Israel's General Patton Moment

Despite the close partnership between Trump and Netanyahu and the truly historic cooperation between the U.S. armed forces and the IDF, America and Israel inhabit utterly different realities.

By Michael Oren

In the classic 1970 film “Patton,” the famous World War II general visits the North African front where a senior British commander assures him that the Royal Air Force enjoys total air superiority. A second later, German planes attack the base. Patton, taking cover under a table together with the British commander, quips “you were discussing air superiority?”

I was thinking about that scene Tuesday night when, during his press conference, President Trump declared victory over Iran, my family and I were sheltering in our safe room. The moment reminded me that, despite the close partnership between the president and our prime minister and the truly historic cooperation between the U.S. armed forces and the IDF, America and Israel inhabit utterly different realities.

In the American reality, the near complete destruction of Iran’s military capabilities, the obliteration of its nuclear plants and ballistic missile making facilities, and the elimination of its senior leadership, can indeed be seen as a victory. For Israel, though, any outcome of the war that will allow the Iranian regime to rebuild its nuclear and ballistic sites, retain enough enriched uranium for eleven atomic bombs, and continue to support its terrorist proxies, is far from victorious. It is an outcome which means that in ten or even five years from now we may have to fight this war again and perhaps have to fight it alone. In the interim, we will have to grapple with Iran’s revived terrorist proxies, above all Hezbollah.

Much will depend on Iran’s response to the administration’s fifteen-point peace plan and whether the United States will agree to a month-long ceasefire during the negotiations. Or, if the Iranians reject the fifteen points, the United States will cease operations unilaterally. Israel’s fear is that the Iranians will once again drag out the talks and water down the fifteen points, reducing them to a mere framework. We saw how the twenty-point plan for Gaza stalled over Hamas’s refusal to relinquish its guns. What will happen, Israelis may well ask, if Iran agrees in principle to the points but then, like Hamas, refuses to implement them?

Heavily dependent on U.S. munitions and fuel supplies and on American diplomatic backing, Israel would be hard pressed to carry on the war against Iran alone. Much as he did during last summer’s war, Trump could compel us to stop. Still, now may well be the time to secure American recognition of a new defensive buffer zone south of the Litani river in Lebanon and our right to continue clandestine operations against the Iranian regime. Now would be an excellent time for the United States to sell us, finally, B2 bombers. Having earned a great amount of American goodwill during this war and respect as an ally, Israel can enter into an intimate discussion with the White House about the best ways to reconcile America’s reality with ours.