With all eyes on Putin, enter Iran — a conversation in Jerusalem
While the world is watching every development on the Russia-Ukraine border, the United States and Iran may be close to a deal on Iran’s nuclear program. To help us understand what could happen next, Yaakov Katz – Editor-in-Chief of The Jerusalem Post and a former advisor to Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett – joins the podcast.
How does the increasing likelihood of an agreement between the U.S. and Iran change Israeli calculations? Does it increase the possibility of an Israeli military strike? What would that mean for Israel, or the Arab world and the broader Middle East, and for energy markets?
And with Russia escalating tensions with Ukraine, how does it impact the emerging crisis with Iran?
Can we learn anything about Israeli intentions from Israel’s strike against Iraq’s nuclear program in 1981 and Syria’s nuclear program in 2007?
Before becoming Editor-in-Chief at The Jerusalem Post, Yaakov Katz served as the paper's military reporter and defense analyst. He is the author of "Shadow Strike: Inside Israel's Secret Mission to Eliminate Syrian Nuclear Power" and co-author of two books: "Weapon Wizards - How Israel Became a High-Tech Military Superpower" and "Israel vs. Iran - The Shadow War"
Transcript
DISCLAIMER: THIS TRANSCRIPT HAS BEEN CREATED USING AI TECHNOLOGY AND MAY NOT REFLECT 100% ACCURACY.
[00:00:00] There's no question that if they were to enrich uranium to 90 percent levels, there's no other purpose, but to obtain a nuclear weapon at 10 percent at 3. 67 percent to 20%, you could still say maybe science, maybe research, maybe medical reasons, 90%. There's no other alternative. There's nothing. It's just a nuclear weapon.
While the world is watching every development on the Russia Ukraine border, the U S and Iran may be very close to reaching a deal in Iran. And this would have staggering geopolitical implications for a number of countries. Especially the one I'm in right now, Israel. While I'm here in Jerusalem, I wanted to catch up with Yaakov Katz, editor in chief of the Jerusalem Post.
Yaakov's also a former advisor to Prime Minister [00:01:00] Bennett in one of Bennett's previous stints as a government minister when I first got to know him. Now, how does the increasing likelihood of an agreement between the U. S. and Iran change Israeli calculations? Does it increase the possibility of an Israeli military strike?
What would that mean for Israel? For the Arab world? And for the broader Middle East? And what about for energy markets? And with Russia escalating tensions with Ukraine right now, how does that impact the emerging crisis with Iran? Finally, can we learn anything about Israelian tensions and calculations from Israel's strike against Iraq's nuclear program in 1981 and Syria's nuclear program in 2007?
Lots to consider, lots to discuss. Yaakov is full of insights and reporting. Before becoming editor in chief at the Jerusalem Post, he served for a decade as the paper's military reporter and defense analyst. He's also the author of Shadow Strike, Inside Israel's Secret Mission to Eliminate Syria's Nuclear [00:02:00] Power, a topic that makes him particularly expert on the subject we're getting into today.
He's also co author of two other books, Weapon Wizards, How Israel became a high tech military superpower, which I reviewed for the Wall Street Journal when it first came out. And then also Israel versus Iran, the shadow war. This is Call Me Back.
And I'm pleased to welcome Yaakov Katz, editor in chief of the Jerusalem Post, to the conversation. Thanks Yaakov for doing this. Great to be here, Dan. Thank you. And it's good to be with you, so to speak, in Jerusalem. So, same city, same time zone, this is much more legit than a typical conversation we'd have.
We're happy to have you in the country. Alright, it's good to be here. It actually, you know, feels like it's returning to normal. So, uh, you know, you know Israel's returning to normal when When the masks go just like below the nose or chin, you know, when everyone's like technically has masks, but they're not really wearing [00:03:00] masks, then, you know, we're really and I think they're on their way off completely.
There's a debate already in government about how they want to get rid of him. So I don't know if you come back in a few weeks, you might not see any. Right, right, exactly. All right, good. Well, I may be back just for that. So, Yaakov, we have a lot to cover on Iran and how Israeli decision makers are assessing Iran and the negotiations between the U.
S. and Iran, which is something you are expert in for a whole range of reasons and that you've been following closely. Just to set the stage, the Biden administration and the The IAEA, the international agency that has regulatory oversight over Iran's compliance with the, with the JCPOA, well, what was the JCPOA, um, they, everybody, all the regulatory bodies, the international bodies, the Europeans, the Americans, everyone seems to [00:04:00] agree that Iran is enriching uranium to 20 percent and that Iran is not allowing real inspections of their nuclear facilities, and Israel regards this as an existential threat.
You know, you recall in 2012, when Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke before the, the UN General Assembly, and he showed a diagram that if Iran got one bomb's worth of 20 percent enriched uranium, that that was a red line. That was going from low enriched uranium, to high and rich uranium, which he argued, rightly so, that it would put the Iranians in a position where they may not be able to produce weapons grade fissile material right away, but the steps you have to, you know, cross or climb to get there would be small and it wouldn't take much to get there.
So everyone seems to agree that Iran is there or close to there. And so what does that actually mean for Israel now? Here we are a decade [00:05:00] Since Netanyahu gave that speech before the UN look where they are today, Dan, is they have a huge quantity of enriched uranium. Now, most of the uranium that they have, which is a few tons already is enriched to lower levels.
But what they've proven with their ability to enrich uranium to 20 percent levels and even to 60 percent levels is that they can. Move that process and go up as you described the way Netanyahu back at the United Nations a bunch of years ago, kind of tried to portray to the world how this is a process, right?
Um, by having uranium enriched to 20 percent and then a small quantity already enriched to 60%, they're getting closer to that 90 percent level, which is the military grade enriched uranium. And that's what we need to be concerned about when, when you hear a lot of people talking about the timeframe. How long it would take for Iran to assemble, to, to build, get a nuclear weapon.
