2024-04-15 15:56:50
Iran’s attack over the weekend is a sign that Israel’s key defensive deterrence policy has been severely damaged by the Netanyahu government’s actions, according to the Israeli opposition leader, analysts and former Israeli officials.
“This government, this prime minister, have become an existential threat to Israel. They have shattered Israeli deterrence,” declared the opposition leader, the liberal Yair Lapid (Yesh Atid), on Monday.
Israel’s deterrence policy has long been an obsession of the country’s political and military circles, and is considered a vital pillar of its security. The term refers to military policies – including retaliation to previous attacks and the maintenance of capabilities – and the deployment of soft and hard power to persuade enemies that an attack is not worth it.
“Our enemies look at this government and smell weakness,” Lapid said, referencing a well-known quote from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Iran’s attack on Israel – blocked by Israeli air defenses, with the help of the United States, the United Kingdom and other allies – was the first by a foreign state against Israel in more than three decades. Other signs that deterrence has been weakened include the Hamas attack on October 7, the conflict with Hezbollah on Israel’s northern border, and attempted drone strikes by Yemen’s Houthis.
In an article published in the newspaper Ma’ariv following the Iranian attacks, commentator Ben Caspit summed up the mood of many of Netanyahu’s domestic critics, who have cited the weakening of Israeli deterrence as evidence of the unsuitability of the prime minister for office.
“Israel’s deterrence, which had prevented Iran from attacking it directly, collapsed,” Caspit wrote. “How did Netanyahu once say it?” he added, referring to the same Lapid quote: “When terror smells weakness, it attacks.”
“Iranians have lost their sense of fear. No more middlemen, secret agents and covert terrorist attacks. From now on, it is Iran against Israel, openly. “Israeli deterrence, which made Iran swallow its pride anew each time and not attack Israel directly, has now been shattered.”
On the Institute for National Security Studies blog, Tamir Heyman, former intelligence chief of the Israel Defense Forces, described a difficult new strategic reality for Israel: “Israel and the United States failed to deter Iran from attacking. Iran managed to harm Israel without forcing the United States to attack in response with Israel’s cooperation. Israel acted for the first time as part of a coalition. This is effective and important, but it limits freedom of action in response.”
Michael Milshtein of the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle East and African Studies, an Israeli thinktank, said that although Israel’s deterrence had been reduced, the picture was complex: “The big dramatic unknown was October 7, which was not only the moment when Israel’s basic deterrence was undermined, but it became clear that Hamas – contrary to the assessments of the Israeli intelligence services – was not deterred at all.
Beyond that, Milshtein said, the Israeli deterrence picture was more relative. “With Iran and Hezbollah the issue becomes more delicate. Deter from what? Iran could have attacked several embassies. “Hezbollah is not deterred from an attrition conflict in the north, but from an escalation, but largely by the context within Lebanon itself.”
By making clear that it would not support an offensive attack by Israel against Iran, the Biden administration has clearly defined the limits of what Israel can count as foreign support, echoed by the United Kingdom and other countries.
Others have pointed to the fact that the Arab countries that cooperated with Israel in various ways to defend it from the Iranian attack over the weekend are highly unlikely to assist in an Israeli attack on Iran, suggesting the fragility of even that coalition.
HA Hellyer, a research associate at the Royal United Services Institute, also said he saw a complicated picture. “When Iran attacked, it did so with massive choreography,” he said, referring to the fact that the attack had not only been announced in advance, but that the United States and its neighbors had been warned: “If it had not been so well choreographed , if it had been a total surprise, I think fewer missiles would have been shot down and others would have managed to get through. And I think that, while it is certainly a cliché to say that Israel is completely beholden and dependent on the United States, it is also true that if the United States and other allies had not stood by Israel we would have seen a different outcome. The fact that Israel has had to rely on a coalition contains a message: that it cannot be imagined that it will always be this way. The fact that Israel has had to resort to a coalition contains a message: that it cannot be imagined that it will always be like this. I don’t think people understood it well before, that without American support there really is no way for Israel to maintain its security paradigm the way it has.”
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