evidence: Israel was not happy with these initiatives, and was particularly displeased by the Shah’s signing of an agreement in 1975 with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq which settled a territorial dispute over the Shatt al-Arab waterway in Iran’s favor in exchange for the Shah ending support for Iraqi Kurds fighting Baghdad. (The CIA also walked away from the Kurds at the time at the Shah’s insistence.) Israel, then as now a supporter of the Iraqi Kurds, felt betrayed by this act and lost faith in the Shah as an ally. Israel saw Iran’s more conciliatory approach to Arab radicals as potentially shifting the balance of power against Israel. Israel has always preferred some tension between Iran and the Arabs in order to use them against each other.