The manipulation of public opinion to this effect may well beconsidered too phantasmagoric to merit any detailed description.Still, the readers of this report should take careful notice of thismanipulation, especially since to all appearances the IsraeliSecurity System does envisage the prospect seriously. Minute-detail-filled anticipations of Iran becoming a major target of Israelipolicies reached a peak of intensity in February 1992. In thisreport I am going to confine myself to a sample of recentpublications (in view of the monotony of their contents a samplewill suffice), emphasizing how they envisage the possibility of"persuading" the West that Iran must be defeated. All Hebrew papershad shared in advocacy of this madness, with the exception ofHaaretz which has not dared to challenge it either. The Zionist"left" papers, Davar and Al Hamishmar have particularlydistinguished themselves in bellicosity on the subject of Iran; moreso than the rightwing Maariv. Below, I will cover mostly the recentwritings of Al Hamishmar and Maariv on Iran, only occasionallymentioning what I found in other papers.

A major article of the current chief political correspondent of AlHamishmar, Yo’av Kaspi, bears the title that already encapsulatesall its contents: "Iran needs to be treated just as Iraq had been"(February 19, 1993). The article contains an interview with DanielLeshem, introduced as "a retired senior officer in the [Israeli]Military Intelligence, and currently a member of the Center forStrategic Research at the Tel Aviv University". Leshem is known asinvolved in forming Israeli strategies. Leshem’s account of howIran’s nuclearization is too dubious to merit coverage on thesepages; and so are his lamentations that "the world" has beenignoring the warnings of the Israeli experts who alone know thetruth about what the Muslim states are like. His proposals toreverse the progress of Iranian nuclearization, however, are by allmeans worth of being quoted or at least reported. Leshem begins byopining that the Allied air raids of Iraq achieved very little todestroy its military and especially nuclear capabilities, but owingto the Allied victory on the ground, the U.N. observers couldsucceed in finishing the job. Harping on this "analogy", Leshemconcludes: "The State of Israel alone can do very little to halt theIranians. We could raid Iran from the air, but we cannotrealistically expect that our aerial operations could destroy alltheir capabilities. At best, some Iranian nuclear installationscould in this way be destroyed. But we couldn’t possibly thus reachthem all, nor even their major centers of nuclear development,especially since that development has proceeded along threedifferent lines in a fairly decentralized manner, with installationsand factories scattered widely across the country. It is evenreasonable to suppose that we will never know the locations of alltheir installations, just as we didn’t know it in Iraq’s case".Leshem believes that Israel should make Iran fear Israeli nuclearweapons, but without hoping that it might deter the Iranians fromdeveloping their own.

Hence Leshem’s proposal "to create the situation which wouldappear similar to that with Iraq before the Gulf crisis". Hebelieves this could "stop the Ayatollas, if this is what the worldreally wants". How to do it? "Iran claims its sovereignty over threestrategically located islands in the Persian Gulf. Domination overthose islands is capable of assuring domination not only over allthe already active oilfields of the area, but also over all thenatural gas sources not yet exploited. We should hope that,emulating Iraq, Iran would contest the Gulf Emirates and SaudiArabia over these islands and, repeating Saddam Hussein’s mistake inKuwait, start a war. This may lead to an imposition of controls overthe Iranian nuclear developments the way it did in Iraq. Thisprospect is in my view quite likely, because the Iranians lackpatience. But if they nevertheless refrain from opening a war, weshould take advantage, for example, of their involvement in theIslamic terror which already hurts the entire world. Right now,Israel has incontestable intelligence, he implies, that the Iraniansare about to resume the kidnappings. We should take advantage of itby persistently explaining to the world at large that by virtue ofits involvement in terrorism, no other state is as dangerous as isIran. For example, I [Lesham] cannot comprehend why Libya has beenhit by grievous sanctions, to the point that all sales of militaryequipment are barred to it, only because of its rather minorinvolvement in terrorism; while Iran, with its record of guidingterrorism against the entire world, remains scot free of such oreven stricter sanctions".

In a true-blue Israeli style, Leshem attributes this lamentablestate of affairs to Israel’s neglect of its public relations (calledin Hebrew "Hasbara", i.e "Explanation"). He nevertheless hopes thatIsrael will soon be able "to explain to the world at large" howurgent is the need to provoke Iran to a war.

