Tuesday, August 14, 2012

ILAN BERMAN, VICE PRESIDENT, AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY COUNCIL, WASHINGTON, DC

The clandestine war in the Middle East may soon become an open warfare

Here, Washington’s opinion matters a great deal. For years, Israeli officials have been sounding the alarm over Iran’s nuclear capability. For just as long they have been pressured by US administrations, Democrat and Republican alike, to allow time for the emergence of an international coalition to contain, deter and pressure Iran. Increasingly, however, such a laissez-faire approach is not possible. That’s because, over the past year, the Obama administration abandoned serious pressure on Iran in favour of an ambitious diplomatic outreach intended to change the behaviour of its leaders. This effort is now understood to have reaped few dividends; Iran viewed US attempts at “engagement” with skepticism and deftly used the strategic pause afforded by American outreach to forge ahead with its nuclear endeavour. As a result, the policy debate in Washington today has shifted in the favour of economic sanctions. But observers in Israel, as elsewhere, seem skeptical that the application of such measures now will have the power to convince Iran’s Ayatollahs to give up their nuclear drive.

Relations between Jerusalem and Washington, meanwhile, are on the rocks. Israel’s ill-timed announcement this March of future housing construction in East Jerusalem was taken as a personal affront by a White House eager to restart the Middle East peace process. From there, relations between the two countries have deteriorated to depths not seen since the formal inauguration of the “special relationship” in the early 1980s. The current crisis (in the Middle East) has profoundly upset the political understanding that previously prevailed between Washington and Jerusalem on a range of issues – Iran chief among them.

As a result, whether Israel will act against Iran is now an open – and hotly-debated – question. If it does, the resulting conflict could re-configure the balance of power in the Middle East. If it does not, the results could be equally profound – ranging from a new arms race in the region (as Arab states seek a counterweight to Iran’s emerging bomb) to the rise of a nuclear-armed Shi’a hegemony in the Persian Gulf. Either way, the international community could soon see the current cold war between Israel and Iran become a hot one.




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