Thomas Friedman, in his analysis of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s election win, surprisingly makes Iran a focal point. In trying to portray Iran as the primary beneficiary of Netanyahu’s political success, Friedman oversimplifies the Iranian political establishment, characterizing its rejectionist position on Israel as uniform and unwavering. His article comes at a time of historic potential in US-Iran relations. Although Iran’s rejection of Zionism still anchors its policy in the Levant, Friedman ignores the possibilities that Iran and its conservative leaders could strike a pragmatic détente with a more moderate Israeli government than Netanyahu’s. He fails to consider that Iran’s political leaders may lament rather than celebrate the domination of Israeli national security by hawks.

Iran’s Islamic revolutionaries seized on populist anti-Israel sentiments from the onset of the revolution to consolidate their legitimacy; the issue now stands as a pillar of their revolutionary identity. As the Islamic Republic drifts farther away from the zeal of its early years, its willingness to reach pragmatic solutions regarding security threats (read: talks with the US) has greatly increased, notwithstanding fiery though usually empty rhetoric to the contrary. The space between what regime-aligned clerics say at Friday prayer sessions and how the state actually operates can easily confuse the reality of Iranian foreign policy. Rather than accept Iranian rhetoric prima facie, analysts should attempt to discern the leeway between the revolutionary principles to which the Iranian political elite must pay homage and the policies which they believe favor national interests.

Friedman’s use of blanket terms for Iran’s political establishment betrays a cliché understanding of Iranian politics. His clumsiness is perhaps akin to a foreign national mistaking the Republican congressional majority for having the final say over US policy. In imagining the Iranian response to the Israeli elections, he wrote: “They must have been doing high-fives and ‘Allahu akbars’ all night in the ruling circles of Tehran when they saw how low Bibi sank to win.” In this scenario of Islamic jubilation, Friedman assumes that all political elites in Iran agree, first of all, on perpetuating Iran’s 35-year old policy of enmity toward Israel, and secondly, on supporting a foreign executive leader aggressively opposed to their government. His “Allahu akbar” jibe directs the readers’ attention to the Islamic half of the Iranian republic, perhaps summoning whatever fears they associate with that sublime phrase so often blurted out by Muslim militants during acts of violence.

His following topic sentence assures the reader that this regime is indeed monolithic and united in its support of its loudest detractor abroad: “No one on the planet will enjoy watching Israel and America caught on the horns of this dilemma more than the clerical regime in Tehran. It is a godsend for them.” He forgets that in 2013 Iran elected a moderate administration, one which enjoys an unusual degree of support from the supreme leader and even some in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. This administration flexed its diplomatic muscles in September 2013, when the president wished “all Jews, especially Iranian Jews, a blessed Rosh Hashanah.” In reply to a tweet by Nancy Pelosi’s daughter asking foreign minister Javad Zarif to “end Iran’s Holocaust denial,” the latter wrote, “Iran never denied it. The man who was perceived to be denying it is now gone.” This rhetoric demonstrates how far many in Iranian politics have travelled since the days of Ayatollah Khomeini’s frequent scapegoating of Jews and Zionists. It also likely expresses an inhibited desire to reconcile Iran’s friction with Israel. The Rouhani Administration’s challenge to the right-wing of course transcends the Israel issue. The prolific Iranian journalist Akbar Ganji has exposed the full extent of this intra-government culture war. Friedman’s apparent ignorance of the possibility for divergent opinions of Israel, let alone of its elected leader, perpetuates the clash of civilizations myth central to Western conservatives’ animus toward Iran.

To be sure, the revolutionary principle of opposing the US and Israel remains ascendant. By recanting its official policy of resistance, the Islamic Republic would have to rewrite its narrative of legitimacy, opening the door for a democratic revision of its power structure. For foreign Shias drawn into Iran’s proxy orbit, such a shift in Iranian foreign relations could end their acceptance of Iranian leadership. Arabs from Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq have joined Iranian-commanded militias in part due to the impression that Iran acts on behalf of Islamic interests, which include resistance to terrorism, American imperialism, and Israeli colonialism. Iran has relied on these actors for projecting power against multiple adversaries. Dropping this principle would strip its national security objectives of their transnational appeal. The only way to coax Iran from its “resistance” position would be to gradually open a space for it within a redrawn architecture for security in the Middle East. As remote as this possibility is, the politics of Prime Minister Netanyahu will further obscure it.

Interestingly, the same members of the right-wing who depend on friction with Israel to maintain their positions abroad and at home have a few reasons to prefer a more moderate Israeli government. Prime Minister Netanyahu has established himself as a chief antagonist to Iran’s national security. In the years preceding the current series of nuclear talks, he repeatedly cried wolf about Iran’s “imminent” breakout capacity and advocated for the credible threat of military confrontation. His government likely commissioned a string of assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists and assuredly colluded with the United States in its cyber-attacks on Iranian centrifuges. As the only nuclear-armed state in the Middle East, Israel under such a hawkish administration poses a serious threat. Israel has also antagonized Iran over Hezbollah and Syria, having struck at weapons convoys to the former and killed a senior Iranian general in the latter. Escalating tensions between the two has led Iran to develop a front along Syria’s border with the Golan Heights, where its goal is likely to better deter Israel from future airstrikes. These actions have balanced against Iran’s geopolitical resurgence, but at the cost of hindering diplomatic progress between it and the US, and in such a way that further encourages Iran to undermine an exclusionary system of order.

Friedman contends that, “few things serve Iran’s interests more than having radical Jewish settlers in a never-ending grinding conflict with Palestinians.” His statement, however, overestimates the importance of Palestine to Iranian foreign policy. When Hamas balked at Iran’s support for the Syrian regime, Iran did not blink an eye; its interest in maintaining influence in Syria and Lebanon trumped its interest in Palestinian resistance. Palestine is somewhat of a secondary if not tertiary issue for the Iranians, who have mostly exploited the issue in its relations with Israel and the US. Peace process with the Palestinians, furthermore, would likely require heavy involvement by Iran, thus generating greater leverage for the country.

While Iran’s conservatives may cherish the opportunity to sustain their antiquated revolutionary ideas in the fertile grounds sown by aggressive Israeli policies, Netanyahu’s opposition will restrain them from a range of diplomatic and military opportunities. Israel’s response to a nuclear deal and any warming of US-Iran relations is unpredictable; a unilateral strike at a sensitive Iranian target is not out of the question. A subsequent confrontation would surely deprive Iran of whatever sanctions relief it may have obtained and pit it against a vastly superior armed force. Contrary to Friedman’s declaration, Iran has an equally sound reason to prefer an administration less likely to obstruct it from these economic and security needs.