Israel Upending Iraq War Deal
Netanyahu is not abiding by a deal he didn't make.
WaPo Exclusive (“U.S. intelligence warns Israel is likely to undermine Iran peace deal, officials say“):
U.S. intelligence agencies have warned the Trump administration that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is likely to take steps that will undermine President Donald Trump’s effort to reach a lasting peace deal with Iran, as the Israeli premier faces intense political pressure to continue waging his country’s war in Lebanon, current and former U.S. officials said.
Israel appears intent on maintaining military operations against Iran’s proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon, an aim that would flout a core element of the fledgling agreement that calls for an end to hostilities in that country, according to intelligence reports, including one circulated this week, said the officials.
The analysis comes at a moment of growing tension between Netanyahu’s government and Trump administration officials, who have publicly warned Israel against launching attacks against Hezbollah that might derail Trump’s deal.
On Friday, Israel launched airstrikes across southern Lebanon in response to a Hezbollah drone strike that killed four Israeli soldiers. As clashes continued, U.S. and Iranian officials said they postponed talks due to begin in Switzerland on Friday. Vice President JD Vance, who was to lead the U.S. delegation, postponed his trip.
If Netanyahu redoubles his military campaign in Lebanon, he would not only threaten the framework for an agreement signed by the United States and Iran on Wednesday, but he could rupture the relationship with an American president that has been integral to his political fortune.
Speaking at a news conference in France on Wednesday to announce the U.S.-Iran “memorandum of understanding,” Trump said that he has a “little dispute over Lebanon” with Netanyahu and has urged the Israeli leader to not “knock down a building every time somebody walks into it that’s from Hezbollah.”
[…]
The new U.S. intelligence report concludes that in the face of national elections this fall, Netanyahu’s political survival is linked to showing his domestic audience that he will not withdraw troops from Lebanon and that he is intent on escalating the fighting with Hezbollah, said one U.S. official familiar with the report. The official, like others interviewed, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the matter’s sensitivity.
The U.S. intelligence report also describes Israel’s frustration with the terms of the Trump peace memorandum, which undermine its broader objective of maintaining maximum pressure on Tehran, according to a current and former official.
NYT (“Israel Is Likely to Continue Attacks in Lebanon, U.S. Intelligence Concludes“) adds:
Mr. Netanyahu is under intense domestic pressure to continue operations against Hezbollah’s ongoing attacks on northern Israel. Israel views Hezbollah, the potent militia and political group in Lebanon funded by Iran, as a critical threat, and officials there do not believe the attacks can go unanswered.
[…]
The cease-fire deal is deeply unpopular in Israel, where commentators criticize its failure to address Iran’s missile program, its requirement that U.S. forces leave the region and, especially, its constraints on Israeli military operations in Lebanon.
Israel is not a party to the accord, which was signed this week. But the Israeli ambassador to the United States, Yechiel Leiter, said on Friday that his country had committed to an immediate cease-fire and “halted all offensive operations” in Lebanon. He insisted Israeli forces would remain in southern Lebanon and said Israel would never compromise on its security.
The recent intelligence assessments show the skepticism inside American spy agencies that such commitments will hold, given the security concerns.
[…]
Those recent intelligence reports outline what has been obvious in public: Mr. Netanyahu and other Israeli security officials are uncomfortable with the memorandum of understanding between the United States and Iran. At the same time, relations between President Trump and Mr. Netanyahu are strained, even if there is little indication the Israeli prime minister will give up on the relationship.
Officials said Mr. Netanyahu was counting on relations with Mr. Trump strengthening once more before he faces Israeli voters this fall. Mr. Netanyahu’s standing and influence with Mr. Trump has waxed and waned before, though the high stakes of the accord with Iran appears to have pushed relations to a low.
[…]
At a news conference to promote the U.S. deal with Iran, Mr. Vance lashed out at members of Mr. Netanyahu’s cabinet who had criticized the United States or Mr. Trump over the cease-fire.
“Donald J. Trump is the only head of state in the entire world who is sympathetic to the nation of Israel at this moment in time, and he happens to be the head of state of the world’s superpower,” Mr. Vance said. “If I was in the cabinet of the Israeli government, I might not be attacking the only powerful ally that I have anywhere left in the entire world.”
Winston Churchill famously remarked, “There is only one thing worse than fighting with allies, and that is fighting without them.” Even though Iran is a common adversary, Israel and the United States have differing national security goals and domestic pressures.
Netanyahu is fighting for his political survival, which surely factors into his calculations here. But he also reflects a widespread consensus in Israel that Iran and its proxies must be dealt with once and for all.
President Trump, meanwhile, feels little direct threat from Iran and is facing considerable backlash from his own party over the war. Despite the advice of his handpicked Joint Chiefs chairman and the rest of the professional national security establishment, he clearly believed he could effect regime change and secure a quick, decisive win. Once that proved not to be the case, he began looking for a way to get out while being able to claim victory.
