Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu
US President Joe Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu today that the United States would oppose any direct Israeli counterattack against Iran, according to an Axios report citing a “senior House official White “.
Two things:
1) If the United States doesn’t want war, that makes sense. Besides oil prices, I see many reasons why Biden would not want this war now.
2) Could this be a smokescreen? Things like this don’t “leak” from the White House. This would be one of the most confidential information on the planet. So, was this leak leaked to pressure Israel? Reduce expectations about real US involvement? Or is this a fake to get Iran to let down its guard?
The answer to that question may have to do with what was said behind closed doors when Iran briefed the United States, Italy and a number of other countries ahead of its response.
Iran could have given diplomats a rough idea of what it was going to do and could have said that no one was likely to be harmed. It may also have launched several ballistic missiles into highly sensitive regions to prove that it could do so. Reports (if true) indicate that Iran struck near an Israeli military base and near a port on the other side of the country. The message could be to say: We missed on purpose but we could hit you anywhere we want. Perhaps Iran was looking for an opportunity to show Israel that its defenses were not foolproof? Perhaps all the warning and easy-to-down drones were effective and a gift to Israel to show its people the strength of its defense.
Iran obviously thinks this is how things will be done, which is why this tweet was so clear. If this produces the desired effect, you could argue this is the most important tweet ever sent.
The timing, clarity and broad scope of this crisis have made it clear that Iran does not want war.
Iran therefore does not want war. We can also take the White House literally, saying it doesn’t want war either.
The frightening miscalculation would be that Netanyahu do envy or a war, or feels that he must answer this. And if he has to and the US is sincere, is there another face-saving step he could take without US support and without further provoking Iran? Will he try to follow this dangerous line?
Or maybe he thinks it’s a good time to deal with Israel’s archenemy forever?
It’s a dangerous 24 hours ahead.
cnbctv18-forexlive
