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Host: Welcome to the INSS podcast series. In this podcast we will discuss the relationship between Iran and China. The increasing cooperation between Beijing and Tehran, which has yielded joint military exercises and a strategic agreement in terms of serious examination of the nature of this relationship, its impact on global and regional security and on the national security of Israel in particular. In this podcast we will discuss all these topics and others with our panel of experts. Efraim Halevi, former head of the Mossad. Assaf Orion, senior research fellow, director of Israel Channel Research program in INSS and Doctor Kevjn Lim, the author of the memorandum China-Iran Relations: Strategic, Economic and Diplomatic Aspects in Comparative Perspective which was published recently. Hello and thank you very much for joining us. So I would like to begin with an introduction of this subject in a general perspective. The relationship of Iran and China, what makes it an area of concern for us in Israel and for our allies in the West. And I would like to as you first, Efraim, how do you see this issue in the context of regional conflicts which involve Israel of course, and the global conflict between the United States and China?
Efraim Halevi: I think we have to spend a minute and a half on history. The history between us and China is a history in which we had confrontations on the key issue from our point of view in the Middle East and that is the nuclear issue. And the Chinese gave support to Iran in the nuclear field, they already have the tradition of showing off (inaudible) and when it comes to the question of how the nuclear issue is assessed as a threat from their point of view, I will say that I once met an expert of theirs, a senior expert, and he said to me the nuclear issue is not a threat to China, there is no possibility that the Iranians will attack China through a missile or any other way but the threat, an existential threat to China is if the price of the barrel of oil will become $200 a barrel. And I think that we have to realize that the Chinese way of thinking is totally different than ours because the circumstances are different. They are a world power, they are now close to become almost, shall we say, crowned, the second world power in the world and people will say in certain areas even the number one. And number two, I think that they are concentrating on the world as a whole which they didn't do in the past, they are on all five continents and the Middle East is a continent which is of interest to them and they want to increase their presence here both economically and also strategically and also militarily both in the maritime area and also in all the other areas. I think that is a matter we have to see and in all these issues our views, theirs and ours, are totally different, I don't say they always conflict, they're totally different, the interests are different, the calculations are different and even I might say, the relative power of Israel compared to the relative power of China is also something one has to mention even today.
Host: Assaf your remarks about the relevance and the impact on Israel, of this relationship between China and Iran.
Assaf Orion: We tried to approach it from a policy point of view and within the Israeli policy design there's an imagined partition between economy and security. So on the one hand we have China who is often spoken of as a friend, as an economic partner, maybe one of the most prominent economic partners, and on the other hand we have the archenemy Iran, the number one threat to our national security. And seemingly, those two run in parallel universes, never to be meeting in Israel and trying not to address it too forcibly. However, this is a dramatic encounter between the number one threat to Israel's national security and a very important trade partner. And imagining that those two have no linkage, no implications, is, as I've said, an imagined partition. And what we are trying to address in this effort of research, both of Kevjn's memorandum and two other articles we've all saw, is to shed light on the linkages, on the implications, Israel is more accustomed to thinking about China and national security through the lens of its relations with America but at the same time when you follow what China and Iran is doing, Israel needs to pay more attention to the actual linkages between its economic relations with China are never purely economic and China's relations with Israel's number one threat.
Host: So Kevjn, you'll follow up this issue and maybe other areas of concerns that we should consider.
