Israel promises Obama: We won't hit Iran without "coordinating" with you

By “coordinating” I assume they mean “without giving you a heads up.” If it means they’ll wait until they have The One’s permission, then, er, they’re going to be waiting a very long time.

During a trip to Jerusalem earlier this week, CIA chief Leon Panetta informed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that U.S. President Barack Obama demanded that Israel not launch a surprise attack on Iran. The message expressed concern that Israel would cause an escalation in the region and undermine Obama’s efforts to improve relations with Tehran.

However, the content was nothing new: The Bush administration also sent tough messages to Jerusalem a year ago, including a demand that it not strike Iran…

The U.S. expects Israel to coordinate its military actions with Washington, a condition to which Jerusalem has agreed due to its dependence on U.S. aid. Senior officials in the Bush administration testified to Congress that Israel had consulted them before deciding on its 2007 air strike on an alleged Syrian nuclear reactor. They said Israel had explained that it considered the Syrian project an existential threat and therefore had to act.

Look at it this way: If they say “we have to act” and The One says no, what do they lose by defying him and attacking anyway? The Democrats aren’t going to risk Jewish votes by cutting off Israel’s foreign aid as punishment, and if Iran’s nuke program is really so far gone that Netanyahu feels he has to try something desperate to stop it, tensions with the U.S. in the aftermath will be the least of Israel’s worries. The one real piece of leverage Obama has, I think, is his reputation (fair or not) for Palestinian sympathies. If Israel acts against his wishes, that would give him every excuse to push harder on Abbas’s behalf during peace talks.

For what it’s worth, and it’s probably worth nothing, Debkafile claims Panetta showed Netanyahu a U.S. intel assessment estimating that Iran’s nuclear defenses are weaker than thought and that they wouldn’t hit back hard in retaliation. Israel was, allegedly, unpersuaded.