"Insanity Is North Korea Threatening A War It Would Instantly Lose" published by The Huffington Post

In light of all the bluster about a potential war between North Korea and the United States, my latest article was just published in The Huffington Post and assesses this very topic: "Insanity Is North Korea Threatening A War It Would Instantly Lose"

Thanks for reading. - R.O.

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/robert-d-onley/insanity-is-north-korea-threatening-a-war-it-would-instantly-lose_a_23223356/

Testing the Canada-Israel alliance

Here's my latest op-ed for the Times of Israel, titled: "Testing the Canada-Israel alliance". Enjoy. - R.O.
http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/testing-the-canada-israel-alliance/

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"Testing the Canada-Israel alliance"

By: Robert D. Onley - 20 January 2014

The inaugural visit of Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to Israel represents a significant moment for an Israeli government that is in vital need of dependable friends and reliable moral allies. Much has already been said about Prime Minister Harper’s unequivocal and unparalleled support of Israel since being elected in 2006.

Indeed because the governments of Canada and Israel see eye-to-eye on nearly every geopolitical issue facing the Jewish State, an important question must be asked about the long-term nature of this bilateral relationship, as the Canada-Israel alliance could soon be tested in both word and deed.

Though the United States remains Israel’s unquestioned military ally, many observers note the increasing willingness of the Obama Administration to publicly object to all of Israel’s policies – on the Palestinian peace process, on settlement construction, and most notably on the negotiations over Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

The latter is most troubling when coupled with the obvious intent of the United States to codify a questionable “final nuclear deal” with the Iranian government later this year and thus absolve the U.S. of any potential military response toward the issue.

Of course it is unsurprising that after two long wars in the Middle East, the United States is ready to step off the stage. Nonetheless the timing could not be worse, as Iran appears to be using present negotiations to buy time for the development of its Persian Bomb.

For example the delay between the announcement of the P5+1′s “interim deal” with Iran on November 24, 2013 in Geneva, and the final text of what then became the “preliminary deal” actually enacted on January 17, 2014, emphasizes Iran’s disconcerting abuse of process.

Accordingly under the Harper government, Canada has stated that it is “deeply skeptical” about the deal, which will hopefully see Iran scale back its nuclear work in exchange for the West easing multiple layers of sanctions which were painstakingly agreed upon by the largely disunited U.N. Security Council.

Canada shares Israel’s primal fear about whether or not the Iranian government can be trusted to live up to the terms of the deal. But aside from echoing Netanyahu’s pessimism about the trustworthiness of the radical theocratic regime in Tehran, it would appear that Canada can contribute little toward stopping Iran’s covert march toward nuclear weapons.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) seen with his Canadian counterpart Stephen Harper during a welcoming ceremony for Harper at Netanyahu’s office in Jerusalem January 19, 2014.

To be sure, there is likely cooperation between Canada and Israel on the espionage and sabotage of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, just as there is with many Western powers.

However in the context of Canada and Israel’s growing alliance, consideration must be given to what might transpire between the nations if diplomacy with Iran ultimately fails. In such a scenario – one that has undoubtedly been war-gamed – Canada’s steadfast moral support of Israel, and Harper’s fundamental belief in Israel’s unique position within the Middle East, will be tested in the flesh.

If there is any government on earth that based on its public statements alone appears willing to ensure Iran never obtains a nuclear weapon, it is Canada; not France, not the U.K., not Italy and not Germany. None of these Western nations even come close to Canada in levying consistent condemnation of Iran’s rhetoric and in pronouncing warnings about the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

Moreover if there is one government on earth that would publicly and defiantly endorse an Israeli decision to conduct unilateral military strikes against Iran’s nuclear program, again it is Canada. This would be no small measure for a “middle power” like Canada, closely allied with the United States but fiercely carving its own identifiable policy in the Middle East apart from its natural Western allies.

The Netanyahu government’s recent criticism of the European Union‘s “hypocrisy” toward Israel bears out Canada’s policy independence on the myriad issues affecting Israel.

Canada’s nearly solitary voice of moral support for Israel is also reflected in comments made by Rafael Barak, Israel’s ambassador to Canada. Speaking to the Canadian media recently, Barak stated,

“We see Iran as a serious threat. Canadians have the same view. I feel that other countries have the same view, but the difference is that Canada is expressing their ideas in public.”

The biggest question for this alliance in early 2014 is whether the Harper government would back up its public expressions with tangible action, either to facilitate effective military strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites, or perhaps more reasonably to help protect the Jewish homeland against Iranian counter-strikes through cooperative defensive military manoeuvres.

The Canadian Forces gained invaluable counter-terrorism experience in over ten years of fighting in Afghanistan (where it bore a disproportionate number of combat losses compared to its ISAF partners) and is adept at assisting in disaster relief operations: might Israel call upon Canadian help if Iran unleashes Hezbollah against the Jewish State? Such a seemingly hyperbolic scenario cannot simply be ignored.

If Netanyahu is in fact preparing for unilateral military action against Iran, as is perennially reported, it is reasonable to suggest that amid all the other nations, Canada alone might be asked for even the smallest contribution on or after that fateful day. This suggestion is particularly probative if the Obama Administration refuses to give Netanyahu a “green light” for the mission. Harper may in fact be the only friend Netanyahu will have to call for help.

These are topics rarely explored in light of Canada’s relatively small military capacity, as some would immediately dismiss out of hand the idea of Canada providing military assistance to Israel.

Perhaps the Harper government would rather not publicly breach such a discussion for fear of unnerving its domestic audience, and this much is understandable. Nonetheless Canada’s unwavering moral alliance with Israel since 2006 clearly provokes legitimate inquiry in the event that Israel’s “D-Day” with Iran arrives.

There is no question that both Israel, Canada and the world desires a peaceful resolution to the stand-off with Iran over its illicit nuclear weapons program. Diplomacy, as it is occurring today, should indeed be given a chance. The unfortunate reality is that time is not on the side of those who seek to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

As Canada’s lonely stand with Israel makes clear, neither country operates in the realm of diplomatic wishful thinking. Rather, the Canada-Israel alliance recognizes the ruthless reality of the hate-filled, anti-Semitic dystopia that Israel’s enemies, like the Iranian regime, never cease to concoct and broadcast right next door. As Harper visits Netanyahu in Israel this week, this reality is surely on their agenda.

