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By Max Boot
August 16, 2024 at 11:59 a.m. EDT
In economics, “moral hazard” is a term for what happens when one party has an incentive to engage in risky behavior because some other actor will protect it from the consequences of its own actions. We are now seeing how moral hazard works in the Israel-U.S. alliance as the Middle East stands poised on the brink of a major conflict between Israel and Iran.
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The last time this occurred was in April after an Israeli airstrike targeted the Iranian consulate in Damascus, killing two senior Iranian commanders and other officers. Iran responded with its first-ever direct attack on Israel, sending 300 drones and missiles toward the Jewish state. The United States mobilized a stunningly successful air-defense coalition, utilizing its own military assets, along with those of Israel and friendly Arab states, to help defend Israel. Almost all of the Iranian drones and missiles were intercepted. Under heavy pressure from the Biden administration to limit its own response, Israel responded with a pinprick retaliation, and the matter was declared closed by both sides.
Clearly neither Iran nor Israel is eager for a full-blown war. Why is that possibility looming again? The latest fuse was lit when a Hezbollah rocket hit a soccer field in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights on July 27, killing 12 children. Days later, on July 30, Israel responded with an airstrike killing Fuad Shukr, a senior Hezbollah military commander, in Beirut. The next day, Ismail Haniyeh, chief political leader of Hamas, was assassinated in the heart of Tehran while staying at an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps guesthouse. Iranian leaders blamed Israel for the killing and vowed vengeance.
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With the possibility of another war threatening to break out, President Joe Biden has scrambled the U.S. military to deter an Iranian attack and to defend Israel should it occur. The United States has deployed a formidable naval and air armada to the region, including an aircraft carrier strike group and an amphibious assault ship, along with multiple destroyers and at least one guided-missile submarine. The massive U.S. response has at least made the mullahs think hard about how they will respond to Israel’s assassinations to avoid a war with Washington.
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There is little doubt that Iran and its “axis of resistance” are primarily responsible for this conflict. A regional war would not be such a strong possibility if Hamas had not staged an unprovoked and barbaric attack on Israel on Oct. 7 and if Hezbollah had not launched at least 7,500 rockets, drones and missiles at Israel since then. But even if Israel had not asked for this conflict, its government has a responsibility to prevent the hostilities from spiraling out of control and potentially drawing in its U.S. allies.
Yet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seems to be acting recklessly in the knowledge that the U.S. military will step in to save Israel from the consequences of his own conduct, even though the United States and Israel do not have a mutual defense treaty. This is the “moral hazard” created by Biden’s unprecedented, if understandable, decision to use U.S. military forces for the first time to defend Israel.