’s June 15, 1992. A news nugget on page A-12 of the Washington Post reports that the chief of Israel’s Air Force believes military action might be necessary to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons:

Maj. Gen. Herzl Budinger told Israeli television that if Iran’s intensive effort to develop atomic weapons is not “disrupted,” the fundamentalist Islamic nation will become a nuclear power by the end of the decade. Earlier, the air force commander told reporters that “the greatest disruption possible, whether military or political,” is necessary to keep nuclear weapons out of the Middle East and prevent a world war. By “disruption,” Budinger said he meant “international political action, and aggressive action, if needed.”

This was the birth of what we can now look back on as two decades of threats by Israel to “bomb Iran” — with or without the consent, assistance and/or leadership of the United States — to prevent Iran’s impending development of nuclear capability.

Iran was struggling to recover economically from the ravages of its eight year war with Iraq (1980-1988). Its firebrand revolutionary leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, had died three years earlier. A US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE 34-91, Oct. 1991) viewed Iran’s president, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, as a pragmatic nationalist who “is likely to move slowly and prudently to repair relations” with the US but conceded that “Iran’s major foreign policy goal is to foster a more stable regional environment conducive to Iranian security and economic development.” Although it would be a “nuisance,” Iran’s becoming “more dangerous” was viewed by the NIE as a “less likely scenario.” The Israeli defense establishment thought otherwise.

Fast forward a decade. Weeks after Iran had quietly assisted the US in achieving its initial victory over the Taliban in Afghanistan, President George W. Bush branded Iran as part of an “axis of evil” during his 2002 State of the Union speech. In an interview with the London Times, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon called on the international community “to target Iran as soon as the imminent conflict with Iraq is complete.” Sharon insisted that the day after the Iraq war (which had not yet begun) ended, the war against Iran must begin.

Fast forward another decade…

During 2012, not a month passed when the prospect of an Israeli attack on Iran didn’t generate hyperventilated headlines. To mark the end of the 20th anniversary of “the Iranian threat,” here’s a look back at some of the articles that kept the about-to-happen war against Iran’s nuclear program in the headlines last year.

January 2012: The year started with a bang…at least in the press. Foreign Affairs features an essay “Time to Attack Iran” by Matt Kroenig, reinforced by “The Case for Regime Change in Iran”, a commentary by Jamie M. Fly and Gary Schmitt, alongside of which are two pieces critical of Koenig’s arguments: “Not the Time to Attack Iran” by Colin H.Kahl” and “The Flawed Logic of Striking Iran” by Alexandre Debs and Nuno P. Monteiro. Also weighing in with a totally contrarian view was neorealist Kenneth Waltz, who contributes “Why Iran Should Get the Bomb” to the debate. An astute critique of Fly and Schmitt, which remains timely, is Simon Tisdall’s piece in the Guardian, “An Iran War is Brewing From Mutual Ignorance.”

A noteworthy pro-war attention grabber that reaches a much wider and more diverse audience outside policy wonk circles is Ronen Bergman’s cover story for the New York Times Sunday Magazine, “Will Israel Attack Iran?”, which concludes, ”After speaking with many senior Israeli leaders and chiefs of the military and the intelligence, I have come to believe that Israel will indeed strike Iran in 2012.”  Ira Chernus provides a takedown of Bergman’s arguments a few days later in the Huffington Post. Also contradicting Bergman is a draft of an Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) report, arguing that Iran would not be capable of building a nuclear weapon in 2012 and that a a military attack wouldn’t effectively prevent Iran from building one if it made the decision to do so.

