…

Meanwhile, Yoni Tobin of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America noted that American forces have redirected 62 vessels trying to break the blockade against Tehran. “It’s preventing Iranian shipments of oil to the Far East, and to China, primarily, which is responsible for the vast majority of Iran’s revenue,” Tobin said.

Hegseth told senators, “But ultimately, we control the Strait because nothing’s going in that we don’t allow to go in.”

…

Read the original article on CBN.

The post Hegseth Argues for Strong Pentagon War Budget as U.S. Bolsters Iran Pressure appeared first on JINSA.

…

The emerging debate now centers on a core question facing Washington: whether additional military pressure could force Iran to abandon its nuclear and missile ambitions, or whether renewed strikes would deepen a regional conflict without producing decisive results.

Retired Vice Adm. Mark Fox, former deputy commander of U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), said he believes the current ceasefire and diplomatic track are unlikely to force Iran to back down.

“I really cannot envision anything other than a full return to combat operations,” Fox told Fox News Digital. “The only thing that they will respond to, I think ultimately, is force.”

Fox argued the U.S. military remains capable of reopening and securing commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz despite ongoing Iranian threats against vessels transiting the waterway.

“This is a militarily obtainable objective,” he said, outlining a strategy involving guided missile destroyers, attack helicopters, drones and expanded aerial surveillance to create a protected maritime corridor through the Strait.

Fox acknowledged the U.S. Navy is smaller than it was during the 1980s tanker wars, but argued American forces still possess the capability to secure the chokepoint if Washington commits enough naval assets and persistent monitoring operations.

“It’s not easy,” Fox said. “But the geography is fixed.”

He described a possible strategy that would rely on destroyers, drones and attack aircraft to create what he called an “unblinking eye” over the strait, allowing U.S. forces to identify and neutralize Iranian speedboats, drones and anti-shipping threats before they can strike commercial vessels.

Fox also warned against allowing Iran to preserve leverage over Hormuz while continuing to advance its missile and nuclear programs.

“If not now, when?” he said. “If they had a nuclear weapon, they would use it.”

Fox, who also signed onto a recent policy paper by the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, echoed the report’s argument that Iran is using negotiations to buy time while preserving its military capabilities.

The paper was authored by several retired senior U.S. military officials and national security experts, including retired Gen. Chuck Wald, former deputy commander of U.S. European Command and retired Vice Adm. Robert Harward, former deputy commander of CENTCOM, argued the current ceasefire and diplomatic track “cannot reliably compel Iran” to meet U.S. demands and warned Tehran was seeking to “drag out talks, erode U.S. resolve, and use the time to strengthen itself.”

The report called for expanded military operations targeting Iran’s maritime capabilities, missile infrastructure and internal coercive apparatus while avoiding broad attacks on civilian infrastructure that could trigger wider regional escalation.

But not everyone agrees that renewed military action would produce a better outcome.

Read the original article on Fox News.

The post Trump Faces Split Among Retired U.S. Commanders Over Whether To Resume Iran Strikes appeared first on JINSA.

The Pentagon says that “it’s delivering the decisive impact we intended.” Certain media outlets and shipping analytics firms suggest the opposite, that dozens of Iranian ships are crossing unimpeded. Both can’t be true.

“Turning Tides: U.S. Blockade Enforcement Exceeds Iranian Evasion,” a May 1 report by the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA), examined the discrepancies. It found that “the truth lies in between though far closer to the Pentagon’s claim.”

In short, the U.S. blockade has proven largely successful.

In an update to its report, JINSA’s review found U.S. forces had redirected 62 vessels that had attempted to breach the blockade as of May 11, and disabled four more. That is up from 44 vessels redirected at the time the report was first issued. The blockade began on April 13.

“The vast majority of ships that are eligible have been turned around or seized under the blockade,” Yoni Tobin, senior policy analyst at JINSA and author of the report, told JNS.

JINSA found that 23 vessels had apparently tried to bypass the blockade. Of those, one-fourth did so on the blockade’s first day, a result of enforcement issues that have since been resolved. One-third were small ships without the capacity to transport large cargo.

“The number one point is, and we’ve tracked literally hundreds of ships as part of this project … none that we tracked going through were oil tankers,” said Tobin. “It’s very significant because that is really what the blockade is all about. It’s preventing Iranian shipments of oil to the Far East, and to China, primarily, which is responsible for the vast majority of Iran’s revenue.”

