BICOM

Former Mossad head Meir Dagan, past military intelligence chief Amos Yadlin and former-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert disputed the Israeli government’s assessment of the threat posed by both Iran and Syria at a conference in New York yesterday.

Speaking at a gathering organised by the Jerusalem Post, Yadlin warned that preventative military action against Iran’s nuclear facilities could be more dangerous than the reality of a nuclear Iran itself. He added that although Israel is “a very strong country… Anyone who attacks [Iran] can only delay them for five years.” Dagan criticised Israel’s government for turning “the Iranian issue from a worldwide issue to an Israeli issue.” Meanwhile, Olmert said that the immediacy of the Iranian nuclear threat had been overblown, commenting that the Israeli government took “very seriously” warnings of Iran’s impending nuclear capacity over several years but “Now, we are in the middle of 2013 – and they still don’t have it.”

However, Strategic Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz robustly defended the government’s stance, saying that “Iran is problem number one for our generation,” and said that lessons must be learnt from history in stopping a regime which pledges to destroy Jews. Steinitz also said that Israel will “do its utmost to prevent delivery” of Syria’s chemical stockpile to groups such as Hezbollah. However, he emphasised that “We never asked and never encouraged the US to take military action in Syria,” despite the White House admission last week that there was evidence of chemical weapons use by President Assad’s regime.

On Syria, Dagan played down the issue of chemical weapons use, saying that if it happened, it was “not approved by the Syrian government.” He added that Islamist regimes being established in the region “won’t be a big threat to Israel.” Olmert similarly assessed that there “is no immediate” traditional short-term military threat to Israel.