Major General (Retd.) Amos Yadlin, former head of the National Security Agency and a research fellow at Howard University, spoke this morning (Friday) with Guy Peleg on his program on 103FM and expressed concern about Bezalel Smotrich’s desire to serve as Minister of Defense in the next government, as well as being asked about the expected appointment of Ron Dermer to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, after recordings published last night on Channel 12 in which Dermer was heard strongly criticizing the conduct of the US vis-à-vis Iran within the framework of the nuclear agreement, accused the US of creating a war in the Middle East, and attacked the Biden administration.
“Weak against Iran”: Secretary of State-designate Dermer in an attack on the Biden administration
To the question of whether Smotrich’s appointment can be accepted even without US consent, he answered in the affirmative: “It can happen. is that good? This is very bad. There is an intimate security relationship between Israel and the USA, in the field of intelligence, operations, there is 3.8 billion dollars in aid every year. There are very good relations between the ministers of defense and the secretaries of defense. It is important that these intimate relations be led by people whom the Americans value professionally and humanly, and if There will be the same appointment you are hinting at, I estimate that Israel’s security will be harmed.”
To the claim as to whether this is not gross interference by the Americans, who recently announced that they intend to open an FBI investigation into the issue of the death of journalist Shirin Abu Aqla, Yadlin replied that in his opinion there is no connection between the cases: “From my acquaintance with the American bureaucracy, the handling of the issue of journalist Abu Aqla began long before the election results. Also the way in which the matter came to the attention of the State of Israel, without the National Security Council knowing. I think it is not related, these are moves by the progressive radicals, it has nothing to do with it. The Americans do not tell us who to appoint as Minister of Defense, they have red lines – they do not even name names , but they say, ‘We don’t have to cooperate with everyone.’ We don’t veto the Security Council, only the Americans do that. Therefore, you should listen to what they say and whoever doesn’t listen, there will probably be consequences.”
He also referred to the expected appointment of Ron Dermer as foreign minister in the Netanyahu government, even though he spoke out strongly against the US: “Let’s separate it into several dimensions, from the least important to the most important – first of all there is the journalistic issue, it was presented yesterday as if it was secretly recorded the day before. This is a podcast I listened to three months ago, when Drummer wasn’t nominated for anything. These are the known positions of Dermer and Netanyahu, so I was not surprised by these things. I’m not a political commentator, but yesterday it was impossible to miss the fact that someone made sure that this podcast reached Channel 12, through Yaron Avraham, and those who made sure that it made it are probably people who really want the position of Foreign Minister for themselves.”
Yadlin continued to say on the same subject: “Dermer explained why the nuclear agreement with Iran is bad, but neither Dermer nor former and future Prime Minister Netanyahu explained how they stop Iran without the agreement, quite the opposite. We saw that when there was no agreement, the Iranians made much more progress and not Trump And not Netanyahu prepared a plan B. This is the point that needs to be revealed. Now this appointment, when there is a democratic government with which Israel is at odds anyway, is a matter of discretion. On the Iranian issue there are two questions – what do we do if there is no agreement, this will be the main challenge of Prime Minister-designate Netanyahu, and Dermer, Netanyahu and Trump need to explain why when they pulled out of the agreement and Iran was moving forward with the bomb, they did nothing to stop it.”
In the meantime, Yadlin referred to the Iranian drone that hit a ship partially owned by Idan Ofer: “Between Israel and Iran there is a campaign going on below the threshold of war, a campaign that is partly secret without taking responsibility and partly public. In all dimensions, in the maritime, aerial, cyber dimension. Israel knew exactly where the drones came from on previous occasions as well. It is clear that those operating them from Yemen are the Iranians. The attempts to harm the Israelis in Istanbul, everyone knew where it came from. Therefore, there is nothing new here, there is a continuation of the campaign. If you want to analyze, then on the naval issue There was a calm, both sides realized that they were vulnerable. That’s why both sides dropped the naval issue, what we see is that the Iranians have returned, there were interpretations that it is related to the World Cup, in my estimation it is related to attacks for which Israel has not taken responsibility but which are taking place in eastern Syria on convoys that deliver weapons to Hezbollah.”
As far as the cooperation between Russia and Iran is concerned, he noted: “This cooperation is definitely a cause that has advantages for Israel and disadvantages. The advantages are that the chance of returning to the agreement after Iran cooperates with Russia and gives them attack drones causes the most anger in Washington, so the chance is low . From this point of view there is an advantage here, the Iranians make it clear to the world that they are on the bad side of history. Will the Russians reward them with activity against Israel? I think not, they paid them 200 million euros, transferred them western weapons that they seized in Ukraine. I don’t think they will pay them in Israeli currency, certainly not in the nuclear field where they are very careful. They don’t want Iran in the nuclear field.”