Kevjn Kim: Yes. So I think like what Efraim and Assaf have mentioned, I mean, there are opportunities and threats here. On the one hand, China and Iran, if we look at it from the regional perspective, there are strong ties. Iran is of course a very important partner for China in the region, it's not necessarily the most important. As we've seen in memo, China has sought and continues seeking to balance its ties, especially with Saudi Arabia, countries like Saudi Arabia and the UAE, but China like has been mentioned, China has also helped Iran to basically set up, stand up its nuclear program, it's artillery rockets, its cruise missiles, so on and so forth. So there is this element of threat in there when it comes to Israel. But they are also opportunities and this is one of the main messages of the memo and this is that there are interests between both countries that don’t always align, China and Iran. I'll just name a few just in the interest of time. And one of them is that for China, you know, Middle East is-, China has been involved in the Middle East in an economic sense, it's all business and China doesn't really have, you know, prominent, a very prominent security deployment here and that's also because it's getting a free ride on the back of America's security provision whereas, you know, and China also wants sort of-, Iran wants the U.S. out of the region, out of the gulf region, but also increasingly out of Iraq, places like Iraq and Syria, whereas China wants the U.S. to remain so that it can continue guaranteeing it's sea lines of communication and supply lines, supply chains. China and Iran look at the region different, Iran has of course enmities or competition, degradation of cost, with different countries in the region, with also different countries in the region and not just Israel but also particularly in the southern gulf whereas for China it's really critical, the Gulf region is critical source of fossil fuel, fossil fuel imports, and China hence has been also trading more with countries like Saudi Arabia and the UAE rather than with Iran and also in terms of investments, in terms infrastructure and in terms of what we've been calling, you know, this comprehensive strategic partnership, this is something that also has to be placed in context of course, so the CFP is something that China has with Iran but China also has with at least four other countries in the region alone. The UAE, Saudi Arabia, Algeria and Egypt, right? So, and one of the other key messages of the memo as well, looking forward, is that, you know, ultimately if China's investments and its trade and its presence in the Middle East increases over time and we think at the moment that it will likely, it is more likely to increase than not, and if we take that into combination, you combine that with the possibility of the U.S. sort of receding, not completely pulling out of the Middle East of course but the U.S. has been steadily receding from the region, not specifically from the southern Gulf but from certain parts like Iraq and Afghanistan and also Syria to focus increasingly on East Asia, then there is also an opportunity here in the sense that for China which has always marketed itself as a nonpartisan actor in the region, China has at that point, would have at the point an important interest in trying to better secure the region, even militarily, certainly diplomatically. Militarily, you know, at some point China might, I'm not saying that it will but at some point it might see greater utility in deploying more robustly in the region if the U.S. continues gradually, at this pace, to pull out from the region, and at that point China will then have to rethink the way it looks at the region. Is it, will it then continue closing one eye on the activities of actors like Iran which are disruptive or will lead attempts to do more in order to sort of re-stabilize the region.
Host: Thank you. So after discussing the regional and the global perspectives on the matter, I would like to focus on the nature of this relationship between the two. How can we define it, concerning their history, their political motivations and their national goals or interests. So I would like to start with you, Efraim. When you examine the level of cooperation and the strategic motivation of the two, is it a type of an alliance? Something comparable to Israel American relations or something else?
Efraim Halevi: I think to compare the relationship between Israel and China to that with Israel and the United States is far from reality. We have a strategic relationship with the United States, it's a defensive security relationship, it's a relationship of common values, of social understandings, of approach to western king democracy. In all these areas we have allegiance with the United States, we also have a big Jewish community in the United States with which we are aligned, we now have a relationship with the evangelical community in the United States. All these things are absent in the relationship with China. Israel was interested in the relationship with China and saw China as a threat in two areas. I mentioned the nuclear threat before. We also saw the logistical support, the banking money trail support for terrorism which the Chinese supported. And at one time there was a dramatic incident over the upcoming first ever visit of Mr. Netanyahu as Prime Minister to China. This was-, he was not the first Israeli Prime Minister to be there, Mr. Rabin was there in order to tackle the nuclear issue and the Chinese denied that they were giving military aid and they did not come-, they were not truthful over this. In this case, Israel at the same time totally separately launched a big operation to try and nail the Bank of China as being a channel for the passing of funds and very elaborate arrangements were made, a family, a Jewish family that had lost a relative in a terrorist attack was going to appear in court and this could have posed enormous damage to Israel. And the Chinese came to the Prime Minister and said if you want to proceed with this, your visit is cancelled. And the Prime Minister had to weigh the two, I remind you that