Israel: Iran is now danger No. 1

Meir Dagan, director of Israel's external intelligence agency, the Mossad, told a parliamentary committee this month that Iran posed an "existential threat" to Israel, according to the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper. He reportedly assured committee members that Israel could deal with this threat.

Like the US, Israel estimates that Iran is three to four years away from building a nuclear bomb. But Israel believes that in 2004, Iran will reach the point at which their nuclear program cannot be stopped.

On the same US trip, Mr. Mofaz told a pro-Israeli lobby group that a nuclear Iran was "intolerable."

"The implicit message of his statements was that if the Iranian nuclear program is not stopped in the next number of months, Israel will have to take action of its own - perhaps even to attack - to prevent nuclear weapons from falling into Iranian hands," analyst Amir Rappaport wrote in the Ma'ariv newspaper.

It would not be the first time Israel has taken preemptive action against a perceived threat. In 1981, Israeli fighter jets launched a successful surprise attack on Iraq's Osirak reactor, destroying it.

In the meantime, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has upgraded Israel's efforts against Iran's nuclear program by putting all related committees under Mr. Dagan's command. Mr. Sharon himself will head a ministerial committee.

In this multipronged effort, Israel's foreign ministry will launch a diplomatic campaign to persuade other countries to work against Iran's nuclear program. The Mossad will work with foreign intelligence agencies, the National Security Council will work with the US-Israeli Joint Committee, and Israel's atomic energy body will focus on technical aspects of Iran's program and work with the IAEA.

Israel's concern about Iran stems from the country's proximity, its longstanding hostility to Israel, and its support for groups like Lebanese Hizbullah, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad.

While these groups launch attacks on Israel and its citizens with Iranian support, some analysts here say there remains the potential for direct confrontation between the nations of Iran and Israel.

Zeev Maghen, a senior research associate at Bar Ilan University near Tel Aviv who studies Iran, disagrees, but he acknowledges, "The amount of hostility that has built up in the world in general, and the Islamic world in particular, against my country might push someone over the edge."

"We're the pariah country," Mr. Maghen adds.

A nuclear Iran would also erode Israel's strategic edge. Israel's military, the world's 14th largest by budget, according to the Center for Defense Information, is vastly superior to any of its Middle East counterparts. Israel is also widely understood to have an arsenal of nuclear and other weapons, though officials deny this. It is not a signatory to the NPT.

"Israel has kept an ambiguous posture about this," says Mr. Arad, "but clearly, should Iran become nuclear, it would clearly be an adverse development. The country supports terrorism, has taken a militant line against the peace process, is hostile to the US, and is active in anti-American attacks [in Iraq]. It clearly poses a very serious threat to everybody."

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