Of what did they persuade Israel

Jed Babbin, former Undersecretary of Defense, writes today on Real Clear Politics about the recent storyline that the obama Administration has used US intelligence to persuade Israel not to attack Iran for the time being. That story was conveniently leaked to the NY Times late last week by the Obamacrats. It is meant to show that Obama is both concerned for Israel but seeking to head off any armed conflict in the Middle East. In reality, however, as Babbin skillfully points out, there is a basic problem with the story: US intelligence agenicies have no reliable info on the actual state of the Iranian nuclear program. There is no way that obama could convince the Israelis with non-existent information that the threat was further away than thought. If anything was accomplished, according to Babbin, it was to further convince the Israelis that they cannot rely on the US under Obama to deal in a realistic manner with the Iranian nuclear threat. Babbin thinks that it makes an attack by israel more rather than less likely.