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Is Netanyahu preparing a false flag attack in the Middle East against U.S. forces, putting Iran or Hezbollah in the frame? It’s a question which has troubled analysts since the realisation that the post-February 28th attacks on Iran weren’t going well and were failing cataclysmically in their objectives. But now it has returned again to trouble pundits following a bombshell announcement that Bibi recently made on Israeli TV, saying simply that his country should dump the U.S. annual military aid, currently well over $3 billion a year. To most, the announcement is entirely illogical given the size of Israel and its ambitions. Why would you turn down $3 billion when it can buy a lot of U.S. military equipment? What are we missing?
Netanyahu claims that the economy is doing well and that his country doesn’t need the charitable gesture any more. Clearly, this is not about money, and the comments have come at a time when the relationship between him and Trump has reached a new low – signalling that he has entered the ’smoke-and-mirrors’ zone of gambits, stunts and cunning skulduggery. To turn down U.S. military aid is a gesture of extraordinary ingratitude and can only be taken as a snub to U.S. hegemony. If Israel refuses to do what any U.S. administration tells it to, there is always the threat that this money could be suspended or even annulled altogether. Removing itself from the annual gratuity simply gives Israel more independence to do what it wants in the region, although it’s hard to imagine, after the recent shambles, that it won’t need U.S. help as soon as it messes up its latest excursion. So what’s the real story behind the ruse?
Of course, there’s more to it than simply choosing to be more autonomous. If Bibi is serious about it and it is not merely a gesture or a signal to Trump that he too has cards to play, then two scenarios spring to mind. Even without being a recipient of this dowry, Israel can still probably rely on the U.S. to bail it out of failed military excursions, and Bibi might be factoring that without the transfer of $3 billion each year, there would be further pressure on the Trump administration to do so than with it. Secondly, this raises the question of how likely a false flag attack is imminent, as Bibi must be tempted more than ever to exploit the ring of sycophancy that Trump has cultivated around him. The question is not whether Trump would fall for the false flag attack, but more whether his generals would even let him know that they knew they were the victim of one – as pointed out by Ray McGovern recently in an interview with Judge Andrew Napolitano. An attack, say, on a U.S. carrier in the region and made to look like it was a hit by Hezbollah, would be the perfect way to drag Trump back to the region and return the ships which made up the battlegroup. It would also be a clever way of keeping the war in Lebanon active, which suits Netanyahu’s objectives entirely.
That is, of course, if all we are seeing in the media is accurate and Trump has been open and honest.
Another scenario is that while it is true that Trump is desperate to get a deal done with the Iranians so that oil prices can come back to normal and markets can normalise, in reality he is attempting to lure them into a trap by giving them a deal which is too good to be true, while he waits for the winter to come, when it will be much more favourable for U.S. soldiers to carry out a ground invasion. More analysts now are beginning to suspect this, with some even going as far as suggesting Iraq could play a critical role. Certainly, the purge in Baghdad at the moment of corrupt politicians and a new PM who seems to be liked by Trump has all caused a great deal of speculation ahead of a Washington visit by Ali Falih Kadhim al-Zaidi, Iraq’s youngest ever prime minister. As far-fetched as this sounds, it is close aides like Lindsey Graham and retired General Jack Keane who seriously believe not only is the plan feasible but preferable. On Fox News, they constantly talk about Trump “taking back the straits”, and so we know for sure that it is one option on the table, as Trump likes to say. Is it possible for such a ruse to be pulled off – that Trump and Netanyahu would pretend to be foes and stage a number of diplomatic tantrums via the media, one of which could be the threat of Israel going completely rogue in the region?
