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Israeli officials say Iran’s ‘existential threat’ is– braindrain of 200,000 ‘best and brightest’

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Panetta

As you surely know the Washington Post’s David Ignatius has reported that Defense Secretary Leon Panetta “believes there is a strong likelihood that Israel will strike Iran in April, May or June.” 

Well, here is some excellent followup reporting by NBC’s Robert Windrem on the thinking among US and Israeli officials.

Panetta’s reported view has been echoed in recent interviews by NBC News with current and former U.S. and Israeli officials who have access to their countries’ intelligence. Those officials, all of whom spoke to NBC News on background, estimated the odds of an Israeli attack on Iran as better than 50-50.

Most of the officials said it is highly unlikely that the war-weary U.S. would mount a military attack on Iran, instead relying on financial sanctions and diplomatic pressure to squeeze Tehran.

Then Windrem offers this beautiful important Question-and-Answer from those unnamed Israeli officials:

Q: Why would Israel launch such an attack?

A: Putting aside Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s inflammatory comments that Israel should be “wiped off the face of the Earth” (which some Iranians claim privately was a mistranslation), some Israeli officials believe the continuous threat of an Iranian nuclear weapon would lead as many as 200,000 of their best and brightest citizens to leave for the United States and other Western nations. That is the “existential threat” Israeli officials worry about, not that Iran could destroy Israel.  An Iranian nuclear weapon would give Israel a lot less latitude to respond to Iranian threats, the Israelis believe.

Repeat: Israeli officials. Remember, it is routine to hear about a second Holocaust posed by Iran. Jeffrey Goldberg talked Auschwitz in his big piece pushing an attack. Newt Gingrich has talked the same poppycock.

As Scott McConnell says: 

A first perhaps, for MSM explanations of how Israel feels its citizens cannot (unlike Americans, Chinese, Russians, etc) deal with the psychology of nuclear deterrence.

Yes, let our MSM finally cover this question in depth. Let Americans have an open discussion of what is at stake here, what Ahmadinejad really said (Charlie Rose was quoting the “wipe off the map” line last night talking to the PM of Qatar), and what an attack would mean for us.

Also, this gem from Ignatius today:

Some Israelis have also likened a strike on Iran to the 1976 hostage-rescue raid on Entebbe, Uganda, which was followed by a change of regime in that country.

As a friend writes, I know there are people who will say this. But are there Israelis who actually believe this?

Oh and here is Juan Cole. Good:

What is striking to me is the glibness with which the Right wing speaks of an attack on Iran. The UN Security Council has not authorized the use of force against Iran, and Tehran has not attacked any other country. A strike on Iran is therefore a war crime, more especially since it would release radiactive toxins on the people of Isfahan and of the Middle East more generally.

Besides, proponents never say how they would pay for such a war. Iran is three times as populous and geographically much larger than Iraq. ..

Anyone who advocates such a thing is a sort of monster, in my view.

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One other problem with reliance on “Ahmadinejad said Booo! to Israel” is that Israel has been itching to harm Iran since at least 1992; the first set of sanctions AIPAC put in place were signed by Bill Clinton in 1995 (executive order) and 1996 (D’Amato Amendment).

In September 2002 THREE YEARS before Ahmadinejad became pres of Iran, Netanyahu told a Congressional panel chaired by Dan Burton that US MUST attack Iraq because it was the “keystone” of a “network of terror” that Iran was a part of. Therefore, decapitating Iraq would cause changes in Iran. Dennis Kucinich questioned Bibi closely on this: “Do you have evidence?” “Who would be second?” “Would Iran be second?” http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/Conflictw

Ahmadinejad was a student in civil engineering in those years; he became mayor of Tehran ~2000; Ahmadinejad was not elected to presidency of Iran until 2005.

Because I believe that Israel will survive, I want the most civilized and humane Israelis possible to remain. It is too depressing to imagine an Israel ruled and populated substantially (or more substantially than today) by religious maniacs/fundamentalist/zealots — facing off with a sea of ever-angrier neighbors.

Whether the so-called 200,000 “best and brightest” (phrase of unnamed Israeli official) are also “civilized and humane” (in my phrase), I have no way of knowing, particularly as an exudus of Israelis may already be under way (and independent of consideration of Iran) and also because this whole phrase may be total propaganda anyhow (like: from what hat was “200,000” plucked?).

I do, however, like the idea of an abandonment of Israel by Jews — not because it is in danger — although that idea is a hoot, since Israel was created for Jewish safety in a dangerous world — but because Israel today is a horrible, disgusting, depressing place for those abandoning-ship Jews to live in. Not everyone really, really wants to live in a despotic, cruel, dispossessing, lawless society. Not fun for everyone.

If 200,000 Jews or 2,000,000 Jews did decide to leave Israel (and had somewhere to go — not like the Jews of Europe who in 1945 sought but failed to find refuge in USA and UK — I’d be delighted. It would not be Arabs “pushing Jews into the sea” but Jews abandoning a self-torpedoed sinking ship, and entirely proper.

And would such an abandonment constitute an “existential threat”? Perhaps. But, also perhaps, a motivation for peace-making by Israel while there is still time.

I do not wish to be rude, but the notion that Leon Panetta’s careful leak to a WaPo columnist about his inner thinking on Israel would somehow be genuine or a real scoop is truly beyond naïve.

Anyone who has ever read a good book on the Mossad/MI5/CIA knows that all three agencies use Western media to plant storylines on a regular basis.

Whatever Israel is planning, it’s not going to tell Iran in advance what and when it will strike in a U.S. mainstream publication. And Panetta would never leak this if the Israelis weren’t on it, and if they weren’t, there would be volanic rage in Israel now and there isn’t.

This sort of reminds me when I read Larry Derfner’s response to the total propaganda snowjob at the NY Magazine by Ronen Bergman. He was writing as if Mr. Bergman was really independent and not into the whole charade. Again, why would the Israeli top brass let a frontpage opportunity go to waste instead of planting a careful story.

The whole point of all these stories is psychological warfare. Make the regime scared and think that a strike is soon to come. What the Israelis really plan is a totally different story. My guess is that we’ll either see a strike on Iran very soon or next year. Most likely next year. Remember that the head of Mossad said that Iran can’t get a bomb in at least 5 years.

After getting attacked in public through a torrent of leaks to the Israeli press suggesting he’s a bit of a loon and maybe even a traitor, Mr. Dagan went underground. When he resurfaced, several months later, Iran was all of a sudden ‘very close to getting a bomb’.

I’m routinely surprised how easy it is to fool people who should know better. Derfner and Mr. Weiss included. The leak to Ignatius serves a specific purpose and should be seen as part of the ongoing psychological warfare campaign, not serious journalism. Ditto for the NY Mag piece by Mr. Bergman.

An excellent column by Glenn Greenwald showing the parallels in the propaganda to the buildup to the invasion of Iraq and what is being directed now towards Iran:
“Iran is the root of all evil” at: http://www.salon.com/writer/glenn_greenwald/

Note that Panetta pointedly refused to comment on the view that Ignatius attributed to him via an anonymous source.