In a new book titled The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain, Jack Straw—who served for five years as Tony Blair’s foreign secretary—attempts to explain the recent history of Anglo-Iranian relations, while arguing in favor of the 2015 nuclear deal. Straw also makes a case for further diplomatic initiatives to expand upon the deal. Not only is the book riddled with factual errors, major and minor, writes Amir Taheri in his review, but its prescriptions are deeply flawed:

[Straw] thinks that because Iran, as he reminds the reader, is an ancient civilization—and has produced great poets, weaves exquisite carpets, and offers one of the world’s hautes cuisines—it deserves indulgence for its [malign] activities in other domains such as hostage-taking, hate-mongering, human-rights violations, and the export of terror in the name of revolution. This is like granting Stalin indulgence because one appreciates Pushkin and Tchaikovsky and enjoys a dish of borscht with a glass of vodka on the side. . . . That Cyrus the Great was a great king and, arguably, even the founder of human rights, as Straw suggests, does not justify, to cite just one example, the mass murder of Syrians by a mercenary army [controlled] by the Iranian mullahs.

[There is also] Straw’s strange belief that the Khomeinist ruling elite includes a “reformist” faction that desires close relations with Western democracies and must, therefore, be supported in order to weaken and eventually get rid of the “hardline” faction led by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. But . . . Straw is unable to cite a single reform proposed, let alone carried out, by his “reformist” faction in Tehran.

Straw is critical of President Donald Trump for rejecting secret diplomacy, [but] offers no evidence than any deal made with the Islamic Republic in the past 40 years has had a long-lasting impact on the Khomeinist strategy and behavior. The Khomeinist rulers of Iran have perfected the art of diplomatic cheat-retreat-advance.

On Tuesday, a Hizballah drone attack injured three people in northern Israel. The next day, another attack, targeting an IDF base, injured eighteen people, six of them seriously, in Arab al-Amshe, also in the north. This second attack involved the simultaneous use of drones carrying explosives and guided antitank missiles. In both cases, the defensive systems that performed so successfully last weekend failed to stop the drones and missiles. Ron Ben-Yishai has a straightforward explanation as to why: the Lebanon-backed terrorist group is getting better at evading Israel defenses. He explains the three basis systems used to pilot these unmanned aircraft, and their practical effects:

These systems allow drones to act similarly to fighter jets, using “dead zones”—areas not visible to radar or other optical detection—to approach targets. They fly low initially, then ascend just before crashing and detonating on the target. The terrain of southern Lebanon is particularly conducive to such attacks.

But this requires skills that the terror group has honed over months of fighting against Israel. The latest attacks involved a large drone capable of carrying over 50 kg (110 lbs.) of explosives. The terrorists have likely analyzed Israel’s alert and interception systems, recognizing that shooting down their drones requires early detection to allow sufficient time for launching interceptors.

The IDF tries to detect any incoming drones on its radar, as it had done prior to the war. Despite Hizballah’s learning curve, the IDF’s technological edge offers an advantage. However, the military must recognize that any measure it takes is quickly observed and analyzed, and even the most effective defenses can be incomplete. The terrain near the Lebanon-Israel border continues to pose a challenge, necessitating technological solutions and significant financial investment.