Provoking Iran, whether into responding by a war or by measuresstopping short of a war, is also elaborated by the editor and formermilitary correspondent of Maariv, Ya’akov Erez ("Iran is anexistential threat", February 12). It is useful to note that Maarivis currently owned by Ofer Nimrodi, the son of Ya’akov Nimrodi whobefore the fall of the Shah had been an Israeli military attache inTehran, who had maintained the most amicable relations with the Shahand some of his high-ranking officials; and who later becameinvolved in the Irangate up to his ears.

Contrary to Leshem, Erez claims that, not only the future Iraniannuclear power, but also its conventional army whose present size hedescribes as "having no limits", poses "an existential threat" toIsrael. In the absence of sanctions prohibiting the sales of"defensive weapons" to Iran, several states, much to Erez’s chagrin,continue to supply Iran with arms, thus aggravating "the existentialthreat" to Israel. He therefore proposes that Israel "persuades theU.S." to enforce an embargo on exmports of weaponry and otherindustrial goods to Iran from any state. For example, "if reallypersuaded, the U.S. Navy could hopefully blockade even North Korea",and thus prevent the latter’s sales of lethal weapons to Iran. Erezthinks this could be done "without particular difficulties". He alsoadvocates "persuading" the U.S. to use all its clout to makeEuropean countries comply with Israeli wishes in this matter. Amongcountries listed by Erez as needing such "persuasions", we find notonly the NATO members such as Britain, France or Germany but alsoSwitzerland.

The whole scheme will according to Erez rest on three assumptions.The first is that "Iranian messengers are reaching every spot in theworld in order to foment what they call `a silent revolution’", withthe effect of "encouraging terror everywhere", or else "invitingpotential terrorists to their centers and actually training themthere". In contrast with this bombast, the list of acts of terrorattributed by Erez (without proof) to Iranians is rather meager: inthe last year no more than three instances. They are: thedestruction of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires (which took placeseveral days after the liquidation of Sheikh Mussawi with his entirefamily; a circumstance which Erez doesn’t mention), the failedattempt to kill the head of the Jewish community in Istanbul (whichthe Turkish authorities attribute to the local Mafia), and theassassination of a security officer in the Israeli Embassy inAnkara.

Even if Iran were involved in all three acts, this hardlycorroborates Erez’s "existential threat" thesis. But let me make anenlightened guess as to the course of Israeli "hasbara". The numberof terrorist incidents, not necessarily involving the loss of Jewishlives, but "attributable" to Iran, can be expected to considerablyincrease the next year so as to make "the persuasion" downrightirresistible. The second assumption is that the Iranian threat tooil resources "is really far greater than that which was caused bythe invasion of Kuwait". Why? "Because all Arab Gulf states, andthereby the sources of Western oil supplies, would thus be exposedmuch more directly than they were at that time. It would no longerbe a case of invading a single state and seizing its oilfields, buta direct threat to all immense spaces of the Arab peninsula and tothe freedom of sailing in the Gulf". The third assumption is that awar against Iran can be fought with perfect ease, with all genuineArab progressives standing to reap immense advantages from it. "Amilitary attack devised to nip the Iranian threat in the bud musthave firm foundations in an alliance with the genuinely progressiveArab states, such as Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Emirates". Turkeywill also be rescued from "a threat to its very survival posed by amillion of Iranians within its borders whom Iran can easily incite".But a war against Iran is bound to rescue other Arab states aswell. Egypt, for example, will only rejoice when freed "fromIran-engineered incitement".

The Palestinians are also not forgotten in this context. Theiropposition to "the peace process" has no rationale apart from theIranian influence on them, says Erez, parroting the official line ofthe "experts in Arab mentality" adopted since the mass expulsion.The defeat of Iran will calm them down. As some still remember,Rabin attributed the outbreak of the Intifada to Iranian and Libyanincitement as its sole cause, thus setting an official Israeli linefor a considerable amount of time. Israeli "experts in Arabmentality" never tire of attributing all signs of unrest to"incitement", preferably manufactured abroad.

In the same issue of Maariv, Telem Admon reports that "a seniorIsraeli", i.e. a senior Mossad agent, "about two weeks ago had along conversation with the son of the late Shah, prince Riza Sha’aPahlevi", presumably in order to appraise the man’s possibleusefulness for Israeli "Hasbara". In the "senior’s" opinion,"Clinton’s America is too absorbed in its domestic affairs", as aresult of which "the prince’s chances of reigning in Iran aredeplorably slim. The prince’s face showed signs of distress after heheard a frank assessment to this effect from the mouth of anIsraeli". Yet "the senior’s" appraisal of the prince was distinctlynegative, in spite of "the princely routine to hand to all visitorscopies of articles by Ehud Ya’ari", (an Israeli TV commentatorsuspected of being a front for the Israeli Intelligence.) Why? Inthe first place because "he shows up how nervous he is. His kneesjerked during the first half an hour of the conversation". Worsestill, his chums "were dressed like hippies", while "he keptfrequenting the Manhattan’s haunts in their company and addressingthem as if they were his equals".