February: David Ignatius reveals in a Washington Post op-ed, “Is Israel Preparing to Attack Iran?”, that US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta’s biggest worry is that Israel may be preparing to attack Iran in the spring. Ignatius’ scoop goes viral, eliciting commentary from all directions within the mainstream media and blogosphere. Charles Krauthammer immediately infers that such a leak would not have occurred unless an Israeli attack was “certain” and concludes it’s a done deal. Gareth Porter argues that the leak brings into sharper focus “a contradiction in the Barack Obama administration’s Iran policy between its effort to reduce the likelihood of being drawn into a war with Iran and its desire to exploit the Israeli threat of war to gain diplomatic leverage on Iran”. In the New York Times, former Israeli military defense chief Amos Yadlin demands ”an ironclad American assurance that if Israel refrains from acting in its own window of opportunity — and all other options have failed to halt Tehran’s nuclear quest — Washington will act to prevent a nuclear Iran while it is still within its power to do so.” Jonathan Marcus at BBC News provides a step-by-step blueprint of “How Israel Might Strike at Iran.”

March: Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu tells Israeli media that he had assured President Obama during their talks in Washington that Israel had not yet decided whether or not to strike Iran in the next few weeks. Within days, a front page piece in the Sheldon Adelson-owned Israeli daily Israel Hayom by headlined “Difficult, Daring, Doable”, propounds the feasibility and desirability of an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities. Mark Perry exposes what his sources believe to be a secret Israeli plan to attack Iran from Azerbaijan; the neoconservative and right-wing media are divided as to whether the story is a hoax or another deliberate leak by the Obama administration intended to thwart Israeli plans.

April: It’s spring and there are no signs of an Israeli attack. Slate’s Fred Kaplan suggests that Israel might launch an “October surprise” just before the US elections:

If they started an attack and needed U.S. firepower to help them complete the task, Barack Obama might open himself up to perilous political attacks—for being indecisive, weak, appeasing, anti-Israel, you name it—if he didn’t follow through. It could cost him the votes of crucial constituencies.

May: In the May/June issue of World Affairs Journal, Elliott Abrams and Robert Wexler debate whether the time for an Israeli attack on Iran has finally arrived. Abrams calls for immediate action and Robert Wexler argues “not yet.” After numerous reports in the right-wing blogosphere cite Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Benny Gantz in arguing that Israel is about to attack Iran, Gantz slams the “public chatter” about the Iranian nuclear issue by people who used to know things about Iran’s nuclear program but no longer do,” while assuring the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that Israel is “super ready” for military action. A temporary lull in war rhetoric from Israel fuels mid-month speculation that the top echelons of the Israeli government are in “lockdown” in preparation for a military strike. The surprise formation of a national unity government, Reuters infers, is reflective of Netanyahu’s desire for “a strong government to lead a military campaign,” particularly one that includes Iranian-born Shaul Mofaz, a former Israeli Chief of Staff and a veteran soldier in the coalition:

‘I think they have made a decision to attack,’ said one senior Israeli figure with close ties to the leadership. ‘It is going to happen. The window of opportunity is before the U.S. presidential election in November. This way they will bounce the Americans into supporting them.’

June: In another op-ed, David Ignatius rings alarm bells:

It’s clear that Israel’s military option is still very much on the table, despite the success of economic sanctions in forcing Iran into negotiations. ‘It’s not a bluff, they’re serious about it,” says Efraim Halevy, a former head of the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service. A half-dozen other experts and officials made the same point in interviews last week: The world shouldn’t relax and assume that a showdown with Iran has been postponed until next year. Here, the alarm light is still flashing red.

July: Chief of Staff Benny Gantz refutes rumours that he is opposed to war with Iran. “The IDF will carry out orders to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities if it receives them from the government,” he declares. Mofaz leaves Netanyahu’s coalition, revivifying the need for Israeli elections. Charles Krauthammer opines to Fox News that Israel will attack Iran if it appears that President Obama will win re-election.

August: During Panetta’s visit to Israel, Netanyahu informs him during closed talks that Israel is prepared to defend itself from Iran with or without the help of the US and that he is prepared to accept the consequences. Barak Ravid of Haaretz reports that others at the meeting believed that Netanyahu’s comments were part of a “psychological warfare” campaign waged by Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak “in order to pressure the U.S. into attacking Iran itself.” Two weeks later, Panetta tells the press that the Israelis have not yet “made a decision as to whether or not they will go in and attack Iran at this time,” while Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Martin Dempsey incurs the wrath of Israeli political leaders when he asserts that an Israeli attack “could delay but not destroy Iran’s nuclear capabilities”.