So it depends what you're looking at as the [00:06:00] marker. Are you looking at them having enough fissionable material, enough highly enriched uranium? Are you looking at them then taking that enriched uranium and assembling a nuclear device? Are you looking at them then taking that nuclear device and making it into a warhead?
Or are you looking at them then taking that warhead and installing it on a ballistic long range ballistic missile? All of these are further steps, but there's no question That if they were to enrich uranium to 90 percent levels, there's no other purpose, but to achieve or to obtain a nuclear weapon at 10 percent at 3.
67 percent to 20%. You could still say maybe science, maybe research, maybe medical reasons, 90%. There's no other alternative. There's nothing. It's just a nuclear weapon. Right. And IAEA late last year said, and I was struck by this, that this didn't get more attention. He said, you don't enrich uranium at the levels that Iran is enriching uranium, and you certainly don't, uh, bar [00:07:00] inspections to the degree the Iranians are barring inspections if you have a peaceful civilian nuclear capability.
I mean, these are all, not just breadcrumbs, but clear, bright, flashing, neon signs that this is a country bent on building a weapons capability. Yeah, I mean, I think there's really no question anymore that that is what they that's their ambition. They lie openly lying claim No, we just as a civilian program, but we're all familiar with the 2018 seizure by the Mossad of Iran's nuclear archive Which which brought just more intelligence to the table that Israel already knew but it was really clear evidence Showing that the Iranians had already mapped out Diagrams and plans of how to build the nuclear weapon and what it would look like and how to do the testing for it.
The fact of what you said with the IAEA Director General Grossi has mentioned of them not allowing inspectors into certain facilities, the fact that they continue, by the way, I mean, You know, we got to ask another question, right? The Iranians are [00:08:00] suffering terribly under the economic sanctions that have been in place already for a number of years.
Their people are suffering. They're spending billions and billions and billions of dollars on this nuclear program. Why go through with it if it, if it wasn't for something that really served a greater purpose to give you as a country, this regional standing that is what you're aiming for. And, and again, I mean, you know, it's a separate issue.
We could talk about it. Do we think that they would one day use it against us or would they not? But they want to have they want to be perceived as a regional superpower and that's what this is about So what are the current state of the negotiations based on your own reporting and the reporting of the jerusalem post?
What's happening now? Well, I mean I could tell you, you know, i'm obviously not in the room, right? Right, but but but you're talking to people. Yeah, we're talking to people Right. We're talking to people in the U. S. We're talking to people mostly here in Israel who are getting the information that they're getting from the different partners.
What we saw was really interesting was that this last week, uh, Israel sent for the first time a [00:09:00] diplomatic delegation to Vienna to meet with a bunch of the different negotiating teams. They met with the IAEA, they met with the Russians, they met with the The French, they met with the Americans, of course, Rob Malley and his people.
This was a high level Israeli team. It included people from Israel's own atomic energy commission and included a deputy director general of the foreign ministry. Uh, they, this is the first time that we've seen Israel. Actually have an open public presence at these Vienna talks. And I think that it comes because Israel is concerned that we're, we're coming down to the wire here, right?
That the, the, the P five plus one, well, now America's kind of sitting outside the room, but all these different players together are coming close to making a deal. And we've seen some leaking of, uh, what the possible parameters of that deal would look like just over the weekend in different media outlets.
Uh, It seems they're close. We know that the world wants there to be a deal. It seems that the Biden administration, of course, wants there to be a deal. There was a phone [00:10:00] call two weeks ago between the Prime Minister of Israel, Naftali Bennett, and President Joe Biden, all about Iran. Um, and, and it seems that it's coming.
So Israel is getting ready for that. And the, according to reporting, the U. S. has allowed Iran to enrich uranium. It seems that the nuclear provisions of the deal are, are close to being agreed upon. According to leaks, according to reporting, the U. S. has agreed to allow Iran to enrich uranium to a higher percentage than the 3.
25 percent outlined in the original JCPOA to store rather than destroy its advanced centrifuges to keep the sunset clauses in place that would roll back all the restrictions on Iran's nuclear program. I guess through something like 2030 when you factor them all in. But, Iran has doubled down on its demand that the U.
S. lift all sanctions and guarantee, quote, guarantee, that future presidents, i. e. a Republican president, not be able to withdraw from the deal. [00:11:00] That this is a demand that they want the U. S. administration to somehow be able to guarantee and enforce. And I think you know better than I do that that's impossible, right?
Exactly. Yeah. And so it That that, you know, I mean, again, I'm not just maybe a negotiating position by the Iranians and if it's the ultimate obstacle to a deal, it may be an obstacle that's removed, but it is striking how much that demand is making it out into the, into the public discourse right now.
Yeah. I mean, look, the Iranians, this deal that we're looking at, the parameters are going to look very similar to the 2015 JCPOA, uh, you know, I'm not going to expect it. This is not going to be what some people in the U S had spoken about in the past, a longer and stronger deal. You're still going to have the sunset clause.
This deal will eventually expire in Iran will be just to jump away from getting its hands on a nuclear device. Uh, it's not going to be stronger in the fact that, like you said, they're now going to be allowed, according to these, the leaking of this 20 page report that made its way to [00:12:00] Reuters over the weekend, they're going to be able to enrich to quantities of at least 5%, which is higher than what they were allowed under the JCPOA.
They're going to be allowed to, uh, to keep these, these more sophisticated, what's called the IR six. Centrifuges centrifuges, which just so people understand our listeners, right? These are those kind of steel machines. They, they, they sit in these cascades and they spin around with, uh, in uranium and they enrich it by spinning and spinning and spinning.
And what the Iranians have done in the years since the JCPOA was signed, even in 2015, they've continued to research. They've continued to develop new, higher. in more advanced centrifuges that can do that spinning better than the, than the older versions. Uh, so they'll be allowed to keep that. So any, any thought that this would be stronger, more enforcement, more restrictions, and, and Dan, we're not even talking about ballistic missile development.
