HOUSE OVERSIGHT 027100 leader will allow such a nightmare to become a reality. The hateful declarations of Iran's leaders, committed to wiping the Jewish state off the map, do not assuage Israelis' fears. 2. Economic sanctions cannot convince the regime in Teheran to abandon its nuclear project. However, sanctions can bring about the collapse of the regime if they are vigorously implemented and enforced. 3. An American military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities would be more effective than an Israeli one. But disparaging Israel's capabilities and its military ingenuity, undermining its deterrence effect, is a grave mistake. 4. Israel's operational window is closing. If Israel has to cope alone with the Iranian threat, its window of operational opportunity is narrower than the American one. It has to act sooner. 5. An Israeli military strike in the next two months, contravening repeated demands by the U.S. President to postpone it, would be counterproductive. The damage of defying the President would be greater than the damage sustained by allowing the Iranian regime an additional few months of advancing toward acquiring the bomb. Such a strike may broaden the gap between the U.S. and Israel and weaken the alliance, which all previous Israeli Prime- Ministers have safeguarded as a strategic asset of Israel. 6. The United States has failed to prevent countries like Pakistan or North Korea from obtaining nuclear weapons. This record feeds Israeli skepticism about a U.S. success in the case of Iran. This skepticism prevails despite the clear rhetoric and unquestionable commitments of the President and the Secretaries of State and Defense to prevent a nuclear Iran. 7. The fact that the Israeli Prime Minister and the Republican presidential candidate share the same political benefactor feeds suspicions in the Obama administration about Netanyahu's motives for attacking Iran a few weeks before the U.S. presidential elections. 8. The regional p