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Israel Has Concluded There Is No Credible American Military Option
(Times of Israel) David Horovitz - Israel always knew the Obama Administration was all about "engagement" and that it would keep open the door to a diplomatic arrangement with Iran almost indefinitely. But there were those in Jerusalem who did not rule out an American resort to force, under certain circumstances, until the Syrian chemical weapons crisis over the summer. At that juncture, the horrified American public and Congressional reaction to the prospect of imminent conflict with Syria further hardened the Administration's determination to do whatever it could to resolve the Iranian nuclear crisis without resorting to force. Since then, Israel has broadly concluded that there is no credible American military option. There is a fundamental contradiction between Secretary of State John Kerry's assurances that Israel has been kept fully updated and his insistence that Israel should not critique a deal about which it is less than fully informed. History would suggest that Israel is entirely capable of defying the international community to act militarily if it regards itself to be facing an existential threat. It has defied the international community in the past. The U.S. is a big country, war wary, a long way from Iran, and not threatened with annihilation. Israel is a small country, relatively close to Iran, potentially threatened with annihilation and with different military capabilities. If Israel's leaders find themselves faced with, on the one hand, the imperative to protect eight million Israelis and the existence of the state and, on the other, the danger of enraging the international community, the choice would actually be quite straightforward.