Read more: Testing the Canada-Israel Alliance | Robert David Onley | Ops & Blogs | The Times of Israel http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/testing-the-canada-israel-alliance/#ixzz2quL0Fkt0
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Tags: Harper visits Israel, Canadian visit to Israel, Prime Minister visits Israel, Canadian delegation trip to Israel, Harper meets Netanyahu, Harper in Israel, Harper in Jerusalem, Prime Minister in Israel

US Govt's Assessment of Assad's Chemical Weapons Attack

Here's the damning U.S. government report on Assad's chemical weapons attack on August 21, in full. The report contains all of the declassified intelligence collected about the attack.

The questions now are: how forceful will Obama's response be? What targets will the U.S. hit and why? Obama has already stated today that his response will be "a narrow act." What exactly does that mean? Why is Obama tipping his hand? So that Assad's wife can continue swimming in the presidential pool?

I believe there is an overwhelming need for the U.S. to decimate the capabilities of the Syrian Air Force. It is time to shut down Assad's air power. I say this not because I believe the U.S. should pick sides in this civil war, but instead, because it is time to level the playing field. If Syria's civil war is truly a popular uprising, then a levelled playing field should reveal the true extent of the support for the (disparate) rebel opposition groups. Otherwise Assad will continue bombing the rebels into oblivion, and the bloodshed will continue unabated.

This is a horrific scenario in which the West is rightfully reticent to get involved. But the reality is that Assad has just committed an unthinkable atrocity, in a region fraught with men willing commit atrocities on a daily basis. The precedent that the UK's Parliament just set -- of sitting out of the action when the U.S. and France are ready to attack Syria -- is simply untenable and cowardly. The West has a moral duty and imperative to act and react when a nation crosses all international mores and norms, such as through the use of WMD's.

The impending U.S. attack on Syria (however limited it might be) is designed to convey one message: the use of WMD's is wholly, completely and eternally unacceptable, and will always be universally condemned by the West. Importantly, this is a crucial message that will be heard loud and clear in Tehran. You can be sure that the Iranians are watching and waiting with wide eyes to see whether or not the West has the backbone and resolve to stop reckless regimes from using WMD's (as Iran has promised to use on Israel, numerous times).

As Iran races to complete its nuclear weapons program, the world is witnessing the opening acts of what will eventually become a broader war against the Islamic Republic of Iran. Assad's use of chemical weapons in Syria makes certain that the Iranian regime will not hesitate to do the same. Hence the need for the West to punish Assad. However, Russia's intransigence and blind support of Assad, even in the face of nearly incontrovertible evidence of Assad's chemical attack, also sends a signal to Israel that Russia will similarly stand behind Iran until the very end. These are complex times.

Should the day ever come when Israel feels it must act to stop Iran's nuclear weapons program, unilaterally, Russia's unwavering support of Iran is indeed a brutal reality that the entire world will have to face. We are certainly in for some fireworks. Bring your gas mask.

Settling Israel's Ancient West Bank Roots

Here's my latest article for the Times of Israel based on my first-hand report from a pro-settlement political event that I attended in the West Bank in July: http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/israels-right-to-re-settle/

Enjoy.

-R.O.
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Settling Israel's Ancient West Bank Roots
By: Robert D. Onley - August 22, 2013
Times of Israel

The uproar emitted by the Palestinian Authority and the international community after Israel approved new housing blocks in East Jerusalem - on the eve of renewed peace talks - caused many people to seriously question the logic of the State of Israel.

However the casually and widely accepted proposition that any Israeli construction in the West Bank is somehow indisputably wrong is based on a fundamentally flawed understanding of present realities and Israel’s ancient history.

One only has to travel about 45 minutes outside of Jerusalem to have this conclusion become abruptly clear. In mid-July I had the privilege of attending the opening of a new cultural center and synagogue on the historic hilltop in Ancient Shiloh, an area deemed 'occupied' by the international community.

Located in the Ephraim hill-country in the Samarian countryside, the village of Ancient Shiloh was the religious capital of Israel for 300 years before Jerusalem and the existence of the first Temple. Ancient Shiloh was also home to the first tabernacle, Judaism’s earliest holy site, and at one point held the Ark of the Covenant. Both iconic Jewish artifacts pre-date the existence of Islam by over a millennium, and yet the reflexively anti-Israel proletariat in Europe and in the West summarily dismiss the centrality of these artifacts to Jewish identity.

Consider a basic comparative example to appreciate Israel’s alleged defiance of international law when building in Shiloh: in the same way that the ummat al-Islamiyah rightfully upholds the sanctity of the site at the Dome of the Rock, the Jewish people justifiably lay claim to the historic significance of geographic locations such as Ancient Shiloh, the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, and numerous other areas integral to the Jewish faith.

The Ancient Shiloh area was re-settled in 1978 and officially recognized by the Israeli government a year later. Just like the local Muslim populations in East Jerusalem near the Dome of the Rock, a Jewish population too has gradually grown up around Ancient Shiloh.

In the last few years, efforts by various pro-settlement groups were undertaken to establish a permanent structure to commemorate ancient Israel’s ties to the land at Ancient Shiloh. Embodying this effort is the multi-purpose synagogue and cultural building that opened there in July. The building features a sweeping panoramic view and a super-widescreen theatre displaying a top-notch reenactment film which uses the natural Samarian hillside as a real-life backdrop for the film.

Commemorating the opening of this unique facility attracted the who’s who of Israel's political settlement movement, including politicians Naftali Bennett, leader of The Jewish Home party, and Moshe Feiglin, leader of Jewish Leadership faction of the Likud party and the Deputy Speaker of the Knesset. Their respective political identities and electoral success are based on an unshakeable belief in the historicity and veracity of the Jewish lineage in the land of Israel, including, of course, at places such as Ancient Shiloh.

However, the existence of a factual Jewish lineage does not matter to those whose understanding of Jewish history extends strictly to June 10, 1967, when the borders between the State of Israel and the Kingdom of Jordan were transformed by the Six Day War and Israel’s subsequent occupation of formerly Jordanian land. To many observers, Israel’s decision then to capture additional Jordanian territory still constitutes “theft” of Palestinian land, today.

All of which is problematic because the European Union’s recent decision to boycott Israeli investments in the West Bank is also predicated on this flawed logic. The E.U.’s logic disregards any actual or potential historic Jewish connection to any of the land in the West Bank.

Further, with its latest directive, the E.U. instead dismisses ancient Jewish history as irrelevant, and alternately is implicitly accepting the totality of the P.A.’s assertion of sovereignty over all of “Palestine”. Meanwhile repeated Israeli governments have sacrificed Israeli territory in the pursuit of peace, only to receive rockets and relentless intransigence in return.

