Israeli Attack on Iran Draws Nearer

Location of Iran's nuclear sites

As I noted in a recent post, I believe Israel is extremely serious about attacking Iran on its own in 2012 if there is not enough progress in the ongoing negotiations between the Iranians and the West.  Just today, Israeli Prime Minister's Benjamin Netanyahu's declared that the threat to Israel from the Iranian acquisition of nuclear bomb dwarfed all other threats.  This was a top on a statement from the Israeli foreign ministry that the international community had "just a few weeks" to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear bomb.

At the same time, the Financial Times is out with an article by columnist Tobias Buck on how Israeli leaders are increasingly concerned that the international community will not prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapons capability.  According to the FT article:

“The first thing to say is that we are actually getting closer. They used to talk about months [until an Israeli strike], now they are talking about weeks,” said Yoel Guzansky, a research fellow at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies.

While many believe that Israel is just saber rattling in an effort to get the US to push Iran even harder, I personally believe that the Israelis are deadly serious and are prepared to launch strikes on Iran on their own.  It is entirely possible that - as happened in 1981 when Israel attacked Iraq's nuclear program at Osirak - that  we will wake up one morning and find out that the Israelis have attacked Iran's nuclear program with no advance warning.  If you asked for my opinion, I'd say the odds of an Israeli attack on Iran before the US Presidential elections in November are now at 50%.  For those interested, here is a previous post with a map outlining possible Israel-Iran war scenarios.  Note: I am at @Global_Politico on Twitter

Here is the Financial Times article from Tobias Buck I referenced above.