the terrorist issue for the Prime Minister is probably one after the nuclear threat, terrorism, all kinds of terrorism, all kinds of groups of terror who are fighting Israel, and his, part of his reputation is on this … but he in the end ordered the ends to this operation in the United States, the United States court, and this was one thing which we have to remember. And therefor I believe that we had two other incidents, very, very serious incidents, in which we had to lose face. We had a contract with the Chinese to help build a new fighter aircraft. At one point the United States came to Israel and accused Israel of using American technologies and actually we're giving them to the Chinese and demanded that Israel stop this operation. Israel initially refused. The president of China came to Israel for this in the year 2000 with five members of his government. I was then head of Mossad, I remember it, I also was part of a meeting with these people. And the president stayed here for five days, five full days, trying to get Israel not to break the agreement. Israel in the end broke the agreement. It was punished by the United States in one way, I'm not going into details, and then came the negotiation with the Chinese how to settle this rupture, and I'm not at liberty to reveal the terms or the way this was settled, all I will say is that it was a very painful settlement for Israel. And I think this is indicative of what China is about. There's one point I'd like to say, to add, to what was said before. The Chinese here are not only working on the economic field, they're also working on the strategic field. They have a military in Djibouti, it is a symbolic base, the Chinese always deal with symbols, in other words take a symbol and develop it to something more. They have the string of pearls, all the ports from the south China sea up to and including the East Africa and port Sudan and other ports along the eastern shores of East Africa. All along. And there's now talk of the Chinese trying to set up a port in the Emirates and strong pressure of the Chinese to get there and there is a lot of apprehension about this between the Emirates. And at the same time there's an effort by the Russians to let-, that the Emirates should allow them to station a Russian military squadron of aircraft in the Emirates, for their political and strategic needs. So I think that the issue here is not only Israel China relations and how the economics work out. And now we have one last point of contention I'd like to mention here, that is the port which is being built in Haifa, which is a port which is adjacent to the Israel port for Israel submarines. And the United States has been very, very, very assertive in trying to deal with this issue. It is not yet settled at the moment, it's an issue which has been dealt with, shall we say, beneath the radar, so to speak, but it's a very, very explosive issue because the United States is insisting on-, they have said that if this issue is not settled properly, they will no longer allow ships of the sixth fleet of the United States to visit Israeli ports, and this is not just a symbolic step, it also has, I think, strategic consequences. So I think it will be a mistake to say that the problem is basically almost only how we level off our economic or our other interests related to economy and related to exports, imports, and so forth in the civilian field, know there are serious strategic issues which are on the table or shall we say under the table, but very, very prominent under the table.
Host: So from the assessment of Israel China relation we would like to move forward to the relationship between China and Iran and Assaf, what makes this relationship complicated, maybe not less than the one with Israel, and how does this affect the scope of cooperation and the future of this relationship?
Assaf Orion: For westerners watching this relations there's a tendency to draw it or portray it as an all-weather all terrain 24/7 alliance, so, China doesn't do alliances. They have many partnerships, they have a full vernacular of terminologies for partnerships and relations, but they don't do alliances. And this relations between China and Iran are laden with contradictions and tensions between them. Kevjn discussed some of them but I'll mention a few. They both challenge the U.S. but Iran would like the U.S. to be out of the Middle East and China is enjoying that U.S. forces are bogged down in the Middle East and are unable to shift to the Indo-Pacific. On trade and economy of course they both enjoy the exchange but China enjoys it more and when Iran is under sanctions, China enjoys a great advantage of almost a monopoly of being the sole partner. On Middle Eastern security and stability China is an economic player and would like to see stability. Iran thrives on trouble, on conflicts, on crisis, generating them, fueling them and living off them. But you don't see China in an active role moderating Iran in any effective way, like, could you please tell the Houthis in Yemen to stop bombarding Saudi Arabia, our comprehensive strategic partner and our main supplier of oil. When Iran attacked Aramco and the oil facilities in Saudi Arabia, China did nothing publically but some declarations and statements. When tankers were hit by Iran or kidnapped, China took care of its own tankers and that's it. So although the safety and security of energy flow regionally is of great interest of China, you don't see them doing head to head with Iran and perhaps they speak about it in closed room. Last point in this sense is that surely, China is very aware of the power relations between itself and Iran and very consciously building dependency of Iran on China and trying to minimize the dependency of China on Iran. So you see diversification of energy sources and at the same time Iran found itself with China being the importer of half of its oil. That's high dependency. So we need to look at that and I think Kevjn's memo clearly shows that, to look at this relation in its full complexity. A lot of convergence in interests and a lot to do together but at the same time divergences and tensions.
