“I’m sure Ukraine will be alright. Rabbi Nachman of Breslav will protect them,” half-joked an Israeli cabinet minister this week, when he admitted that he had no idea if the Russian troops amassed on Ukraine’s borders were about to invade the neighbouring country.

Like many other governments, Israel’s was uncertain over what position to take on the threat of war. On Friday evening, shortly after the US and Britain put out urgent warnings to their citizens to get out of Ukraine as soon as possible, Israel’s foreign ministry issued its own travel advice.

It was also planning to pull out the families of Israeli diplomats but the instructions to Israeli citizens were less urgent.

They were advised just to “consider” whether they should remain in Ukraine and those planning to fly there over the next few days should also “consider” whether their journey was necessary.

Israel’s security experts were seeing the same intelligence that their western counterparts had. They also have their own excellent sources from that region. The Israeli intelligence assessment was not very different from the American or British ones, but the initial message was different.

Why wasn’t Israel rushing to order its citizens out of Ukraine? Some ascribed it to the fact that the American and British governments were still traumatised by their experience of having to airlift their people out of Afghanistan as it fell to the Taliban just six months ago, and the political fallout that ensued over their lack of preparedness.

After being burned in Kabul, the Americans and the Brits were simply over-compensating now, reckoned some Israeli officials.

Then there were Israel’s special concerns regarding that part of the world. Israel is not only thinking about the estimated 15,000 of its citizens currently in Ukraine, it also has to look out for the safety of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian and Russian Jews who could be negatively affected if the Jewish state is seen to be taking sides in this conflict.

And yet, despite trying to keep a low profile, someone in Washington didn’t like the fact that Israel seemed to be downplaying the danger, and another intelligence report was sent, late on Friday night, to Jerusalem.

This one seems to have been so alarming that on Sunday morning, despite Shabbat, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and foreign minister Yair Lapid held a conference with senior diplomats and Russia-watchers and decided to issue new travel guidance that evening, this time urgently calling Israelis to leave. Yet doubts continued to linger afterwards.

General disbelief

One very senior security official who had closely read all the intelligence reports – those prepared by the Israeli agencies and those which had arrived from Israel’s allies – said he was still baffled. “There some enigmatic elements, in what we’re seeing both in the attack and defence plans. [The Russians] have made all the preparations, there are all the signs, and yet their intentions remain unclear.”

Early on Tuesday afternoon, hours before Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that some of his forces would be moving away from the border, there came a much clearer sign that an attack was not as imminent as the Americans had been suggesting. And it was coming much closer to Israel.

Russian fighter jets and strategic bombers carrying hypersonic missiles were deployed to Khmeimim airbase in Syria. Along with them landed a Tupolev Tu-214 airborne command post carrying Russian Defence Minister Sergey Shoygu, who was arriving to observe an exercise of his country’s contingent in Syria and award a few medals to the officers there.

If General Shoygu, widely seen as a central figure in the pro-war faction around President Putin, had time on Tuesday to visit the Middle East, it looked extremely unlikely that Russia would be launching a war in Ukraine the next day. Perhaps next week. But for now, the more cautious Israeli assessments seem to have been borne out.

Royal welcome

While Europe was on a war footing, Mr Bennett was also travelling abroad. On Monday evening, he flew off for his fourth visit to an Arab nation. In just eight months since becoming prime minister, he has been to see the leaders of Jordan, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and now Bahrain.

The rate at which Israel’s discreet relationships with the “moderate” Sunni Arab regimes is coming out into the open is breathtaking. Mr Bennett’s first trip to meet King Abdullah in Amman was kept a secret even after he came back.

When he flew to meet Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Emirati ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed, the trip was kept under embargo until he actually arrived. This time, the media were allowed to report the prime minister’s departure in advance and actually got to come along in his plane.

The Bahrainis could hardly have been more welcoming to the Israeli delegation and gave Mr Bennett all the trappings, including a military band playing Hatikva flawlessly as he arrived at the palace for a meeting with Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad al Khalifa.
In fact, as one officer in the delegation observed, they played it much better than the IDF’s own orchestra.

Bahrain, one of the smallest of the Arab nations, has more to it than meets the eye.
Manama’s port serves the American Fifth Fleet and has recently been expanded to serve more warships of Britain’s Royal Navy.

It is a strategic location, not just against Iran across the horizon on the Persian Gulf, but for Western force projection towards Asia in general. With Russia and now China expanding into the region, Bahrain’s importance will continue to grow.

But there’s another key significance to Bahrain’s location. It’s an island kingdom connected by the King Fahd Causeway to Khobar, Saudi Arabia.

The Saudis are Bahrain’s protectors, as seen back in 2011 when they sent security forces over that causeway in order to help to quell pro-democracy demonstrations. Bahrain’s rulers had claimed that the protests were actually an attempt by Iran to orchestrate a Shia coup in the kingdom.

Bahrain wouldn’t have signed the Abraham Accords back in September 2020, following the UAE which went first, without the endorsement of the Saudis.

Mr Bennett’s trip to Manama was in effect a visit to a Saudi branch office. For various reasons, the Saudis themselves aren’t ready to come out in the open with their relations with Israel just yet.

But the undeniable warmth with which the Israeli prime minister was greeted on the Arabian peninsula was the clearest sign that the Saudis are very much on board with the new regional alliance.

Or, as one senior member of the Israeli delegation put it while out on the balcony of the Manama Four Seasons, with the view looking out eastward across the Gulf: “The main thing we’re doing here today is sticking it to the Iranians.”