The huge flurry of Iranian weapons fired at Israel this weekend turned the countries’ long-running shadow war into a direct confrontation, raising fears that the countries’ old paradigm of trading carefully measured strikes had been replaced by something more overt, violent and dangerous.
But as of Monday, Israel had yet to respond to the Iranian attack. Instead of preparing the public for a showdown with its arch-rival, the government signaled a return to relative normalcy by lifting restrictions on large gatherings and allowing schools to reopen.
Some right-wing Israeli politicians, frustrated by the lack of an immediate response, argued that Israel must strike back strongly – and soon – or risk losing its deterrent power. Other more centrist officials argued that Israel should instead bide its time before responding and build on the support it has received from allies and regional actors, who are otherwise angry about Israel’s war on Gaza.
Any forceful Israeli response would risk angering President Biden, who has pushed Israel to de-escalate and whose military support Israel would need in the event of a major conflict. Israel has already drawn criticism from the president for prolonging the war in Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu must now weigh the perceived benefits of retaliation against the risk of further displeasing the president, along with the potential costs — both human and financial — of waging two wars at once.
An Israeli official briefed on the cabinet’s deliberations, who requested anonymity to discuss security matters, said as of Monday that various options, ranging from diplomacy to an imminent strike, were being considered, but did not elaborate.
In short, the next steps in the conflict remain uncertain.
The nature of Israel’s response, analysts said, could raise or lower the likelihood of a regional war. And it could improve or strain Israel’s ties with Arab nations that share a dislike for Iran but have criticized the war in Gaza.
It is also possible that Israel and Iran will simply return to the established rules of their shadow war – with Israel assassinating individuals, Iran’s proxies firing volleys at Israel, and the two sides trading cyber attacks.
“It’s too early to tell,” said Dana Stroul, who until recently was a senior Pentagon official with responsibility for the Middle East. “From an Israeli security perspective, it’s hard to see how they can let it stand,” Ms. Stroul said. “The question is: What does that look like and how can a clear line and signal be sent to Iran, avoiding World War III in the Middle East?”
If the trajectory of the coming days remains frustratingly opaque, the events of the past 48 hours have brought some new clarity to the conflict.
The weekend attack, in which Iran sent hundreds of explosive drones and missiles – mostly from its own territory into Israeli territory for the first time – was in retaliation for Israel’s killing of seven Iranian officials in Syria earlier this year. month.
In military terms, the Iranian strikes signaled its willingness to confront Israel directly rather than through the use of regional proxies such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, thereby overturning Israel’s assumptions about Iran’s threat threshold.
In diplomatic terms, Iran’s strikes and Israel’s staunch defense against them, coordinated with Western and Arab partners, have helped divert international attention from Israel’s war on Gaza, where a reported death toll of more than 33,000 has drawn accusations , which Israel categorically denied. , of genocide.
At a time when Israel’s closest allies had become increasingly critical of the Israeli military’s conduct in Gaza, Iran’s attacks prompted those partners to work closely with the same Israeli Air Force that carried out devastating strikes in Gaza.
“You can see that not only among Arabs but also among Western Europeans, Israel’s diplomatic standing is somewhat improved because it was a victim of Iranian aggression, not an aggressor,” said Itamar Rabinovich, Israel’s former ambassador to Washington. “Being a ‘victim’ improves your position.”
Analysts said it remained unclear how Israel’s defenses would have worked without Iran’s several days of warning before its attacks over the weekend, which allowed Israel and its allies critical time to prepare. And while Iran has said that any future Israeli “mistake” would be met with a “significantly more serious” response, that threat also remains untested and has been vague enough to leave room for maneuver.
If Israel fires at Iran in a way that would drag the region into war, the goodwill Israel has recently built up with its allies could quickly disappear, analysts said.
For Iran’s leaders, the strikes, which caused limited damage and seriously injured a child, were nevertheless a domestic and diplomatic victory because of the way they allowed Iran to portray itself as standing up to Israel.
At home, Iran’s leaders have faced accusations of being too passive following previous Israeli attacks on Iranian officials. Analysts said the salvo also reassured Iran’s allies and proxies in countries such as Lebanon and Yemen that Iran was willing to take the risk of attacking Israel from its own soil. And, they said, it allowed Iran to field rival Middle Eastern leaders who have often publicly criticized Israel while quietly cooperating with its government.
Iran wants to “take the mantle of protector of the Muslim world,” said Narges Bajoghli, an Iran expert at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington. “They are basically flexing their muscles for regional audiences and at the same time showing the weakness of Arab leaders in the region,” he said. “Arab nations have not confronted Israel in the direct way that Iran has.”
The opposite was true: At least one Arab country, Jordan, was directly involved in repelling Iranian incursions, and others are believed to have quietly aided Israel either by sharing information or sending data collected by missile-detection sensors.
Jordan, Israel’s eastern neighbor, has a large Palestinian population and has regularly criticized the war in Gaza. However, he admitted that Iranian targets had been “countered” in Jordanian airspace and that his military would repel similar attacks in the future.
The announcement was a reminder of how, before the Gaza war, fears of Iran had begun to moderate Israel’s diplomatic integration in the Middle East and allow for greater military coordination between Israel and some Arab countries, including arms deals and common educational exercises.
For some Israeli analysts, this is why Iran’s attack could still help Israel’s acceptance in the Middle East, even as its reputation plummets over Gaza.
“The full details of how the Sunni Arab regimes helped protect Israel, no doubt saving Israeli lives from Iranian missiles and drones, may not be known for a while. But this is a historic change,” Anshel Pfeffer, an Israeli commentator, wrote in a column for Haaretz, a leftist newspaper. “Arab cooperation against Iranian aggression proves that the trend in the region is still toward an Arab-American-Israeli alliance against Iran and its proxies.”
In particular, some hope it may give new impetus to US-led efforts to seal diplomatic ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia for the first time, which seemed close to success before the Gaza war.
Saudi oil refineries were attacked in 2019 by the Houthis, an Iranian-backed militia in Yemen. Riyadh is seeking greater security cooperation with the United States to prevent similar aggression in the future — an arrangement the US has indicated is likely to happen only if Riyadh formally recognizes and cooperates with Israel.
But the chances of such a deal remain slim as long as the war in Gaza drags on and Israel’s right-wing government avoids any talk of creating a Palestinian state after the fighting ends – a key Saudi demand.
“Diplomatically, I would take advantage of that and try to revive and revitalize regional cooperation,” said Mr. Rabinovitch, a former Israeli ambassador. “But the obstacle remains,” he added. “What are you doing about the Palestinian issue?”
Gabby Sobelman and Johnatan Reiss contributed reporting.