We're not talking about their, their support of terrorist proxies. I mean, just look at the past few weeks, how many [00:13:00] drones have been sent by the Houthis in Yemen into Abu Dhabi International Airport, right? The Houthis in Yemen don't have, don't make their own drones, right? They're getting them from someone, and we just saw this past weekend, a drone fly into Israel from the north, likely by Hezbollah, uh, another Iranian proxy, but none of that is even being mentioned in this, in this deal that's being proposed.
So according to a number of experts I've spoken to, and again, also reported in the press, it's a real determinant of whether. Or not a deal can be reached is how iran views the russia ukraine crisis Unfolding right now and that if russia invades ukraine Iran will have more leverage russian invasion would cause a spike in oil prices increasing the pressure On the biden administration to pull any levers possible to lower energy prices which could include Signing a deal with iran, right?
I mean the um, the revival of the jcpoa would bring something like Half a million barrels per [00:14:00] day of crude oil onto the markets from inventories, and that could be followed by increases of around quarter, you know, quarter of a million barrels per day every month until 2023. I mean, this is what is being discussed and forecast.
So, the, the Biden administration will, will need more oil flowing, so to speak, if there's, if, Tensions escalate between Russia and Ukraine. And truthfully, the world will be distracted with Russia if Russia invades Ukraine. So if the Biden administration wants to cut a controversial deal that may be politically problematic for them domestically in the U.
S. It may not be a bad time to do it from their own calculations. Yeah, I think also what this crisis right now in the Russia Ukraine border does to Iran is it, it diverts attention from what's happening there, right? And it, it makes the ability of the U. S. and the rest of these countries that are participating in these talks more difficult to put pressure.
On the [00:15:00] Iranians, right? They're going to be focusing on this massive crisis that might be happening if Russia decides to invade Ukraine By the way, if Putin is successful, whatever he might be doing in Ukraine in the next couple of weeks Uh that would embolden him that would even embolden the Iranians because we know that the Russians have long been Representing to an extent their interests.
We've seen how they're they've operated alongside one another in Syria all these years, right. And how Israel has basically had to maneuver very carefully, right. Which by the way, puts Israel in a whole other, uh, predicament because imagine. So Russia goes into Ukraine. And the Biden administration says to Israel, you stand with us.
We're sanctioning. Now the Russians were sanctioning the oligarchs who are alleged to be the bank rollers of Putin, and we need you to enforce these sanctions as well. Israel, on the other hand. needs to continue to think about Syria. We just saw an alleged Israeli attack Thursday. I'm sorry, Wednesday night, [00:16:00] uh, in Syria.
So for Israel to do that, we know Israel coordinates with the Russians who are in control of Syria. Can Israel sanction Russia and at the same time continue to coordinate Israeli operations in Syria, which are meant to prevent the buildup of Iranian presence there, as well as the transfer of Iranian weaponry to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
That's going to be a really tough place for us. It's going to have the Americans on the one side, pressuring Israel, the Russians and the Israeli strategic security interest. On the other hand, I mean, this, this really carries with it a lot of, a lot of consequences for Israel. And as your papers reported, this is why Israel is doing everything it can to just stay out of getting dragged into Russia, Ukraine.
Totally. Israel wants to be as pariv as possible and is so uninvolved as possible and neutral on this issue because, you know, obviously, if you listen, by the way, to what is really saying, the only thing that the officials are saying is, you know, if Jews need help getting out, we'll help get them out.
Right. But that's about it. Uh, there, there's no other involvement. Out of Ukraine. Exactly. [00:17:00] Yeah. And I don't want to digress, but I will for a moment. What is, from your standpoint, Putin's strategy in the Middle East? We understand the game he's playing in his own immediate neighborhood. We understand to some degree what his motivations and his grand strategy, if you will, vis a vis Ukraine and other republics from the countries that were republics of the former Soviet Union.
How would you summarize his, his grand strategy in the Middle East? Look, Putin's been here in, in Syria. Now it's, we're coming up already and it'll be a couple of years, but we're coming up on a decade almost, right? It was like 2014, 2015, when he started to deploy troops here as the Syrian civil war was, was, was raging to the North of Israel.
Um, The understanding was, you know, he wanted to have a presence here. He wanted to be a player. He wanted to project power and he's established this very sophisticated base on the port of the city of Tartus on the, on the port of, uh, on the coast of Syria with the Mediterranean. It [00:18:00] gives him the ability to project power also into the Eastern Mediterranean and beyond there's oil and energy interests here.
There's the interest also of, uh, basically I think also Making sure that the United States, which to an extent has, we've seen a gradual withdrawal of the U S from the region, right? Whether it was from Afghanistan over the summer, whether it was, it's been in Iraq. We've also, you know, they've downsized a lot, very significantly their presence in Syria, let Putin wants to be the main guy here.
And, and as America. Moves out we see more and more of Putin and Russia here So Israel has had to learn how to get along with this because at the end of the day Russia is on our Russia's our neighbor now, right? I mean like a few years ago that would have sounded crazy Dan But today that's the honest truth and what people don't even realize which is also sounds crazy is you know in the in the curia military?
[00:19:00] Headquarters in Tel Aviv, right? So that's like so that's the equivalent of Israel's the Pentagon Yeah. So at the Pentagon, at the Israeli Pentagon, there's an underground command center. And that's where all operations are run from for, for the entire Israeli defense forces of the IDF. So there's a special hotline, a phone that an Israeli air force officer, usually Russian speaking can pick up and it goes directly to a Russian base in the Syrian city of Tartus, right?
If I told you that that, and you know, that's how they call up and they say, okay, we're going to be operating tonight against X, you know, ABC. Right. And and they give them the heads up. Now that just sounds crazy, but that's this Middle East that we have today and Right. Thank, thankfully, so far it's been working for to Israel's benefit.