It strongly suggests Iran is deterred. It is reflected in the fact, widely reported, that the country is running out of places to put its oil. “They’re not able to move it. They’re not able to store it. We’re seeing them put it on ships that can’t go anywhere,” he said.

On May 8, Iran attempted to send two oil tankers through the blockade. The U.S. fired on and disabled both of them. “There have been several tankers that briefly crossed the blockade line but were then rerouted or disabled by U.S. forces… None have ultimately evaded U.S. blockade enforcement,” said Tobin.

United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) claimed on May 4 that a single Iranian tanker had run the blockade and made it to to East Asia, possibly en route to China, “but JINSA has not been able to verify that,” he said.

Misreporting about the blockade is due to three main reasons, according to Tobin. The first is terminology. In other words, how an “Iranian-linked vessel” is defined. He pointed to an April 22 Financial Times article with a headline claiming 34 “Iran-linked tankers” bypassed the blockade.

Not only did the text of the article make no such claim, he said, but the report cited Vortexa, a shipping analytics firm that defined “Iran-linked” as any tanker with a connection to Iran going back years, “including just visiting its port, taking cargo a year or two ago.”

“A tanker being abstractly ‘linked to Iran’ is not part of the blockade’s criteria,” he said.

Secondly, there is confusion over the term “shadow fleet” or “ghost fleet vessels.” Lloyd’s List, a shipping data firm, drew considerable attention with an estimate published on April 21 that “at least 26 Iranian shadow fleet vessels” had bypassed the blockade. (U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, drew criticism when he posted a link to the article on his X account with the caption “awesome,” making it appear he was rooting against U.S. efforts.)

Similarly, The Wall Street Journal on April 16, using Lloyd’s List, reported that “81% of ships that transited the strait since April 13 were affiliated with Iran through ownership, flag, port calls in Iran and other links.”

But in a less publicized update, Lloyd’s List omitted the word “Iranian.” The firm also defined its criterion for a “shadow fleet vessel”—ships involved “in a cargo delivery where at some point over the course of the delivery one party in the chain engages in one or more deceptive shipping practices.”

That is clearly beyond the blockade’s sphere of responsibility, said Tobin.

What’s more, 23 of the 26 ships were ultimately redirected by U.S. forces. Which brings Tobin to his third point, which is that there is a lack of understanding about where the blockade starts. Many reports refer to ships crossing through the Strait of Hormuz. “In reality, that is not where the blockade is being enforced at all,” he said. U.S. Navy vessels are stationed roughly 300 miles away in the Gulf of Oman.

The naval blockade is not just about stopping Iran’s energy trade. As JINSA underscored in its report, the blockade also “constricts the regime’s ability to import weapons components, assembled weaponry, inputs for missile fuel, and cash.”

What is often overlooked is that the blockade is part of a broader effort dubbed “Operation Economic Fury,” said Tobin. It includes sanctions, such as against a major oil terminal and five so-called “teapot” refineries in China heavily involved in trading Iranian oil, and the freezing of Iranian bank accounts and other assets, including cryptocurrency.

Blocked from the U.S. financial system, nobody is going to want to do business with them, he said. On May 7, Bloomberg reported that “China’s financial regulator advised the country’s largest banks to temporarily suspend new loans to five refiners recently sanctioned by the U.S.”

“We’ve seen something that nobody has succeeded at doing under successive American administrations, which is to cut off the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism from its main funding source,” said Tobin. “There have been piecemeal attempts at dealing with it in the past, but this is a monumental step toward that objective.”

Read the original article on JNS.

The post U.S. Hormuz Blockade Succeeds in Choking off Iran’s Oil Lifeline appeared first on JINSA.

On Iran’s confidence in the negotiations, GEN (ret.) Votel argued it should come as no surprise, noting that Iran “survived an eight-year war with Iraq amidst horrendous suffering of their people” and that “there is a certain amount of wasta coming with this” — a belief that they can wait the U.S. out. On the military situation, he described U.S. forces as continuing to enforce the blockade, now having turned back nearly 70 ships, while using the ceasefire period to “replenish and resupply” so that forces are prepared should a “more robust military posture” be required. On the ceasefire itself, he offered a careful but telling assessment, saying it is “holding politically but degrading operationally” given the continued strikes back and forth between both sides.