The "senior" deplores it greatly that the prince emancipatedhimself from the beneficial influence of his mother, "who had done asimply wonderful job travelling from capital to capital in order toimpress everybody concerned by her hope to enthrone her son in Iranwhile she is still alive". Her valiant efforts look to me as ifconnected, to some extent at least, to the no less valiant effortsof the Israeli "Hasbara", after it has already written off her son.The new Israeli attitude toward the "progressive" Arab regimes isalso mentioned by Haaretz New York correspondent Shlomo Shamir(February 19) who deals with them in a Palestinian context. Shamirdescribes at length the role of the Moroccan Ambassador to the U.N.,who in February was the President of the Security Council. Acting onpersonal instructions of king Hassan II, he was instrumental "inconvincing the Security Council members from the Third World statesto accept the agreement between Israel and the U.S. concerning theexpellees". In the opinion of the Israeli Foreign Affairs ministry,informs Shamir, Morocco’s help "is attributable to the fear someprogressive Arab states have of Islamic fundamentalism asrepresented by Iran". Due to that factor, those states can beexpected to support Israel on many political issues. According tothe well-informed Pinhas Inbari (Al Hamishmar, February 12) it wasSaudi Arabia which stood behind the Moroccan initiative. In Shamir’sopinion, "the PLO either grasped the real state of affairs in theU.N. belatedly or not yet". Israel places its hopes in those"progressive" Arab states, expecting them to continue doing whatthey have been doing.

Describing Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Emirates as "progressive"must be seen as a specialty of those Hebrew press commentators whosehabit is to nostalgically stare at the government for inspiration.(Kuwait is not so described because its atrocious persecutions ofthe Palestinians are eminently exploitable by the Israelipropaganda.)

Even the most expert of the Israeli "experts" could not yet comeout with an explantion of what exactly their "progress" consistedof. This is why the label keeps being used without any explanation.Nevertheless, presumably to reinforce their impression of"progress", Israeli censorship has in recent months rigidlysuppressed all news which might cast a doubt upon their"progressiveness". This is nothing new. In the past, censorshiprepeatedly silenced the news likewise: from Mengistu’s Ethiopia,Numeiri’s Sudan, Ceausescu’s Romania and from other regimes withsimilar virtues. It is true that in conformity with Leshem’saccount, Iran had indeed claimed the three islands. But itsubsequently agreed to seriously negotiate their status. This factwas already duly suppressed by Israeli military censorship.But what might happen if both Israel and Iran have nuclearweapons? This question is being answered by the Hebrew press atlength, often in manner intended to titillate the readers byanticipated horrors. Let me give a small sample, choosing also anarticle relating to the Palestinians. Two "analytical" articles ofAl Hamishmar and Maariv summed up above, were accompanied by muchlonger pieces stuffed with the "scenarios" competing one with theother in inventing the possible horrors. In Al Hamishmar, Kaspiinterviewed the notorious hawk, professor Shlomo Aharonson, whobegins his perorations by excoriating the Israeli left as a majorobstacle to Israel’s ability to resist Iranian evildoing. Withoutbothering about the left’s current lack of political clout, saysAharonson: "The left is full of prejudices and fears. It refuses tobe rational on the nuclear issue. The left doesn’t like nuclearweapons, fullstop. The opposition of the Israeli left to nuclearweapons is reminiscent of the opposition to the invention of thewheel". Profound insights, aren’t they?

After spelling them out, Aharonson proceeds to his "scenarios".Here is just one of them: "If we tomorrow establish a Palestinianstate, we will really grant a sovereignty to an entity second tonone in hostility toward us. This entity can be expected to reach anuclear alliance with Iran right away. Suppose the Palestinians openhostilities against us and the Iranians deter us from retaliatingagainst the Palestinians by threatening to retaliate in turn againstus by nuclear means. What could we do then?" There is a lot more inthe same vein, before Aharonson concludes: "We should see to it thatno Palestinian state ever comes into being, even if the Iraniansthreaten us with nuclear weapons. And we should also see to it thatIran lives in permanent fear of Israeli nuclear weapons". Thisappears in the Mapam party organ which "explains" abroad that itsumbrella list, the Meretz, is committed to the establishment of aPalestinian state, "following a period of autonomy". And such"explanations" for the consumptions of foreigners are still widelybelieved!

