On a moonless and cloudy night on 7th June, 1981 Israeli fighters flew low and fast toward their target, skimming the desert floor on route to a confrontation many pilots believed would cost them their lives.
Most pilots took it for granted that their actions that night would provoke war but they all saw it as a risk worth taking. Their target was Osirak, the Iraqi nuclear power plant and it was being attacked because Iraq was on the verge of becoming a nuclear threshold state.
The mission, Operation Opera was a complete success and caused irrevocable damage to the infrastructure at Osirak, ending Iraq’s nuclear ambitions permanently.
The backlash was huge, even from the United States. But Israel, its leadership and its people saw the risks involved in this operation as worth taking. Many of the men who planned and ordered the mission were the same men who walked emaciated, lice-ridden and bent double from hunger, out from the Nazi crematoria forty years before and who had sworn at that time… “Never again.”
They had meant it.
In 2007 the world awakened to news of a mysterious disaster at an unnamed, off the map military complex deep in the Syrian Desert. It was a Syrian black site. Nobody was supposed to know about this site apart from a select few within the Syrian regimes upper hierarchy. All indications pointed to a significant attack by a sophisticated, highly trained and technologically superior enemy.
It later transpired, after much whispered talk in the press and at government conferences, that this attack was the result of Israeli action against an attempt by Syria to acquire nuclear threshold status.
Israel preemptively destroyed their infrastructure and materials in order to prevent a nuclear armed Syria becoming a present day reality in the Middle East.
The international response was muted while world leaders and the Middle East waited through gritted teeth for the inevitable Syrian reaction. None came other than for the Syrians to clean-up the radioactive material that had seeped into the local environment and then they quietly abandoned the site and walked away.
Syria knew they had come up against a formidable and determined enemy. They knew they were facing an enemy who had somehow infiltrated their air space, attacked their most secret clandestine military site and the secret program within it, and then made good their escape without even registering on Syrian military defensive radar systems.The entire attack, from start to finish was completely undetected and this unnerved the Syrian government.
“Never again” was once again quietly whispered through the halls of power in Jerusalem.
The Samson Doctrine is an Israeli military doctrine dictating that if Israel faces an existential threat to their existence, then Israel will could attack preemptively in order to the ensure the destruction of the threat and their enemies. This would happen even if the predicted response was to be Israel’s own complete destruction.
As Samson in the Old Testament book of Judges sacrificed himself so that he could kill an entire generation of Philistine leadership, thus ensuring the future safety and security of Israel, so too according to the Samson Doctrine Israel could strike first, even if the military reaction against them meant their own potential annihilation.
Israel was and is determined that “never again” will the Jewish race face the threat of complete destruction without a response; it is essentially Israel telling the world: If we are going down, every one of our enemies are coming down with us…
Israel today, in 2015 face a far greater threat than that posed in 1981 and 2007. Today they face an enemy that has publically and proudly called for her complete and swift destruction. They face an enemy whose Islamic eschatology demands their destruction in order to fulfil their own end-time expectations.
They face an enemy that is now, thanks to Barack Obama, the main player in the Middle East. They are emboldened, empowered and have been let completely “off the lead,” free to do as they will with no regard for consequences. Iran have won and Iran know it.
This particular threat is much more complex than any Israel has faced before. If reports on the Iranian nuclear agreement are to be believed, Israel will have to face off against the United States military directly, should they wish to repeat the exploits of 1981 or 2007.
Barack Obama and America, in the documentation and clauses of the agreement seem to have acquiesced to Iranian demands to be partly responsible for defending the Iranian nuclear infrastructure and program against all comers. This includes their “ally” Israel.
That this nuclear deal is a bad deal is at this point beyond question. It is an upfront, in your face betrayal of Israel. Major General Yaakov Amidror, former National Security Advisor to Benjamin Netanyahu believes that when this program rears its head again it will be a much more significant threat than the program we see now. It will pose such a threat to the national security of Israel that it will demand an immediate military response just to ensure and preserve the ongoing existence of the Jewish State.
Obama openly views Netanyahu and Israel, who overwhelmingly support Netanyahu’s opposition to this deal, as being the prime threats to this deal passing through Congress. Open warfare has been declared on Israel and her supporters.
Kerry and Obama have been clear that if this deal fails to pass and war breaks out, they will both be holding Israel directly responsible for it.
If this agreement with Iran does pass then Israel will be completely boxed in, they will have absolutely no where to go diplomatically. Iran will effectively be allowed to float the terms of this agreement with little or no meaningful consequence. Iran will have received a complete pass from the United States and the international community.
Yet Israelis will act, if only, because the ongoing survival of their nation depends on it.
It was the Samson Option that underpinned and girded the Israeli belief that an attack on Osirak’s in 1981 and then Syria in 2007 was the right course of action for the Jewish State to take, irrelevant of the consequences. The Samson Option is still the hard reality underpinning the concept of “…Never again…”
It is the final resort, the ultimate resolve that Israel and its people will never again be subjected to an attempted genocide without consequence or reply. Never again will they let the whims of a tyrannical dictator take the Jewish race to the very brink of annihilation. Osarik and Syria in 2007, a tangible demonstration of how far Israel is prepared to go and how much she is prepared to risk to ensure her survival.
It is the existence of the Samson Option that guarantees that the current status quo with Iran will not last. Israel will act, on their own in all probability. If the time comes the decision will be made and the IDF will make its move; all Israel will stand behind her and the world would be sent reeling by it.
Much of the world today already openly despise Israel. If they are forced to attack Iran, this will turn into open, unrestrained hatred.
Benjamin Netanyahu recently stated, “This deal means war.” Just like the leaders of Israel before him, Netanyahu absolutely means what he says.
Never again.