On what comes next, GEN (ret.) Votel argued that “the onus really has to be on the diplomatic element of power at this point,” saying there is “not much more we can do militarily other than respond to the situation that develops.” On Netanyahu’s suggestion that Iran taking over the strait was unforeseeable, he was blunt: “It was absolutely foreseeable. Every war game, every study we’ve ever had has suggested that Iran would use the Strait of Hormuz as a point of leverage.” On the prospects for a deal, he was measured, noting that both sides “still seem to be at kind of extreme ends” of their negotiating positions and that “fundamentally, there’s got to be trust built between two sides before they can begin to move towards the middle.”

Listen now:

The post GEN (ret.) Joseph Votel on NPR: The Ceasefire Is “Holding Politically but Degrading Operationally” appeared first on JINSA.

…

On the nuclear issue, former Israeli National Security Advisor Yaakov Amidror said Israel’s position remains uncompromising

“Weaponized uranium must leave Iran,” Amidror said. “The Iranians must not be allowed to enrich uranium.”

Alongside the nuclear issue, Israeli analysts say Iran’s ballistic missile program has become equally central to Israel’s security concerns.

Read the original article on Fox News.

The post Trump-Backed Board of Peace, Israel ‘Will Take Action’ if Hamas Remains Out of Compliance: Netanyahu Advisor appeared first on JINSA.

Appearing on “The Record With Greta Van Susteren,” the former deputy commander of U.S. Central Command said President Donald Trump appears focused on two urgent goals: restoring the flow of global commerce and stopping Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

“The president wants to get the flow of commerce going and, more importantly, he wants to stop the nuclear weapons program,” Harward said. “And so, he’s looking to achieve those two goals.”

Host Greta Van Susteren raised concerns about proposals for a 30-day negotiation period involving frozen Iranian assets, noting Tehran may have $100 billion to $120 billion held around the world.

She compared the idea to the Obama-era nuclear deal in 2015, arguing the regime used unfrozen money at that time to support terror proxy groups Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis.

“So, I don’t know how good a deal this could ever be by handing cash to Iran,” Van Susteren said.

Harward said he shared her concern, even as he acknowledged the administration may view sanctions relief or asset access as part of a broader effort to get Iran to reopen the critical shipping lane and curb its nuclear ambitions.

“I, with you, think that could end up representing long-term problems because then you empower the regime,” he said. “They walk away winning the negotiation, so to speak, and can move on with their long-term objectives.”

Harward said Iran’s long-term goals are not limited to the Strait of Hormuz or nuclear weapons.

“[It’s] not only the nukes and not only the strait, but exporting the Islamic revolution,” he said.

The retired Navy SEAL said Trump may believe he can still strike a tactical deal while pursuing a longer-term campaign to weaken Iran through asymmetric pressure.

“Now, if the president thinks he can make that deal and still go after them asymmetrically, a longer campaign where he’s weakened them but can undermine them in the longer run, maybe that’s part of his strategy,” Harward said.

But he warned that such a strategy would require a sustained U.S. commitment beyond Trump’s administration.

“That would have to be dependent on that strategy carrying on through administrations,” Harward said. “And the U.S. does not have a good track record of doing that.”

Read the original article on Newsmax.

The post Vice Admiral Harward to Newsmax: Iran Asset Deal Could Backfire appeared first on JINSA.

In his discussion with Haviv Rettig Gur on Ask Haviv Anything, JINSA Fellow Hussein Mansour argues that a new ideological framework originating in the American political far-left is threatening to undermine mainstream Democratic support for Israel.

Mansour speaks of how even supposedly centrist Democrats are veering away from the party’s traditional support of Israel. Mansour says that this process is piecemeal and incremental but is poised to transform the entirety of Democratic politics and foreign policymaking. Using the analogy of DEI initiatives, Mansour argues that anti-Zionism could gradually and thoroughly seep through the Democratic party’s platform and institutions.

