Bibi really would press the button, but Iran might hold the answer to our prayers

Thomas Greene

Why do the Western powers permit Israel to commit genocide, and extend its borders by force, and attack a superior military power like Iran that the United States will be forced to deal with? Any one of these evils should draw armed intervention from abroad, but we all know, that will never happen.

Everybody has a preferred explanation. The big three are: 1) Mossad has kompromat on literally everyone in positions of power and influence and is blackmailing them; 2) the Israel lobby shames politicians, and media execs and personalities, into submission with their favorite double-barrelled weapon: accusations of anti-Semitism and/or inadequate Holocaust remorse and anguish; and 3) the lobby’s widespread and lavish distribution of bribes in every important sphere of influence: politics, law, education, finance & commerce, defense & security, and media.

I don’t think those tactics, real though they are, represent enough combined power to paralyze the entire Western world against contamination from Israel’s grotesque crimes against nature. The unimpeded siege of Gaza should be impossible today. The postwar liberal order was built on the idea that nothing like the Shoah would ever be permitted again. And yet here we are witnessing an encore. The justifications by western authorities and media outlets are deplorable: self-defense, decapitated babies, human shields, tunnels within tunnels, and Hamas, Hamas, Hamas. Politicians and media sources can’t excuse Israel’s behavior successfully for the simple reason that is is inexcusable and virtually everyone can see it.

So why are presidents and prime ministers, news readers, interviewers and their guests, lawyers and educators, authors and entertainers, unable to say a single true word about Israel? Why are anti-genocidal and pro-Palestinian comments blocked on social media? Why are the police beating the shit out of peaceful protestors who contradict official propaganda?

The sum of all horrors
I think I can answer this. Let me ask you a quick question: what is the difference between the conflicts in Ukraine and in Gaza? Both involve underdogs bullied by a far more powerful neighbor that means them tangible harm and which doesn’t mind killing unarmed civilians.

The difference is on the bully side: the difference is between Russia and Israel, between Putin and Netanyahu.

Putin is a confident man, a rational man. We can oppose him militarily to some degree, and hate his guts, and loudly denounce him in public. He’s not going to enact anything like the Samson option: that is, he won’t torch the world merely because his plan is thwarted or his feelings are hurt. He’s got a monumentally sweet gig. It’s good to be the Putin. He’s not going to throw that away. And so the USA and the EU get away with flexing at him. He’s probably more amused than offended.

Netanyahu is different. He is emotionally unstable and morally depraved. The slightest provocation, the merest impediment to his goals — even public criticism — send him into fits of deadly mass violence. He’ll do anything to stay in office and out of prison: sacrificing two million souls in Gaza is nothing to him. Sacrificing all of the Israeli hostages is nothing to him. Sacrificing the entire IDF is nothing to him. He is an absolute degenerate. He’s the ultimate nightmare PM in the context of the Samson option: Bibi Netanyahu really would press the button.

This is the answer to pretty much every question regarding the Middle East. Why won’t the US government threaten to cut off aid to Israel to pressure the government into moderation? Because Bibi really would press the button. Why did Biden, and now Trump, permit the Israelis to defy them openly, to bully them ostentatiously in public — and, by extension, permit Israel to bully America? Because Bibi really would press the button.

A very real risk of nuclear Armageddon is the unspoken cause of the West’s castration. This is why our politicians and media elites don’t merely tolerate, but actively cover for, a demonic, Cromwellian siege in Gaza, among other atrocities.

We have no choice but permit Israel to cleanse Gaza, to annex the occupied West Bank, and to keep the land they recently stole from Lebanon and Syria — along with whatever sovereign territory they fancy next. We have to let them bomb any place they wish, assassinate whomever they please, and let them get away with the ludicrous claim that terrorists were hiding in the basement or SAMs were mounted on the roof when any fool can see them intentionally eliminating an entire apartment block to kill a single enemy who might or might not be at home.

Can anyone in power possibly be comfortable with the fact that Israel has a substantial nuclear weapons arsenal, and a PM who has repeatedly proved himself willing to cross any line, even enacting a genuine Holocaust? Israel is a nation of sociopaths governed by the Seven Princes of Hell; they’re capable of anything. The only reason they haven’t nuked Gaza is because they intend to occupy it.

Iran to the rescue?
Now, after seeing the depths of evil to which Netanyahu is pleased to descend, the world has got to ensure that Israel will no longer be able to incinerate the planet. What we need is something like the SALT treaties (Strategic Arms Limitation Talks) originally aimed at reducing the number of nukes held by the USA and the USSR. A kind of Delilah option, so to speak. And Iran might be in a position to help.

Bear with me. The Trump administration has been leaking vague tidbits about direct negotiations with Iran, but what if they’re actually three-way talks?

I suspect that Iran is farther along in nuclear arms development than our governments want known. The doomsday clock is perhaps closer to midnight than it’s ever been since the Cuban missile crisis. The negotiations we keep hearing (so little) about might be between Washington, Tehran, and Tel Aviv. And a lot of what we see reported might be mere performances.

Iran’s reply to the recent Israeli attack will be informative. If it’s severe, it will mean Iran is not to be trifled with. Bit if the reply is tame, and Iran adopts the attitude of, ‘OK we’re even now’ after a showy but ultimately unconvincing counterattack, and then we find that sanctions are lifted, and Israelis have stopped obsessing about the Iranian bomb, we’ll know that the Iranian government is cooperating. The Samson option is so terrifying that Iran might be willing to abandon its nuclear program (which the West might be willing to reward with major concessions) in exchange for Israel surrendering its nuclear arsenal or at least reducing it to deterrent size: something that virtually everyone on the planet wants to see.

I can’t help noticing that Israeli strikes against Iranian targets, even ones on Iranian soil, always exhibit an uncanny precision. Perhaps it’s a combination of luck and skill, but I find it hard to imagine that Iran’s security apparatus could be so inept. Mossad can’t be that far up in Iran’s business without an invitation. Are the theocrats clearing out military hardliners in hopes of normal relations with the West and a guarantee that Israel will be largely de-fanged, at least sufficiently to annul the Samson option?

Might the Iranians have sacrificed some of their hardline anti-Israel associates, like Ismail Haniyeh, Hassan Nasrallah, and even hawkish homies like General Mohammad Bagheri, Iran’s armed forces chief of staff; General Hossein Salami, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC); General Gholam Ali Rashid, commander of Central Headquarters; Mohammad Mehdi Tehranji, a physicist; and Fereydoun Abbasi, a nuclear scientist, all of whom were assassinated last night by Israeli strikes in Tehran?

Is Israel accepting the blame for an Iranian purge of military leaders who might buck, violently, a normalization and nuclear de-escalation agenda with Israel and the West? Was the assassination op a bit of coup d’état insurance for the Iranian government? Did something like that happen to Hezbollah leaders in Lebanon eight months ago? I mean, how did the Israelis kill everyone in charge when they can’t nail Hamas leaders right under their noses?

You’ve got to admit, it’s strange how dangerous Tehran is for Israel’s sworn enemies these days, even Iranian ones. Nearly as dangerous as Beirut last September.

Just saying.

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https://wiredgourmet.medium.com/how-israels-samson-option-castrated-the-west-377bea55e0b6