Spectre of a deadly escalation

The looming threat of an aggravated Iran-Israel conflict – with the US as a key actor – leaves the region on edge

Going by the intensifying conflict between Iran and Israel, it may be hard to imagine that Iran – Israel’s most powerful and dreaded enemy since the Islamic Revolution of 1979 – had for years been a rare friend of Israel under its former leader, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, in the otherwise almost entirely unfriendly Middle East.

But Iran’s new Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, following the revolution that deposed the Shah, declared the annihilation of what he called “the Zionist entity” to be a goal of the new Islamic state. Iran’s accelerated efforts in the mid- to late-1990s to develop nuclear weapons were seen by Israel as an existential threat.

Iran and Israel have been locked in a shadow war for decades since the Islamic revolution. The rivalry came to a head when to stop a nuclear Iran, key Iranian scientists were assassinated; Iran’s nuclear programme has also faced recurring threats. Wary of a preemptive strike on its nuclear production facilities, Iran has gone to great lengths to make its underground nuclear megacomplex as unassailable as possible. It has also stated that any attack on its nuclear sites would represent a major escalation.

Under a 2015 deal with world powers and the European Union
(EU), Iran had agreed to restrict its nuclear programme in exchange for sanctions relief.

The US’ lack of fair-mindedness and lopsided diplomacy, it might appear, has been at the root of many conflagrations in the Middle East. The recklessness with which Israel is escalating the war could not have been possible without America’s backing. The Obama administration, perhaps, was seized of the matter that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory and expansion of settlements is a threat, both to Israeli democracy’s long-term viability and to the US’ broader interests in the region. Sustained diplomatic pressure to make Iran abandon its nuclear ambitions and support for terrorist organisations did not go alongside the need to press Israel to stay tuned to the peace process and have it abandon its hawkish militarism that makes no distinction between a terrorist and a civilian.

America has run into quite a few crises, since World War II, surrounding the Middle East but none of the underlying problems were resolved. It was mired in the plot to retake the Suez Canal, and perhaps topple Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser in the process, orchestrated by Britain, France, and Israel in 1956. US president Dwight D. Eisenhower neither succeeded in protecting America’s reputation from the blowback of Arab anticolonial anger nor in achieving any notable success in stemming Arab nationalism. During the two Arab-Israeli wars in 1967-1973, America sided with Israel; after the second war, it became fatefully associated with Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.

The Islamic Revolution not only rocked Iran and toppled a key American ally, but sent shockwaves through Arab regimes, precipitated an almost decade-long war with Iraq, and helped ruin an American presidency. America’s unsteady adjustment to the
new political force of radical Islam continued apace until 1990 when Iraqi forces under Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait. The triumph in the land war notwithstanding, the US was embroiled in a 20-year strategic
embrace of Iraq – first containment, then invasion and occupation – with lasting consequences leading to the September 11, 2001 attack that sucked it into a prolonged war in Afghanistan, and invasion of Iraq at a heavy cost to its resources and constitutional principles.

No longer a proxy battle

The threat of open warfare erupting between the arch Middle East foes and the US getting dragged in has put the region on edge as Washington said America did not seek conflict with Iran but would not hesitate to protect its forces and Israel. The Pentagon recently announced the THAAD deployment to help bolster Israel’s air defence systems following Iran’s ballistic missile attacks on Israel in April and October.

A general war between Iran and Israel would not only involve the US but would also drive millions of Arabs, Sunnis, as well as Shi’a, to side with Iran, and reinvigorate the terrorist jihad. The Israel-Palestine peace process has already been thrown to the winds. Should there be an escalation, the US can never gain back its moral footing much of which has already been frittered away given the disproportionate nature of the Israel-Hamas war.

The war which began in Israel and Gaza on October 7 last year, as per an estimate on October 4, has already accounted for the death of more than 42,000 Palestinians compared to 1,706 Israelis – a figure that highlights the disproportionate nature of the conflict. And among the Palestinians killed are defenceless citizens including women and children, the sick, the elderly, and the disabled.

Why must the US look the other way? The power of the Jewish lobby in shaping US policy has long been recognised as an effective tool that makes the US turn a blind eye to the violence perpetrated against the Palestinians. While the link between the Israeli state/the Jewish lobby and the US’ Middle East policy is hardly ever explained away, the massive, sustained, and unprecedented US funding to Israel continues unhindered.

Policy-makers must ponder why, following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the defeat of Iraq in the 1991 Gulf War, the engagement among Iran, Israel, and the US altered so radically and why in the wake of this geopolitical rupture, Israel and Iran viewed each other no longer as potential security partners, but as rivals for defining the balance of the Middle East. Mitigating the hostilities between Israel and Iran is, without a doubt, the larger goal now.

(The writer is a Kolkata-based commentator on geopolitics, development, and culture)