Host: So Kevjn, considering the dissimilar viewpoints of Iran and China and maybe also we should refer to what Efraim said before about the perspective from Israel, I mean, how does China puts itself as a regional actor and a global actor in front of Israel and in front of Iran, what are its main goals in the region, what are the strategic considerations and of course the constraints that it actually has to deal with while actually maneuvering between its relationship with Israel on the one hand and its relationship with Iran on the other hand?
Kevjn Lim: Yeah, so, China's policy in the Middle East differ somewhat from its policy elsewhere and its near abroad in East Asia, in South East Asia, places like that. So, we've seen of course an increasingly assertive China. Especially under the presidency of Xi Jinping since 2013 in places like the East Asia, like the South China seas, those islands and even on the borders of India. In the Middle East it's a different kettle of fish, right? So what we're seeing is China ramping up its trade energy, that sort of thing, investments, but it's been very consciousness about staying away from conflicts. So China has offered symbolic, well, perhaps a little bit more than symbolic but not much more than that, proposals when it comes to the Israel Palestinian conflict, it hasn't-, it has avoided, like Assaf has said, it has refrain from, well, at least as far as we know publically, it has refrained from pressing Iran so far to moderate its disruptive behavior in the region, especially when it comes to Saudi Arabia which is a CSD comprehensive strategic partner for China but it's also, in that sense it's also been able to maintain its image of a nonpartisan, of, I suppose of-, if you will, if not necessarily of an honest broker, there's certainly one-, an image of somebody, of a country that does not seek to go beyond business, right? And in that sense regional countries including Israel are willing to deal with it on that basis, that imagined partition that was mentioned earlier, it may be an illusion but I think some countries are looking at China in that sense. So long as we do business and we do good business, we can sort of compartmentalize that from the security aspects and of course from the worrying security aspects, such as China's relations with Iran and of course also in the context of this 25 year agreement going forward. So China has started to do that and in so doing, unlike other P5 countries including Russia. Russia has been siding with Bashar al-Assad, … so Russia is seen since the start of Syrian war and especially since 2015 when it more robustly intervened on the side with its air force, on the side of the Assad government. Russia has been seen as supporting Syria, well, China also, by the way, helps Syria in certain ways, including the supply of, as I understand it, radars and that sort of thing, but it's still hasn't acquired an image of some-, of a country, of a major power that seeks to enforce, that seeks to shape things strategically. China has been doing it, China has strategic objectives in the region for sure but it's been doing it very quietly, so the string of pearls, all that's been mentioned, Djibouti, the port in Jebel Ali in the UAE, port calls, coproduction of weaponry with Saudi Arabia and other countries and of course with Pakistan, well Pakistan maybe, technically outside of the Middle East but it's still pretty much part of West Asia, West South Asia, so the … are not insulated from each other, including Afghanistan. And so China has been doing that, it's been successful so far and from Israel's point of view I think this is something that probably, looking forward with the current government or in future governments, this is something that we certainly have to take into account. I mean, memo of course mentioned some of these things but just looking at the bigger strategic picture, what China seeks to achieve in this region, it's not, certainly not all about economics. There are important strategic aspects to this as well.
Host: So let's discuss the impact on the region in terms of actors that are involved, as well as the challenges and hazards that this developing relationship between China and Iran pose to the region, and maybe we should also refer to Russia that is involved and has a unique history with China in view of their border. Efraim, what does this actually makes to the involvement of China in the region, is it a kind of competition, is it a kind of a conflict with Russia? How do we understand the Russian involvement as a factor on the topic of our discussion?
