Against the backdrop of a resurgent military conflict between the United States and Iran, a senior far-right Israeli cabinet official has publicly framed the ongoing fighting as an optimal strategic outcome for his country – so long as Israeli forces do not have to join the battle themselves. Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s finance minister, laid out this controversial position in public remarks delivered Tuesday at the annual Katif Conference for National Responsibility, a gathering dedicated to advancing the reestablishment of illegal Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip. The comments were first carried by Israel’s public Kan News outlet.
Smotrich, a longstanding hardliner who has repeatedly called for full Israeli reoccupation of Gaza, the imposition of permanent military rule, the establishment of civilian settlements, and the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian populations from the enclave, emphasized that Israel has no pressing need to enter the direct fighting. “Israel has no interest in joining the campaign – the current situation is the best for us,” he told attendees. The minister went on to clarify that while Israel prefers to sit out the direct conflict, the ultimate strategic goal for Jerusalem remains the full collapse of the Iranian government – an objective he argued the United States does not necessarily share.
“[We] must remember that the ultimate goal of Israel, and not necessarily the United States, is to undermine and weaken the regime in Iran – to the point of overthrowing it,” Smotrich said. He added that collapsing Iran’s economy is the most efficient path to achieving that end, pointing to crippling domestic economic data as evidence that pressure is already working. “Currently, inflation in Iran is at 85 percent, food inflation of over 134 percent in a total of four months, and the Iranian rial is trading at an exchange rate of 1.9 million to the dollar – and it’s going up,” he noted. Reiterating his core position, Smotrich stressed that Israel should avoid direct entry to the war, saying that “the current situation is good for us, and there’s no point in pushing ourselves inward.”
The current cycle of violence traces back to February 28, when Israel and the U.S. launched coordinated strikes on Iranian targets after Israeli lobbying pushed Washington to agree to open hostilities. Tehran responded with retaliatory attacks on U.S. military installations across the Middle East, and after a brief pause in major fighting, hostilities reignited earlier this month. To date, Israel has not deployed its own military forces in the direct conflict.
In mid-June, Washington and Tehran reached a 14-point memorandum of understanding to end active military operations and launch 60 days of diplomatic negotiations. But Israeli officials immediately came out against the deal, pushing to keep the military campaign alive, and have since sought to derail the agreement by continuing Israeli attacks on Lebanon – a violation of the deal’s very first condition, which required a halt to all cross-border hostilities.
U.S. Vice President JD Vance recently confirmed these covert efforts by Israeli officials to drag Washington away from diplomacy and into deeper conflict with Iran, speaking in an interview on the Joe Rogan podcast. “You have seen this very discreet, extremely well-funded campaign to try to derail the negotiation and try to derail the deal,” Vance said.
While Smotrich and other Israeli officials now frame the renewed fighting as beneficial to Israel, the United States is bearing the full human and financial cost of the conflict. As of the latest updates, 17 U.S. military personnel have been killed in the fighting, at least 420 more have been wounded, and one service member remains missing in action.
Independent cost trackers have already documented staggering financial burdens for American taxpayers and households. The Iran War Cost Tracker estimated that by June 16, the conflict had cost U.S. taxpayers more than $100 billion. Separate data from Brown University’s Iran War Energy Cost Tracker shows that American households have paid an additional $71 billion in inflated fuel costs, equal to roughly $544 per household. With hostilities having resumed since that data was collected, analysts expect these total costs to rise significantly in the coming weeks.