In a surprising development, Mossad director Yossi Cohen attacked Israeli army chief of staff Aviv Kohavi who publicly criticized the US administration’s policy on the nuclear deal with Iran.
In his remarks last Tuesday, Kohavi denounced US President Joe Biden’s intentions to rejoin the 2015 nuclear agreement as “bad”.
Multiple Israeli sources reported that Cohen described Kohavi's statements as damaging to the Israeli position and its allies, saying they were "irresponsible" and only express his personal views, according to Israeli Army Radio.
The sources believed that Cohen could not have acted on his own in criticizing his "brother in arms", noting that he had received the green light from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
They pointed out that the verbal attack is the first of its kind in the history of the Israeli military establishment.
Netanyahu has already decided to turn a new page in the relations with the Democratic administration to correct some of the past mistakes, in reference to the bad relations that marred the era of former President Barack Obama.
An informed source indicated that Netanyahu is aware that he will “clash with Biden” on the Iranian and the Palestinian issues, but he wants to make serious attempts to win the US president over so that he is not responsible for any conflict between them.
The PM is trying to persuade the new White House administration to tighten sanctions against Iran, until it submits to international pressure and give up its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, as well as its plans to control regional countries.
Netanyahu has appointed Cohen as the chief of a team for this task, after his term as Mossad chief ends in June.
A close associate of Cohen revealed that he began practicing this mission as soon as he was informed of it last month.
Cohen traveled to Washington during the last days of former President Donald Trump's term and met with a number of Democratic officials.
The intelligence chief will travel to Washington again within the next two weeks to meet White House officials, and perhaps Biden himself.