September: Among the questions that Lesley Stahl asks “The Spymaster” — the former head of Israel’s Mossad, Meir Dagan — in a Sixty Minutes interview is whether an Israeli attack on Iran could succeed. Although she opens the interview with a Dagan quote asserting that “Israel attacking Iran was the stupidest idea [he] had ever heard,” she insistently argues that he ought to believe otherwise, sometimes even putting words in Dagan’s mouth despite his clear resistance.

Netanyahu’s speech before the UN General Assembly on Sept. 27 becomes an iconic moment when the Israeli leader literally draws a line with a red marker on a crude graphic of an incendiary device. “Ladies and gentlemen, the relevant question is not when Iran will get the bomb. The relevant question is at what stage can we no longer stop Iran from getting the bomb,” he said. Netanyahu’s use of the “Wile E. Coyote” rendition of an Iranian nuclear weapon evokes disapproving frowns as well as irreverent mockery: “I’m hearing ridicule of that stunt from people in the United States government who are a) militant on the subject of Iran, and b) needed by Israel to carry-out effective anti-proliferation efforts,” Jeffrey Goldberg fumes in The Atlantic. Goldberg, normally a staunch defender of Netanyahu, also complains:

Netanyahu’s constant threats, and warnings, about Iran’s nuclear program have undermined Israel’s deterrent capability. Netanyahu spent much of this year arguing, privately and publicly, that soon it would be too late to stop the Iranians from moving their centrifuges fully underground. He knows full well that the Iranians could soon enter the so-called zone of immunity, by moving the bulk of their centrifuges into the Fordow facility, where Israeli bombs can’t reach. But he’s now kicked the can down the road until next spring.

October: Israeli Foreign Minister Ehud Barak tells Britain’s The Daily Telegraph that Iran has used up to a third of its enriched uranium to make fuel rods for a medical research reactor, thereby delaying progress towards a weapon for 8-10 months. Barak speculated that Iran’s “ruling ayatollahs” may be trying to reduce tension over the nuclear issue until after the US presidential election, or convince the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of Iran’s willingness to cooperate. Barak said this did not change Israel’s view that Iran was seeking to develop nuclear weapons.

The threat of an October surprise immediately before the US election subsides. The alliance of Netanyahu’s Likud party with Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s even more hardline Yisrael Beiteinu (“Israel is our home”) party leads to concerns that the PM is forming a war cabinet that would make a military confrontation inevitable. According to Aluf Benn of Haaretz:

…he announced that the top priority of his next government will be preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. The merger with Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party will dissolve any domestic opposition to the war, since after the election, Netanyahu will be able to argue that he received a mandate from the people to act as he sees fit. Ministers and top defense officials will have a hard time arguing with him. From now on, only American opposition is liable to delay, or even prevent, a command to the Israel Air Force to take off for Iran.

November: Netanyahu vows to stop Iran’s nuclear progress, even if it means defying the US. In a joint press conference at the Pentagon, after Panetta implied that retiring Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak agreed that “there is time and space for an effort to try to achieve a diplomatic solution” with Iran — which Panetta said “remains, I believe, the preferred outcome for both the United States and for Israel” — Barak undercuts his host, stating that Iranian leaders would have to be “coerced” into ending their nuclear program. Barak predicts this will happen in 2013.

December:  On Dec. 31, in a Haaretz article headlined “Bibi’s Strange Silence on Iran,” Uzi Benziman wonders what has become of the Iranian threat, which suddenly vanished from Israel’s national conversation, with the exception of a single unremarkable mention as part of a list of challenges in a political party speech by Netanyahu last week:

Since his [Netanyahu's] In a joint press conference at the beginning of the month with Panetta, retiring Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak anyahu’s] resounding appearance at the United Nations, where he pointed to the Iranian threat by means of a ludicrous drawing, this fateful issue (from his perspective ) has somehow dropped from the public eye. It’s a strange turn of events considering the fact that the Iranian nuclear program topped Netanyahu’s agenda during his entire current term in office, and that the manner in which he handled it cast a pall of palpable existential threat over Israel.