Unanswered by the P.A., is that if the 1967 borders are essential to peace for both the P.A. and the E.U., why then were these borders not acceptable in 1967 immediately prior to the Six Day War? Tracing this reasoning further back in history: why were the 1948 borders not acceptable for the creation of a Palestinian state? Legally and objectively, at both points in history – May 1948 and June 1967 – Israel was not “occupying” a square inch of territory in the “West Bank”.

The P.A.’s inability to address these simple yet challenging questions, and the resultant 65 years of bloodshed between Israel and the various Palestinian entities that have expressed vitriolic hatred toward the Jewish people, together raise alarming concern about the fundamental ideological underpinnings of the current and future Palestinian government.

Further, the P.A.’s silence in the face of legitimate objective inquiry exposes its radical agenda, reliance on historic revisionism and perpetual strategic hypocrisy. More than anything, this silence effectively legitimizes Israel’s construction activity, particularly in areas of ironclad historic prominence to Judaism.

At the Ancient Shiloh event, Naftali Bennett, a member of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s governing coalition, made explicitly clear his response to the paradox above, stating:

“The world says that these ‘settlements’ are terrorizing the Palestinian people. I say that not building on this land is terrorism against the Jewish State.”

Bennett’s new party won 12 seats in the 2013 national elections, and he is widely considered an up-and-coming political leader. With peace negotiations now underway, Bennett’s ideological ambition and rising popularity are worth bearing consideration in the context of Israel’s future.

In many respects, Bennett’s vision for Israel’s growth (into the West Bank), emerges from the perception in Israel that the Palestinian government is systemically and intractably divided, riven with venomous jihadi ideologies, and simply incapable of the intellectual maturity required to accept both Jews and the Jewish State on a secular, humanistic, civilizational basis.

That the P.A.’s anti-Semitic political positions are granted hearing in the highest global forums only entrenches Bennett’s belief that Israel must take matters firmly into its own hands, both now and for the foreseeable future.

The reality is that Israel has agreed to come to the negotiating table in 2013 without preconditions. That means: without the basic condition that Israel be accepted as a Jewish State. Is it really any wonder to the international community precisely why Israel continues to build in areas of vital historic importance?

None of this means that Israel has the right to build absolutely anywhere in the West Bank that it deems fit. Nearly all Israelis agree that sensible limits should be placed on construction in areas that will directly impact the ability to create a contiguous Palestinian state - indeed such limits are in Israel's interest when they can lead to definable final status borders.

Yet as the construction at Ancient Shiloh demonstrates, Israel's "settlements" are not necessarily unreasonable or baseless land grabs, but rather are often rooted in ancient, verified history. If only the rest of the world, particularly the E.U. and P.A., would stop to appreciate and construct that conclusion on their own.

Fortress Israel: Interview with Mark Regev, international spokesman for Prime Minister of Israel

By: Robert D. Onley, J.D.

July 2013

(Jerusalem) - With peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority set to begin after years of impasse, the eyes of the world are once again intensely fixated on the Holy Land. Though a degree of optimism is percolating at the prospect of negotiations for a two-state solution, outside of Jerusalem the State of Israel is facing potential armed conflict on nearly every one of its borders.

In such a hostile neighbourhood, it is often difficult to determine the Israeli government's official position on the myriad regional issues affecting the Jewish State. The reality is that hot button topics such as the Syrian civil war, Iran's nuclear weapons program and Hizbullah's involvement in propping up Assad, are all so interconnected that the Israeli government refuses to comment for fear of complicating the situation.

With this perpetually messy Middle Eastern picture in mind, a visit to the Prime Minister's Office in downtown Jerusalem for an interview with Prime Minister Netanyahu's international spokesman, Mark Regev, provides a much needed inside look at Israel's coldly calculated diplomatic positions.

Though the formal announcement of the resumption of peace talks with the Palestinian Authority would be made by U.S. Secretary State John Kerry the day after this interview was conducted, Mr. Regev, Israel's foremost government representative, public face, and official defender of the State of Israel, offered insight on nearly every issue affecting the Jewish State today.

Mark Regev (L), international spokesman for the Prime Minister of Israel, with Robert Onley at the Prime Minister's Office in Jerusalem. (July 2013)

Robert Onley: Mark, thank you for this opportunity. My title for this interview is: “Fortress Israel in the Collapsing Middle East.” The big picture is this: when you look on the map, you see all the countries around Israel swallowed up in so much instability, but at the center of them all is Israel: secure, solid, and stable.

Mark Regev: More than that, what you’re seeing now in the region is unprecedented instability, violence, tyranny, extremism, fanaticism, and Israel stands out as a stable, prosperous, free democratic country. For many years people brought a theory, some people, that the reason there’s problems in the Middle East, is because of Israel or because of the Israel-Palestinian issue. Obviously we want peace with the Palestinians, we really want peace, we yearn for peace with the Palestinians. But those theories that the reason -- in that large expanse of land, from Morocco on the Atlantic shore through to Afghanistan -- the reason there’s instability, has got nothing to do with us. You have, unfortunately, a whole series of failed states, failed political systems, failed economies, and I think finally more people are beginning to understand, as Prime Minister Netanyahu said when he spoke at the U.S. Congress in 2012, “Israel’s not what’s wrong about the Middle East, Israel’s what’s right about the Middle East.”’

Robert: Given there are these negative global attitudes and opinions about Israel, and looking at current events with near total instability around the region, what do you feel is your primary responsibility as the Prime Minister’s spokesman?

Mark: We’ve got to, in Israel, first of all, defend our country against those who would seek to harm us, and today that’s first and foremost the Iranian nuclear threat. Though there are other threats closer to our borders, whether it’s the terrible situation in Syria, or Hizbullah or Hamas, so [we must] obviously [seek to] protect our people, that’s the first obligation of any country, to protect our people. Unfortunately there are very real threats out there, they are threats that you cannot ignore. At the same time, you want to see [if] it is possible to achieve peace with your neighbours and always to extend the hand for peace and negotiations and to try to move on, to build a better region for all its inhabitants. Thirdly, while doing that, while acting to defend and protect your people, while trying to achieve a new set of peaceful relations, you’ve got to build your country.

And here it is that Israel has much that we can be proud of, because if you look at Israel’s history, in many ways it’s an amazing success story. Today Israel is relatively prosperous, Israel is strong and secure, we can be proud of our democracy here, there are many things that we can look back and say, 'these have been important achievements'. That doesn’t mean we should be complacent about the challenges we face internally [in Israel] -- we have some serious challenges, but we can, I think, from the experience of the last few decades, look to the future with confidence that we can deal with the challenges that we have.

