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September 27, 2002/Tishri 21 5763, Vol. 55, No. 5
Should attack by Iraq force retaliation?
MATTHEW E. BERGER
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
WASHINGTON - A disagreement is surfacing between the United States and Israel over whether the Jewish state should retaliate if attacked by Iraq during an American-led war.
For months, as talk of U.S. action against Iraq intensified, Israeli officials have said Israel cannot hold its fire if attacked by Iraq, as it did when showered with Iraqi missiles in the 1991 Persian Gulf War.
Coupled with those statements was the view that the Bush administration understood and would allow Israel to retaliate.
In the last week, however - as talk of war increasingly occupies the international community - U.S. officials have been asking Israel to just sit tight if attacked.
Asked Sept. 18 if the United States should restrain Israel during a war, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld told the House Armed Services Committee that Israel should hold its fire even if attacked.
There is "no doubt in mind but that it would be in Israel's overwhelming best interest not to get involved," Rumsfeld said.
The main U.S. concern, emphasized by lawmakers on political talk shows last week-end, is that Israeli involvement could turn Arab countries against the U.S. effort or even escalate the conflict into a general Arab-Israeli war.
While the Bush administration is hoping to win Arab acquiescence to an attack on Iraq, some fear that an Israeli retaliatory attack against Iraq would move the Arab states from bystanders to active combatants against Israel.
The U.S. stance is "about building a coalition, but it's also about preventing a coalition against" the United States, one Jewish official said.
The administration's statements have rattled the Israeli government.
On the one hand, Israel hopes the U.S. battle plan will include measures to undermine Iraq's ability to attack Israel.
But many Israeli officials see the decision not to respond to the Iraqi attack in 1991 as a grievous strategic error that undermined Israel's deterrent power and emboldened Hezbollah and Palestinian terrorist groups to attack the Jewish state.
While Israel hopes to stay out of the war entirely, Israeli officials also hope the United States will support Israel's need to respond if it is attacked.
"If attacked unprovoked, Saddam Hussein cannot presume that we will automatically repeat the restraint we exercised in 1991," said Mark Regev, spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Washington.
At the same time, Israeli officials also note that the country is not on automatic pilot, and that decisions about retaliation will be made on a case-by-case basis.
The calculation also would depend on the provocation: A different response would be considered if an Iraqi missile landed harmlessly in the Negev Desert than if chemical warheads hit Tel Aviv.
Some analysts are concerned that Bush's comments will lead to perceptions that Israel is weak.
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