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<\/p>\nFormer prime minister of Israel Ehud Olmert has said that the potential peace deal between Iran and the US may be seen as a betrayal in Israel.<\/p>\n
Speaking on RT\u00c9’s Morning Ireland, he said: “I think that maybe for the point of view of the original position of Netanyahu, it may be interpreted as a betrayal, although he will never admit it because he is entirely, completely dependent on the relations and support of President Trump.”<\/p>\n
US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had used the ambitions of ending Iran’s support for regional armed proxies and curbing its missile programme as justifications for their war on Iran.<\/p>\n
Neither of these points are thought to be on the agenda in upcoming negotiations.<\/p>\n
However, Mr Olmert said that there must be a degree of caution in judging the deal from an objective point of view as all of the details are not known.<\/p>\n
“We don’t know every aspect of it, but as it appears, it seems that there is a big margin between the initial expectations of both America and Israel when they started the military operation on the 28th of February, and the present understanding between America and Iran, which is far less in terms of substance than what it was supposed to be.”<\/p>\n
Mr Olmert said he thinks the “door is open” for an agreement between the Israeli government and Lebanon, and added that Israel should withdraw from southern Lebanon.<\/p>\n
He said that the Lebanese government, for the first time in modern history, has said it is ready to negotiate peace with the state of Israel.<\/p>\n
“We don’t need any territory in the south of Lebanon. We should pull out, as part of a process of negotiations with the Lebanese government, we should pull out completely from the south of Lebanon and make all the necessary adjustments for territorial agreement, and we should try to make peace.<\/p>\n
“And maybe in co-operation with the Lebanese government, we will be able to actively disarm Hezbollah, which is still a very dangerous and a very serious terrorist organisation which threatens not just Israel, but also its own country, Lebanon.<\/p>\n
“Therefore, we can co-operate with Lebanon rather than occupy any part of the south of Lebanon,” he said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The former Israeli prime minister said Donald Trump should not be taken up “for every word that he says”, adding that he has said contradictory things about the Iranian leadership.<\/p>\n
“Come back after a couple of days to quote to him what he said, which is the opposite of what he says at that time and so on and so forth.”<\/p>\n
He said that the expectation that the Iranian regime would collapse after one attack was unrealistic.<\/p>\n
Mr Olmert said that the US and Israel did not have a strategy for the continued war following the initial attack, and questioned the partnership between the two countries.<\/p>\n
“One can say that when President Trump attacks Benjamin Netanyahu and calls him by some very nasty names, how did you go to war with Netanyahu?<\/p>\n
“Why Israel was ready to go to war with America is a much simpler and lighter question. Of course, if you go with the mightiest nation on earth, you can justify everything.<\/p>\n
“But I think the expectations which were built originally by both Israel and America, I remember every major statement made by President Trump and then Netanyahu in the beginning.”<\/p>\n
“There were false expectations, unrealistic, not serious, not thoughtful. There was not any strategy for the next day, not any thinking of what will happen after the initial attack.”<\/p>\n
Mr Olmert said that any expectation that Iran would collapse in one attack was “not serious”.<\/p>\n
“The expectation that the regime will collapse was unrealistic. The expectation that Iran a nation of 90 million people, it is a powerful regime that has sustained so many difficulties and challenges over the last 50 years.<\/p>\n
“They believe that one single military attack is tough, and as painful as it happened to be, will bring down the government, was not serious,” he said.`<\/p>\n
He added that both the Americans and the Iranians “were looking for a reasonable way to restore the situation to what it was before the war started”.<\/p>\n
“And the Iranians were very successful,” he said.<\/p>\n