Efraim Halevi: Russia today is not the power that the Soviet Union was. Probably if president Putin was in the room he would disagree but the fact of the matter is Russia is-, the status of Russia internationally has been hurt because of the weakness of the Russian economy, because of the results of the dismemberment of the eastern bloc which included European countries in central Europe, and Russia is in a different mood and a different mode today. But Russia to a large extent, in terms of its international trade, is a one item exporter of oil. They have-, they also export, of course, weaponry, I'm talking about the civilian side, in the area of weaponry, yes, they have a lot to offer and they are selling weaponry in the Middle East which is of concern to us, great concern to us, both so called defense weaponry but also weaponry which could be used for offensive purposes. But I think that Russia today is also going through a transition and it could well be that the Russian Chinese confrontations of the 50s which was 70 years ago when the Chinese demanded the Russians provide them with science and knowhow for creating nuclear weaponry and the Russians refused and in the end the Chinese went alone and they found their own way. Today China does not depend on Russia and although it is very conscious of the fact that it has to respect the personal position of Russian president and so forth, nevertheless the balance, in my view, the balance between the two has dramatically changed in China's, the Chinese's benefit. In the Middle East, of course, we have the Russians active in Syria, we don't have the Chinese active in Syria militarily at the moment but I remind you that there was also an attempt to create a reactor in Northern Syria which was a North Korean project and which Israel ultimately razed to the ground with an aerial attack and that is a serious issue. Until recently I think also the Chinese tried to put on a face of benevolence, they are helpful, they are benevolent, they are investing massively in Middle East, they are building a new city in Egypt, the new capital of Egypt is being built by the Chinese. They also more or less control one of the major ports in Greece as well today. There is talk of the Chinese sending a flotilla of sea equipment, I don't know what kind of ship, we'll see, for a kind of visit, a visit to the Mediterranean by the Chinese. I think this will come about very, very soon. And this is something nobody resist. Whether they want to visit Israel or not and what Israel will or will not do. My guess is that Israel would prefer not to play host to a Chinese visit because-, not because of what could happen in the intelligence field but also because could have a disastrous effect on its relationship with the United States. So we are gradually reaching the point where the military and the economics are coming together and there is a situation which we will have to contend with, which will raise a lot of serious questions in the future and I think if we have to be honest with ourselves, we don't have all the answers yet to all these predicaments which we're going to have to face in a year or two or three from now.
Host: Assaf, your point of view on the problems or maybe the complications of the regional politics, regional security issues as a result of China's involvement and in particular the ties with Iran.
Assaf Orion: Since Israel and many others see Iran as the main antagonist and the main destabilizing force in the Middle East, above the structural imperfections, the China Iran axis is perhaps the most concerning to all. One is that yes, China plays a supportive role in achieving the JCPOA and the post JCPOA but it's supporting Iran's positions and Israel is among those who see JCPOA as far from perfect and I'm delicate, or polite. Secondly is that China actively helped Iran break out of the isolation and although it maneuvered around the sanctions, you see it providing great relief to Iran through the oil exports business and vetoing whatever effective measures the security council can decide on. They call it under their principle of no intervention in other nations' affairs but in practice it defangs a lot of what the security council can do. From the Israeli perspective but not only Israel because Israel is not alone on the receiving end of Iranian weapons and Chinese derivatives of-, or Iranian derivatives of Chinese weapons. We were already hit by Chinese designed C802 hitting the Israeli navy ship in 2006, in the second Lebanon war. We were on the receiving end of cluster rockets made by China, falling in Haifa, and as we're looking at this-, the outlines of the new agreement for a comprehensive strategic partnership and as we see on the actual activities as analyzed in Hiddai Segev's article, we see an acceleration since 2013 of the military contacts, military dialogs, military cooperation, joined exercises, port calls, high level official visits and general understandings on common or joined development of weapon systems technologies, intelligence and cyber. All of these are bad news for whoever lives in the Middle East and is facing Iran's maligned network. Another point of concern and Efraim mentioned China's support to Iran nuclear program at the early stages. I think it's quite disconcerting to see China helping Saudi Arabia in the early extraction phases of yellow cake and uranium exploitation. So I think it's a moment of reckoning to understand that yes, we have a thriving economic relations with China and we have a lot of commonalities on the economic interest but recently we see more of the differences come to the surface, first and foremost on Iran and as we've recently, last month, we've seen at the backdrop of the Gaza conflict, we heard China in very sharp terminology criticizing Israel and I think stepping quite far from its usual vocabulary of friendship and win-win and mutual respect.
Host: Kevjn, I would like to ask you concisely about this agreement, this agreement for 25 years between Iran and China. What do we know about it and why should we be concerned about it?