Robert: In your interviews, often the TV hosts can get pretty combative with you, and you’re very good at adapting to what they’re proposing and giving them an alternative. To what extent do you feel your job is to correct the global narrative about Israel, rather than establish it?

Mark: My job is to be Israel’s voice as best as I can. And the job of journalists is often to ask you difficult questions, and for me, it is a matter of great pride to be able to represent my country and it’s not a job that you take for granted, it’s a job that you feel has importance. I enjoy it. I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t enjoy it.

Robert: Turning to Iran, you mentioned that it’s the greatest threat facing Israel, during Prime Minister Netanyahu’s recent appearance on CBS he suggested that Israel might be ready to stop Iran. What is Israel’s greatest fear if it feels forced to conduct unilateral air strikes?

Mark: I’m not going to go into operational details, but I can say the following: in the past the Jewish people were defenseless against threats, and we paid a price, a very severe price for being defenseless. Today we have an independent, sovereign state and the ability to defend ourselves, and that’s something that we take very seriously. We also take seriously the threats coming from Iran. Every time an Iranian leader opens his mouth, and because it’s Iran it’s always a ‘him’ and never a ‘her’, because that’s the nature of the Iranian regime, they say, “Israel has to be wiped off the map” or that, “Israel is a cancer that must be removed.”

Israel would be irresponsible not to take those threats seriously. The marriage between that very extreme regime and the world’s most dangerous weapons is something that we have to avoid at all costs. Now Israel would like to see a peaceful solution, but one way or another, we cannot allow Iran to get a nuclear weapon. We are very serious about that. Deadly serious.

Robert: Shifting to settlements and the two-state solution in its broadest term. Many Western commentators make the claim that Israel’s settlements are the primary roadblock to peace. If you could set the record straight: what is the truth about Israel’s settlement policy? What is it about the realities of the West Bank that these commentators might be misunderstanding?

Mark: The issue of the settlements has to be resolved in peace talks with the Palestinians. The issue of settlements, along with all the other issues that we have disagreements on, that’s the place [negotiations] where they should be resolved. What’s clearly not true, is those who say that the reason there isn’t peace is because of settlements. The best example of that is Gaza, where Israel took down all of the settlements and evacuated them. Did we get peace in return? On the contrary. In fact, if you want to look back even further, those people who say its all about the settlements, well, before 1967, was there peace? The answer is clear. No.

Prime Minister Netanyahu often says, “Some people have historic memory that goes back to breakfast.” Only someone who really didn’t have any historical knowledge could say that the settlements are the reason there’s no peace. I’d even go further, some people say that the reason there is no peace is because there’s no Palestinian state. But we [Israel] have been ready for a Palestinian state and peace and reconciliation for decades. Back in the 1930’s we were ready for two states for two peoples. [We were ready] when the UN put partition on the table in the late 1940’s. The problem is not the Palestinian state, -- we’re ready for that. The problem is: are our neighbours ready to accept the Jewish State in any borders? Because if they are, we can have peace tomorrow.

Robert: Some of Israel’s strongest supporters are evangelical Christians, particularly from the United States and Canada. Across the Arab region we see Christian minorities being persecuted, alongside many religious minorities. In the West Bank, the Israel Defense Forces [have] bases to protect Jewish and other minorities. One challenge that some people fear in the two-state solution, is how might religious minorities be affected. What is Israel's policy toward the minorities that might end up inside potential Palestinian borders?

Mark: I can say the following. Inside Israel, [the] freedom of religion and the protection of the holy sites of all faiths is an integral part of our politics. In other words, we enshrine freedom of religion in our political system. Now, you are correct, that in other parts of the region that is not the case, and in fact we’ve seen in some places, growing intolerance, growing forces that oppose religious minorities [and] that want to see the Middle East just in one colour. That’s an issue: it’s an issue in the larger Muslim world, [and] it’s an issue in the Arab world. Of course, Israel has and will continue to be a bastion for religious freedom and hope our example can be of influence and an example to other countries in the region. We’re aware of the threats.

You’ve got to remember, we’ve also gone through it ourselves. There were thriving Jewish communities across the greater Middle East, in Iraq, in Syria, in Morocco, in Egypt… today what were once thriving communities [are] today, very, very small numbers of Jews in Arab countries, and they left, in part, also, because of intolerance and persecution.

Robert: The Israeli government will not comment on what’s going on in Egypt, to the broader extent…

Mark: No but Prime Minister Netanyahu said that Israel is saying the following: in relations with Egypt, the central issue is maintaining the peace, we have a peace treaty with Egypt, we want to see that treaty honoured, maintained, and that’s our focus.

Robert: Briefly, could you comment on the relationship with the now ousted Morsi government? What is the difference?

Mark: I don’t want to go into anything that could be perceived as interfering in internal Egyptian affairs, except to say to all Egyptians, that Israel believes that peace has been good for both our countries, that peace has been a cornerstone for stability in our region, and that we have to protect the peace and maintain the peace.

Robert: Turning to Syria, how would you characterize Israel’s relationship with Assad prior to the civil war?

Mark: Assad was, and is, one of the few Arab leaders that was formally in the Iranian orbit. The Syrian Regime under Assad and his father was a bastion of support for Hamas and Hizbullah and Islamic Jihad, the most radical and extreme anti-Israel groups. Assad never was, never has been, someone that we could look on as a stabilizing or moderate influence.

Robert: What would Israel’s position be with respect to potential Western or NATO intervention in Syria?

Mark: We’re being very careful not to give public advice. We think that a public position by Israel would be detrimental. We will respect the decisions made in Washington and other Western capitals. For obvious reasons, we have very special concerns, specifically the large stockpile of weapons that are in Syria, and to ensure that in the framework of a fragmenting Syria, those weapons don’t get into the hands of some very dangerous actors, first and foremost, Hizbullah.

Robert: Speaking of weapons and Syria’s relationship with Russia in particular: how would you describe Israel’s broader relationship with Russia, in the context of what’s happening in Syria and Iran and that issue?

Mark: We have a dialogue with Russia, the Prime Minister recently just met with [Russian President] Putin in Russia, and the Russians are aware of our concerns.

Robert: One issue that’s not on the front burner at all, is Israel’s recent discovery of enormous natural gas reserves in the Mediterranean. Does Israel foresee potential conflict over these reserves?

Mark: No. There’s no reason to have conflict over the reserves. It’s interesting, because for the first 65 years of our independence, we were sure that we were a country that was not blessed with the abundant energy supplies that our neighbours had, and the fact that 65 years after our independence we’ve discovered large energy reserves is a miracle. It’s a good thing. 