I wanna talk now about how you interpret Israel's reaction now to the speed with which things seem to be moving between, uh, the US and Iran. And, and the considerations, uh, Israel will have to evaluate, uh, as it [00:20:00] gets closer to a deal or even if a deal is hatched. But before we do that, I, I want to just tap into your, your expertise and, and your history, certainly as it relates to the most recent book you wrote.
Uh, but I want to go back even farther than that. What were the Israeli considerations in the strike against the Osirak nuclear facility in Iraq? In 1981, what, why did Menachem Begin, then Prime Minister, believe he needed to strike? Look, from people who I've spoken to who were involved in that decision making process back then, I think that really, to an extent, Begin, whose family had been annihilated, In the Holocaust, uh, murdered, he felt that this would create a threat that could potentially give an enemy of Israel the ability to carry out another Holocaust against the Jewish people.
That's really what it was. He even said that as the F 16s, the Israeli F 16s were flying off to [00:21:00] Iraq in this amazing, daring, unprecedented operation, that they were certain Not everyone would come back. Thankfully, everyone did return all those pilots, but they were sure that a quarter, not even a half, of that, of that fleet would, would be downed by Iraqi planes or Iraqi air defense systems.
He later said that he saw visions of his parents and his family as, you know, he wasn't, he didn't see them be murdered. He had already left. Uh poland at the time, but to him he he was just imagining them and he very much felt that uh I think that that that was began began did it also, you know in contrast to what's happening now in in what we have with iran um There was never talk of an Israeli strike.
There was never talk of Israel going at it alone. Um, it never really came up. It was a very secret, covert operation. No one thought that Israel You mean, you mean before or after? Before even, right? Like, even, like, today It wasn't, it wasn't this [00:22:00] Yeah, like, exactly like today, we've been thinking, I mean, think, you know, think back the last decade, right?
There's, oh, is Israel going to do it? Can Israel do it? When is Israel going to do it, right? It's, it's, it's been there in the headlines. People have been thinking about this for a long time. It goes back to, you know, Rabin, Perez, you know, Barack, Sharon, Netanyahu, or I guess Olmert also. Olmert, I mean, right, every premier has, has talked about it.
And four U. S., four or five U. S. presidents have resisted it. Right. And everyone's resistant, but it's always been out there with Iraq. It was never out there. It was never something that was spoken about. Uh, and, and let's remind people, you know, the Reagan administration was not happy, right? They condemned Israel to the United Nations.
They delayed the delivery of aircraft to Israel as a result as, as something of a punishment, it would take years for the, uh, Americans to actually recognize and acknowledge that what Israel did was, was, was a good thing, by the way, in 1991. So, uh, [00:23:00] America goes into, uh, Iraq in the first Gulf war and, and, and Dick Cheney, who was then serving as the secretary of defense, right?
Uh, takes a photo of the bombed out reactor of Osirak and gives it as a gift to the Israeli air force commander back in the 1981 operation, David Avery, who later served as Israel's ambassador to the United States as well. And writes on it. I think he was ambassador. He was ambassador while the first gulf war was happening, right?
He was ambassador a little later. He was ambassador in the later 90s But he i've seen this photo in ivory's office and it basically said what you did allowed us to do what we had to do 10 years later, right? So it took some time because imagine if the iraqis had nuclear weapons The whole region would have looked different you think america would have been able to go in and save kuwait at the time Of course not right, right?
So what were the?
So to your point, there was not a lot of heat before and anticipation, but from Israel's [00:24:00] calculation, the risk was they could lose the pilots that conducted the operation. Was there, was one of the real credible risks that they could, that Israel could provoke? a regional war in which Iraq or one of these other Arab countries would would retaliate not at the time because iraq at the time, uh, Obviously, there's no shared border with the iraq with iraq between israel the with jordan between us um The Iraq's ballistic missile capability at the time in the early 80s was not perceived to be capable of flying towards Israel.
And it would take 10 years for Saddam to try to exact that revenge when he would send 36 God missiles at Israel during the first Gulf War. Uh, so The, the, um, there wasn't that fear necessarily for retaliation. There was a fear of getting on the bad side of the French who were helping the Iraqis build this reactor.
There was fear of getting on the bad side of the Reagan administration. Uh, there, there was already some tension as, as well. You know, you'll recall back in the day [00:25:00] between Begin and, and Reagan, um, So all of that together was, was what the conservative, and it was that you might fail. And, you know, before Israel attacked, what a lot of people forget is the Iranians tried to attack the nuclear reactor, right?
This was around the time of the Iran Iraq great war and the Iranians failed. Uh, so Israel was coming at it on the heels of a failed Iranian operation and Iran's much closer than Israel. So they didn't have that massive thousands of miles. To fly over enemy airspace, uh, to get there and then still to carry out a successful bombing.
So this was something that was really just, uh, kind of a Hail Mary to an extent, but, but it was perceived as being to, to begin, at least as being this existential threat. existential threat that Israel cannot live with. And that's what, you know, later became known as the, as the so called Begin Doctrine, right?
The fact that Israel will not allow, and Begin, by the [00:26:00] way, said it in interviews later, which I heard he spoke on the radio. I mean, not in real time, I was a young kid, but, uh, but when I was researching my book, um, He went on the radio shortly after and spoke about how everyone should know that Israel will not allow its enemies to get their hands on nuclear weapons.
Like, he basically, he didn't call it the Begin Doctrine, but he paved the way for this to be understood. Israel has now set a line in the sand that it will not allow to be crossed. And one consideration that I think Israeli decision makers have to evaluate today, That they didn't have to in 81 was the sense of finishing the job.
Meaning if you, if you went into Iraq, there was a, there was a path to literally completely eviscerating the threat or the potential threat of an Iraqi nuclear capability. When we talk in terms today of a possible Israeli strike against Iran, it's not about removing the threat. Threat for the foreseeable future.
