A Difference in Leadership
The contrast in leadership could not be starker than Yair Lapid’s speech at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) on Thursday 28 January (see our article January 29, ‘Its a Question of Leadership’) and the speech of IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Aviv Kochavi at the same conference where he unapologetically criticized the United States, President, Joe Biden’s intentions to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal while he also threatened the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Lt. Gen Aviv Kochavi said returning to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal or “even a similar agreement with a number of improvements, would be bad and not the right thing to do.” Lt. Gen Kochavi went on to announce that he had ordered the Israel Defence Forces to come up with fresh plans to strike Iran’s nuclear program if it should become necessary.
The Chief of Staff immediately came under attack from the leftist media and politicians. He was prorogued for using harsh words, “that contradicts the position of the new American administration, this could be seen as defiance,” said Amos Gilad, a former head of Military Intelligence and a former top Defence Ministry official.
I have no doubt Yair Lapid would agree with the sentiments expressed by Amos Gilad.
They are part of the Social justice warriors that advocate foreign and defence policies that emphasize multilateral diplomacy over military strength and a raft of policies associated with today’s left-wing political parties. People like Lapid and Gilad hope to reorganize Israeli society in their image and it is a political objective which would abandon the Jewish State to an unknown future in a dangerous neighbourhood. Lapid would not be out of place amongst America’s liberal and socialist activists imposing their universalistic ethics upon its citizen’s whether they want it or not.
Their utopian new order is nothing more than a grab for power, populists fuelling the discontent felt by those who no longer believe the promises that drip from their mouths and their pledges they know will never be met and yet they continue with the lies and kick the can down the road for someone else to pay for their self-perceived entitlement’s.
That’s not leadership its amoral opportunism and is fast becoming the new moral imperative.
The words of disapproval thrown at Lt. Gen Aviv Kohavi for standing up for Jewish sovereignty and relying on our selves to defend our people against all comers are an epidemic of national self-hatred more dangerous than any Covid19 virus could ever be.
Lt. Gen Aviv Kohavi spoke with honesty and courage willing to look at the reality that the Jewish State is facing in a hostile world and not prepared to accept being a convenient target regardless of whose foot he may stand on.
Lt. Gen Kohavi was absolutely correct in his damning of any Iran nuclear deal and his resolve that Israel would not allow the Islamic Republic under any circumstances from gaining the nuclear option. He made Israel’s position on Iran crystal clear to the Americans that Israel was determined to see that the ayatollas cannot threaten the Jewish State’s existence.
This is where the United States and Israels thinking on Iran diverge. Since Obamas reproachment with Iran and his distancing of traditional allies in the Middle East, there has been a shift in the region’s military balance and its psychological impact on the Sunni Arabs of Egypt, the Gulf States and Saudi Arabia. This has come about by Iran’s commitment to obtaining nuclear capability and with it the ability to pressure the Arab states into submission while intending to destroy the Jewish Homeland. The Biden administration seems keen to turn the clock back to the Obama era a time when appeasement held the high ground. Unless it all goes pear shape over the next four years we will most likely see the Americans bully and cajole the State of Israel into giving up the military option in favour of diplomatic doublespeak. This is why Lt. Gen. Aviv Kohavi’s speech was so important for Israel’s security interests and why the Lapid approach is so dangerous to us all.
If we can learn anything from these two divergent views of leadership it is this weakness breeds insecurity, insecurity breeds fear, fear breeds desperation, and desperation leads to appeasement and appeasement leads to defeat.