Kevjn Lim: Okay. So, the only thing we know about this agreement that was signed 27th of March this year is based on the draft that was leaked from last summer. What we think, what I think at the moment is that this agreement whose details have not been published in full, probably is not different from the one, from the leaked draft, or at least not significantly different. And importantly, and this is something that both foreign ministries of Iran and China have also confirmed is that there aren't figured involved in this agreement other than 25 years. So they're not talking about figures, investment figures over how many years etcetera. Look, by and large it's something that covers everything and you might say nothing. It covers pretty much, it also covers intelligence and military cooperation and that sort of thing, of course oil. But also a host of civilian areas. IT, education, tourism, clean energy, that sort of thing. I think that the aspects that we ought to be looking at from the strategic point of view are obviously aspects that include things like China's official ramping up of military cooperation with Iran, if this comes to include coproduction of weapons for instance or further arm sales, what types of platforms? Are we talking about big platforms, are we talking about subsystems that could improve go to … precision of Iranian missiles, that sort of thing. And also, one of the intriguing things within this, the draft at least, if not the final agreement, is a specific reference calling for China to support Iran in international forum. And the only entity that is mentioned by name here is the SCO Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Now, there's been a lot of hype of course over what the SCO means or what it might not mean and there probably is more hype than not but this is also a point of contention between both countries, by the way, because Iran has been seeking full membership, it's an observer state but it's been seeking for a membership since the 2000s, it's been 12, 13 years and it's not been admitted, there is no real, at least publically, reported discussions but admitting Iran at this stage and Iran wants this more than I think more than any other SCO member. It sees this is as a kind of bulwark, a kind of, if you will, insurance. Additional insurance in addition to its ballistic missiles and its support for regional militias against the U.S. international order if you will. But that has not happened and so like mentioned of the SCO in this draft agreement or in this agreement, it's vague and I think that also characterizes a lot of the other, practically everything else that appears in the agreement. And from intent to implementation there is a long ways to go. Now, I'm not saying that things are not going to get implemented. I think, but I'm only saying, implementation is probably going to be uneven, we're going to see China, yes, ramping up cooperation in some areas but also holding back in others, why? Because one of the main determinants of the Iran China relationship is also China's own relationship with the U.S.
Host: It is. So, we will not end before presenting your recommendation. Of course your recommendations to Israel and also maybe to Israel's greatest ally the United States. So we would like to start with you, Efraim.
Efraim Halevi: I think-, first of all I think what we've been talking about today certainly leads to the conclusion that we have to invest even more than we invested before in our relationship with the United States. I think the importance, the strategic importance of the relationship between Israel and the United States is not just a relationship which is a regional one but it has international connotations and I think we will be facing together with the United States the gradual and maybe even more intensive entry of China in all the areas we discussed today and this is the number one conclusion and more important than any other conclusion at the moment. Secondly I think it means that Israel must invest more in its relations with Europe. Europe is our neighbor, we have very important agreements with Europe, Europe is also an area where China is trying to enter and has entered in many ways and that the Europeans are waking … too and I think we should invest much more so that we have not only the United States but also key European allies who could be important for us in these situations. Thirdly, I think we have to take into account that the measure in which we are, shall we say, deciding on how far to allow Chinese penetration into the Israeli economic system should be much more, shall we say, streamlined, and much more effective. We have to be more careful than ever of the Chinese entry in areas like for instance their attempt to enter the field of Israel's massive corporations which deal with finances' with pensions funds, all kind of other funds. I think this is something which has to be done, maybe it has to be done in a discreet way, Israel has to take itself to task on this. And for reasons which are unimportant at the moment for this particular discussion we're having Israel has been very lax on this and we're finding that the Chinese have entered in areas which we didn't even believe in. There are two big companies here which give special medical help to, kind of a private societies which give you, not private but societies that give you services in cardiac activities and in providing ambulances and things like that, a kind of an insurance system, there are two main companies on this here in Israel and both of them are being bought by the Chinese. And I should assume that in the personal data which these companies have on probably a large number of figures in Israel, it's an enormous source of data, personal data about people, about their health, about what it is they're about, about the addresses, bank accounts and so on and so forth. We must be and we have to do it a-, all this has to be done careful way but it has to be determined and the previous government of Israel was very lax on this and for reasons which are unimportant again, it's for the history books and not for practical discussions this morning, but I think this is something which has to change and we have to be effective on all these things and we have to be vigilant, we have to be very, very vigilant and watch what is going on very, very, very attentively and see how this is developing. I would like to mention once last thing in this respect. We are now speaking in the wake of the 100th anniversary of the existence of the Chinese Communist Party, there was a major address given yesterday or the day before by president Xi. The language he used was very, very, very harsh and the mood in China today is obvious now, especially after COVID19 and the problems which China had in the international arena about the questions of the origins of the COVID19 and so forth. The way the president of China expressed himself is a turn which I hadn't seen for a very, very long time and we have to see also that in South East Asia China is adopting a more aggressive stance, how they are now more or less gradually putting end to the semi-autonomous status of Hong Kong, there is growing tensions between China and Taiwan, generally speaking the mood now in China is a mood which is not one of smiles but one of determination and this is no longer the China that we thought was benign and was sort of acting like uncle Tom and it's not the uncle Tom approach at all. This is change and we have to condition ourselves to this.