What’s especially good is that for 65 years we’ve developed a country on the basis that we don’t have natural energy reserves, and so we had to invest in our people, in our education, we had to be competitive, we had to be good without natural energy reserves. Now today we’ve got natural energy reserves and so that’s like the icing on the cake. Who would’ve thought ten or twenty years ago that Israel would be becoming an exporter of energy? That’s the reality, and that’s important for Israel.

You’ve got to remember that the Israeli taxpayer has burdens that no other taxpayer on this planet has, a defence burden that cannot be ignored, and energy exports will make us have the ability to earn revenues that will allow Israel to do things for our people that they deserve, whether its reduced taxation, more money for social services, increasing funding for education and so forth, it’s a good thing. And it could also be a vehicle for regional cooperation.

Robert: Do you foresee that these revenues could be part of some sort of peace agreement with the Palestinians?

Mark: We’re open to have gas cooperation with different countries in the region.

Robert: In the bigger picture, after the recent [Israeli military] operation in the Gaza Strip, and seven years ago now the war with Hizbullah in the north, plus instability in Syria: does the prospect of a multi-front war function into decision making in Israel?

Mark: Obviously, we’ve been attacked by Hizbullah in the north, Hamas in the south, and we are aware that they could do both at the same time. It’s the job of our defence establishment to prepare for worst case scenarios, they would be irresponsible if they didn’t make such preparations, and it’s the job of other people to work for the best case scenarios, which is, can we have peace and stability and work with our neighbours more effectively? 

That’s our challenge: to prepare for the worst, and to work for the best. That’s why we’re 100% behind the recent American effort to try to get the peace process back on track with the Palestinians, we hope the Palestinians will be ready to talk peace. We’re aware of the threats out there, whether its Hamas or Hizbullah, and we have to make sure that we can deal with those threats if need be.

Robert: Canada has been one of Israel’s most vocal supporters in recent years, what does that mean for Israel in the world today and for Israel going forward?

Mark: Canada has always been a good friend of Israel and today more so than ever. Prime Minister Netanyahu considers Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada, not only a good friend of Israel, but a good personal friend. There’s no doubt that Canada has taken a moral leadership [position] that we appreciate and [that] we think is an example for others. Sometimes you go to an international forum and there’s the standard anti-Israel resolution, not balanced, supported by the Arab countries and some of their automatic allies, [and] Canada will stand up and say, "This is wrong and we refuse to support it". In Canada you see moral leadership, standing up for the truth, and Israel appreciates it greatly.

(Special thanks to Mark Regev, David Baker, Jacob Waks and John Hansen for facilitating the interview.)

© The World Assessor, 2013
By: Robert D. Onley - robert@robertonley.com

Iran closer than ever to nuclear bomb

Will Israel be forced to take unilateral military action to stop Iran's nuclear weapons program? With every passing day, this becomes more likely. The consequences of Israeli action against Iran -- or inaction -- will undoubtedly be global. Count on it. - R.O.
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Netanyahu: Iran closer than ever to nuclear bomb

Jerusalem Post - February 22, 2013

IAEA report: 180 centrifuges hooked up at Natanz, Iran's main uranium enrichment plant; PM calls findings "very grave."

Centrifuges unveiled in Natanz. Photo: REUTERS

Iran is closer today than ever before to obtaining the necessary enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said on Thursday evening.

He was reacting to the publication of details of a confidential report by the International Atomic Energy Agency that Iran had begun installing advanced centrifuges at its main uranium enrichment plant.

The Prime Minister’s Office said that preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons would be the first issue on the agenda when US President Barack Obama came to visit in less than a month’s time.Netanyahu termed the report “very grave,” and said it proved that Iran was moving swiftly toward the red line he had set out at the United Nations in September. He said during that address that Iran must be stopped before it crossed the line, something he said at the time could happen as early as the spring.

According to the report, 180 so-called IR-2m centrifuges and empty centrifuge casings had been hooked up at the plant near the central town of Natanz. They were not yet operating.

Such machines could enable Iran to significantly speed up its accumulation of material that could be used to make a nuclear weapon.

It was not clear how many of the new centrifuges Iran aims to install at Natanz, which is designed for tens of thousands.

An IAEA note informing member states late last month about Iran’s plans implied that it could be up to 3,000 or so.

Iran has for years been trying to develop centrifuges more efficient than the erratic 1970s IR-1 model it now uses, but their introduction for full-scale production has been dogged by delays and technical hurdles, experts and diplomats say.

Iran has also started testing two new centrifuge models, the IR-6 and IR6s, at a research and development facility, the IAEA report said. Centrifuges spin at supersonic speed to increase the ratio of the fissile isotope in uranium.

Iran’s defiance is likely to anger world powers ahead of a resumption of talks with Tehran next week. Six world powers and Iran are due to meet for the first time in eight months in Kazakhstan on Tuesday to try again to break the impasse, but analysts expect no real progress toward defusing suspicions that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons capability.

US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in Washington Thursday that Iran's installation of new-generation centrifuges would be "yet another provocative step."

White House spokesman Jay Carney warned Iran that it would face further pressure and isolation if it fails to address international concerns about its nuclear program in the Feb. 26 talks with world powers in the Kazakh city of Almaty.

In a more encouraging sign for the powers, however, the IAEA report said Iran in December resumed converting some of its uranium refined to a fissile concentration of 20 percent to powder for the production of reactor fuel.

That helped restrain the growth of Iran’s higher-grade uranium stockpile since the previous report in November, a development that could buy more time for diplomacy and delay possible Israeli military action.

The report said Iran had increased to 167 kg. its stockpile of 20-percent uranium – a level it says it needs to make fuel for a Tehran research reactor but which also takes it much closer to weapons-grade material, which could be obtained if it were processed further.

Bombing the Syrian Nuclear Reactor: The Untold Story

Incredible inside perspective on the Israeli decision to bomb Syria's nuclear reactor in 2007. Powerful assessment of the implications of this decision, given the ongoing civil war in Syria today and fears about its chemical weapons program. Imagine the present state of affairs in the Middle East today if Assad had nuclear weapons? - R.O.
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Bombing the Syrian Reactor: The Untold Story - Commentary Magazine
By: Elliott Abrams — February 2013

As the civil war in Syria enters its third year, there is much discussion of the regime’s chemical weapons and whether Syria’s Bashar al-Assad will unleash them against Syrian rebels, or whether a power vacuum after Assad’s fall might make those horrific tools available to the highest bidder.


