Watchwords: Tuesday, June 9
Israel is cast this week as both too reckless for Washington to control and too cowed to act on its own — when the field is plainly Israel's, and the fight is over who decides when it acts.
Two charges landed on the same government in the same days, and they cannot both be true. Israel struck Iran back before Washington licensed it, stood down a loaded second strike when Trump warned it would be "on its own," and cleared Tyre over Tehran's objection — and the week's accusers want it to be the reckless cowboy and the leashed client at once. The strongest move you have is to put the two charges in the same breath and let them collide, and this brief gives you the facts that survive the contradiction.
The field is Israel's, and the real argument is over who decides when it acts, not whether it can.
The Israel Brief is the Mitzpe Institute's read on Israel and the region — most mornings, Sunday through Thursday. More at mitzpe.org.