At this time of high risk in the region, the deal with Iran even if shaky seems unavoidable.
It offers the only available opportunity to improve the terrain for US-led moves to promote regional stability for America’s sake and that of Israel and other allies.
Failure to win signatures in Vienna would have sent a resentful Iran sulking into new conspiratorial huddles against American interests.
In the event of failure, China and Russia could have acquiesced to more sanctions busting by Iran to cause embarrassment in Washington while reinforcing their own business interests.
Both are serious rivals of the US for influence in the Middle East and Central Asia, and are poised for opportunities in Iran and the wider Arab Gulf to undermine America’s friends.
They are cooperating closely to make economic inroads in West Asia, Central Asia and Eurasia through heavy infrastructure investments and other business deals.
The rapidly moving cooperation was at center stage earlier this month in Ufa, Russia, at summit meetings of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and BRICS members.
China and Russia set up an unprecedented working group to tie the SCO – a security grouping that includes India and Pakistan but excludes the US – with Beijing’s trillion dollar New Silk Road Belt initiative and a Moscow-backed Eurasian economic group.
All of these moves directly challenge American influence in the region. Iran is expected to enter the SCO shortly, thus allowing firmer investment footholds for China and to a lesser extent Russia inside the country and its near abroad.
The Vienna deal may turn out to be inimical to Israel but it opens the door for a start to building a more stable military and political environment in its neighborhood.
The stability might make it less necessary for Iranian hardliners to strengthen Israel’s enemies through weapons, money and training.
Rightly, Israel and Sunni Muslim countries including Saudi Arabia fear that Iran will sharpen its swords using the wealth it receives after economic sanctions are reduced and then fully removed.
The entire Middle East is much more unstable and risk-prone for Israel. Compared with 15 years ago, Syria and Iraq are in flames, Jordan is weak and Turkey is in political confusion. Yemen, in the Arabian Peninsula, is also falling to pieces.
The Islamic State is resilient and Al Qaeda seems resurgent. To Iran’s east, Afghanistan is turning into a failed state and Pakistan is afflicted by very poor governance.
The violent nature of ideological hatred of the Jewish state in the neighborhood may be held in check by Israel’s military supremacy and skillful diplomacy.
But worse instability in the region could spawn too many unpredictable wild cards for Israel’s strategists to handle on their own.
All the more if Netanyahu succeeds in using friends in Congress to embarrass the President of his only faithful ally into using a veto to save the Vienna deal.
Reducing Iran’s isolation might help to defuse its rabidly anti-Israel hardliners especially if Tel Aviv stays studiously neutral in the current wars among Saudi-led Sunni and Iran-led Shia Muslims.
In any case, it may not be wise to see the Saudi princes steeped in Wahhabi Islamist theology as trustworthy Israeli allies even if some interests coincide among the two at this time.