Why Israel Struck Iran First

The Political Scene | The New Yorker

WNYC Studios and The New Yorker

Politics, Obama, News, Wnyc, Washington, Barack, President, Lizza, Wickenden

4.2 • 3.3K Ratings

🗓️ 23 June 2025

⏱️ 43 minutes

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Summary

The ayatollahs who have ruled Iran since 1979 have long promised to destroy the Jewish state, and had even set a deadline for it. While arming proxies to fight Israel—Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, the Houthis in Yemen, and more—Iran is believed to have sought to develop nuclear weapons for itself. “The big question about Iran was always: how significant is its apocalyptic theology?” Yossi Klein Halevi explains to David Remnick. “How central is that end-times vision to the Iranian regime? And is there a possibility that the regime would see a nuclear weapon as the way of furthering their messianic vision?” Halevi is a journalist and senior fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, and he co-hosts the podcast “For Heaven’s Sake.” He is a fierce critic of Benjamin Netanyahu, saying, “I have no doubt that he is capable of starting a war for his own political needs.” And yet Netanyahu was right to strike Iran, no matter the consequences, Halevi asserts. “The Israeli perspective is not . . . the American war in Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s our own experience.”

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to the political scene.
0:07.0	I'm David Remnick.
0:08.3	Early each week, we bring you a conversation from our episode of The New Yorker Radio Hour.
0:15.4	This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.
0:22.2	Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick.
0:26.5	In much of the world, Israel's longtime Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been known, above
0:31.8	all, for his opposition to a Palestinian state. And that's an opposition, of course,
0:37.0	that's deepened since
0:38.0	October 7th. And yet, if you really drill down Netanyahu's true obsession is not so much Palestine.
0:46.0	His true obsession for years has been the Islamic Republic of Iran. The Ayatollahs who have ruled Iran
0:53.0	since 1979 have promised to destroy the Jewish state.
0:57.0	The country's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khomeini and his theocratic regime and his security
1:03.0	chiefs all insist that Israel is an alien presence, that the Holocaust is a hoax, that Israel is the
1:10.5	junior Satan and America the senior
1:13.0	Satan. Iran has armed and funded proxies to fight Israel, Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis in Yemen,
1:20.7	and militia groups in Iraq and elsewhere. And in the meantime, Iran, we believe, has sought to develop
1:25.9	atomic weapons. For years, Netany, has sought to develop atomic weapons.
1:28.1	For years, Netanyahu has called on the world to take seriously Iran's threat to destroy
1:32.5	Israel.
1:34.1	And Iran seemed to maintain a position of strength, even as its economy struggled and internal
1:39.7	protests grew.
1:41.6	But after October 7th and the killing rampage by Hamas, the power balance in the region
	...

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