Iran-Israel, for now a game of deterrence

4 min read EUGENIO GARCIA GASCON 0 comments

EUGENIO GARCIA GASCON

Common sense says that the Iranian attack against Israel in the early hours of April 14 will not escalate, but logic does not always work in the Middle East. Departing from logic has been common within the Israeli leadership for many decades and has been publicly stated by senior officials of successive governments since the establishment of the state in 1948, some of whom developed the doctrine of disproportionate response, so It remains an open question whether Israel will behave one way or another.

The final decision is in the hands of Benjamin Netanyahu, but it is worth specifying some relevant details that were known in the hours after the attack, and that can guide us in the direction that the veteran prime minister will take.

First of all, American and Hebrew media confirmed that Joe Biden is not satisfied with Netanyahu's behavior in the hours before and after the attack. In reality, the US president has been disappointed with Netanyahu for months, since the Hamas attack on October 7. Even before, since the president has been talking about the need to resolve the Palestinian conflict, which Netanyahu is completely opposed to.

Now Biden has clearly told Netanyahu that he will not participate in a counterattack against Iran, an attitude that partially, but not totally, limits the possible responses of the Zionist state. In a discussion held by the war cabinet in the hours before the attack, several ministers spoke in favor of launching a punitive attack against Iran without waiting for the green light from Washington, but in the end Netanyahu stopped such an option.

Netanyahu always has the last word, as is being seen in the Gaza war. Biden can suggest an idea to him over the phone or through the media, whatever idea he thinks is best, but it is Netanyahu who decides. For more than half a year he has ended up doing what he wanted, sometimes using as a shield the pressures of the nationalist and religious extreme right, a pretext that regularly serves to justify his own decisions before public opinion and before Western leaders.

In the White House it is thought that “Israel has no strategy” in what it does, but it is precisely the opposite, in the sense that lacking a strategy can be a strategy. In Washington they say it because they don't see Netanyahu making any moves to resolve the great Palestinian tragedy, but that is exactly a strategy. The prime minister doesn't want to reveal his game as he changes the geography of the occupied territories, and Washington mistakenly believes that means he has no strategy. But, on the contrary, this explains why he has frequently supported Hamas in the Gaza Strip to the detriment of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who continues to play the game that suits Israel.

Just as Washington is deeply frustrated by what is happening in Gaza, there is a fear of even greater frustration if Netanyahu manages to drag it into a larger conflict with Iran. Although Biden has made things clear to him and has told him that he will not participate in retaliation against Iran, there is fear that Netanyahu will not listen to him, which would have unforeseeable consequences for the entire region. Even for American bases, since Tehran has said that it does not plan to attack those dozens of bases scattered throughout the Middle East if the US does not join the attacks against Iran.

In fact, Biden already showed his displeasure over the Israeli attack against the Iranian diplomatic representation in Damascus last week, which claimed the life of a senior official of the Revolutionary Guard. Netanyahu did not notify Washington in advance, and in this way it was seen that he does what he wants, as is happening in Gaza, and that he does not care what the Americans say, even though they are the ones who maintain in principle end to the Jewish state. Without American support, which is expressed in a thousand ways, the state of Israel would not last long.

Israel accuses Iran of financing terrorism, but in the regional context it is difficult to define what terrorism is. In Tel-Aviv, everything from Palestinian resistance to Hezbollah militias is considered terrorism. Anything that calls Israel to account for its brutal behavior is terrorism, according to the definition of Israel ratified by Western powers. In any case, Israel finances and trains the Mujahidin al-Khalq, real Iranian terrorists whom Israel uses to sabotage the Islamic Republic from within. And perhaps from there, that is, by destabilizing Iran from within, the main Israeli retaliation could come.