Iran, Israel And The Potential For Miscalculation blog by jay markujay

Iran, Israel And The Potential For Miscalculation
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The Middle East has been waiting with bated breath for Israel’s response to Iran’s attack last weekend as the spectre of regional conflict seems closer than ever.

That spectre has waxed and waned since the war on Gaza began in October with the fear that it would spiral into a regional war, dragging in Iran and its allies as well as Western countries such as the United States.

In the six months that have followed, there has been violence in the wider Middle East with tit-for-tat attacks between Israel and Iran-backed forces, primarily the Lebanese group Hezbollah.

These attacks have followed a regular pattern with each violent incident marking a slow climb up a rung of the escalation ladder.

Missiles and drones are fired deeper and deeper into Lebanon and Israel, but each side takes a degree of care to increase those distances incrementally and choose targets carefully.

Israel has been more adventurous, often being the side to widen the bounds of the “red lines”, perhaps to make Hezbollah attack in a way that gives Israel a pretext for a more full-throated bombardment of Lebanon.

So far, despite the killing of several Hezbollah senior commanders, the group has held back from using its long-range missiles.

But when Iran saw one of its generals killed in what is widely believed to have been an Israeli attack on Iran’s embassy complex in Damascus, itself an unprecedented military strike on a diplomatic mission, Tehran raised the stakes with a direct attack on Israel.

Risk of war

What comes next? There is a high chance that Israel will respond militarily in some capacity. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has long projected himself as a security hawk and the man to keep Iran in its place, is unlikely to allow a direct attack from Iran go without a response.

Israel, especially right-wingers like Netanyahu, prides itself on the perception that it is the primary military power in the Middle East, and deterrence is vital to maintaining that image, particularly after the damage Hamas did during its October 7 attacks on Israel.

Iran's Ambassador to the United Nations Amir Saeid Iravani

Iran’s UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani told the Security Council that his country had responded within the limits of international law. At the UN in New York City, US, April 14, 2024 [Eduardo Munoz/Reuters]

And yet, while the United States and other allies were initially firm in backing Israel in its war on Gaza, they are desperately trying to persuade Netanyahu to not respond to Iran and risk launching a war that many, particularly Washington, would feel obligated to participate in.

“Take the win,” US President Joe Biden reportedly told Netanyahu, eager to avoid what would be yet another damaging US war in the Middle East in an election year when his popularity is already battered by his backing for Israel as its forces have killed nearly 34,000 Palestinians in Gaza.

The Biden administration likely knows that Israel will attack – United Kingdom Foreign Secretary David Cameron has already admitted as much – but it will be putting pressure on Netanyahu to keep its retaliation limited and then cross its fingers that Iran does not respond and everyone goes back to the cold proxy war that Israel and Iran have participated in for years.

It sounds as if everyone – barring, perhaps, some of the more messianic figures in the Israeli government – wants to avoid an all-out war that would be devastating for all involved and the wider region.

But that does not mean that each side doesn’t have its own desired outcomes, all of which could potentially lead to the conflict that they’re all apparently eager to avoid.

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