[Salon] Iranian retaliation and the cycle of violence in the Middle East

FM: John Whitbeck

The world may ... or may not ... have dodged a bullet.

Whatever one's view of the Iranian regime, one must give it credit for subtle sophistication in structuring its response to Israel's deadly attack on its consulate in Damascus, which could not have been allowed to go without a response.

It has executed a response which was significant in its scale but essentially symbolic and performative in its results, targeting exclusively Israeli military installations and advising the United States and Israel in advance what it would be doing and when it would be doing it, thereby ensuring that the Israeli and American air defense systems would be well prepared to intercept virtually all the drones and missiles launched toward Israel.

Indeed, Israel claims to have successfully intercepted 99% of Iran's drones and missiles and, so far, to have suffered only minor physical damage, no deaths and only one injury -- incontestably, an impressive performance by the Israeli and American air defense systems.

To his credit, President Biden is reported to have advised Prime Minister Netanyahu to "take the win" represented by Israel's highly successful defense and not to retaliate for this Iranian retaliation by attacking Iran and, significantly, to have told him that the United States would not participate in any further attack upon Iranian territory.

If the decision-makers of the Israeli government were rational people, they would, exceptionally, accept this American advice, trumpet their successful defense against the wave of hundreds of Iranian drones and missiles and luxuriate in the fervent Western condemnations of Iran's recklessness.

However, since the decision-makers of the Israeli government are not rational people and the clear intention of attacking an Iranian diplomatic mission was to provoke a broader regional war and draw the United States into war with Iran, it is far from certain that these decision-makers will view last night's events as a "win".

If Israel were to ignore the American advice, the next round of Iranian retaliation would be unlikely to be equally symbolic, performative and pre-advised but could well be viewed by these decision-makers as a "win" for them personally even if it were to be catastrophic for everyone else.

Israel's defense minister has said this morning that Israel's confrontation with Iran was "not yet over."

The world must still hold its breath.