Today’s Top Stories
1. In a prime time televised presentation (see video or transcript) Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denounced Tehran for misleading the world about its nuclear program, buttressing his arguments with a trove of Iranian documents pilfered by the Mossad (I’ll come back to the Mossad angle) and verified with US intelligence.
The documents date up to 2015, before the US, Europe and Iran reached the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA, or the Iranian nuclear deal), and detail Tehran’s efforts to design, develop and test nuclear weapons. Netanyahu said Iran had violated the JCPOA by failing to disclose this activity as part of its obligation to come clean and accused Iran of holding the research for a future nuclear breakout.
Critics said the PM’s presentation didn’t say anything new and further underscored the need for the JCPOA to rein in Iran. Without saying so outright, Netanyahu seemed to suggest that President Donald Trump should pull the US out of the nuclear deal. Trump has May 12 deadline to decide. Take your pick of Haaretz, Times of Israel or Associated Press coverage. See below for much more on this story.
2. How did Israel acquire 55,000 pages, another 55,000 files and 183 CDs of documents out of Tehran and into Israel? In a widely cited piece, the New York Times reported:
The senior Israeli official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a secret mission, said that Israel’s Mossad intelligence service discovered the warehouse in February 2016, and had the building under surveillance since then.
Mossad operatives broke into the building one night last January, removed the original documents and smuggled them back to Israel the same night, the official said.
Mr. Trump was informed of the operation by the Mossad chief, Yossi Cohen, on a visit to Washington in January, the official said. The official attributed the delay in making the material public to the time it took to analyze the documents, the vast majority of which were in Persian.
Join the fight for Israel’s fair coverage in the news
3. What do the Israeli revelations mean for the Iranian nuclear deal? Where do we go from here? See below for all the commentary and analysis.
4. How Did The Guardian Change Genders of Israeli Flash Flood Victims? HonestReporting gets the record corrected.
Iran’s Nuclear Docs
• Netanyahu’s presentation shined a spotlight on Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, a senior officer in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps and a nuclear scientist. Ynet takes a closer look at what’s known about “the father of the Iranian bomb.”
• Experts explained to the Wall St. Journal (click via Twitter) why they were concerned about Iran keeping all the documents:
“The Iranians are preserving an option that can be acted upon quickly in the future,” said David Albright, president of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security.
“Why would you maintain this kind of documentation?” added Ollie Heinonen, the former director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, who favors strengthening the Iran nuclear accord. “The concern is that they are keeping it for a rainy day. We now need a bigger fix than we thought.”
• Following up on his address, Netanyahu appeared on CNN’s New Day, where he was pressed by host Chris Cuomo about whether and how the trove of of Iranian documents has changed anything. Towards the end, Cuomo tried — unsuccessfully — to get Netanyahu to acknowledge Israel’s nuclear capabilities. The PM’s US media blitz continued on Fox & Friends.
• Where do we go from here? Ynet posed that question with a number of analysts.
• See below for all the commentary/analysis.
Israel and the Palestinians
• Non-governmental organizations had their day in court to challenge the IDF’s rules of engagement along the Gaza border. The human rights groups want the High Court of Justice to declare that the rules of engagement violate international law. The Jerusalem Post was on hand for the proceedings.
• Gaza ‘fence cutter unit’ vows to breach border, retake ‘occupied lands.’ Call this another great moment in “peaceful protest.”:
“Allah willing, today we shall enter our occupied lands and ignite a revolution against the Zionist enemy in order to proclaim, loud and clear, that this enemy is destined for perdition and that what was taken by force will be regained by force alone,” the masked man said in the clip.
• Mahmoud Abbas wrote his dissertation on the Holocaust, so he knows what he’s talking about:
Abbas says Jews’ behavior, not anti-Semitism, caused the Holocaust
• Tanzania announces plan to open embassy in Israel for first time. Embassy in Ramat Gan to open on May 8.
• Nice JTA explainer video about the upcoming US embassy move to Jerusalem.
• Three eastern Jerusalem Palestinians charged with planning a terror attack for Hamas after plotting to open fire on soldiers at a bus stop.
Window into Israel
• Knesset lawmakers advanced controversial ‘Jewish state’ bill in its first reading.
The controversial, long-gestating ‘Jewish State bill’ that would enshrine the state’s Jewish character in the country’s constitutional Basic Laws passed its first reading in the Knesset early on Tuesday.
