Why Israel Can’t Live With a Nuclear Iran: Gadi Taub

In this Quillette interview, historian Gadi Taub speaks with Pamela Paresky about Israel’s war aims, the threat of a nuclear Iran, and the collapse of key assumptions in Western foreign policy.

Taub argues that the objective is not to eliminate Iran’s nuclear capacity entirely, but to make its pursuit prohibitively costly. He also reflects on the legacy of Oslo, the limits of deterrence, and the ideological divide shaping Western responses to conflict.

The conversation examines how postmodern and postcolonial ideas have influenced Western thinking—often distorting rather than clarifying geopolitical reality.

Chapters

00:00 – War aims and the limits of destroying nuclear programmes
01:00 – Why deterrence may not work with Iran
03:00 – How the Middle East strategic balance has shifted
05:00 – The problem with “living with a nuclear Iran”
07:00 – Zionism, academia, and the culture wars
10:00 – Civilisation vs barbarism: competing worldviews
12:00 – Nuclear deterrence and Western complacency
14:30 – Why avoiding war can lead to bigger wars
18:00 – Israel’s early military doctrine vs modern strategy
22:00 – Deterrence, escalation, and US–Israel alignment
25:00 – Internal tensions: politicians vs military leadership
29:00 – The “gatekeepers” and democratic accountability
33:00 – Oslo explained: demographics vs security
37:00 – The collapse of the “concept” on October 7th
42:00 – Palestinian society, education, and ideology
47:00 – Civilian casualties and urban warfare comparisons
50:00 – Why Oslo failed in practice
55:00 – Gaza disengagement and its consequences
59:00 – West Bank risks and security realities
01:05:00 – The West’s tendency to blame itself
01:10:00 – Postmodernism, Foucault, and truth
01:15:00 – Identity politics and the depoliticisation of identity
01:20:00 – Why Zionism is uniquely targeted
01:24:00 – What the West gets wrong—and what must change