The Roman senator and orator Cato the Elder (real name: Marcus Porcius Cato) famously ended every speech with the Latin phrase Carthago delenda est (“Carthage must be destroyed”). He used this phrase to advocate for the total destruction of Carthage (today’s Tunisia) during the150s BCE, leading up to the Third Punic War.

Prime Minister Netanyahu has somewhat mirrored that statement for the last four decades, referring not to ancient Carthage, but to modern day Iran, which is, of course, ancient Persia.  Not that he ever literally meant that the country needed to be destroyed. After all, Israel holds no brief against the Iranian people. But rather, that Iran as an existential danger to Israel needs to be neutralized or, in other words, denuded.

Often during this current war against Iran, the enemies of Israel worldwide have pounced on Netanyahu’s statement early in the war charging that he has been advocating for war against Iran for 40 years, but totally misinterpreting Bibi’s intent when making that statement.  To be sure that can be a topic for a full blog by itself at some other point in time.

However, it is clear that the US, our current partner in the war to eliminate Iran’s existential threat to both Israel and world, does speak in terms of total victory and unconditional surrender. The realists among us clearly understand that while “Carthage must be destroyed” is nice to think about, that will, of course, not actually happen.  The last time a war in this world ended up with the destruction of a country was at the end of World War II, something that probably will never ever happen again in our lifetimes.

What can occur, and what is playing out in real time every day in this war, is that Iran is becoming weakened dramatically, its defenses have been shattered, its leadership assassinated, its energy infrastructure is in the process of being destroyed, and its regional proxies have lost their support structure.   Therefore, when this war ends, which will happen sooner rather than later (most likely when the US President decides to call it a day), the geopolitical map of the region will have changed significantly and in our favor.

Barring any unforeseen circumstances, Israel and the US in concert will have successfully denuded Iran but will not have defeated the country in the normal sense of the term.  Iran will have been crucially toned down as an existential threat to Israel.  But that nation of 90 million people will continue to function, the religious political leadership may well continue in place and the lives of the people living there may have improved, although regime change may not have occurred.

If all of this comes to pass Israel will be in an infinitely better place security wise than it was on October 6th 2023, now with a weakened Iran and neighboring proxies bereft of their support systems.  In addition, it may well be, given what we are seeing today in the GCC countries, that the Abraham Accords will actually expand further with the war having created a tighter potential bond between them and Israel.   Nevertheless, our government here will need to remain alert to shifts in Iran’s security platform, ready to go in and “mow the lawn,” to use a term well known in Israel, to root out any serious attempt at rearmament or further development of Iran’s nuclear capabilities. That may be the best we can hope for.

However, it will also give all of us here and our government, hopefully under new, younger and more creative leadership, the opportunity to finally spend serious time addressing our social issues including the widening gap between rich and poor, further integration of the Haredi community into the work force and the military, broad appeal judicial reform, providing equal government services to the Israeli Arab community and a serious approach to addressing the Palestinian issue in a creative, fair and equitable manner.

When Israel pauses to celebrate its 78th year of independence on April 22nd the political leadership needs to abandon the mantra that “Carthage needs to be destroyed” and replace it with “Israel needs to be reset.”  Concomitant with that approach we will also need to see a plan for the future that positively reflects our amazing accomplishments as a nation while recognizing that there is yet much to be accomplished.

Carthage was eventually destroyed and plowed under.  Cato did not live to see it and the Roman Consul Scipio ended up supervising its demise.   But Israel is not Rome and Iran is not Carthage.  Responsible leadership is obligated to see the world as it is not as it wishes it was, and then act to leverage our assets to continue to grow and prosper as the good Lord intended us to do when this land was first promised to us.  We dare not fail in responding to that charge.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)