Comments on reads 1/16 (UPDATED)

Elliott Abrams: How Not To React To Provocations From Iran

If there is any chance of avoiding a military confrontation with Iran or the Iranian acquisition of nuclear weapons, that chance will be the product of very resolute American policy toward Iran. In the last few days we have seen more evidence that such a policy is lacking.
First came the report that Iranian boats are harassing American naval vessels in the  Persian Gulf.

Iranian Navy speed boats harassed US naval vessels in two recent incidents in the Strait of Hormuz, a senior US defense official said, confirming a CNN report. The first incident occurred as the USS New Orleans, an amphibious transport ship, was sailing last week through the Strait of Hormuz into the Persian Gulf. Three Iranian Navy speed boats rapidly approached within 500 yards of the US ship, according to US officials cited by CNN. The second incident involved a US Coast Guard cutter off the Kuwaiti coast, similarly approached by an Iranian speedboat. Sailors aboard the cutter USCGC Adak reported seeing Iranians aboard the speed boat brandishing AK-47 assault rifles and a heavy machine gun, CNN said. “I can confirm there was some harassment,” a senior official told AFP.

How do we respond to such provocations?  Here is one possible answer:

Israel and the United States have postponed a massive joint defense exercise, which was expected to be carried out in the coming weeks, in order to avoid an escalation with Iran, Channel 2 reported on Sunday.

That is the wrong response, especially at a moment when Iran is going full steam ahead with its nuclear program and now indulging itself in direct threats to Gulf oil producers. Here is a new report:

Iran has starkly warned Gulf states not to make up for any shortfall in its oil exports under new U.S. and EU sanctions, adding yet another layer of peril to the international showdown over its nuclear programme. If Arab neighbours compensate for a looming EU ban on Iranian imports, “we would not consider these actions to be friendly,” Iran’s representative to OPEC, Mohammad Ali Khatibi, was quoted as saying by the Sharq newspaper on Sunday. “They will be held responsible for what happens” in that case, he said, adding ominously: “One cannot predict the consequences.”

Iran’s Arab neighbors are not rattled, as this story suggests:

Saudi Arabia says it has enough oil output capacity to meet global customers’ needs if new sanctions keep Iran from exporting oil, a top U.S. Republican lawmaker said on Friday. House of Representatives Majority Leader Eric Cantor spoke to Reuters by telephone from Europe after several days of meetings in the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia. Saudi oil minister Ali al-Naimi was among the officials he met. “The Saudi government indicatedthat it was ready and able to meet needs of its customers,” Cantor told Reuters.

In fact, comparing this Saudi reaction to the cancellation of the US-Israel maneuvers, we are perhaps more rattled than they– which if accurate is a sad story, as is the story of failures to react to completely unprovoked harassment by the Iranian navy. Surely such an American stance will do nothing to persuade Iran’s rulers that we are serious about preventing their acquisition of nuclear weapons by whatever means necessary and that “all options are on the table.” Such a stance therefore makes an eventual confrontation between the United States and Iran, or U.S. acquiescence in the Iranian nuclear program, more likely.

FP: Didn’t I say that the US is deterred by Iran? Has been America.

 
Barry Rubin: The era of the Muslim Brotherhood

The alternative wishful-thinking theory is that being in power will moderate the brotherhood. Participating in elections, proposing laws in parliament, and running government departments is supposed to convert brotherhood leaders to compromise and pragmatism.


For Israelis, however, all of these claims sound precisely like the argument made during the 1990s’ peace process and regarding Yasser Arafat. This argument also didn’t work in Iran, Lebanon, or the Gaza Strip.
True, the radical regimes are more cautious in their pronouncements and don’t instantly launch wars. But that is because they are consolidating power at home and are just getting started. Even in Turkey, the Islamists in power have worked tirelessly to transform their societies, assure that they never lose power, and radicalize their foreign policies. Turkey’s break with Israel and alignment with Hamas and Hezbollah provides a vivid case study.

FP: Those who don’t learn from the past and defy reality, are doomed to repeat it and will not survive.



Hackers crash Tel Aviv Stock Exchange and El Al websites

Tit-for-tat cyberwar between Israeli and Saudi hackers escalates as alleged Saudi hacker threatens to target Israeli sites day before they crash • "0xOmar" taunts Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon in video interview broadcast on Israeli television.

 Zappos Says Hackers May Have Accessed Customer Account Details
The account information for millions of customers at Zappos.com, an online shoe and clothing company, may have been compromised by a hacking attack, the company’s chief executive, Tony Hsieh, wrote on Sunday in an e-mail to employees.


FP:  See what I mean? The online recorded life is in existential danger. 
  
UPDATE: And Hamas knows a good thing when it sees it:

Hamas Calls for Escalation in Internet Hacking Against Israel
 In this day and age it pays to not be automated and on the Net.
 
 
Ultra-Orthodox sect stages mass riots over fraud arrests

Following the arrest of five members of an extremist ultra-Orthodox sect on suspicion of massive financial offenses, members of the sect riot in the streets of Jerusalem and Beit Shemesh • Protesters pelt police with rocks, call them "Nazis."

FP: Israel’s other existential problem.