Brett Daniel Shehadey
Special Contributor for In Homeland Security
Presently Israel is afraid of a growing separation with the US- one that is in de facto transition from the special relationship that they had benefited from for so long. Iran, frankly is getting in the way.
The meeting between US Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif and the recent letter and then the phone call between the US and Iranian Presidents must have Netanyahu’s cabinet shrilling behind closed doors. Just recently, as serendipity would have it, an Iranian was caught in Israel with pictures of the US embassy. This had to happen right at the time of Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani’s UN visit in New York.
To be fair, Iran is not thinking kindly of the US, nor does it hold a special place in its heart for America. There is no message of love and in Syria, with Russia, Iran is against the US interest. In Iraq and Afghanistan, Iran was also acting militarily against the US. And the US and Israel had been engaged in a covert small scale war with Iran via intelligence agencies and special operations personnel.
What was the previous condition for over a year?
Israel wanted the US to annihilate Iran before Iran’s previous president could annihilate them. The US was in place for a bombardment and did not do so. IAEA nuclear non-proliferation negotiations fell apart when Iran would not allow inspectors into a facility suspected of testing a nuclear device. Since then it had been a cold war and an international isolation of Iran (with some exceptions).
What changed? Syria. The US-Russia-Syrian agreement to ban chemical weapons and the willingness of the US to work with Assad changed everything. The election- a new Iranian moderate President- still not a fan of the US- but willing to get passed sanctions in a way that will make him look good and benefit his country. Is he pro-American? Of course not. Can America deal with him? Maybe, it has never been done since 1979 through official channels. It would be worth the effort but the US needs a master plan for the region and each state individually that is more current.
Neither does Israel hold love for the Americans. Both nations act alone for themselves. They engage in their own attempts to manipulate US action and gain access to more US money in their own way. While the US made gains with having special US-Israel relations in the past, the Israelis have always gained the most, been one step ahead and played the US to the point that it is questionable why such a dynamic even can exist at all today or have prevailed all those years. Israel is not the “good guy.” They have chosen a path that has no political solution and will perpetually result in killing and warfare; as have their neighbors.
The Israel response to a subtle separation and loss of status as a “special partner” has been an enormously effective espionage program targeting the USA and stealing as much as it can. There is also a foreign ideological foothold which has attempted to lobby and project itself. This is now gradual challenged by foreign Muslim dominated states and a growing Muslim lobby as the present dynamic of the Middle East drifts from the anchor of its past.
Many international and national Muslim charities and ‘education and awareness’ organizations attempt the same thing that Israel did, using many of the same successful methods. These groups, either Israeli or transnational Islam-based or state lobbies (i.e. Saudi Arabia) are not to be trusted, they are to be dealt with in kind and manipulated from the homeland. It is better they do our bidding than we do theirs. If the US does not actively project power into those states in more successful ways it will find itself the loser of more than the freedom political of action but in its own internal affairs as well. This is seen most blatantly by realists, such as the penetration of high-profile or critical position of pro-Israel or pro-Muslim national security appointments that will act counter to the American interest when in place.
The Muslim lobby is targeting the media even more aggressively than the Israeli lobbies recently, and they are effective at turning any Muslim distinction attached to terrorist incidents so as to alter the true perception of a war against international jihad. There is also a strong pro-Muslim litigation campaigns that are in effect. Such groups like the Council of American Islamic Relations (CAIR) have learned from the Israelis and Jewish campaigns to counter anti-Semitism; effectively they ended up treating all negative press against Israel or Jewish persons as anti-Semite- even when such stories or actions have nothing to do with race and are context related. In Congress, the result was a blockade against any disagreement with Israel, even if it did not benefit the US or actually set it back. Now the same thing will happen on the opposite end of the spectrum with Muslim states whose populations have nothing but contempt for Israel and large portions have shouted “death to America!”
Benjamin Netanyahu’s latest push at the UN, for the US to not trust the arch-rival Iran, should be taken with this in mind; along with a very large grain of salt. Such a warning should not bar positive diplomatic gains or close any doors on peace-building with the future generation of Iran’s next leadership or the greater Muslim world. Prime Minister Netanyahu should know well that Israel’s nuclear capability is one of the reasons that Iran wants the bomb. Its own secrecy is exactly what Iran wants. But like Israel, they want the capability more than the assembly line of the WMDs. Remember what happened to Muammar Gaddafi when years after he stopped attempts at building a nuclear weapon in 2003 he was attacked by insurgents and invaded by the NATO? Iran has no guarantee that this will not be its fate if the nuclear option evaporates.
One of the biggest keys to UN Resolution 2118 for banning Syria’s chemical weapons program was Russia. A similar arrangement using a third party state with pull and the international actors with Iran and nuclear weapons might be effective if done correctly. The Iranians will have to do some work too, but they need a guarantee from a power they trust. For a start, they need to work more with the inspectors as a sign of good faith but obviously this is a double standard when it comes to Israel and Iran. Israel’s nuclear weapons will continue to be a problem for the region in the future. Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal is an even bigger worry for the US and the world and this Sunni state’s nuclear capacity also plays into Iran’s calculus.
Neither should the US “abandon” Israel, but the US should treat Israel realistically as a rouge state that will not listen to its political directives and will instead do what it believes necessary to survive. The US should not sacrifice its freedom of action by any player or its integrity, even for present allies, but should be playing them all to its advantage. Instead, these two categorical opponents- primarily getting support from the Middle East region- are playing the US like a musical instrument.
The efforts of the Jewish and Muslim organizations are not in the interest of the USA- they serve their own. This goes for all states, including Muslim dominated states as well; especially, Pakistan and the Gulf. They represent special interest groups that holds an international character and uses foreign ideologies with an attempt to manipulate US interests abroad and at home- as far as such organizations are political and militant in objective and not religious and peaceful- they serve no good at all or extension of the American Way and the promotion of America’s values and principles abroad.
Things are rapidly changing. The method in which America measures the character and value of its partnership must also evolve to reflect ‘real-world’ conditions and not historic legacies. This will include how much is reasonable to give states free of charge that act counter to the purposes of those funds given. A set of strict policies in dealing with dictators, or negative players that tarnish and imperil US objectives and security, would do well to promote a greater amount of American freedom of action and control to run its own affairs and become the lead state influencer rather than the pinned and manipulated- an end scenario of a death by a thousand ideological cuts.
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