The conversation centers on Syria’s chemical weaponry, not on something vastly more serious: its nuclear weaponry. It well might have. This is the inside story of why it does not.

Relations between the United States and Israel had grown rocky after Israel’s incursion into Lebanon in 2006, for Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice believed the Israelis had mishandled both the military and the diplomatic sides of the conflict. While Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s personal relations with President George W. Bush were excellent, those with Rice were sometimes confrontational—especially when Rice worked at the United Nations to bring the war to a close while Olmert sought more time to attack Hezbollah. Olmert always seemed to ask for 10 days more, while Rice believed the war was not going well and that more time was unlikely to turn the tables.

By the war’s end on August 14, 2006, Olmert’s political status had been diminished and his ability to negotiate any sort of peace agreement with the Palestinians was in doubt. The autumn of 2006 and winter of 2007 saw no movement on the Israeli-Palestinian front, and all the Israeli analysts we consulted said there would be none. We were stuck. And there was another surprise in store.

In the middle of May 2007, we received an urgent request to receive Mossad chief Meir Dagan at the White House. Olmert asked that he be allowed to show some material to Bush personally. We headed that off with a suggestion that he first reveal whatever he had to National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley and to me; I was then the deputy national-security adviser in charge of the Middle East portfolio on the National Security Council. Vice President Dick Cheney joined us in Hadley’s office for Dagan’s presentation. What Dagan had was astonishing and explosive: He showed us intelligence demonstrating that Syria was constructing a nuclear reactor whose design was supplied by North Korea, and doing so with North Korean technical assistance. Dagan left us with one stark message: All Israeli policymakers who saw the evidence agreed that the reactor had to go away.

There then began a four-month process of extremely close cooperation with Israel about the reactor, called al-Kibar. As soon as our own intelligence had confirmed the Israeli information and we all agreed on what we were dealing with, Hadley established a process for gathering further information, considering our options, and sharing our thinking with Israel. This process was run entirely out of the White House, with extremely limited participation to maintain secrecy. The effort at secrecy succeeded and there were no leaks—an amazing feat in Washington, especially when the information being held so tightly was as startling and sexy as this.

Initially, there were doubts that Bashar al-Assad could be so stupid as to try this stunt of building a nuclear reactor with North Korean help. Did he really think he would get away with it—that Israel would permit it? But he nearly did; had the reactor been activated, striking it militarily could have strewn radioactive material into the wind and into the nearby Euphrates River, which was the reactor’s source of water needed for cooling. When we found out about the reactor, it was at an advanced construction stage, just a few months from being “hot.”

The consideration of what to do about the reactor continued alongside tense meetings between Rice and Israel on how to proceed with the Palestinians, but the two initiatives did not collide. For the most part, this was because different people were involved. Military and intelligence personnel uninvolved in peace negotiations were the key interlocutors for Israel in considering the al-Kibar reactor, as were individuals on the vice president’s staff who were sympathetic to Israel’s position. The work on al-Kibar was a model both of U.S.-Israel collaboration and of interagency cooperation without leaks. Papers I circulated to the group were returned to me when meetings ended or were kept under lock and key; secretaries and executive assistants were kept out of the loop; meetings were called under vague names such as “the study group.”

The debates were vigorous in our secret meetings in the White House Situation Room. The role of those in the Situation Room was not to decide what was to be done about the reactor; it was merely to be sure every issue had been thoroughly debated and was covered in the memos we drafted for the administration’s principal officials on foreign-policy matters and for the president. This was an excellent example of how policy should be made. Several times, principals—Rice and Hadley, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, CIA Director Michael Hayden, Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Peter Pace and Vice President Cheney—trooped over to the president’s living room in the residence section of the White House to have it out before him, answer his questions, and see what additional information he sought.

I attended all these meetings as note taker, and the notes are under lock and key at the National Archives.


From above: A satellite image of the Syrian reactor site one month after it was bombed by Israeli forces in September 2007.

The day I left those notes on the floor under my chair in the president’s living room, and discovered when back at the NSC that I no longer had them, remains emblazoned in my mind. These were among the most sensitive notes then existing in the U.S. government, amazing precautions for secrecy had been taken, and I had simply left them on the floor. Pale and drenched with sweat, I ran back to the residence, where the butler graciously let me back in and accompanied me to the Yellow Oval Room where we had met. There was my portfolio, under the chair, untouched. Well, I thought, if the butler keeps his mouth shut, I may actually not be shot after all.

The facts about al-Kibar were soon clear, and about those facts there was no debate: It was a nuclear reactor that was almost an exact copy of the Yongbyon reactor in North Korea, and North Koreans had been involved with Syria’s development of the site. Given its location and its lack of connection to any electrical grid, this reactor was part of a nuclear-weapons program rather than intended to produce electric power.

The array of options was clear as well: overt or covert, Israel or United States, military or diplomatic. The United States and Israel both had an obvious military option: Bomb the site and destroy the reactor. This was not much of a military challenge, General Pace assured the president. Whether anything short of a military strike could destroy the reactor was another question, and the difficulties with such an option were obvious: Just how would you get the needed explosives to the site except through a military attack? It was soon agreed that a covert option did not exist, and military options were quickly designed to make the reactor disappear; as Dagan had said when he first visited us, the Israelis clearly believed it had to go away. We developed elaborate scenarios for U.S. and Israeli military action addressing these issues: Whom would you inform when, what would you announce and what would you keep secret, and what if anything would you say to the Syrians?

But a diplomatic option existed as well, and we did draw up elaborate scenarios for it. We would begin by informing the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of the facts and making them public in a dramatic session before the IAEA Board of Governors in Vienna. We would demand immediate inspections and that Syria halt work on the reactor. If Syria refused, we would go to the UN Security Council and demand action. If there was no action, the military option in theory remained open.

However, this diplomatic option seemed faintly ridiculous to me. For one thing, it would never be acceptable to Israel, whose experience with the United Nations was uniformly bad. The Jewish state would never trust its national security to the UN. For another, it would not work; Syria’s friends in the UN, especially Russia, would protect it. At the IAEA, we had plenty of experience with Director General Mohamed ElBaradei, an Egyptian. He was redefining the director general’s role from that of inspector and cop to that of peacemaker and diplomat; he would seek a deal with Syria rather than concerted action against it. Moreover, taking the reactor issue to the UN and the IAEA meant handing it over to the State Department, and I thought an issue of this importance should be handled in the White House.