The fact that Trump’s team negotiated the deal without Israel adds to the challenge here. Vance isn’t wrong about Israel’s current world standing. But there are considerations of national pride at stake even beyond the security issue.
And let’s not forget that Hezbollah has a vote here, too. They’re unlikely to accept a permanent ceasefire that leaves Israel in control of substantial parts of Lebanon.
Tactics aren’t worth much when you have no strategy.
The US is finished as a power in the Middle East. Our Gulf allies know we can’t protect them, and no matter how many of our toys they buy, they can’t protect themselves. Iran got its ass kicked at the tactical level yet pulled off a strategic victory of truly epic proportions. Iran can sell oil, it can collect tolls, it will quickly rebuild its missile armory aided immensely by a tsunami of money. Iran will want to strengthen the Houthis, giving them control of the bab el mandeb. Saudi and the UAE et al will have no choice but to kowtow. Iran won’t need nukes short-term, but I imagine they’ll have them in five years. Iran’s strategic victory is so complete China couldn’t save the Arabs even if it wanted to.
And now Israel knows we can’t hand them victory and without any foreign support, with dreams of Greater Israel slipping away, I’m afraid of what Bibi’s successors may do.
This is from Miriam Adelson’s Israeli newspaper:
Israel knows any cease fire with Hezbollah is temporary, that Hezbollah would restock rockets and munitions and dig more tunnels in South Lebanon. As the Lebanese government can not control Hezbollah, Israel will act accordingly. (Israel has been continuously rocket attacked by Hezbollah since 2023 and the Israeli people are pissed).
And as noted, Israel did not participate in (effectively) bilateral negotiations between U.S. and Iran, so does not sign off on them.
Netanyahu has discovered he is not a very special boy, Trump has no more loyalty to him than to any other “ally” (i.e., sucker). ETTD. By contrast, Iran stands by its ally Hezbollah.
Really? Trump has, in Israel, rapidly gone from being very popular to very unpopular, a very dramatic and rapid reversal. Friendly with Trump is perhaps not as great an asset as before.
@charontwo:
Untrue. They signed a ceasefire in 2024 which Israel violated but Hezbollah didn’t. The attacks started again after Iran was bombed. Israel’s paranoia and lying has turned it insane and completely incapable of reporting on any form of reality. The entire country is basically the same combination of violence and victimhood.
No surprise that they found a natural ally with Trump. But also no surprise that Trump has ‘betrayed’ Israel by not being taken in by sob stories about innocent IDF soldiers being killed by Hezbollah terrorists. Israel is like the French or the Americans/French in Vietnam–they’re eventual losers of a colonial war except they have nowhere to go. Trump doesn’t care about where they might go, but he hates losers.
US & Israel, classic ‘wag the dog.’ But Bibi and Israel have overplayed their hand and the political winds in the US have turned against them. The emerging US consensus on Israel mimics Henry II on Thomas Becket.
BBC and others are reporting that Iran has closed the strait over Israeli attacks on Hezbollah. Another day ending in Y.
@Sleeping Dog:
Art of the deal! Iran knew all along Israel would give them a reason to close the Strait again. Meanwhile, Iran was able to move a lot of tankers into (empty) or out from (laden) the gulf with the U.S. blockade lifted. I believe they have all $24B of frozen funds, I am sure they have at least the first $12B.
So U. S. delivered some concessions up front and can now wait for the goodies from Iran. Art of the deal, tourists in the souk version!
@charontwo:
OK, but why?
You presented this as if Hezbollah just wants to kill Israelis out of sheer hate.
And this is the kind of stubborn, willful blindness (which also AFAIK pervades Israeli public opinion) that prevents any kind of political settlement.
Perhaps if Israel didn’t treat Lebanon (and southern Lebanon in particular) as a place they should be able to bomb and occupy with impunity, some kind of agreement could be reached.
But that would require seeing Lebanese lives as equally valuable as Israeli lives. And that is something that Israelis/the pro-Israel crowd simply can’t countenance.
However, attitudes like “our lives are precious, theirs are not” or “we are defending ourselves, they just hate” are (besides patently untrue) not conducive to effective diplomacy.
I have said this before: there was no Hezbollah prior to 1982. That alone should give you (as well as Israeli policy makers) some pause.
And to avoid any misunderstandings: this is not an attempt to paint Hezbollah as the good guys (either as such or in lieu of Israel), just a stab at injecting some realism in this debate.
It takes a very special kind of idiocy to make an agreement to keep the world’s most economically crucial waterway open contingent on the actions of a third party who was not even consulted about the agreement.
@Kathy: This is the same guy who started the war with Iran without consulting or even notifying our allies then getting angry with them and, IIRC, threatening more tariffs if they didnt help bail Trump out.
Steve
Iran has closed the Strait of Hormuz again. They are saying that the U.S. allowed Israel to violate the ceasefire in Lebanon.