It's [00:27:00] basically about buying time. So am I right in that, that you know, in 81, there was a sense that we're going to, we're going to wipe this thread out for a while or no. So, so not exactly. In 81, when they went there, you speaks to people like, uh, Amos Yadlin and, and, and who was one of the pilots later to become an Israeli air force general and, and head of military intelligence.
Yeah. And so, yeah, in 2007. So he, he was, he was the head of the military intelligence at the time. Um, he will tell you that as a pilot, right, he was then a young pilot, but that they spoke about that. They'll set them back for, you know, maybe two years. They, they, they weren't sure they weren't certain how long it would take.
Which, which basically what we learned from that is that you never know how these things are going to play out. Right. And on the one hand, so you could say to yourself, and this ties into what you just said about the Iranian, uh, nuclear threat, what's, you know, people could say, what's the point if all you're going to be doing is setting them back and just buying [00:28:00] some time, but the other side is you never know what that time does, you never know what happens during that time.
And the fact is with the Iraqis, they never rebuilt it. They tried, but it was prevented. It was denied of them. Okay, so now let's fast forward to 2007. We just talked, we referenced it briefly, but I want to get into it. The Israeli strike against the Syrian nuclear program, which was the subject of a superb book, uh, that you wrote, uh, and we will, we will post the link to it.
So hopefully, uh, even more people purchase it. Um, what were Israeli considerations in advance of that strike? So in, in 2007, I just want to, Frame the, the, the dilemma, right, we're, we're talking about March 2007. Israel is just about seven months after a bad war, what's perceived at the time as a bad war in Lebanon, what's known as the second Lebanon war, 34 days of fighting over 4, 000 rockets, Hezbollah rains down on northern Israel, [00:29:00] 122 Israeli soldiers killed, Israel did not feel like it had achieved its goal, Hezbollah still standing the day after, uh, the country's reeling.
reeling in the aftermath of this conflict. And then seven months later, Israel carries out an operation in Europe, the Mossad, Israel's equivalent of the CIA gets its hands on intelligence that shows that the Syrians are building a nuclear reactor in the Northeast in a region known as Deir ez Zor. So this lands on the prime minister at the time, Ehud Olmert's desk, while he's now facing an inquiry of commission on his handling of the second Lebanon war.
He's facing Increasing police investigations against him, which culminates in him being sent to jail eventually a few years later. And now he's got to grapple with a country, not Iraq, thousands of miles away, right? That it doesn't share a border with, but a country literally. It's Israel's backyard. And not only that, but this is Israel that we're [00:30:00] supposed to know everything that happens in Syria.
It's just over the border and we're caught with our pants down on this one. So, uh, this is huge and it's just months away from becoming hot from those fuel rods being installed, which means if you attack after those fuel rods are in this, the reactor Euphrates river, which kind of crosses the entire.
Northern Middle East over there, that whole, uh, Syria, all the way to Iraq. Uh, if you attack and then you disperse nuclear material into the Euphrates, you could be responsible for deaths. For decades to come, right? And, and, and who knows what. So, um, that clock is ticking, that window is narrow, and Israel has to decide what to do.
And I think, though, that in contrast to Iraq, in contrast to this debate that we just spoke about before, that's been going on forever, what to do with Iran. Attack, not attack. Here it was clear from the beginning. This reactor needs to go away. [00:31:00] The question was how exactly do we make it go away? And this is where, uh, Israel decides to share the intelligence with the Americans.
And basically prime minister Olmert goes to president George W. Bush and says, I want you to attack. And that sets off this whole diplomatic exchange that they have over a period of months. Where, where the U S says we can't do it, Mr. Prime minister, because correct, because we're just still dealing with Iraq.
We're in the middle of a war in Iraq and we're in the middle of a war in Afghanistan. And the idea that the U S administration is going to announce that they're taking a military action against. Another another Arab Muslim country is insane based on a WMD threat, correct? Provided by a foreign country, right?
Let's not forget. It's not even American intelligence It's intelligence that Israel gave America. So it's like it's it's a remake. It's a replay of the build up to the Iraq war It's it's just got all the it's got all the bad politics potentially there But at the same time prime one Prime Minister Omar says fine Then [00:32:00] we're gonna take care of it and the u.
s. Doesn't Exactly have the reaction that the Reagan administration had to Begin's invasion of Iraq, which was do what you got to do. Basically Bush was the Bush administration's approach. Bush, Bush, Bush basically said to Olmert, we will stand by or we'll stand on the side. We won't get in your way. We won't interfere.
We won't say a word about this. Uh, because at the time it Assad. Did not know that Israel and America had learned of the existence of this reactor and that, that element of surprise was crucial for Israel to be able to act against, uh, the reactor. So, uh, so, you know, it's interesting in the years since I've spoken to a lot of people, obviously for the book, um, and There are some people who actually think that Bush wanted Omer to attack, right?
Bush understood his limitations. He's in a war in Iraq. He had just launched the surge, right? Uh, you know, increased troop levels in Iraq and like this last ditch effort. Let's try to change [00:33:00] the tide of this war. Afghanistan is still going on. Uh, things aren't looking good politically back home. To, so. He, he, he couldn't do it.
And he had real internal opposition within the administration. Condoleezza Rice was against it. Bob Gates, the secretary of defense was against it. The only person who was pushing it was Dick Cheney, who was the vice president, really wanted America to push. That would make sense for the way people perceive Dick Cheney.
Um, but so people, people within the administration, even people in Israel who had been You know, we're, we're part of those conversations, walked away with a feeling. It was never said by Bush from what I've been told, but walked away with a feeling that Bush actually was happy when Olmert said to him in this phone call that they had in July.
So two months before the September bombing, uh, when Bush calls Olmert on a Friday and says, listen, I'm not going to attack, we're going to take it to the UN. We're going to hit them with sanctions, you know, blah, blah, blah. And Olmert says to him on the phone right there, Mr. President, if you're not going to do it, I'm going to do it.
