Israeli envoy: War losses ‘horrific,’ but US alliance necessary
As the war against Iran entered its second week, Israel’s Ambassador to the Philippines, Dana Kursh, lamented the harsh reality of lives lost in the conflict but maintained that her country’s alliance with a “superpower” was necessary to defeat an imminent nuclear threat.
“Unfortunately, in war, you cannot control [the loss of innocent lives] directly. And that’s the most horrific thing of war,” Kursh said in a freewheeling discussion with Inquirer editors and reporters on Wednesday last week.
The suspected cruise missiles that hit Shajareh Tayyebeh girls’ elementary school in Minab, southern Iran, on Feb. 28 killed over 170 people, mostly children. The attack drew international condemnation for causing the highest number of civilian deaths in a single location on the first day of hostilities.
“I think it makes it more complicated, even if it was a US strike,” she said. “But the US and Israel are basically working together at this time, so it makes it more complicated for this war to be accepted by the Iranians as something that would be helpful to them.”
A casualty tally by the regional news outlet Al Jazeera on March 12, a day after she spoke with the Inquirer, showed that 2,100 had been killed in Iran, Israel, Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Oman.
Preliminary findings reported by US media suggest that the strike may have resulted from outdated targeting intelligence. The incident is currently under investigation by the Pentagon.
Mistaken targeting
“An ongoing military investigation has determined that the United States is responsible for a deadly Tomahawk missile strike on an Iranian elementary school, according to US officials and others familiar with the preliminary findings,” The New York Times reported on Wednesday.
The report said that investigators were looking into whether artificial intelligence systems, data analysis programs, or other technical intelligence tools may have contributed to the mistaken targeting of the school.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other administration officials have declined to comment on the strike, other than saying that it was under investigation. “Despite that, the President has tried at times to put the blame on Iran,” the Times said.
Kursh said that Israeli forces were using cutting-edge military technology in an effort to be “very precise in their hits” on enemy targets.
She said that not harming Iranians was high on their agenda, which includes assisting them in changing their rulers.
“We are hoping that this operation will set them free from the Iranian fanatical regime,” she said.
Vital ties to US
Kursh said it was essential that her country was “joined by a superpower” and that this support reflected confidence, as the combined strength of the United States and Israel would succeed and bring about “a different Iran.”
Every leader has both critics and supporters, and both perspectives are valid, she said.
From her point of view, she sees a “positive” partnership between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump. While the two countries have a long-standing relationship, Kursh said Israel is independent of the United States.
“We are not another star in their flag,” she said.
Kursh said there were times that Netanyahu and Trump did not see eye to eye, but the two “brave leaders” identified a concrete and imminent threat and tackled it together. “And for me, that’s the end of the game.”
Kursh cited three threats that Israel aimed to eliminate. First is the “fanatical Iranian regime’s” development of nuclear capabilities for “war purposes.”
Second is Iran’s accelerated ballistic missile production, noting that the country is making them deeper underground than where they had been previously produced.
Kursh identified the third threat as stemming from the Iranian regime itself, which has been in power for 47 years.
According to her, the Iranian regime is continually “inflicting a lot of harm on (its) people” and “diverting oil revenues” to fund terrorist groups, such as Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis who act as its “proxies” against Israel.
Asked how much has been achieved to eliminate the threats, Kursh couldn’t give a close estimate.
As regards the end of Israel’s “Operation Roaring Lion” against Iran, she said: “I will not be able to give you more concrete timing, but up till now, it has been very, very successful, and God willing, it will enable [us] to bring stability to the region and to the world.”
‘Irrelevant’
Kursh admitted that she has been asked multiple times the question: “Does Israel have nuclear weapons?”
And her answer has been evasive, in keeping with her government’s policy of neither confirming nor denying. Whether Israel has nuclear weapons doesn’t really matter, according to her.
“It’s irrelevant, because what we have is a lot of technologies, but the aim of those technologies is not to create wars, [but] it’s to create peace,” she said, quickly pointing to the existential threat to Israel from Iran.
“I think that what we need to remember is that what Iran is saying, ‘Let’s wipe Israel off the map,’” she said, adding that when a country makes such statements openly and develops the nuclear capability to carry them out, that poses a major threat to Israel.
The New York Times, quoting the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation (CACNP) and the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI), reported last year that Israel was widely believed to have at least 90 nuclear warheads and sufficient fissile material to produce hundreds more.
Around 1967, Israel secretly developed the ability to build nuclear explosives, according to the Arms Control Association. By 1973, the United States “was convinced Israel had nuclear weapons,” the Federation of American Scientists later wrote, the Times said.
The Washington Post, citing estimates by the Federation of American Scientists researchers last year, reported that as of 2021, “Israel was believed to possess 90 nuclear warheads for delivery by aircraft, land-based ballistic missiles and possibly sea-based cruise missiles.”
Nonsignatory
According to the CACNP and the NTI, Israel is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and has not placed some of its key nuclear activities under the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards.
The NPT is a major international agreement signed in 1968 that took effect in 1970 and was extended indefinitely in 1995, aimed at stopping the spread of nuclear weapons, encouraging cooperation on the peaceful use of nuclear energy, and promoting disarmament.
The IAEA serves as the global hub for cooperation in the nuclear sector, promoting the safe, secure, and peaceful use of nuclear technology. —WITH A REPORT FROM INQUIRER RESEARCH
