From the Jerusalem Post:: Iran-Israel Showdown Near

Four recent developments have pushed Israel closer to a confrontation with Iran over its nuclear weapons program — and that could have dire consequences for an already beleaguered U.S. economy, according to best-selling author Edwin Black.

Black, an investigative journalist whose books include, “The Plan: How to Save America When the Oil Stops,” cited the four developments in an Op-Ed piece for the Jerusalem Post:

• Iran successfully launched a satellite into outer space on Feb. 2 and plans three more satellites this year, creating “an easily weaponized space net that worries American military planners.”
  
• The International Atomic Energy Agency admitted in mid-February that it had underestimated Iran’s nuclear stockpile by about one-third, and now confirms that Iran has enough nuclear material to build at least one bomb.
  
• Iran has stepped up its uranium enrichment program with thousands of highly advanced centrifuges, and is now near its goal of 6,000 centrifuges. “American policy-makers are now convinced that Iran, despite all protests and charades, is in a mad dash to create a deliverable nuclear weapon,” Black disclosed.
  
• Benjamin Netanyahu has just become the prime minister-designate of Israel, and he is determined to take action against Iran before it can deliver a nuclear weapon to the nation that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said should be “wiped off the map.”

Also, Russia is in the process of delivering an advanced air defense system that can shoot down Israeli aircraft and drones. But the system will not be fully operational for several months, “creating a narrow window for Israel to act,” Black observes.

The author points out that Iran has repeatedly vowed that if attacked by Israel, it will close the Strait of Hormuz to shipping and attack the Saudi Arabian oil facilities at Ras Tanura and Abqaiq.

“Any one of these military options, let alone all three, would immediately shut off 40 percent of all seaborne oil . . . and some 20 percent of America’s daily consumption,” Black writes.

Such an interruption in oil supplies, he warns, would likely push gasoline prices in the U.S. to $20 per gallon.