The vote passed with 64 lawmakers in favor and 50 against. It still needs to pass a second and third reading before it can become law, but there have been reports the coalition does not intend to bring it for further votes.
More on the story at Ynet.
• The Knesset authorized the prime minister to declare war in ‘extreme’ situations by consulting defense minister alone without consulting cabinet. Critics say bill is vague and removes all oversight.
Commentary
• Best overall take on the nuclear intelligence trove: Eli Lake. Whether you think the prime minister offered smoking gun or vindicated the need for the Iranian nuclear deal, the Mossad’s coup bites the credibility of US intelligence to keep tabs on Iran and raises uncomfortable questions for the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty:
Beyond the fate of the nuclear deal, the Israeli intelligence also presents a crisis for the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, to which Iran is a member. If verified, it shows that Iran has systematically lied to weapons inspectors for nearly 20 years. If Iran doesn’t pay a price for its deception, then what is to stop future rogues from following the Iran model?
• Best response to the “nothing new here” criticism: David Horovitz:
No, Israel’s contention is not that Iran is breaching the deal. It is, rather, that this agreement, far from preventing Iran from attaining a nuclear weapons arsenal, paves Iran’s path to it.
And what that haul of Iran’s own documentation conclusively demonstrated is that this is precisely what Iran intends to do. Compelled to freeze the program in 2003, Iran is merely biding its time before resuming nuclear weapons-related activities, empowered by the R&D progress it is being allowed to make under the terms of the accord.
• Most straightforward take on what this all means for Trump and the Iran deal: Wall St. Journal staff-ed (click via Twitter):
Mr. Trump has said he’ll decide by May 12 whether to withdraw from Mr. Obama’s Iran nuclear deal, and the Israeli intelligence findings are surely relevant. If Tehran is waiting until the deal sunsets starting in 2025 to rev up its reactors, then the evidence tilts toward withdrawal unless the deal can be reworked to make it permanent.
• Plenty more spilled ink and burnt pixels weighing in:
– Amb. Danny Danon: Israel and its neighbors need an Iran deal overhaul (click via Twitter)
– Oren Liebermann: Iran and Israel draw closer to war than ever
– Judah Ari Gross: Mossad’s stunning op in Iran overshadows the actual intelligence it stole
– Benny Avni: Iran’s past lies are very important now
– Maj. Gen. (ret.) Yaakov Amidror: A fantastic intelligence feat
– Yonah Jeremy Bob: What Netanyahu’s speech about ‘Iran lies’ means for the nuke deal’s future
– Con Coughlin: Israel’s only aim is to persuade Donald Trump to scrap the Iran nuclear deal – and it could work
https://twitter.com/michaeldweiss/status/991053151590666240
– Yoav Limor: Stop playing make-believe
– Raphael Ahren: PM’s Iran revelations unlikely to diminish global support for nuclear accord
– Daily Telegraph (staff-ed): A wider conflict is coming to the Middle East unless Iran mends its ways
– Prof. Abraham Ben-Zvi: Blocking Iranian nuclear proliferation
– Alyssa Katz: Netanyahu’s impressive display doesn’t answer tough questions about what the US must do now
– Amos Harel: Israel’s double front against Iran: Military strike in the morning, press conference at night
– Seth Frantzman: Iran wants to retaliate against Israel, but how?
– Yossi Verter: Netanyahu turns intelligence theater into unprecedented force
• Poor Noura Erekat: The Palestinian professor gets an oped published in a major daily (the Los Angeles Times) and it’s overtaken by developments with Iran. In any event, we addressed the issue of US funding for UNRWA.
• Here’s what else I’m reading today, believe it or not . . .
– Lt. Col. (ret.) Jonathan D. Halevi: Hamas’ warfare tactics in the “Great Return March”
– Moshe Arens: Putin’s gambit could backfire
– Smadar Perry: Between Riyadh and Tel Aviv: Spy games and secret relations
Featured image: CC BY-ND Mark Shahaf; Knesset CC BY James Emery; atom CC BY-SA DeviantArt/deejaywill;
For more, see yesterday’s Israel Daily News Stream and join the IDNS on Facebook.
Before you comment on this article, please remind yourself of our Comments Policy. Any comments deemed to be in breach of the policy will be removed at the editor’s discretion.