Finally, the argument that there would always remain a military option as a last resort was misleading at best. Once we made public our knowledge of the site, Syria could put a kindergarten right next to it or take some similar move using human shields. Military action required secrecy, and once we made any kind of public statement about al-Kibar, that option would be gone.

The vice president thought the United States should bomb the site. Given our troubles in Iraq and the growing confrontation with Iran, this would be a useful assertion of power and would help restore our credibility. As he later wrote:


I again made the case for U.S. military action against the reactor. Not only would it make the region and the world safer, but it would also demonstrate our seriousness with respect to non-proliferation….But I was the lone voice. After I finished, the president asked, “Does anyone here agree with the vice president?” Not a single hand went up around the room.

My hand did not go up (and as we left the president’s living room that day, June 17, I apologized to the vice president for leaving him isolated) because I thought the Israelis should bomb the reactor, restoring their credibility after the annus horribilis of 2006 with the Second Lebanon War and then the 2007 Hamas takeover of Gaza. It seemed to me that Israel would suffer if we bombed it, because analysts would point out that Israel had acted against the Osirak reactor in Iraq in 1981 but had become paralyzed when it came to Syria. Such an analysis might embolden Iran and Hamas, a development that would be greatly against American interests. Moreover, hostile reactions in the Islamic world against the bombing strike might hurt us at a time when we were fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq—another argument for letting Israel do the job. (I did not think there would be any such reactions, but this was an argument worth deploying in our internal debate.)

Secretaries Gates and Rice argued strenuously for the diplomatic option. Gates also argued for preventing Israel from bombing the reactor and urged putting the whole relationship between the United States and Israel on the line. His language recalled the “agonizing reappraisal” of relations Eisenhower’s secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, had threatened for Europe in 1953 if the Europeans failed to take certain defense measures: They simply had to do what we demanded or there would be hell to pay.

I thought I understood why Gates did not want the United States to bomb Syria: America was a steward of wars in two Islamic countries already, so striking a third one seemed terribly unattractive to him. Why he was almost equally insistent that we prevent Israel from bombing it was never comprehensible to me, nor was Rice’s similar position. It seemed clear to me that if we could not prevent Syria from undertaking a nuclear-weapons program, our entire position in the Middle East would be weakened, just as it was being weakened by our inability to stop the Iranian program. If there were too many risks and potential complications from striking Syria ourselves, we should not only allow but encourage Israel to do it; a Syrian nuclear program in addition to Iran’s should be flatly unacceptable to the United States.

I tried to think my way through Rice’s reasoning, but came up with only one theory. She had simultaneously been expressing opposition to a new program of increased military aid to Israel. This indicated to me that she had an underlying strategy: She did not want Israel feeling stronger. Rather, she wanted Israel, and especially Prime Minister Olmert, to feel more dependent on the United States. That way she would be able to push forward with plans for an international conference on Israeli-Palestinian issues and for final-status talks leading to the creation of a Palestinian state before the end of the second Bush term.

I hoped this was not her intention, because it seemed to me that such designs were sure to fail. An Israel that was facing Hamas in Gaza and now two hostile nuclear programs, in Iran and just across the border in Syria, would never take the risks she was asking it to take. I thought we had learned that lesson with Ariel Sharon as Bill Clinton had learned it with Yitzhak Rabin: Wrap your arms around Israel if you want it to take more risks, so it feels more secure, not less.

The arguments for going to the IAEA and UN seemed so flimsy to me, despite the length and detail of the planning memos and scenarios to which they gave rise, that I did not much worry about them. Who could believe these organizations would act effectively? Who could believe we would not be sitting there five years later entangled in the same diplomatic dance over the Syrian program that we were in with respect to Iran?

In the end, our near-perfect policy process produced the wrong result. At a final session in the gracious Yellow Oval Room at the Residence, Bush came down on Rice’s side. We would go to Vienna, to the IAEA; he would call Olmert and tell him what the decision was. I was astounded and realized I had underestimated Rice’s influence even after all this time. The president had gone with Condi.

I tried to figure this one out and could not. Perhaps it was the same worry that Gates had about making another American military strike in the Islamic world. But that would not explain why he bought the IAEA/UN strategy lock, stock, and barrel; instead, he could have said, “Let the Israelis do what they want; let’s just tell them we will not do it.” Years later I asked him if he thought he had been wrong; he said no. It was then, and is still, baffling. In his memoir, Bush explains one key consideration: The CIA told him it had “high confidence” that the facility in Syria was a nuclear reactor but “low confidence” that Syria had a nuclear-weapons program, because it could not locate the other components of the program. The president thought that the “low confidence” judgment would leak, as it surely would have, and the United States would have been attacked for conducting the bombing raid despite the “low confidence” report. That is a reasonable argument, but it explains only why we did not bomb—it does not explain why he urged the Israelis not to do so.

On July 10, I gave Hadley a memo explaining my views on where we stood with the Israelis. First, we were on the verge of telling the Israelis that we had considered which of us should act against the reactor and had decided that neither of us should use force. Moreover, we were going to say we would pressure them not to do so even if they disagreed. And we would be saying all this after Hamas had just taken over Gaza (which it did, in a coup against the Palestinian Authority, in June 2007). Hezbollah was back fully rearmed in Lebanon despite all those UN Security Council resolutions we had told the Israelis would work. Iran was moving toward nuclear capability. Syria was building a reactor that could only be part of a nuclear-weapons program.

It also looked as if we would be telling them we were about to call for an international meeting on the Palestinians that Israelis did not want and that they feared—and would be doing so in a presidential speech that talked about negotiations for Palestinian statehood “soon” (the word was in the speech drafts). Such a big international conference was the State Department’s answer to unsticking a “peace process” that was stuck.

The editorial comment from our friends on the right, I told Hadley, will be that we have taken leave of our senses: Hamas takes over Gaza, Syria and Iran build nukes, and we are handing things over to the UN and then pushing final-status talks? I still did not think there was a need for any presidential speech, but if there were to be one, I wrote that it should be sober about the situation and supportive of the new Palestinian prime minister, Salam Fayyad.

At that point, Fayyad had been prime minister for about a month, and already the PA was changing. It now had a serious, talented, incorruptible executive at the top of the government. This had never been tried before. The least we could do was to back him, firmly and fully, and not spend all our political capital on great conferences. It was, as I recall it, a terrific memo, yet like all the wonderful memos about the Syrian reactor, it had no impact whatsoever. On July 16, the speech that Condi had sought was given. “Bush Calls for Middle East Peace Conference,” the headlines read.

