Ronen Bergman, an Israeli, has a big piece in GQ on the Dubai Job, and how Israel hurt itself with the hotel-room assassination of Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh last year. A glance at the piece tells me that it is written too much Inside the Israeli narrative (how did Mossad screw up?) and not inside the American one (our client is destroying our brand). But it touches on one of my favorite themes, are Jews smarter. Here’s the takeaway paragraph:
As one very senior German intelligence expert told me: “The Israelis’ problem has always been that they underestimate everyone—the Arabs, the Iranians, Hamas. They are always the smartest and think they can hoodwink everyone all the time. A little more respect for the other side—even if you think he is a dumb Arab or a German without imagination—and a little more modesty would have saved us all from this embarrassing entanglement.”
