Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly agreed to a demand by U.S. President Joe Biden that Israel will not attack Iran’s oil facilities or nuclear sites in retaliation for a ballistic missile attack earlier this month.
As Breitbart News reported, Biden supported Israel’s right to defend itself, after surviving the largest ballistic missile attack in history largely unscathed, but also said that Israel should not hit Iran’s nuclear program or oil facilities.
Netanyahu appears to have agreed, bowing to Biden’s political concerns according to the Washington Post Monday:
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has told the Biden administration he is willing to strike military rather than oil or nuclear facilities in Iran, according to two officials familiar with the matter, suggesting a more limited counterstrike aimed at preventing a full-scale war.
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When Biden and Netanyahu spoke Wednesday — their first call in more than seven weeks after months of rising tensions between the two men — the prime minister said he was planning to target military infrastructure in Iran, according to a U.S. official and an official familiar with the matter. Like others in this story, they spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive deliberations.
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The retaliatory action would be calibrated to avoid the perception of “political interference in the U.S. elections,” the official familiar with the matter said, signaling Netanyahu’s understanding that the scope of the Israeli strike has the potential to reshape the presidential race.
The Biden-Harris administration announced this week that it would send Israel a Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) battery, manned by U.S. troops, which may have been an incentive for Netanyahu to accede.
It is possible that Israel could attack Iran’s missile sites, then carry out a more ambitious attack after the U.S. elections on November 5, citing Iran’s continuing strategic threat to its security and to other states in the region.
It is also possible that the entire leak could be an elaborate ruse designed to conceal Israel’s true attack plans.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Agenda: What Trump Should Do in His First 100 Days, available for pre-order on Amazon. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
