By Staff, Agencies

Former “Israeli” army’s Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot lamented that “the ‘Israeli’ military establishment was kept in the dark ahead of the decision of the United States to withdraw from the Iranian nuclear deal, a move by Washington that was a ‘strategic mistake’.”

“Only Yossi Cohen, Ron Dermer and Benjamin Netanyahu dealt with this issue of leaving the nuclear deal. No one spoke with the security establishment,” Eisenkot told The Jerusalem Post’s sister public Maariv.

Eisenkot said that he had never attended a meeting or held a meeting with former “Israeli” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the possibility of withdrawing from the nuclear deal or even former US President Donald Trump’s “Deal of the Century” with the Palestinians.

“This does not make sense, this is not the right way to run a ‘country’,” he said.

Describing the atmosphere prior to the decision, he said that "Netanyahu came with one worldview and narrative, the defense establishment came with another story and narrative.”

According to him, he was aware that the Mossad was pushing the Americans to withdraw from the deal while he was building his multi-year plan on the assumption that the “Israeli” army could look forward to a decade of quiet on the nuclear issue.

That assumption “allowed us for the first time to delivery enormous resources, tens of billions, in favor of other missions” including destroying cross-border tunnels belonging to both Hezbollah in the north and Hamas in the south, building the barrier along the border with the Gaza Strip and increasing technological capabilities.

“Then, in the middle of it all, comes the exit from the agreement. And we are surprised by the exit from it. This is a matter that we did not prepare for,” he said.

The exit by the administration of former US President Donald Trump from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in 2018 was a “strategic mistake” that while it had certain holes, it slowed down Iran’s nuclear program and the withdrawal “freed the Iranians from certain shackles.”