The imperatives are plain. Whatever the trajectory of wars in the region, Israel has a law-based obligation to keep Iran non-nuclear. Immediately and incrementally, therefore, Jerusalem will need to ensure “escalation dominance” during periods of competitive risk-taking.
This overriding responsibility concerns both Iran’s sub-state proxies (especially Shiite Hezbollah and Sunni Hamas) and Iran directly. What are the pertinent particulars? Though Iran remains pre-nuclear, there are variously complex scenarios in which Israel could still feel compelled to cross the nuclear conflict threshold. this would mean an “asymmetrical nuclear war.
” Israel’s Iran problem lies in the details, in tactical and strategic particulars. At this point, the calculable odds of any Israeli preemption against Iran – a singular act of “anticipatory self-defense” under international law – are plausibly low. While Israel could plan on certain law-based acts of nuclear asset sabotage against Iran (e.
g., actions along the lines of Israel’s earlier Stuxnet interventions and its cyber-attacks against Iran’s Natanz reactor enrichment processes), any such piecemeal strategy would be (1) perilously ; and (2) continuously subject to adversarial intra-war modifications. At the conceptual heart of Israel’s evolving strategic policies are exceedingly complex elements of nuclear deterrence.
To wit, Israel should promptly shift from its traditional stance of “deliberate nuclear ambiguity�.