Erez’ article is also printed next to a much lengthier article,stuffed with horror scenarios even more ghastly then Aharonson’s. Itis written by Avner Avrahami and it bears the title "1999: the yearof the Iranian nuclear bomb". It will suffice to quote its openingsentences alone: "What are you planning to do in 1999? To finallyterminate the payments on your mortgage? To celebrate a Barmitzvafor your son, who is now 7? To use some money you are now saving inorder to tour the U.S. from coast to coast which has been the dreamof your lifetime? To retire from work and then to build foryourself a dream of a house, surrounded by a large garden, perhapsin Israel or perhaps in some of the settlements in the Territories”Whatever you want to do in 1999, will be done under an ever hoveringthreat: that an Iranian nuclear bomb may fall on you… According tothe best expertly estimates, 1999 is the latest date for Iran toacquire a nuclear bomb. But it can happen even sooner…"

Let me reiterate that the Israelis are now being bombardedceaselessly with such messages. And official announcements to thesame effect are also not lacking. For example, general Ze’ev Livneh,the commander of the recently set up "Rear General Command" of theIsraeli army said (Haaretz, February 15) that "it is not only Iranwhich already endangers every site in Israel" because, even if to alesser extent, "Syria, Libya and Algeria do too". In order toprotect Israel from this danger, general Livneh calls upon "theEuropean Community to enforce jointly with Israel an embargo on anyweaponry suplies to both Iran and the Arab states. The EuropeanCommunity should also learn that military interventions can havesalutary effects, as proven recently in Iraq’s case".

Timid reminders of the Hebrew press that Israel continues to havethe monopoly of nuclear weapons in the Middle East, were definitelyunwelcomed by Israeli authorities. In Hadashot of January 29 andFebruary 5, Ran Edelist, careful to rely only on quotes from theU.S. press, raised the problem of the nuclear waste disposal fromthe rather obsolete Dimona reactor and of other possible risks ofthat reactor to Israeli lives and limbs. He was "answered" bynumerous interviews with named and unnamed experts, all of whomfiercely denied that any such risks existed. The experts didn’tneglect to reassure their readers on this occasion that the Israelireactor was the best and the safest in the entire world. Butspeaking in the name of "the Intelligence Community" Immanuel Rosen(Maariv, February 12) went even further. He disclosed that the said"community" had felt offended "by overly self-confident publicationsof an Israeli researcher dealing with nuclear subjects. Thisresearcher has recently been found by the Inteligence Community topose `a security risk’, to the point of observing that in somestates such a researcher `would have been made to disappear’". RanEdelist did react in a brief note (Hadashot, February 14), confininghimself to quoting these revealing ideas of "the InteligenceCommunity", and drawing attention to threats voiced there. But apartfrom Edelist, the press of "the only democracy in the Middle East"either didn’t dare comment, or was not allowed to.

Yet the press is allowed, and even encouraged, to discuss oneissue related to Israeli nuclear policies. It is allowed to say howclever Peres was in pretending to agree to negotiate nucleardisarmament treaties, and then raising unacceptable conditions forentering any such negotiations. An example of this is Akiva Eldar’s(Haaretz, February 19), coverage of Rabin’s excoriation of Egypt onTV a few days earlier. Rabin scolded Egypt for suggesting that aMiddle East regional nuclear disarmament agreement would bedesirable. Eldar comments that "Rabin’s attack was aimed at Peres noless than at Egypt". And he goes on: "The Prime Minister is known toloathe anything that relates to Egypt. Aiming at Butrous Ghali, hesaid [in a public speech]: `What can you expect of him? Isn’t he anEgyptian?’ But Rabin is particulrly averse to Egyptian insistencethat the Middle East should be completely denuclearized. Peres, bycontrast, favors using Egypt as an intermediary in variousdiplomatic pursuits, while recognizing that Cairo’s reminders on thesubject of Dimona obstruct his real mission, which is to mediatebetween Egypt and the grand man in Jerusalem". Therefore, after"Egypt recently invited Israel to a symposium that `would deal withboth conventional and non-conventional armed confrontations’, ahigh-level discussion was held in the Foreign ministry on how topretend to accept the invitation and then `decline it elegantly’.The solution was to communicate to Egypt the Israeli agreement inprinciple to attend the symposium, but on three conditions: that itbe chaired by the U.S. and Russia; that its agenda be unanimouslydetermined by the chairmen and all the participants; and, mostinterestingly, that no weapon reductions be discussed unless thepresence of other Arab states (not just of Syria and Lebanon, butalso – hard to believe – of Libya and Iraq) be in advance assured.In this way, any conceivable discussion of nuclear affairs waseffectively precluded". I find it superfluous to comment on Eldar’sstory.

