An incredible piece by Ronen Bergman and Yuval Robovich on how the Israeli security establishment was pressured to launder Netanyahu and Trump's lies about how successful the two wars on Iran were. Israeli security officials confirm they were pressure to tell lie after lie:
1) Trump called the nuclear sites "totally obliterated" hours after the strikes, before any damage assessment existed. A leaked Pentagon report contradicted him in two days. The White House then pressed Israeli intelligence to sign a document backing him. A senior official refused in a shouting match: "there's no way I'm signing this." If the truth came out, he said, "in the end we'll eat the whole thing."
2) The Atomic Energy Commission signed instead, though its director-general is no nuclear scientist. Its chief scientist called the document "at the very least significantly distorted" and forced in a caveat: the achievement holds only "if Iran does not gain access to nuclear material." Iran already held it, roughly 440 kilograms of fissile material, enough for about 11 bombs.
3) Netanyahu justified the war by claiming Iran was dashing for a weapon. Both the US March 2025 assessment and the Israeli picture held there was no active weapons group and no build order from Khamenei. "Not one moment, not a smoking gun," one expert said. A senior officer added: "the IDF ranks helped Netanyahu even though they knew the things were not true."
4) Netanyahu declared the missile threat removed. Israel hit roughly a third of the missiles; half the launcher array survived, including production components. A senior Aman officer said: "when Netanyahu announces we removed the dual existential threat, the system knows he's lying." Iran had 2,500 missiles at the start of round two, only 500 fewer than before.
5) Netanyahu said "we eliminated Iran's leading nuclear scientists." Nine were killed, four senior, out of hundreds. Yet an air operations chief called it cutting out "the brain of the entire project," holding his head as he said it. The professionals knew the scientific base was intact and served the narrative anyway.
6) The September BDA showed no site fully destroyed and the program set back months, not "generations." The IDF hid the results. Rafi Miron, former NSC deputy for technology, cut to it: "the highly enriched uranium, which embodies the first-order threat, remained under Iranian control."
7) In 2026 Netanyahu made regime change a war aim. Aman called it hopeless and its research chief formally objected. As the officer known as Michael put it: "he wants you to go for regime change, and not to bother him with anything else." When it failed, the IDF quietly redefined the goal to "creating conditions."
In Israel, as in the United States, intelligence has been co-opted by the political echelon and their conclusions and statements are tailored to fit political needs. That is one of the reasons we see these disastrous strategic mistakes. The leaders don't want the truth. Netanyahu uses the military for his political needs and nothing else.
