The Middle East War No One Wanted
After years of proxy battles, Israel and Iran are on the brink of a direct fight.
NYT national security correspondent David Sanger analyses recent events and sees “A Wider War in the Middle East, From Hamas to Hezbollah and Now Iran.”
The long-feared “wider war” in the Middle East is here.
For the last 360 days, since the images of the slaughter of about 1,200 people in Israel last Oct. 7 flashed around the world, President Biden has warned at every turn against allowing a terrorist attack by Hamas to spread into a conflict with Iran’s other proxy, Hezbollah, and ultimately with Iran itself.
Now, after Israel assassinated the Hezbollah chief, Hassan Nasrallah, and began a ground invasion of Lebanon, and after Iran retaliated on Tuesday by launching nearly 200 missiles at Israel, it has turned into one of the region’s most dangerous moments since the Arab-Israeli War of 1967.
The main questions now are how much the conflict might escalate and whether the United States will get more directly involved.
The past few days may be a turning point. Since Israel killed Mr. Nasrallah on Friday, the Biden administration has been shifting from cautioning against a wider war to trying to manage it. Officials have defended Israel’s right to strike back at Iran, but are advising against direct attacks on its nuclear facilities that could tip the conflict out of control.
[…]
To many Israelis, the escalation was inevitable, another chapter in a struggle for survival that began with the nation’s creation in 1948.
Mr. Netanyahu clearly has America’s blessing to retaliate. At the White House on Tuesday, Jake Sullivan, Mr. Biden’s national security adviser, said the Iranian attack had been “defeated and ineffective,” largely because of the coordinated efforts of American and Israeli forces, who had spent months planning how to intercept the incoming missiles. “We have made clear that there will be consequences — severe consequences — for this attack, and we will work with Israel to make that the case,” Mr. Sullivan told reporters.
Mr. Sullivan said the White House was consulting extensively with Israel, including with the prime minister’s office, to formulate the appropriate response. He emphasized the degree of communication, leaving unsaid the obvious. Mr. Biden and Mr. Netanyahu barely talked as Israel invaded Gaza and took the fight to Lebanon. But once Iran, a lethal threat to Israel with military powers that Hamas and Hezbollah can only aspire to, directly entered the fray, America’s tone and strategy changed.
Sanger’s colleague, Thomas Friedman, writing just before yesterday’s missile barrage from Iran, termed Israel’s attacks in Lebanon “The First Volleys of a Ballistic Missile War in the Mideast.”
We may be about to enter what could be the most dangerous moment in the history of the modern Middle East: a ballistic missile war between Iran and Israel, which would almost certainly bring in the United States on Israel’s side and could culminate in a full-blown U.S.-Israeli effort to destroy Iran’s nuclear program.
That is the assessment I have gleaned from talking to Israeli intelligence sources, whose analysis is that Iran plans to launch a missile attack against Israel at 12:30 p.m. Eastern time, which is 7:30 p.m. in Israel. The attack is planned in two waves 15 minutes apart, and each wave will involve 110 ballistic missiles, the Israelis said.
The Iranian missiles are aimed at three targets. First, the headquarters of the Mossad, Israel’s foreign intelligence service, near Tel Aviv. Second, the Israeli air base at Nevatim, and third, the Israeli air base at Khatzirim; both bases are in the south of Israel in the Negev Desert. The Israeli officials are particularly concerned about any strike on Mossad headquarters because it is in the densely populated north Tel Aviv suburb of Ramat Hasharon. It is also not far from the Israeli defense intelligence headquarters, Unit 8200.
This information has been shared with me because the Israelis insist that they do not want a full-scale ballistic war with Iran, and want the United States to try to deter the Iranians by letting them know that if they do launch this missile attack, the United States will not be a bystander, and its response, unlike with the April 13 Iranian missile and drone attack on Israel, will not be purely defensive. In other words, Iran could be risking its entire nuclear program if this missile attack goes ahead.
I have not been able to speak to any senior U.S. officials to gauge their reactions, but will update this blog post as I do.
One might think that Israel is itching for this kind of war with Iran to finally take out its nuclear program and involve the United States. That is not my impression. A war of ballistic missiles could do enormous damage to Israel’s infrastructure unless virtually every missile is intercepted.
At this writing, they in fact were—with considerable assistance from the United States. Whether that was Iran’s intent is not within my ability to ascertain from public sources.
An an afternoon update, Friedman observes,
The attack was executed by the Air Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and was not an operation of the regular Iranian army or air force, according to Israeli sources. The Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, was not informed of the attack until shortly before it began, the sources said, indicating that the Iranian regime is divided over the operation, which will probably add to the fractures in the government.
Israel’s ability to anticipate the Iranian strike and name the precise hour of the attack, and the fact that it was a revolutionary guards operation — not the regular Iranian armed forces under the command of the new president — demonstrates how deeply the Mossad, Israel’s cyber command, Unit 8200, and the Israeli Air Force have penetrated the Iranian regime and coordinated their defensive response. It means no Iranian leader can trust another anymore.
