Also remember that the 1996 elections were one of the most controversial in Israel’s history, since they came only 7 months after PM Rabin’s assassination by a right-winger, who despite all claims to the contrary did not act alone and had some right-wing rabbinical support. Netanyahu’s victory over Acting PM Peres was literally only by a few thousand votes (so much so that early polls on election night declared Peres the winner), and was only achieved after a massive terrorist campaign which had made Peres seem like a weak and ineffectual leader. Biby’s victory, therefore, left a bad taste in many people’s mouths – one that I shared at the time, and made Netanyahu one of the least popular PMs in history. His not-so-occasional stumbles and clumsy attempts at political intrigues hadn’t exactly helped him that regard either, as he himself later admitted.

Lastly, I never said Yaari made anything up – this is his genuine take on the situation, only I believe he’s reading it wrong, as usual.

Obama is regrouping, rethinking strategies, yes, but his objective – appeasement of the Arab\Muslim world at the expense of further weakening of Israel – remains the same. Blunt force doesn’t yield results (or least hasn’t yet) and he has the upcoming congressional elections to think about. I expect this sudden “pro-Israel” shift will therefore come to an abrupt end after November. I also doubt he cares much about Iran’s nukes – he hadn’t before, so why start now? Because suddenly he cares how he will go down in history? Please. BHO still believes in containment and nothing short of either an American strike on Iran or allowing an Israeli one to take place won’t convince me otherwise. Still, he’s not a complete idiot: he knows how badly this policy reflects on him internally, so he’s making all the right noises to make people think he’s coming around.

Let’s be realistic for a moment: we all know sanctions, even severe ones, simply won’t do the trick. A country that is willing to send truckfuls of its own children to clear out mine-fields isn’t going to be intimidated into changing its foreign policy by a further drop in its civilian population’s level of lifestyle. Yes, they’ll face some internal pressure for it; the last year had shown they can aptly deal with it, since they don’t have explain themselves to any Goldstones. In any case, they’re probably banking on the fact that such sanctions would only be temporary anyway – once they have nukes they could intimidate Europe and the Arab world into a de-facto abandonment of any sanctions, and unfortunately they’re probably right. Some believe severe sanctions will give the Iranian opposition the backing it needs to finally topple the regime. This would indeed be the best thing for everyone concerned, but sadly to this day we haven’t seen the opposition, even at its height, really amount to anything much other than to get mowed down like sitting ducks. How can they, when the regime is firmly propped up by a majority of rural Iranians who are deeply Islamic and enjoy flaunting the West even at their own expense?