Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends a news conference in Jerusalem Feb. 22, 2012.RONEN ZVULUN/REUTERS
Despite all the anti-Iran rhetoric from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and members of his government, the Israeli public remains strongly opposed to Israel launching an attack on Tehran's nuclear facilities.
Writing in Wednesday's Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper, Prof. Ephraim Yaar and Prof. Tamar Hermann of Tel Aviv University reveal the findings of their most recent Peace Index that show 62 per cent of Israelis are opposed to Israel launching an attack on Iran without U.S. cooperation.
In his just-concluded visit to the United States, Mr. Netanyahu spoke of Israel's inherent right to pre-emptive self defence, a right acknowledged by U.S. President Barack Obama, though limited to taking such action when a perceived threat is "imminent." The two men apparently disagreed on when the threat of Iranian nuclear weapons would be imminent, and the U.S. leader said he asked the Israeli not to consider taking a pre-emptive attack until all other actions, such as sanctions and diplomatic pressure, have been exhausted.
While that U.S. approach has earned condemnation from some hard line Israeli columnists and editorialists, it would appear to be in synch with Israeli public opinion.
The Peace Index, a highly reliable regular survey that is conducted under the auspices of the Evens Program in Mediation and Conflict Resolution at Tel Aviv University and the Israel Democracy Institute, found that only 12 per cent of Israelis "strongly favour" Israel carrying out an attack on Iran on its own, with another 17 per cent saying they "moderately favour" such an initiative.
While Israelis have no illusions about the current Iranian regime being a friend, they are concerned that an attack on Iran will result in serious retaliation by Tehran, which has far more accurate and deadly missiles at its disposal than did Iraq in 1991, when Saddam Hussein fired on Tel Aviv, and than did Hezbollah in 2006 during its conflict with Israel.
Last week, Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak played down the threat of casualties from Iranian retaliation to a pre-emptive strike, saying that an Iranian missile response would result in only about 500 Israeli casualties. A majority of Israelis don't believe it.
Just over 60 per cent of Jewish Israelis say they believe the Israeli casualty level will be higher than that; 54 per cent of Arab Israelis say so too.
Were Israel to wait and carry out a strike against Iranian nuclear facilities with U.S. cooperation, public opinion shifts considerably.
In such an event, a majority of Israelis say they would favour an attack (65 per cent of Jewish Israelis and 47 per cent of Arab Israelis). An even higher majority say they believe such an attack would be effective in stopping for a significant period of time Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons (72 per cent of Jewish Israelis and 57 per cent of Arab Israelis).
If Israel were to attack on its own, only 39 per cent of Jewish Israelis say they believe such an attack would succeed; 52 per cent of Arab Israelis think it would be successful.