No Such Animal as an "Israeli" Attack on Iran

Source: huffingtonpost, 25-06-2008

The Cheneyista faction in the Bush administration and Congress is once again laboring mightily to place the idea of a U.S. attack on Iran before the Bush administration leaves office back on the table. The American public and the Congress quite reasonably still have a very bad taste in their mouths from the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq, so in recent weeks we've seen renewed Cheneyista efforts to re-package a U.S. attack on Iran as something more palatable.

In Congress, the Cheneyistas are promoting a resolution demanding that the president work to ban all gas exports to Iran, which could not be achieved without a blockade, an act of war. Such a blockade would surely provoke Iranian retaliation, providing a rationale for U.S. counter-retaliation, and who can say what the end result of that cycle of escalation would be?

And in the media, the Cheneyistas are recycling the theme that if we don't act, the 'Israelis' will. The fatal flaw of this argument is that for all practical purposes, there is no such animal as an 'Israeli' attack on Iran. There is no way 'Israel' can attack Iran without U.S. approval, encouragement, and assistance, and everyone in the region knows this, so if 'Israel' were to attack Iran, everyone in the region will assume, correctly, that the attack has been approved, encouraged, and assisted by the Bush administration, and respond accordingly. The Iranians would surely retaliate against 'Israel' and the U.S., and the Bush administration would then surely retaliate against Iran; again we would be in a cycle of escalation whose outcome none can predict.

Therefore, if anyone speaks to you about an "'Israeli' attack on Iran," you should correct them: "you mean a U.S. attack on Iran." Because that's what they are talking about.