The Iranian Interest

“If it bleeds, it leads.” Ask any journalist and he or she will tell you this old cliché holds true. It is tempting to suggest that in a media culture in which bad news is good news, a culture in which recognition of tragedy rather than of objectivity is the accepted definition of press, when there is no bleeding news then a story with the promise that there will be blood would do the trick.

As an example of this trend take a look at an article by Yossi Klein Halevi entitled “The Iranian-Israeli War“, run by The New Republic. In this article Halevi declares Iran as number one enemy of Israel and foresees a direct confrontation with Iran increasingly unavoidable. The
article is totally built on a promise, and its logic is in the good will of the reader.

To cast some doubt to his claim, let me note one historical fact that alone makes the idea of war with Iran inconceivable. About 2500 years ago, after the Persian conquest of Babylon, Cyrus the King of Iran issued the decree of liberation to the Jews. The edict of Cyrus for the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem marked a great epoch in the history of the Jewish people. Cyrus is mentioned twenty-three times by name and alluded to several times more in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) as the patron and deliverer of the Jews.

For this reason alone, I do not think Israel goes to war against Iran, unless attacked by Iran, an attack that no Iranian political leader dares to carry out since he has to set himself up against Cyrus the Great, the founder of Iran. Just a thought-experiment.