Iran’s National Security Advisor Ali Larijani has carefully avoided
echoing Ahmadinejad’s fiery rhetoric. Iran’s Foreign Minister Manuchehr
Mottaki’s has denied that Iran seeks the destruction of
Israel. Their posture is far less sensational than Ahmadinejad’s rhetoric, yet much more indicative of Iran’s real policy.
Contrary to conventional wisdom, Iran’s position on Israel isn’t
ideologically driven. Though the ideological component of Iran’s
foreign policy is undeniable, it is secondary to Iran’s geostrategic
considerations.
Ideology and geopolitics
Throughout the existence of the Islamic Republic, the Iranian theocracy
has adopted a harsh, provocative and uncompromising rhetoric on Israel
to boost Iran’s credentials as a leader of an imaginary Islamic bloc
and use the anti-Israeli card to bridge Iran’s difficulties with the
Arab states.
But the rhetoric has only been translated into actual policy when
Tehran deemed that its ideological and strategic imperatives coincided.
When these two pillars of Iran’s foreign policy have clashed – as they
did in the 1980s during the Iraq-Iran war when Tehran quietly sought
Israel’s aid and the Jewish state made many efforts to get Iran and the
US back on talking terms – Iran’s geostrategic concerns have
consistently prevailed over its ideological impulses.
Today, Tehran believes that its ideological and strategic imperatives
coincide in regards to the Jewish state. On a strategic level, Iran
opposes Israel due to a perception that the Jewish state seeks Iran’s
prolonged isolation and exclusion from regional affairs. Whether in
Washington or in Ashkhabad, Iran perceives Israel to be countering its
interest. On an ideological level, the Islamic Republic’s pretense to
leadership in the Islamic world compels it to pursue a line that often
times make Iran more Palestinian than the Palestinians.
The key to changing Iran’s behavior vis-à-vis the Jewish state lay in
the dynamics between ideology and geopolitics. If these two forces of
Iranian foreign policy once again can be arranged to counter each
other, the force behind Iran’s belligerence against Israel can be put
to rest.
This, however, cannot be achieved solely by increasing pressure or by
making threats of war. Only through a larger US-Iran accommodation can
Iran’s foreign policy impulses shift away from its current stance on
Israel.
To explore this strategic opportunity, Israel must first adopt a more
sober analysis of Iran; one in which it sees through Iran’s
deliberately misleading hyperbole and pays attention not only to the
dangerous rhetoric but also to the less sensationalist voices in the
Iranian government. Iran’s pragmatists may not be friendly towards the
Jewish state, but neither are they apocalyptic. By only focusing on the
most extreme and radical notions coming out of Tehran, we let the
radicals win. And their victory is a loss for all.
Writings 
Subscribe to this comment's feed