But I do want to make some commments of my own on the incitementof Israelis against Iran. I am well-aware that a lot of expertopinions and predictions quoted in this report will sound to foreignreaders like fantasy running amok. Yet I perceive those opinions andpredictions, no matter how mendacious and deceitful they obviouslyare, as being politically significant. Let me explain my reasons. Inthe first place, I didn’t quote the opinions of raving extremists. Iwas careful to select only the writings of the respected andinfluential Israeli experts or commentators on strategic affairs whocan be presumed to be well-acquainted with the thinking of theIsraeli Security System. Since militarily Israel is the strongeststate in the Middle East and has monopoly of nuclear weapons in theregion, strategical doctrines of its Security System deserve to bedisseminated worldwide, especially when they are forcefully pressedupon the Israeli public. Whether one likes it or not, Israel is agreat power, not only in military but also in political terms, byvirtue of its increasing influence upon U.S. policies as describedin report 116. The opinions of the Israeli Security System may meansomething different from what they say. But this doesn’t detractfrom their importance.

But there is more to it. Fantasy and madness in the doctrines ofthe Israeli Security System are nothing new. At least since theearly 1950s those qualities could already be noticed. Let us justrecall that in 1956 Ben Gurion wanted to annex Sinai to Israel onthe ground that "it was not Egypt". The same doctrine was professedin 1967-73 with elaborations, such as the proposal of severalgenerals to conquer Alexandria in order to hold the city hostageuntil Egypt would sign peace on terms dictated by Israel.The 1982 invasion of Lebanon relied on fantastic assumptions, andso did the 1983 "peace treaty" signed with a "lawful Lebanesegovernment".

All Israeli policies in the Territories are not just totallyimmoral, but also rely on assumptions steadily held and advocatedwithout regard for their fanciful contents. It will suffice torecall how Rabin together with the entire Israeli Security Systemperceived the outbreak of the Intifada as a fabrication of westernTV and press. They concluded that if the Arabs are deniedopportunities to fake riots in order to be photographed, the unrestin the Territories could be suppressed with ease.

Relevant to this is the fact that Israeli policies bear the easilyrecognizable imprint of Orientalist "expertise" abounding inmilitarist and racist ideological prejudices. This "expertise" isreadily available in English, since its harbingers were not so muchthe Israelis as the foreign Jewish Orientalists like Bernard Lewisor the late Elie Kedourie who had visited Israel regularly for thesake of hobnobbing on the best of terms with the Israeli SecuritySystem. Yet all too often this "expertise" is being ignored. It wasKedourie who performed a particularly seminal role in fathering itsassumptions and who consequently had in Israel a lot of influence.In Kedourie’s view, the peoples of the Middle East, with the"self-evident" exception of Israel, would be best off if ruled byforeign imperial powers with a natural capacity to rule: certainlyfor a long time yet. Kedourie also believed that the entire MiddleEast could be ruled by foreign powers with perfect ease, becausetheir domination would hardly be opposed except by grouplets ofintellectuals bent on rousing the rabble. Kedourie lived in Britain,and his primary concern was British politics. In his opinion theBritish refused to continue to rule the Middle East, with calamitouseffects, only because of intellectual corruption of their ownexperts, especially those from the Chatham House, misguided enoughto dismiss the superior expertise of minority nationals,particularly Jewish, from the Arab world, who alone had known "theArab nature" at first hand. For example, in his first book, Kedouriesays that already in 1932 (!) the British government was misguidedenough to grant Iraq independence (it was faked, but never mind)against the express advice of the Jewish community in Baghdad. Onmany occasions during his recurrent visits to Israel since the 1960suntil his death (one of which I myself attended), Kedourie wouldassure his Israeli audiences that Iraq could "really" be still ruledby the British with ease, under whatever disguises it would beconvenient to adopt, provided only the grouplets of rabble rouserswould be dealt with by a modicum of salutary toughness, and theopportunities for education would be restricted so as not to producesuperfluous intellectuals, prone to learn the Western notions ofnational independence.

