Director Alfred Hitchcock, Master of Suspense (“Psycho” etc.) gave away his secret to success.

He said, “There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it.”

Also, in storytelling, “The bomb must never go off. Bad technique.”

The trick, then, is to keep the audience at the edge of their seats. It’s the “anxiety” of the “unexpected” that makes the drama.

The bomb going off (still speaking of movies) spoils the suspense and delivers a yawn. The audience is let down. Yes, bad technique.

Keep them guessing. Keep them wondering and worrying about what comes next. That’s moviemaking Hitchcock-style.

That’s politics Iran-style.

Around this point, then, I depart from my colleagues who fear that the mullahs are ready to act ballistically against Israel or the United States – and let’s be clear that we are all in the same boat. America is just as much at risk. But as for Israel, I do not think it’s coming so fast, if at all.

All talk and no action? Listen, the ayatollahs are not stupid. Of course they have the means and of course they already have the bombs and the missiles, or close enough. Makes no difference what Congress says or how many times and by how many votes the Democrats betray our greatest ally, Israel, and further betray the United States of America.

The ayatollahs may say that Israel is one bomb away from annihilation. So what does that make Iran? Two bombs away? Okay three. Four can surely do enough of a job. But if they start something, they know damned well that Israel will surely wipe them off the map. They are not dumb and love their own hides.

The IDF will come at them so fast that it will “make their heads spin,” to use a Donald Trump vernacular.

There will be hell to pay. There will be payback of biblical proportions.

So if the ayatollahs know this, what’s the game, what the scheme, what’s the plot, what’s the technique?

What do the ayatollahs really want?

In a word – suspense. Keep Israel worrying. Keep the Jews on edge. Keep them off their game. Keep them wondering what’s coming next.

That is part of the strategy.


The trick is to keep the anti-Semitism pot boiling…all the more fuel for the boycott movement that seeks to isolate the Jewish State.
But there’s something else as well, something just as venal, and that is to keep Israel, and all Jews, in the headlights of worldwide mockery.

The trick is to keep the anti-Semitism pot boiling…all the more fuel for the boycott movement that seeks to isolate the Jewish State.

Never mind that the world can find no outrage in the fact that for no good reason one country daily demands the obliteration of another country.

No good reason except that the other country is Jewish. The world does not even give this a second thought. Why, this is so ordinary.

Another day, another call for genocide. What’s the big deal? The Jews should know the score by now and not be so touchy.

The ayatollahs know how to play this game.

Cleverly and adeptly they are using two devices. The first is the game of suspense. Anticipation about what’s coming next from the skies.

Second, they intend to condition public opinion to the notion that Jews deserve to die.

Yes, I know. This is incredible. What a world! But that’s the plan. The plan, in my view, is not about actually raining missiles on the Jewish State.

It’s about raining constant hatred…and that’s enough. Mission accomplished.

I could be wrong.

If the ayatollahs keep talking that talk and if the IDF gets wind of something incoming, the suspense will be over.

Stand back and watch IDF ferocity when the suspense has gone on too long and become intolerable.

New York-based Novelist Jack Engelhard writes a regular column for Arutz Sheva. His latest work is “The Bathsheba Deadline,” a newsroom thriller that features legendary editor Jay Garfield and his heroic stand against media bias and Islam’s clash against the West.  Website: www.jackengelhard.com