‘Too late to fight it’: With Iran deal reached, what should Israel do now?

The nuclear accord the U.S. and other world powers reached with Iran on Tuesday presents Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with an agonizing dilemma. Throughout his political career, Netanyahu has fought any accommodation with terrorists and the states that sponsor them — chiefly Iran, in the view of most Israelis — even risking his relationship with the White House earlier this year in an effort to block a deal. Now that an agreement has been reached, some analysts here are saying the Israeli leader should accept it as a fait accompli and try to repair his relationship with President Obama, which is more tense and troubled than any between an Israeli and American leader in more than 30 years.

I think it’s too late to fight it and I believe another confrontation with the administration now would be counterproductive. Israel needs the help of the U.S. in other areas.

Giora Eiland, a retired major general who headed Israel’s National Security Council a decade ago, tells Yahoo News

But the analysts believe — and Netanyahu’s remarks about the deal so far seem to bear them out — that the Israeli leader will opt instead for more confrontation, pressing his allies in the U.S. Congress to derail the accord. Israeli officials said the deal leaves much of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure intact, potentially allowing the regime to reconstitute a secret military program when the accord expires in stages beginning a decade from now. While Obama believes the agreement could moderate Iran and bring it closer to the international community, Netanyahu feels the opposite is true. Iran would use the wealth it gains from oil once sanctions are lifted to prop up its radical allies, Syria and Hezbollah, and further destabilize the region.

I think Israel has a variety of means at its disposal which it can try and use … But I don’t think there’s an existential threat to Israel emanating from Iran, even if it gets nuclear weapons.

Israeli analyst, Efraim Halevy, a former head of the Mossad intelligence agency

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