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its terror attack on a Pan American airliner in the late 1980s. Or, as in South
Africa, that a change in nuclear policy might come from a change in régime in
Tehran. Yet realistically, we couldn’t count on either. And there was no doubt in
our minds that a nuclear Iran represented a hugely serious threat. If the Shi’ite
Muslim regime in Iran did get a nuclear weapon, Sunni Arab states like Egypt and
Saudi Arabia, and Turkey as well, would try to go nuclear. Neither they nor we
could assume that Iran was developing a bomb as a mere act of deterrence. We
couldn’t exclude the possibility that, especially in a crisis threatening the survival
of the ayatollahs’ rule, Iran would use the weapons it was developing. It could
even send a nuclear device in a container smuggled on board a commercial vessel
docking in one of Israel’s ports.

While few in Israel disputed the seriousness of the threat, a number of top
political and military figures had deep misgivings about military action. Given the
need for secrecy, most of our discussions took place within the so-called Group of
Eight, often also including the chief of staff and other top generals from the kirya.
Both Dan Meridor and Benny Begin, Menachem Begin’s son and a minister
without portfolio, were opposed to an Israeli attack from the start. They were
convinced that the implications for the region, and for our relations with the wider
world, were difficult to predict and potentially dire. Dan raised a further concern.
He feared an Israeli attack might actually intensify Iran’s effort to get a nuclear
bomb, only now with political cover, because it would argue it was acting in self-
defense. The view of those opposed to an Israeli strike was that we should rely on
American economic and political pressure to deal with the threat. And, if that
failed, on American military action.

In November 2010, the internal debate came to a head, at a meeting involving
the Group of Eight as well as the chief of staff, the head of military intelligence
and the commander of the air force. We convened in a villa that the Mossad kept
for clandestine foreign visitors, near the coastal road north of Tel Aviv. The
meeting began with a presentation by the generals of our attack plan. There was
still a core of ministers opposed: chiefly Dan Meridor and Benny Begin, but also
Boogie Ya’alon, a former Sayeret Matkal commander and chief of staff who
Minister of Strategic Affairs. But the confidence and detail with which the plan
was laid out, and the fact that Bibi, Lieberman and I were in favor of being
prepared to act, gave me the sense that a majority would back military action if it
became necessary. The proviso would be the need for the chief-of-staff, and ideally

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