The same is largely true of the Hezbollah leadership, thanks to Israel’s brilliant attacks on their command and control system.
Regardless, Netanyahu would seem to have no choice to follow up with a strike on Iranian targets. Depending on the level of severity of that strike, escalation into all-out conflict seems inevitable. This, despite it being clear none of the major parties involved want it. Certainly, not the United States.
As Sanger notes,
Mr. Biden’s warnings started early, on his visit to Israel less than two weeks after Oct. 7, to show solidarity after one of the most gruesome terrorist attacks of modern times.
That was before Israel obliterated Gaza from above and sent its military in on the ground, against Mr. Biden’s advice in a series of heated conversations with Mr. Netanyahu. It was before Israel booby-trapped pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah that exploded across Lebanon, and before Israel not only killed Mr. Nasrallah but systematically decapitated much of the Hezbollah leadership.
It was before the administration hinted that Israel would join a 21-day cease-fire, only to be defied, again, by Mr. Netanyahu, who then turned around and authorized the strike that killed Mr. Nasrallah.
To Mr. Biden’s critics on the right, this is all the result of American hesitance, his unwillingness to back Israel unconditionally, to nuance every promise of aid with a warning not to make the mistakes the United States made after the Sept. 11 attacks.
To his critics on the left, what has happened in the past 10 days is another example of Mr. Biden’s failure to make use of American leverage, including the threat of withholding American weapons from Israel, after more than 41,000 people have died in Gaza.
Similarly, the Iranian leadership has clearly wanted to remain in the so-called Gray Zone, backing proxies to keep Israel on its back foot but not doing so much damage as to provoke more than token response. For whatever reason, they viewed the brashness of the Israeli attacks on Hezbollah leadership—and, perhaps more importantly, on the IRGC leadership—as to much to take without a major response.
It’s largely up to Netanyahu now. While I’ve never much cared for him, seeing him as a bully and, increasingly, one using the war to preserve his own hide, I don’t think he wants a full-scale war with Iran either. His next move may well decide whether he gets one, at least in the near term.
Oooo, look at the pretty maps. Did Bibi color them all by himself? I’ll bet he did. Of course he didn’t stay within the lines but crossing lines is pretty much second nature for Bibi.
I think Netanyahu does want a wider war in the region. I think he’s prepared to keep raising the stakes until America is irrevocably on the record as supporting Israel all the way. And that this is a presidential election year makes it even more important that he get this nailed down before November. He’s seen that Harris is considerably less on side than Biden. I hope she’s not going to step into that snare.
So, I suppose the only reason we aren’t shooting down Russian missles over Europe is because of Putin’s nuclear blackmail?
@Not the IT Dept.:
Yeah, he forgot to use black Sharpie. That’ll cost him.
I expect America’s attitude to shift after the election, one way or another.
So…Israel attacks a terrorist organization and Iran responds by attacking Israel? Isn’t that a violation of international law or something? Or does that stuff only matter when it can be used as a club against Israel or the US?
I have to wonder if the James Joyner of 20 years ago would have taken an Iranian rocket attack on Israel as an opportunity to defame and malign Israel’s leader.
@TheRyGuy:
Is the JKB persona been retired for the day? Are you alternating personalities depending on the day of the week? If so, you slipped up on the calendar because Paul L. is also posting. Doesn’t it get exhausting keeping up with the changes?
@TheRyGuy: As noted in the OP, Israel also killed an IRGC general. And at least one senior Iranian diplomat was seriously injured in the pager attacks.
Even during his first stint as PM, in the late 1990s, I thought Netanyahu a bully and bad for both Israel’s security needs and the relationship with the United States. He’s proven himself to be worse in subsequent stints. And a criminal. Still, I don’t begrudge any Israeli leader for forcibly responding to security threats.
EDITED TO ADD: Here’s me criticizing Netanyahu a little over 21 years ago.
Americans had better hope that the Israelis, with help from the US and Jordan, shoot down every Iranian missile, because if Iran were to hit Mossad HQ we’d see an actual war, not an endlessly-announced ‘escalation.’
The problem with cries of escalation is that the term implies some sort of parity between the warring parties. As I wrote yesterday, Israel has exposed Iran’s weakness, just as Ukraine has exposed Russia’s. 180 missiles fired with zero hits? Iran has no serious air defense, so if Israel were to fire 180 missiles back, the result would be very different. This is not a battle of equals, this is a good old-fashioned, one-sided ass-kicking.
Israel has shattered Hamas and Hezbollah. Iran’s proxies are having a bad year. If Iran wants to keep at it, I’m sure Israel will be happy to do to the IRGC what they’ve done to Iran’s proxies.
But I don’t believe Netanyahu wants eternal war. Consider the economic impact of so many men not at work. Even in Israel, it’s the economy, stupid.
I don’t see how these two can have a war. They don’t border each other, and they can’t project power. They can exchange missiles and drones. Israel might carry out air strikes in Iran, if it can fly over Saudi, Jordanian, and Iraqi airspace unmolested. I don’t see how either lands troops in quantity.