But according to former Obama national security adviser Dennis Ross, 2013 will be “the decisive year” in the showdown with Iran’s nuclear program. “If by the end of 2013 diplomacy hasn’t worked, the prospects for use of force become quite high,” he said.

A new year, with new possibilities, which will probably include more talk of an impending war with Iran (that Lobe Log will continue to track and report on). Elections are coming up in both Israel and Iran, opening the door to a range of events that can seriously impact the US and Israel’s Iran policy, as well as Iranian foreign policy. And while total peace may be unlikely, one can at least hope that past predictions of war with Iran will be as accurate in 2013 as they have been in the past.

Among Israel’s former top security officials, a growing consensus has emerged over the past several months that a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities would be counterproductive to Israeli interests. Yesterday, former Israeli spy chief Meir Dagan emphasized that point, telling an audience that “a strike could accelerate the procurement [...]]]> via Think Progress

Among Israel’s former top security officials, a growing consensus has emerged over the past several months that a military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities would be counterproductive to Israeli interests. Yesterday, former Israeli spy chief Meir Dagan emphasized that point, telling an audience that “a strike could accelerate the procurement of the bomb” and “provide them with the legitimacy to achieve nuclear capabilities.” But a new report by Ynet, suggests that the consensus opposing an Israeli attack on Iran extends all the way to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s defense chiefs.

“[P]olitical sources told Ynet on Wednesday that IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz, Mossad Chief Tamir Pardo and several top section chiefs in the Mossad are against a strike at this time,” reads a report by Ynet. “Without Gantz’ support the chances of mounting a strike are slim,” an anonymous “political source” said.

Indeed, Gantz and Pardo have expressed reservations in the past about the effectiveness of an Israeli strike.

In December, Pardo warned that while Iran poses a threat to Israel, “The term existential threat is used too freely,” a view closely mirrored by former Mossad Chief Ephraim Halevy, Meir Dagan and a number of former high-ranking Israeli security officials.

And while hawks in the U.S. and Israel frequently misrepresent the intelligence on Iran’s nuclear program to portray an Iranian nuclear weapons as imminent, IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz pushed back last month, telling Haaretz, “[Iran] hasn’t yet decided whether to go the extra mile.” That assessment is shared by U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper.

Gantz also told Haaretz, “I don’t think [Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamanei] will want to go the extra mile. I think the Iranian leadership is composed of very rational people.”

Ynet looked at Netanyahu’s nine-minister security forum and concluded that Netanyahu, Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman support an attack. But Vice Premier Moshe Yaalon, Kadima Chairman Shaul Mofaz and ministers Dan Meridor, Benny Begin, Eli Yishai and Yuval Steinitz oppose a strike.

A potential Iranian nuclear weapon is widely considered a threat to both the security of U.S. and its allies in the region, as well as the nuclear non-proliferation regime. However, intelligence estimates give the West time to pursue a dual-track approach of pressure and diplomacy to resolve the crisis. Questions about the efficacy and consequences of a strike have led U.S. officials to declare that diplomacy is the “best and most permanent way” to resolve the crisis.

Iran poses a serious threat, but not an existential one.

- Dan Halutz, Former Israeli Defense Force Chief of [...]]]> Not according to many current and former Israeli and U.S. officials. Following are just a few recent quotes opposing that notion from a thorough and useful compilation by the folks at Just Foreign Policy:

Iran poses a serious threat, but not an existential one.

- Dan Halutz, Former Israeli Defense Force Chief of Staff, YNet, February 2, 2012

I think the Iranian leadership is composed of very rational people.

- Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, Israeli Chief of Staff, Haaretz, April 25, 2012

Any war with Iran would be a messy and extraordinarily violent affair, with significant casualties and consequences.

- Colin H. Kahl, former US Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East, Foreign Affairs, March/April 2012