Key Quotes:

1. “The Democratic establishment has decided that they have to choose currently between party unity and party civil war around the issue of Israel. And if they are to compete seriously in 2028 and win the White House, they must concede on Israel to the left.”
2. “This completely normalized and accepted anti-Zionist position of the left is then going to steamroll into all institutions of the party. You’re going to adopt the entire framework of anti-Zionism.”
3. “The mainstream of the Democratic party adopted DEI piecemeal, they didn’t believe it deeply. I don’t think that anybody in the leadership level of the Democratic party thought through that adopting DEI is going to completely transform the institutional structure – within a decade – of the Democratic Party and of liberal institutions.”
4. “The United States is a unique country. Our relationship with Jews has been one of the characteristic and unique features of American history and of American identity. No other nation in history— certainly no other massive superpower like the United States—had such a positive relationship for so long.”
5. “Israel winning for the United States matters immensely—for the security of the US and for the future of the United States. The world is becoming a dangerous place, and we are turning a major corner.”

The post What’s Next for the U.S.-Israel Relationship? JINSA’s Hussein Mansour on Ask Haviv Anything appeared first on JINSA.

…

“Frankly it’s hard to imagine Qatar ever becoming less ideological or antagonistic toward Israel,” Jonathan Ruhe, a fellow at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, told JI. “Despite the Iran war’s economic toll, Doha still can afford to propagate anti-Israel, anti-Western extremism through Al Jazeera, the Muslim Brotherhood and other actors. And it still has every incentive to support Islamist groups and media to buttress its own credibility in the Arab and Muslim worlds.”

Additionally, Ruhe said there is little external pressure forcing Qatar to change course, pointing to the Trump administration’s favorable posture toward Doha.

“The war has not altered the Trump administration’s reliably favorable attitude toward Qatar,” Ruhe said. “Qatar’s relationship with Tehran is now severely damaged, but it can compensate through stronger ties with Turkey and Saudi Arabia, both of whom have been propagating anti-Israel rhetoric, and possibly Pakistan, too.” 

…

 Read the full article on Jewish Insider.

The post Iran’s Attacks on Qatar Could Prompt Regional Realignment, Experts Say appeared first on JINSA.

…

On the nuclear issue, former Israeli National Security Advisor Yaakov Amidror said Israel’s position remains uncompromising.

“Weaponized uranium must leave Iran,” Amidror said. “The Iranians must not be allowed to enrich uranium.”

…

Jonathan Ruhe, Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA) fellow for American strategy, told Fox News Digital, “Ultimately the United States and Israel should have strongly similar redlines for an acceptable deal,” he said, including “shutting down Iran’s nuclear weapons program completely, permanently and verifiably.”

Ruhe said that goes beyond Iran handing over highly enriched uranium and includes shutting down remaining enrichment-related facilities at Pickaxe and Isfahan.

…

Amidror said Iran’s ability to support Hezbollah and Hamas has already been weakened by the collapse of regional supply routes. 

“The Iranians cannot effectively support the proxies because there is no longer a land bridge from Iran to Syria,” he said, but warned that if negotiations leave the impression that Washington backed down, Iran’s regional proxies could emerge stronger even after the war.

Ruhe similarly argued that Israel wants to avoid any agreement that restores legitimacy to the Iranian regime without fundamentally weakening it.

“Avoiding anything that legitimates Iran’s regime and abandons the Iranian people” is critical, Ruhe said, including “giving guarantees against future attacks or compensating Tehran for wartime damages.”

Ruhe warned that for Israel, a “bad deal” is ultimately any agreement that restrains Israel’s future freedom of action against Iran and its proxies.

“This is one big reason Iran wants to ensnare the Trump administration in open-ended negotiations that sideline military options and create daylight between Washington and Jerusalem,” Ruhe said.

 Read the full article on Fox News.

The post What Israel Wants From an Iran Peace Deal: No Enrichment, Missile Limits and Strict Enforcement appeared first on JINSA.

“I don’t mean to be the party pooper, but look, this is not going to be helpful if we’re not going to be honest with each other,” he said on an opening panel, urging the crowd to reckon with a marked downturn in support for the Jewish state over its war in Gaza, particularly among younger voters. “Israel is extremely unpopular.”

…

Michael Makovsky, president and CEO of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, told JI in a recent interview that he disagreed with Emanuel, even as he acknowledged the sentiment as a “legitimate view.” Still, he added that it is “in the U.S. interest” to continue providing military aid to Israel, “which anyway all goes to buying U.S. weaponry.”

…

 Read the full article at Jewish Insider.

The post How Rahm Emanuel Is Recalibrating on Israel Ahead of 2028 appeared first on JINSA.