Three days earlier, on July 13, President Bush had called Prime Minister Olmert from his desk in the Oval Office and explained his view. I have gone over this in great detail, Bush explained on the secure phone to the Israeli prime minister, looking at every possible scenario and its likely aftermath. We have looked at overt and covert options, and I have made a decision. We are not going to take the military path; we are instead going to the UN. Bush recounts in his memoir that he told Olmert, “I cannot justify an attack on a sovereign nation unless my intelligence agencies stand up and say it’s a weapons program” and that “I had decided on the diplomatic option backed by the threat of force.” We will announce this approach soon, Bush said on the secure line, and we will then launch a major diplomatic campaign, starting at the IAEA and then the UN Security Council. And of course a military option always remains available down the line.

I wondered how Olmert would react and believed I could predict his response: He would say, “Wait, give me some time to think about this, to consult my team, to reflect, and I will call you tomorrow.” I was quite wrong. He reacted immediately and forcefully. George, he said, this leaves me surprised and disappointed. And I cannot accept it. We told you from the first day, when Dagan came to Washington, and I’ve told you since then whenever we discussed it, that the reactor had to go away. Israel cannot live with a Syrian nuclear reactor; we will not accept it. It would change the entire region and our national security cannot accept it. You are telling me you will not act; so, we will act. The timing is another matter, and we will not do anything precipitous.

This is not the account President Bush gives in his memoir, in which he writes that Olmert initially said, “George, I’m asking you to bomb the compound.” Someday transcripts of their conversation will be available, but Bush’s recollection does not comport with mine.

After that conversation, there was a nearly two-month gap, from July 13 to September 6. We now know the time was filled with Israeli military calculations—watching the weather and Syrian movements on the ground—with the aim of being sure that Israel could act before the reactor went “critical” or “hot.” We knew the Israelis would strike sooner or later. They acted, in the end, when a leak about the reactor’s existence was imminent and Syria might then have gotten notice that Israel knew of its existence. That would have given Assad time to put civilians or nuclear fuel near the site. The Israelis did not seek, nor did they get, a green or red light from us. Nor did they announce their timing in advance; they told us as they were blowing up the site. Olmert called the president on September 6 with the news.

As I had sat in the Oval Office on July 13, listening to his conversation with Olmert, I had wondered how the president would react to the Israeli action. With anger? Or more pressure? None of it. He heard Olmert out calmly and acknowledged that Israel had a right to protect its national security. After hanging up, the president said something like “that guy has guts,” in an admiring tone. The incident was over; the differences over al-Kibar would obviously not affect Bush’s relationship with Olmert or his view of Israel.

So quickly did he accept the Olmert decision that I wondered then, and do still, if the president did not at some level anticipate and desire this result. He had sided with Condi and shown that she was still in charge of Middle East policy, but her “take it to the UN” plan had been blown up along with the reactor. He did not seem very regretful. What is more, he instructed us all to abandon the diplomatic plans and maintain absolute silence, ensuring that Israel could carry out its plan.

The Israeli assessment of Syria’s likely reaction was correct. The Israelis believed that if they and we spoke about the strike, Assad might be forced to react to this humiliation by trying to attack Israel. If, however, we all shut up, he might do nothing—nothing at all. He might try to hide the fact that anything had happened. And with every day that passed, the possibility that he would acknowledge the event and fight back diminished. That had been the Israeli theory, and the Israelis knew their man. We maintained silence and so did Israel—no leaks. As the weeks went by, the chances of an Israeli-Syrian confrontation grew slim and then disappeared. Syria has never admitted that there was a reactor at the site. Soon after the bombing, the Syrians bulldozed the reactor site, but the only way they could be sure their lies about it were not contradicted was to prevent a full examination. When a 2008 site visit by IAEA inspectors found some uranium traces, Syria made sure never to permit a return visit.

Two final points are worth noting. First, in May 2008, Turkish-mediated peace talks between Israel and Syria were publicly announced in Istanbul. The discussions had begun secretly in February 2007, and obviously had continued after the Israeli strike on al-Kibar. It would appear that the strike on al-Kibar made the Syrians more, not less, desirous of talking to the Israelis because it made them afraid of Israeli power. It also made them more afraid of American power until we undermined our own position, which is the second point.

A very well-placed Arab diplomat later told us that the strike had left Assad deeply worried as to what was coming next. He had turned Syria into the main transit route for jihadis going to Iraq to kill American soldiers. From Libya or Indonesia, Pakistan or Egypt, they would fly to Damascus International Airport and be shepherded into Iraq. Assad was afraid that on the heels of the Israeli strike would come American action to punish him for all this involvement. But just weeks later, Assad received his invitation to send a Syrian delegation to that big international confab of Condi’s, the Annapolis Conference, and according to the Arab envoy, Assad relaxed immediately; he knew he would be OK. I had not wanted Syria invited to Annapolis because of its involvement in killing Americans in Iraq, but Condi had wanted complete Arab representation as a sign that comprehensive peace might be possible. It was only years later that I learned that Assad had instead interpreted the invitation just as I had: as a sign that the United States would not seriously threaten or punish him for what Syria was doing in Iraq.

Since the day the Israelis struck the Syrian reactor in September 2007, much has changed in the neighborhood: Assad faces a civil war he cannot win, the “Arab Spring” has replaced Hosni Mubarak with a Muslim Brotherhood government in Egypt, and Israel has now fought two wars with the Hamas statelet in Gaza, in December 2008/January 2009 and in November 2012. Yet there are three lessons from this incident that still bear noting.

First, good “process” and good policy are related but distinct. In the end what counts is output, not input: the foreign policy we adopt, not the proposals that are advanced. And that output depends, when it comes to foreign policy, mostly on one man: the president. That’s the second lesson. Advisers advise; the president decides. All the books about how rival bureaucracies or powerful lobbies determine policy are off the mark; the simpler and truer conclusion is that at any given moment our foreign policy reflects the views of the president.

Finally, this incident is a reminder that there is no substitute for military strength and the will to use it. Think of how much more dangerous to the entire region the Syrian civil war would be today if Assad had a nuclear reactor, and even perhaps nuclear weapons, in hand. Israel was right to bomb that reactor before construction was completed, and President Bush was right to support its decision to do so. Israel was also right in rejecting fears that the incident would lead to a larger war and in believing that it, and the United States, would be better off after this assertion of leadership and determination. That lesson must be on the minds of Israeli, and American, leaders in 2013.
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About the Author:

Elliott Abrams is a senior fellow in Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. This article is taken from his new book, just published by Cambridge University Press, Tested by Zion: The Bush Administration and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, a memoir of his service at the National Security Council from 2001 to 2009.