Israel Says It Has ‘Significantly Accelerated’ Plans for Attacking Iran
The head of Israel’s military general staff says the Israeli army has “substantially accelerated” its plans for attacking Iran.
Avi Kohavi, in an interview with the Israeli website “Walla News” on the occasion of the Jewish New Year published on Monday, September 6, said that in light of significant advances in Tehran’s nuclear program, the Israeli army has “accelerated” plans for bombing Iran.
He stated that the increase in the military budget, which was recently approved by the government, was requested with the aim of accelerating plans to attack Iran.
The Naftali Bennett government allocated substantial funds last week within the framework of a two-year budget to increase the military budget. The exact amount of the additional budget has not been announced, but Israeli media have reported it to be around an additional half billion dollars.
Avi Kohavi told Walla News that the army will continue its actions to limit Iran’s regional presence, particularly in Syria, and constantly monitors the movements of Iran’s regional allies. He referred to Hezbollah and Hamas in this regard.
The army’s request for a budget increase of hundreds of millions of dollars in the final months of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government faced opposition from some Israeli politicians who deemed it unnecessary. However, most of those politicians, now as part of a coalition with the Naftali Bennett government, have provided the army with a larger budget than the amount previously requested.
Israel’s military budget, considering its small population and the large share it takes from the country’s financial resources, is one of the largest military budgets in the world.
US President Joe Biden also approved on the 5th of September, during a meeting with Naftali Bennett at the White House, equipping Israel’s “Iron Dome” rocket defense system with more missiles for one billion dollars and said he is “absolutely, absolutely, absolutely” in support of this.
The Biden administration’s recent arms assistance to the Israeli army was in addition to the $38 billion in military aid from America to Israel over a ten-year period, which was approved in the final weeks of Barack Obama’s presidency.
Concurrently with Naftali Bennett’s two-week trip to America, Benny Gantz, the Defense Minister, and Avi Kohavi, several times stated that discussion of attacking Iran to prevent Iran’s military nuclear capability is “serious.” Benny Gantz told foreign diplomats in Israel that Iran is only two months away from the capability to possess an atomic bomb.
Ebrahim Raisi and officials of Iran’s new government have said that in the event of reviving the JCPOA, Tehran will cancel steps taken in its nuclear program that constituted withdrawal from JCPOA commitments. However, there appears to be no prospect for reviving Vienna negotiations.
Israel’s Prime Minister, during his two-week trip to America, stated that the JCPOA has fundamentally lost its relevance, and presented a plan for “containing Iran” without connection to the JCPOA.
Based on reports, the Bennett government’s plan, titled the establishment of a “Gulf NATO” (Persian Gulf) with the participation of Persian Gulf emirates and Jordan, to counter Iran, was presented to Joe Biden. America has neither approved this plan nor at least shown any public reaction to it.
Jordan and the emirates have also not confirmed Israel’s claim of their readiness to participate in the “containing Iran” plan.
Many military experts believe that Israel, despite having a strong air force, does not have the capability to attack Iran’s nuclear sites alone and will not be able to bear the consequences and Iran’s inevitable reaction to such attacks.
Source: Radio Farda
