Israel and US Defense Secretary James Mattis have a dangerous mutual enemy. Five years ago, when he headed the US Central Command, Mattis said of the three most pressing problems for the United States in the Middle East, “Number one Iran. Number two Iran. Number three Iran.” In February, the Marine general said that Iran is the “biggest state sponsor of terrorism in the world.” “Mad Dog” Mattis also criticized President Barack Obama for going along with the nuclear agreement with Iran.
At a February meeting in Munich with Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman, the two agreed on the need to form a broad international coalition against the axis consisting of Iran — which is pulling the strings of the Shiite Hezbollah organization in Lebanon — and the regimes in Syria and North Korea. Liberman urged Mattis to be active in the Middle East.
Several weeks later, on March 9, it was Russian President Vladimir Putin’s turn to be briefed by Israel on the perils of Iran. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came to Moscow to remind his hosts that Iran is carrying on the legacy of ancient Persia, which 2,500 years ago sought to annihilate the Jewish people. According to Netanyahu, radical Shiism not only threatens Israel but endangers the entire region and even world peace. Netanyahu told reporters that Israel is adamantly opposed to leaving any presence of “Iran and its proxies” in Syria as part of an overall agreement on ending the civil war there. The prime minister said he was certain “the message had sunk in.”
In Jerusalem, it was assumed at the time that Donald Trump’s election victory in the United States would end the Russian-Iranian love affair that developed during Obama’s presidency. The compliments Trump paid Putin during his election campaign led to hope that Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif would not be able to repeat the comments he made in Moscow in October 2016: At the end of the summit meeting of the foreign ministers of Russia, Iran and Syria, he said that relations between Syria, Iran and Russia were at their peak.
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