"I once asked Bibi who among the leaders of history impressed him," recalled Prof. Uzi Arad, who until recently served as national security adviser and was one of the people closest to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

"What did he say?" asked Prof. Aviad Kleinberg, a historian, in a recent conversation with Arad. "Churchill?

"Not Churchill," Arad responded. "Churchill goes without saying. He said Hannibal."

"Why?" Kleinberg asked, taken aback.

"That surprised me, too," Arad explained. "I asked him, 'Why did you pick a loser?' I knew that, in the end, Netanyahu judges things by their results. He said, 'Hannibal got the most out of very limited resources. His effort against Rome - he got as far as threatening the city of Rome itself - was an expression of determination to produce impressive results out of very little.'"

Arad's disclosure that, contrary to the accepted wisdom, Netanyahu's hero is not Winston Churchill but Hannibal - a Carthaginian general and statesman (247-183 B.C.E. ) who declared war on the Roman Empire - surprised the historian. The astonishing reply says a lot about the prime minister, Kleinberg said. Hannibal's reckless adventure destroyed Carthage. His chances of defeating Rome were slim. After the war, it was clear to the Romans that they had to destroy Carthage. And not long afterward, that is what they did. "Hannibal achieved glorious victories that were worthless in the long term," Kleinberg said.

Kleinberg wondered whether Netanyahu's admiration for Hannibal doesn't attest to a dangerously constricted vision, an inability to see beyond instant gratification, and to a gambling instinct that leads to catastrophe. Hannibal wasn't able to foresee the disaster that his arrogant policy would bring down upon himself and his nation. (A humiliating peace treaty dispossessed Carthage of most of its lands, obliged it to pay compensation to Rome and forbade it to make war without Rome's permission, while Hannibal killed himself by taking poison. ) But Netanyahu, as Arad hinted, is following in his hero's footsteps with eyes wide open all the way to the abyss.

Netanyahu's statements and conduct show many symptoms of Hannibalism: short-term achievements, disregard of the global and regional reality, disregard of the diplomatic, demographic and economic ramifications of perpetuating the occupation, and an irresponsible gamble over the future of his nation.

An even more perfect expression of Netanyahu's Hannibalist tendency to take on the global superpower of his era was secretly documented in 2001 during a condolence call he paid in the West Bank settlement of Ofra. "I wasn't afraid to clash with [U.S. President Bill] Clinton," he said. "I wasn't afraid to clash with the United Nations. ... I know what America is. America is something that can easily be swayed."

His foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, and his aides have completed the roster by clashing with Europe ("It's irrelevant" ), Turkey (the famous incident of the low chair, in which Foreign Ministry officials humiliated the Turkish ambassador by seating him on a low chair in a televised meeting ), and South Africa (rebuking the ambassador over a decision to label products made in the settlements ). And they're ready to take on others, too.

What does Netanyahu's policy of clinging to the settlements have in common with Churchill's decision to get rid of the British Empire's colonies? What do his threats to attack Iran have in common with Churchill's recognition of the importance of building a coalition with the two global superpowers? Even Arad, who cannot be suspected of leftist defeatism, said in an interview that, by itself, Israel lacks the capability to ensure that Iran is deprived of nuclear weapons over the long run. In his view, only an America willing to engage in ongoing, forceful action, combined with an international consensus, can ensure that Iran never gets nuclear weapons.

But the man who once headed the National Security Council, like the former head of the Mossad and the former head of the Shin Bet security service, is naturally just a disgruntled former official. They should bow their heads before our Hannibal. And start swimming.