True, Kedourie also opposed the idea of exclusive Jewish right tothe Land of Israel as incompatible with his imperialistic outlook,but he favored the retention of Israeli permanent rule over thePalestinians. The rather incongruous blend of Kedourie’s ideas withthe Land of Israel messianism is already an innovation, of theIsraeli Security System vintage.

Israeli policies toward Egypt have been consistently guided byKedourie’s doctrine. Recall the Lavon Affair, whose purpose was toensure that British troops would occupy Egyptian territory forever.Recall the establishment of an informal but pervasive Americanprotectorate over Egypt through the Camp David accords. Until thisday, the real Israeli aim is to control Egypt indirectly by usingone or another Western power for this purpose. Israeli policiestoward all other Middle Eastern nations are similar, except that thestronger Israel feels the more it tries to replace western hegemonyby its own.

The implications of the Kedourie doctrine for Israeli policymakers are obvious. First, Israel always seeks to persuade the Westabout what it "true" interests and "moral duties" in the Middle Eastare. It also tells them that by intervening in the Middle East theywould serve the authentic interests of Middle Eastern nations. Butif the Western powers refuse to listen, it is up to Israel to assume"the white man’s burden" as defined more than 100 years ago.Another implication of the Kedourie’s doctrine, acted upon byIsrael since the early 1950s, is that no strong state is to betolerated in the Middle East. Its power must be destroyed or atleast diminished through a war. Iranian theocracy may have itsutility for the Israeli hasbara, but Nasser’s Egypt was attackedwhile being emphatically secular. In both cases the real reason forIsraeli offer to start a war was the strength of the stateconcerned. Quite apart from the risks such state may pose to Israelihegemonic ambitions, the Orientalist "expertise" requires that thenatives of the region always remain weak, especially when ruled notby their traditional notables but by intellectuals, whetherreligious or secular.

Before World War I, such principles were taken for granted in theWest, professed openly and applied globally, from China to Mexico.Israeli Orientalism is no more than their belated replica. Itcontinues to uphold opinions which, say in 1903, were widely takenfor granted as "scientific" truths. All the subsequent "troubles" ofthe West are perceived by the Israeli experts as a well-deservedpunishment for listening to its intellectuals who had been castingdoubt on such self-evident truths. Without such rottenintellectuals, everything would have remained stable. Israeliexperts replicate this logic when they insist that a tiny little bitof escalated repression could (after nearly 26 years of trying!)make the Palestinian masses in the Territories "psychologicallycollapse" and instantly acquiesce to the Israeli diktat.Let us return to the special case of Iran, though. Anyone notconverted to the Orientalistic creed will recognize that Iran is acountry very difficult to conquer because of its size, topography,and especially bcause of the fervent nationalism combined with thereligious zeal of its populace. I happen to loathe the currentIranian regime, but it doesn’t hinder me from immediately noticinghow different it is from Saddam Hussein’s. Popular support forIran’s rulers is much greater than for Iraq’s. After Saddam Husseinhad invaded Iran, his troops were resisted valiantly under extremelydifficult conditions.

All analogies between a possible attack on Iran and the Gulf Warare therefore irresponsibly fanciful. Yet Sharon and the Israeliarmy commanders in 1979 proposed to send a detachment of Israeliparatroopers to Tehran to quash the revolution and restore themonarchy. Until stopped by Begin, they really thought that a fewIsraeli paratroopers could determine the future history of a countryas immense and populous as Iran! According to a consensus ofofficial Israeli experts on Iranian affairs, the fall of the Shahwas due solely to his "softness", in particular to his refraining toorder his army to slaughter thousands of demonstrators wholesale.Later, the Israeli experts on Iranian affairs were no lessunanimous in predicting a speedy defeat of Iran by Saddam Hussein.No evidence indicates that they have changed their assumptions ordiscarded their underlying racism. Their ranks may include somerelatively less opinionated individuals, who have survived thenegative selection process which usually occurs within groupssharing such ideologically-tight imageries. But such individuals canbe assumed to prefer to keep their moderation to themselves, whilehoping that Israel can reap some fringe benefits from any Westernprovocation against Iran, even if it results in a protracted andinconclusive war.

I hope I have made it clear why I tend to treat Israeli officialexperts on Iranian affairs seriously, in spite of their evidentmadness.