Middle East: Peace needs to be a strategic priority!

Steve Bishop argues that the US failure to restrain Israel is pushing the region towards wider war, with an attack on Iran likely to have devastating consequences

The extent to which Israel is prepared to go it alone in a threatened strike against Iran was made clear this week in reported discussions between the Israelis and the United States.  US President, Joe Biden, and Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, discussed issues relating to Israel’s expected provocation against Iran in their first call in over a month last week.  The White House has said that Biden emphasised the need for “a diplomatic arrangement” to allow Israeli and Lebanese civilians displaced by fighting to return to their homes; urged Israel to minimise civilian casualties in airstrikes against Beirut; and discussed “the urgent need to renew diplomacy” on achieving a ceasefire in Gaza.

Clearly Biden’s words have had little impact with the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) carrying out its heaviest bombing raids so far on Thursday night [10 October], just over 24 hours after the Biden-Netanyahu conversation.

It is apparent that the US is frustrated by being repeatedly caught off-guard by Israel’s military actions in Gaza and Lebanon, but appears incapable of summoning the political will to head off further escalation.  There was some hope that the US would learn more about what Israel was contemplating when Israeli Defence Minister, Yoav Gallant, and US Defence Secretary, Lloyd Austin, were scheduled to meet at the Pentagon last week.  However, Netanyahu blocked Gallant from going to the US as Israel continued planning its Iran operation.  As it stands, the US claims not to know either the timing of the strike or what Israel might target.

It is known that Army General Erik Kurilla, who heads US Central Command, with responsibility for US military operations in the Middle East, has met with Gallant and top Israeli military commanders, to warn against striking Iran’s nuclear sites or oil facilities.

Gallant is widely seen in the West as the Israeli leader most responsive to the US concerns about Israel’s prosecution of the war in Gaza, especially regarding increasing humanitarian aid and creating a plan for post-war governance.  However, it is evident that Netanyahu’s desire to cling to office, and take advantage of the hiatus which the pre-election period in the US represents, outweighs any wider strategic concerns for him and the religious fundamentalist backers in his government.

US failure to act decisively is frustrating the international community as it is clearly the major supplier of arms to the IDF.  Israel can only continue to prosecute the wars it has initiated on multiple fronts, because of its dependence on the US military.  Over the past year, it has not only relied on supplies of American munitions, but benefited from US help in shooting down missiles and drones, as well as the rapid deployment of American naval and air forces to deter more substantial Iranian attacks.

In turn the US has had to modify its strategic priorities, which were focussed on ramping up conflicts with China and Russia, to adapt.  Struggling to head off an all-out Middle East war, the Pentagon has deployed two aircraft carrier battle groups to the region for much of the year.

Against this background the threat of further escalation once the IDF attack Iran is significant, for the region, for world peace, and for the people of Iran themselves.

Inside Iran, the theocratic leadership of the Islamic Republic is walking a political tightrope having seen its adventurist foreign policy in the region at least temporarily crushed, following the overkill of the Israeli response to the Hamas attack on the 7 October last year.  Leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah have been assassinated, key targets have been hit, disrupting operations, and the Israelis have even reached into Tehran itself to undermine the Islamic dictatorship’s reliability on its own security apparatus.

Evidence in both Gaza and Lebanon would suggest that the Israelis are not inclined towards acting with restraint, as the death toll on both fronts mounts, along with the increasing unrest in the occupied West Bank. Iran’s response to the strikes against Hezbollah in Lebanon have so far not inflicted significant damage upon the IDF but have been sufficient to give the Israelis justification, in their eyes, to strike back.

While thousands have turned out in the streets of Tehran to condemn Israel and demand a response to the assassination of Hezbollah leaders, many more Iranians fear the consequences of a direct IDF attack and have little faith, based on experience over the past year, of the West being able to curb the actions of the Israelis.

The recent presidential election in Iran in July demonstrated, with its low turnout and manipulated outcome, that the regime in Tehran enjoys little popular support.  The current hope of the regime is that anti-Israeli sentiment, surging on the back of attacks in Gaza and Lebanon, will mask the regime’s shortcomings and bring people together to face a common enemy.

For the Iranian dictatorship this is a high-risk strategy.  With Hamas and Hezbollah weakened Iran, may feel the need to assert is regional leadership, countering any IDF strike with further actions of its own, escalating the conflict further.  This may provide the theocratic dictatorship with the fillip it desires in the short term but would come at a significant political as well as human cost.

On the other hand, humiliation at the hands of the IDF would see the credibility of the Islamic Republic, as the centre of the so-called ‘axis of resistance’, crumble as well as fuelling the growing internal opposition to the regime. The price paid for either policy is likely to be a high one for the people of Iran, still struggling for peace, social justice, and democracy.

The disastrous effects of Iran being dragged into all-out war, on top of the horrors of the past year, simply cannot be overstated.

It is clear from the evidence of the past year, the years of illegal Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, the repeated incursions into Lebanon by the IDF over the years, that there is not a military solution to the issues in the Middle East.  The only solution can be a diplomatic one, starting with the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination and a state of their own.

The failure of the international community, primarily the US and Britain, to enforce United Nations resolutions, which would compel Israel to negotiate, and to continue to supply weapons to sustain the IDF, are the key drivers of the current situation.  Until peace is at the top of the strategic objectives of all players, the people of Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran will continue to suffer.

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Steve Bishop is a longstanding member of the Executive Committee for the Defence of the Iranian People’s Rights (CODIR).