Greg Scoblete asks how Washington can possibly restrain Israel with respect to Iran’s nuclear program when it cannot even keep the Netanyahu government from pushing ahead with new settlement construction. That’s a fair question, but I think putting the question this way overlooks the enabling effect that the stated “no space” guarantee to Israel has on the behavior of the Israeli government. This relates to the application of the idea of moral hazard to foreign policy that Leon Hadar proposed and I have mentioned before. Many Americans might reasonably assume that by making unconditional, explicit security guarantees to Israel Washington could expect greater flexibility and accommodation from the Israeli government on points of contention, but this is not how it works. The moral hazard of unconditional backing is not only that the ally being supported will engage in reckless behavior, but that it does so knowing that it will pay no real price for this behavior as far as the relationship with the U.S. is concerned. The temptation is to focus criticism on the ally that is taking advantage of this, but the one deserving the most blame is our own government.

If the federal government can be counted on to rescue firms that are “too big to fail,” it can be expected to tolerate just about any allied behavior because of the ostensible strategic value the ally has to offer. Hawks were quick to point out that the administration’s demand for a settlement freeze encouraged Palestinian leaders to be less inclined to compromise, but if this is right imagine how uncompromising and inflexible decades of unconditional support have made Israeli leaders. Indeed, on settlement policy that is exactly what we have seen for over thirty years.

The Georgian government believed that it enjoyed the same sort of unconditional backing, only to discover far too late that it has misinterpreted the signals coming from Washington, but the moral hazard effect is even worse for those allies that can actually count on being bailed out by Washington. Unlike Georgia, Israel does not have to make a leap of faith that Washington will come to its aid, but can take that support for granted. The result is that Israel can ignore Washington when it wants and demand Washington’s help when it needs it. The British have started to appreciate the one-sided nature of their relationship with us. One wonders how long it will be before we understand that our relationship with Israel is much the same.

So long as the benefits from the alliance keep flowing uninterrupted, Israel has no incentive to make concessions that Washington requests. After reducing or halting aid was automatically taken off the table, Washington’s requests fell on deaf ears because the Netanyahu governmen had no reason to listen to them. While the timing of the settlement announcement was probably coincidental, it was a useful reminder that the the benefits of the alliance tend to flow in one direction. Our government has only itself to blame for this. Unless there is at least the possibility of negative consequences for undesired behavior, that behavior will continue. This is not something unique to the U.S.-Israel relationship. It is true of all imbalanced and unhealthy political relationships defined by dependence and unaccountability.

The conduct of U.S. foreign policy is really quite a comedy show. Washington insists on trying to make regimes over which it has no leverage and no influence do things that they are never going to do, and it refuses to use what leverage it has over its allies to achieve its stated goals in their part of the world. A better question might be this: if Washington cannot convince an ally, client state and largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid to halt settlement construction on contested and controversial land, what makes anyone believe that our government can make the Iranian government accede to its demands?