Document Type : Original Article
Authors
Professor of Humanities, Palestinian Studies Research Unit, Al-Azhar University.
Abstract
Article Title [العربیة]
This article examines Israel’s strategic construction of Iran as an existential threat throughout the 1990s, arguing that this portrayal was not based on objective intelligence assessments but served instrumental political purposes. Through analysis of Israeli policy under Prime Ministers Rabin, Peres, and Netanyahu, the study demonstrates how the Iranian threat narrative was leveraged to advance domestic agendas, justify negotiations with the PLO, influence U.S. foreign policy, and resist concessions under the Oslo Accords. The article reveals a pattern of exaggeration and manipulation of intelligence regarding Iran’s nuclear and missile capabilities, often contradicting Israel’s own security establishment. It concludes that the demonization of Iran was a flexible political tool, periodically amplified or downplayed based on shifting Israeli strategic interests rather than empirical changes in Iranian capabilities or intentions.
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