This is not [00:34:00] acceptable. This thing has to be Destroyed. It's, it's a threat to the Jewish people and I'm responsible for the Jewish people. And people who had listened in on the conversation were, were, were pretty much, they walked away with the feeling that Bush was actually happy that that was Olmert's response.
And was, how concerned was Olmert and the security establishment here in Israel about the risk of some kind of retaliation, Syria lighting up? I mean, if you put it in today's terms, you know, Hezbollah in Lebanon has something like 150, 000 rockets, numerous UAVs, drones. And now there are advanced capabilities that one could think that Tehran, or in that case Damascus, could turn on against Israel for any kind of retaliation.
Now maybe the arsenal was not as advanced as it is today, back in 2007, but it was certainly real, as Israel learned during the second Lebanon war, just a year before. So, how concerned was Israel about being drawn to something much messier than just a clean strike? Honestly, they were terrified. [00:35:00] Uh, this was, you know, because again, we were, so now we jumped to September when the bombing is, is, is taking place.
So we're just exactly a year and a month, 13 months after that war had ended in Lebanon, the second Lebanon war. So now we're about to attack Syria, right? We're about to take away the prize possession of Bashar al Assad. This, this is his gotta be his jewel, right? You know, the, the, a nuclear reactor. And.
This is Syria pre civil war, right? This is Syria with hundreds of scud missiles. This is Syria with thousands of tons of chemical weapons, right? This is Syria with more tanks than the Israeli defense forces, not to mention Hezbollah, which is right next door, which has already started to rebuild itself.
Israel doesn't know, does have no guarantee whether war is going to break out. It's not going to break out. Israel's preparing for that possibility, but it's, it's got to be ready for. an unprecedented conflict that could see the [00:36:00] entire country lit up with not, not these short range Katyusha rockets that Hezbollah had fired into Israel a year earlier, but long range Scud C, Scud D ballistic missiles that some of them for all we know are carrying chemical warheads.
Okay. So now fast forward to what are Israel's considerations? As it contemplates the likelihood of an Iran Israel, uh, Iran U. S. deal, some kind of return to the JCPOA that strengthens, one could, well, depending on how you look at it, but certainly strengthens Iran, you, you have said, you said to me, it's not, it's, it, what looks like where it's heading is towards a bad deal, so if it's a bad deal, then it's a bad deal for Israel.
They struck in 81. They struck in 2007. Why wouldn't they struck strike in 2022? So it's a complicated one, because on the one hand, you know, just on the surface, to make it real simple, Iraq, one facility, Syria, one facility, [00:37:00] both in both cases above ground, once destroyed end of the program, Iran. Numerous facilities scattered throughout the country.
Some of them deep underground behind reinforced concrete and steel, making even just a standard conventional airstrike, even more complicated. So we're looking at taking out a number of facilities, but, uh, but I'll add another thing to the mix, Dan. And, and this is what I think a lot of people need to keep in mind.
Iraq, the reactor was being built for the Iraqis by the French. Syria, the reactor was being built for the Syrians by North Korea. In Iran, we're talking about domestic technical. Knowledge, right? It's not a foreign country or entity that is building this reactor on their behalf. So when you took out the Iraqi reactor, you would still need the French or the Russians or someone else to come in and build it for them.
When Israel took out the Syrian reactor, so North Korea could, of course, try to rebuild it and build a new one, but it requires foreign assistance here in Iran. [00:38:00] It's all Iranian. So even if you destroy the facilities. They don't need some foreign country to come to the rescue. Their guys will just rebuild it.
So that, that what we spoke about before, and you had mentioned if, you know, what's the expectation, would it, how much would it delay them? How much time would it buy in this case? There's no question that this would not be the end of the program. Unlike what happened with Iraq, unlike what happened with Syria, because here are the Iranians.
They have domestic. Knowledge they can do it. They've done it. They're doing it as we speak. They can do it again, right? So even if you take out some of those facilities, they're just gonna rebuild them So that's an important data point that that I think really makes an Israeli potential Israeli strike all the more Difficult and hard to see actually happening because if really at the end of the day, the most you're going to get is just a small window.
And I, you know, I don't want to say, you know, I take back small, a window of opera, a window of what a year or two, three, whatever it is. And then they rebuild, you really got to ask yourself, is it worth it? Because let's think [00:39:00] about what happens. You attack the Iranians, you embolden the regime, right? Now they're for sure going to build a nuclear weapon.
Because you've just given legitimacy to do so because everything they've said, if they don't want nuclear weapons, well, now you've showed them that they have an enemy to be concerned about. It will rally the people of Iran behind the regime, right? Because there's nothing better than being attacked by the Jews and the Zionists than to say, we got to stand with the Ayatollahs.
The world will even get upset, right? They've just gone back into a deal, and now here comes Israel to crash that party. Right. So I don't know if we're going to have the international support. Um, and you're probably going to be in a massive war now, right? This is what, this is what Hezbollah was created for, right?
Exactly this moment in time for is to, to retaliate on Iran's behalf. You're going to have a big war with Hezbollah. You might have some Syrian involvement. You might even have Iranian ballistic missiles flying towards Israel. It's going to be a tough war. I'm not worried about it. You know, there will be damage.
There will be casualties. Israel will be fine. I'm not, you know, in that, in that sense, this won't be the end of Israel, [00:40:00] but you got a lot of different factors that you got to keep, keep into considerate, take into consideration here. Um, and I don't know, I feel, I feel like there's a part of me. That I have no doubt that we can't live with an Iranian nuclear weapon.
It would be an existential threat to the state of Israel, no question. But I, I, I fear we might've missed that window for, for that strike. And I don't know. I think it's a tough one. And when you say we've missed, Israel has missed the window, why has Israel missed the window? Because it's just too, the, the, the, the infrastructure is too developed, it's too diffuse, there's too much knowledge.
there's too much knowledge locally, there's too, the, the, the facilities are already too advanced, the, the technology is too advanced, you can cause damage, you can set them back, it, it, it'll, Buy you some time, but they'll rebuild everything. I think the real window was back 2013. That was when we really had an opportunity.