Assaf Orion: Four major recommendation that flow from our recent researches including Kevjn, Kevjn's memo, my own and Hiddai Segev's. One is that, as Efraim talked about, vigilance. We need to prioritize China Iran as a high priority issue for our intelligence community and to conduct an ongoing risk assessment including technology transfer from Israel to China to Iran eventually. So this is a path in which our technology can go out, come back and bite us, and we need to be watchful on that. Second is that we need to have a dialog with China, sharing our concern in clear terms. At the same eye, cleared eyed and with, I would say, calibrated expectations. China knows its math, it counted how many Muslims and Arabs there are and how many Jews and it knows the comparative importance of Israel for China is low except on technology. So we need to share our concerns and hope for improvement but not holding our breath. Third is that as we can see, Iran is a common concern for Israel and the Gulf states and we need to share our common concerns with China going together, in concert. So Israel alone with its voice is much weaker than Israel and Saudi Arabia and the UAE and the rest of the concerned partners in the Gulf. And last but not least, perhaps the most important thing, is that the convergence of this axis of Iran and China is not only he match point between Israel's important trade partner and its number one threat but actually the junction between Israel's number one threat and America's number one threat. And that's the actual point where Israel and America should discuss how to address this alliance or partnership between China and Iran as a source of common concern.
Host: Kevjn?
Kevjn Lim: Yes. Well, look, I mean, I certainly agree with all that's been said until now. I also want to point out attention to something. When the memo was put out there were reports I think by Jerusalem Post and this was carried on also by on-, reverberated in other media, suggesting that the-, saying that the memo suggests that China can save Israel from Iran. That is clearly a gross misrepresentation of what the memo tries to say. Let me just, perhaps this is one thing. And This was mentioned also briefly. The Abraham accords is something, it's an opportunity, it's an immense opportunity, especially taking into consideration the fact that many of these countries have their own tensions, big tensions with Iran. I don't think Israel can realistically seek to pressure Beijing to cut off ties with Iran. I don't think that is an option at all. But with the Abraham accords, with this realignment, what we certainly can do is to try and reach that critical mass to put-, to make it known to Beijing that there is this alignment of interests in the Middle East and playing on Beijing's search for stability, stability really is the big thing for China, certainly in the Middle East which is also, I mean, in terms of its oil exports, etcetera. And so, and also taking into consideration the China touts itself as a nonpartisan actor. Stability, nonpartisan actor, Abraham accords. Ultimately for Israel and its partners in the region to get China to rethink the way it has been approaching national security in not just in economics but national security in the region and certainly and specifically with respect to Iran. Not to cut off its ties with Iran because I don't think there's any relationship between how China relates to-, how China sees Iran with China's own relations with countries like Israel. But to moderate and moving forward Iran's behavior to some degree.
Host: This brings us to the end of the podcast. Efraim, Assaf and Kevjn. Thank you very much for being with us.
Kevjn Lim: Thank you very much. Thank you.
(end of recording)
