Israel’s pledge to respond to Iran’s massive missile attack has prompted diplomats to scramble for ways to prevent an all-out regional war.
AFP spoke to five experts about Iran’s calculations, Israel’s choices and fears of escalating tensions.
Why did Iran order the missile attack?
The Islamic Republic is believed to have suffered a series of humiliations by Israel in the past year, thwarting its strategy of building allies across the Middle East.
The Iran-backed coalition known as the “Axis of Resistance” includes the Palestinian group Hamas, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Yemen’s Houthi rebels and other Shia Muslim armed groups in Iraq and Syria.
Israel has launched an offensive against Hamas in Gaza since October last year when Hamas launched an unprecedented attack, while the group’s political leader Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated in Tehran in July.
In Lebanon, pager blasts and airstrikes have seriously weakened Hezbollah, while its leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed along with an Iranian general by an Israeli missile in a Beirut suburb last week.
Following the Israeli attack on Iran’s consulate in the Syrian capital Damascus in April, Tehran retaliated for the first time by firing 300 missiles and drones at the Jewish state, almost all of which were intercepted.
Tuesday’s attack, which fired 200 more missiles, had little military impact, meaning they were largely “symbolic,” according to Kay Campbell, a US military intelligence veteran with a history of working on Iran.
“All air defense systems have a saturation point, and it appears that Iran deliberately stayed below the Israeli air defense saturation point,” Campbell told AFP.
“I don’t think Iran wants a major regional war,” said John Alterman, a Middle East expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based think tank.
How might Israel respond?
James Demin-De Liese, an author and political analyst who has written a book about Israel and anti-Semitism, said he thinks Israel will want to emphasize its advantages.
“Iran is now completely weakened, because its proxies have been destroyed,” he said, predicting a “rather dramatic regime change”, adding that Israel is possibly also eyeing regime change in Tehran. .
A senior European diplomatic source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there were real fears of “expansion of the conflict”.
“Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s team is a little excited, thinking ‘we’ve got Nasrallah, we’re going to change the Middle East,'” the source said.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett argued on Wednesday for a more targeted military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
But Israel is already fighting on two fronts: in Gaza – where more than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to the Hamas-run health ministry – as well as in southern Lebanon where troops on Monday launched a ground campaign targeting Hezbollah. Had started.
Would this risk igniting a third war?
“Israel has had a lot of successes in the last two weeks that they may not want to jeopardize,” said Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
He said Israel would have to choose between “the two trends of locking in profits, or doubling down on a strategy that produces results.”
What are ‘off-ramps’?
The United Nations Security Council is due to hold an emergency meeting on Wednesday to discuss the Middle East, but the global body is widely seen as ineffective and divided.
The only foreign power with potential influence on Israel is the United States, but President Joe Biden’s administration has shown itself to have only relative influence.
In a statement the day after Nasrallah’s killing, Biden reiterated US support for “Israel’s right to defend itself against Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, and any other Iranian-backed terrorist groups.”
But Biden is also pushing for a ceasefire in Gaza and has declared himself against any Israeli ground attacks in Lebanon – to no avail.
“It’s likely that President Biden will step up to negotiate but I doubt he’ll have much influence,” said Jordan Barkin, an Israeli political analyst and former magazine editor.
The US also lacks direct relations with Iran, meaning any diplomatic steps to ease tensions would require European or Middle Eastern involvement.
Hassani Abedi, director of the Geneva-based center, said, “Everything will depend on the Israeli response and everything will depend on the advice and efforts made by the US administration, which has no interest at this time in getting embroiled in a regional war.” Center for Studies and Research in the Arab and Mediterranean World (CERMAM).
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