By the way, that's when Israel really discussed the possibility. There were a number of [00:41:00] security cabinet meetings that Prime Minister at the time, Netanyahu, convened to discuss a possible strike against Iran. In the end, it didn't happen. And why not? Good question. Right. Uh, unclear. The jury's still out on that one.
First of all, just the facts. He didn't get the support in the security cabinet. He didn't have the numbers. The ministers were voting with him. So can you just explain to our listeners that Israel doesn't have a commander in chief system that we're accustomed to in the U. S. when it comes to making one of these major military decisions where the president of the United States is the commander in chief of the military.
If the president wants to go Bomb Iran's nuclear capabilities. He can go bomb Iran's nuclear capabilities. The prime minister of Israel cannot. No. Just make that decision unilaterally. So can you just explain how the system works in that? So, so there is the cabinet, which includes all the ministers, and then there's, what's called the inner security cabinet, which is, it ranges in size.
It could be any, let's say around 10 ministers or [00:42:00] whatever it is who sit there, uh, and obviously it includes, you know, the defense minister, the public security minister, the justice minister, the finance minister, foreign minister, of course, the prime minister, and some other people who they decide to, you know.
Give, give that extra benefit of sitting in on those, you know, real classified, sensitive conversations and decision making, uh, events. Um, you need that, that, those are the, that, that is the forum that can make the decision to go to, uh, an operation of this kind that could lead to war. So in 2007 And they literally vote.
They have to reach consensus within that group. Yeah, it's a vote. 2007, when A. Wood Olmert convened the cabinet, he had the minister's vote. There was, uh, one minister who actually abstained, right? Forget, let's not get into politics, but I mean, you got to have the numbers, right? And, and, and Bibi back in 2010 and also in 2012, when he was trying to push this through, he wasn't able to get those numbers, uh, and, and therefore it never even came up to a vote because he knew it wasn't going to pass.
He was also facing opposition. And some of the experts within, who were briefing the security cabinet, like Mayor Duggan, who was the head [00:43:00] of the Mossad, and Gabi Ashkenazi, who was the army chief of staff, were against it. They were opposed, correct. So, so Netanyahu in a sense was isolated in his own security cabinet because his security cabinet was being briefed.
By these secure by the security establishment against it. Yeah without right so that so he didn't have that He didn't have the ministers. He didn't have his security chiefs you can't go to an operation like this if you don't have the full support of Your commander, you know your commander of the idf and your head of the mosaic But but and and the president of israel at the time was shimon peres who was also against who was also against it But this is why I say the jury is still out, because there is a part of me, and it depends who you talk to, who people still believe that Netanyahu never meant to attack.
Netanyahu was bluffing all along, and he even convened these discussions because it was part of the game. It was part of the ploy. Let's remember, Netanyahu wanted a deal. Right. But he wanted a good deal. Everybody wants a diplomatic resolution. No, no Israeli wants war. That's the last thing [00:44:00] any Israeli wants.
We want a good deal. We want a deal that will prevent war, right? A bad deal speeds up the possibility of war. So Netanyahu's constant saber rattling at the time, which by the way, he was in cahoots with the defense minister, uh, Ehud Barak, then they were doing this together. Uh, I have no doubt got the Obama administration terrified that Israel's actually going at it.
And if you remember, Dan, at the time, they were sending every week back in 2012, another, you had Leon Panetta coming here. You had Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs coming here. Every week there was another top level guy. You had never seen anything like this. Uh, and they were coming to ease Israeli concerns because they were terrified.
I think that's what brought about ultimately the JCPOA. So we got a bad deal. So Israel didn't get everything it wanted, but it got a deal. So now let's, if you're, if you're Prime Minister Bennett, I understand all the, the, the considerations of, of the Israeli leadership writ large and the Israeli [00:45:00] security establishment.
You laid out all the risks and, and why it's, it's not a clean shot, so to speak, but also talk for just for a moment before we wrap about Prime Minister Bennett and his political position within his own government. Right. That I think you believe limits his options. Look. Everyone's familiar with that famous Netanyahu speech to Congress back in 2015.
Um, there are those who think it was a mistake and it undermined Israeli bipartisan support for Israel within, within the U. S. There are those who think that it was crucial and critical. For Netanyahu and for Israel and that that's what led ultimately to the Abraham accords. That's what led to this strategic alliance that Netanyahu had with president Donald Trump.
I mean, you know, whatever you think about it, but ultimately Netanyahu was able to do that. He was able to lead the fight against Iran because he had two things. One, well, three things. One was a genuine opposition to the deal. He thought the deal was terrible. The second thing that he had [00:46:00] was an international gravitas, right?
He was, he was a household name. Definitely in the United States. And the third thing that he had was domestic political support. His whole government was behind him. Let's take a look at Bennett for a moment. So Bennett's genuinely opposed to this deal. He said it numerous times, right? He doesn't have the international gravitas and it's not his fault.
He's just, hasn't been around like Netanyahu has. He, he, he's more of a rookie than Netanyahu. Uh, and three. What we know he definitely doesn't have is the domestic political support. He is a party of six within the coalition of 61. The rest of his partners in the coalition, Yair Lapidze Shetid, Benny Gantz's Blue and White, Avigdor Lieberman's Israel Beiteinu, and then the left wing parties of Labor and Meritz, they for sure Don't support Bennett doing anything that's going to undermine this diplomatic process right now that's taking place in Vienna.
So that limits what he can do. Now, does that mean that Israel won't act? No, that's not what that means. That means that right now, I think [00:47:00] Israel's resigned to an extent to the fact that there's going to be a deal and it's going to be a bad deal. But if you listen to what Israel's saying, it's saying we will retain, we will still have to do what we have to do.
