Unlike the United States, where war with Iran is unpopular, Israel is fully embracing its bombing campaign against Tehran and other cities. It’s an effort that has achieved clear successes — the killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the degradation of Iran’s military capabilities — but is fraught with risk for Israel’s security and reputation. To learn more about Israel’s strategic objectives and the many problems bombing Iran probably will not solve, I spoke with Danny Citrinowicz, senior researcher in the Iran and Shi’ite Axis Program at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies. Previously, Citrinowicz served as the head of various Israel Defense Intelligence units over 25 years, including the Iran branch in the Research and Analysis Division.

A few days ago, you summed up the Israeli perspective on the war in Iran as follows to the Financial Times: “If we can have a coup, great. If we can have people on the streets, great. If we can have a civil war, great. Israel couldn’t care less about the future … [or] the stability of Iran.”Yes, people are quoting me everywhere.

Well, it’s a pretty eye-grabbing quote. The thing I don’t understand about it is that you’re saying Israel doesn’t really care about the stability of Iran, but at the same time, I thought Israel’s No. 1 reason for attacking and disabling Iran was to prevent it from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Those two impulses seem at odds. If they create a completely chaotic and unstable situation, wouldn’t that leave things in an even more precarious situation than they are now?The main purpose of Israel right now is to prevent Iran from being a strategic threat to the State of Israel — a strategic threat meaning missiles and nuclear weapons. Everything else we couldn’t care less about. And if Iran is in chaos, it definitely won’t have the ability to develop nuclear bombs or invest in building missiles. It wouldn’t pose any threat to the State of Israel. You have to remember that after the 12-Day War last year, we saw the problem in just focusing on the strategic capabilities. We attacked their nuclear and missile sites, but immediately after the war ended, they rebuilt the capacity. So the understanding is that this is not just about their strategic abilities; it’s about depriving the regime of the capability to........

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