Right. And I think, Dan, that if we see sometime in the future. What we spoke about in the beginning of Iran enriching uranium suddenly to 90 percent levels, and we know about that. The possibility of Israeli action suddenly jumps really. to the front. Uh, will it have to happen immediately? No. I've heard the, the current idea of Chief of Staff Kochavi talk about this recently, you know, if they enrich uranium to 90%, it doesn't mean they automatically have a bomb.
They would still have to assemble a bomb. They'd have to put on a warhead. I mean, there's still a process, but you, but that window now is clear and it's, it's closing. And it's what? It's months? So it's months till they have enough for, Weeks even till they would have enough for enough enough material for a nuclear weapon for one nuclear weapon Then they'd have to build that bomb.
They'd have to you're talking about a year Maybe a little more 18 months, uh, but you got to act [00:48:00] right. And I think that if that happens, you'll see, you'll see Israeli Israel cannot allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon. This, this would constantly pose and present to Israel a threat that is unimaginable. A, because of their possibility that they could use it against us, but B, because it would embolden them to do things that they're currently not doing in the region.
It would embolden their terrorist organizations that they support. Uh, it would set off a nuclear arms race in an already volatile region. You'd have the Egyptians go for a bomb, the Saudis go for a bomb, probably the Emiratis go for a bomb. Uh, this would be a disaster. And that's why Israel cannot allow this to happen.
We have to hope that that day never happens. Real last question, just in, in the. In the realm of Israel taking some kind of action, even after a deal, how would you evaluate Israel's success at these covert operations, the assassinations of Iranian scientists, the Stuxnet, the [00:49:00] cyber attacks against Iran's nuclear facilities, and probably a bunch of other operations we know nothing about, or at least I don't.
You cover this stuff day to day. First of all, incredible, right? What Israel has done. To the Iranian nuclear program, just purely with sabotage. I mean, I don't want to, it's incredible taking out Iranian scientists. Getting some to defect to the West blowing, inserting secretly nuclear, uh, not nuclear, sorry, explosive devices into facilities, having them blow up like what happened a year ago at Natanz at their main uranium enrichment facility, Stuxnet back in 2010, um, Stealing the nuclear archive from the heart of Tehran in 2018.
This is the, each, each of these events is, is a Hollywood blockbuster film, right? Uh, that will probably definitely one day still be made, but what it's done is it's bought Israel time. And that time was [00:50:00] crucial. That time was important because it also, it got at least the JCPOA, maybe a bad deal, but it got a deal, which bought even more time.
It got the world to be made more aware of the nature of this threat and what the Iranians were doing. Definitely the seizure, the, the, the, the seizure of the nuclear archive, but that's all it did. It bought time. And, and that, and that clock is still ticking. And they, they have, like I said before, they have that domestic knowledge.
They've, they've overcome all of those different hurdles that were put in their way. And a very parochial, on a very parochial note, Your newspaper was hit by a cyber attack, right? Yes by bite from Iran. Well, we assume it's from Iran It was a few weeks a few weeks ago About one o'clock in the morning or two o'clock in the morning.
I got woken up by a phone call from One of my internet editors. We operate 24 7 the Jerusalem Post website that the site is down and there's a image [00:51:00] of, uh, something about Qasem Soleimani, it was the, uh, anniversary of Qasem Soleimani's, uh, targeted killing by the Trump administration back in, uh, what was it, January, uh, 2019 or 2020, uh, yeah, 2019, yeah, um.
So it was, and it was something we can get you. We can get you wherever you are, whatever the text was that was there. It was a sophisticated attack. I mean, I'm no expert on this stuff, but they managed to bring down our site for a few hours. It took us a few hours to gain back control of it. I had to wake up the entire tech team.
They were working through the night. Uh, You know, to, to the, to the extent. 2020 January 3rd, 2020. Correct. January was the bag that internationally just before, just before COVID changed the world, but, um, the, the, what they were able to bring down the website. We were, we, we finally got it back. Uh, I think that what it.
Showed at least to me is definitely to, you know, the extent that look, the Iranians are playing an information war. This is all about info. It's an [00:52:00] influence campaign. It's, it's the ability to show people we can hit you. We can hit it in Israeli international news organization. Cause like we're read around the world.
This is about, uh, showing the world what they can do. And, you know, to me, it was also a feeling of, okay, I guess that we are. And I knew this, but you know, it just reinforces the Jerusalem post is a big player. Right. And, and, and they wanted to target a player or something that's prominent in to them. And I think to the world, so, you know, at least that, right.
You can use that with your advertisers. Yes. We were attacked by Iran. Don't just look at our CPMs. You should know that the Iranians think we're a big deal. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. All right. Uh, Yakov, this was, uh, a Terrifying but important conversation appreciate you taking the time. I know it's late here on a Saturday night in Jerusalem, but I hope that won't deter you from coming back, as I have a feeling this issue is not going away and we're going to continue to pick your brain.
[00:53:00] Anytime, Dan. Always a pleasure to be with you. Alright, the Jerusalem Post Editor in Chief, Yaakov Katz. Thanks for joining us.
That's our show for today. To keep up with Yaakov, you can follow him on Twitter, at Yaakov Katz. That's Y A A K O V. K A T Z. You can also subscribe to the Jerusalem Post, which is jpost. com, and you can find all of his books at your favorite independent bookseller, or at barnesandnoble. com, or that e commerce site, I think they're calling it amazon.
com these days. By the way, I, I now have people, like, really giving me a hard time. Or that e commerce site that I think they're calling Amazon these days. More and more people are getting a hold of me to complain about this. And they're saying that this joke is not that funny anymore, and it's bordering on like a bad dad joke.
Alright? Well, guess what? I'm a [00:54:00] dad. I'm 50 years old. And I get to crack dad jokes. So, I'm not letting go of this one any time soon. Call Me Back is produced by Ilan Benatar. Until next time, I'm your host, Dan Senor.