Israel has nukes, and I assume some means of delivery. But they’d be mad and stupid at trumpian times the square of infinity to use them.
Hamas and Iran’s proxy, Hezbollah, started this war. Hezbollah, in particular, thought it could surf the edge and conduct continuous low-level attacks on Israel without Israel significantly responding. It thought this because it was overconfident, along with its patron, Iran, that Hezbollah’s significant missile and rocket arsenal and Iran’s assistance would deter Israel from doing much. And they talked specifically about this strategy, and made it clear that if Israel responded too strongly to Hezbollah’s unprovoked attacks, they were prepared to unleash hundreds of thousands of rockets and missiles on civilian areas in Israel and cause widespread destruction.
It turns out they grossly overestimated their position.
We have a saying in the military and intel community – “the enemy gets a vote.” The US learned that the hard way on several occasions. Iran and its allies are learning it now.
Starting a war is always risky. History is littered with examples of wars started based on hubris and overconfidence (see the US invasion of Iraq as one example). Starting a war and assuming you can control your enemy’s response and keep them from treating it like an actual war is foolish. This is the lesson Hezbollah and Iran are learning.
That said, I think the talk of a wider war is overwrought. Plus, the war has been wide for some time.
The strategic reality is that Iran and Israel are quite distant, and they have limited capabilities to attack each other directly. Iran has its ballistic missiles and proxies, and that’s it. It has relied primarily on its proxies, like Hezbollah, to attack Israel more directly and carry out its decades-long project to try to destroy the Israeli state.
Israel has many fewer long-range missiles than Iran, but what they do have is much more accurate. It also has long-range fixed-wing strike capability that is extremely capable, but also limited in number and the ability to sustain long-range operations. It can do raids, not a sustained air campaign against Iran. Israel has no proxy network to harass Iran or serve as a strategic deterrent, and therefore, Israel is not any kind of strategic threat to Iran in the way Iran is to Israel.
Regardless, the distance and limited capabilities mean that the ability to sustain combat operations is extremely limited in both cases for both Iran and Israel. They can do limited attacks and raids. But Israel has a distinct advantage in terms of precision. The accuracy of Iran’s ballistic missiles is measured in multiple football fields. They’ve now conducted the two largest ballistic missile strikes since the German V-2 attacks in WW2 and don’t have much to show for it. This last attack used more modern missiles and tactics learned from the first strike, resulting in many missiles impacting near their targets. However, the poor accuracy means that very little significant damage was done. The advantage of Israeli and US ballistic missile defense systems is that they can calculate where missiles will impact and prioritize shooting down those that will cause damage. This greatly reduces the effectiveness of the kind of saturation attacks Iran has attempted thus far.
Last time, Israel’s response to Iran’s first large-scale attack was shooting 1 or 2 missiles at the radar of an air defense battery and precisely destroying it. This advantage in precision allows Israel to do more with less, and Iran’s lack of defensive capabilities means any Israeli strikes will likely be effective or at least do a lot more than what Iran’s massed, inaccurate ballistic missiles can do.
Israeli retaliation is certain IMO. The question is, what will they strike? They have a lot of options. Destroying much of Iran’s oil export capability would be pretty straightforward and easy since it’s vulnerable and on the coast. That would wreck Iran’s economy. The IRGC has reportedly said that if Israel does that, then Iran will attack the region’s oil infrastructure, essentially declaring war on all of Iran’s neighbors. That statement demonstrates that they understand how vulnerable their oil infrastructure is, and making threats about widening the war is the only deterrent they have.
But the Biden administration, for various reasons, probably won’t allow strikes on oil infrastructure.
The nuclear sites are still – as I’ve been arguing for over two decades now – not within Israel’s ability to destroy with US assistance. They could destroy or damage a handful of them, which would be dumb and counterproductive. And the Biden admin will oppose that too, so that is likely off the table.
My estimate is that Israel will go after the IRGC and probably the IRGC missile infrastructure used in Iran’s attacks. This would not only focus on the element of the Iranian government that’s been engaged in a decades-long conflict with Israel, but it could also potentially reduce Iran’s capability to conduct ballistic missile attacks in the future. It’s instructive that this latest strike by Iran appears to be an entirely IRGC affair. Apparently, not even the Iranian President was informed, and neither was the regular Iranian military. Israel would be smart to limit retribution to IRGC targets.
Let’s say Israel does this, then what? Iran has limited retaliatory options. More ballistic missile attacks? Its ace card of Hezbollah’s arsenal serving as a strategic deterrent is now gone. More unconventional attacks? More assistance to the Houthis to disrupt global shipping?
Anyway, escalation spirals always end at some point. Iran is on the losing end of the one they started, whether they realize it yet or not. They are usually smart and savvy players, and I think they will realize they have a losing hand if they haven’t already.
I found this state the most interesting written so far:
How true it is, I don’t know. What we (the audience) also don’t know is what is the postures and positions of Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, UAE, etc. Are they just planning to sit back as usual and let the Israelis do their dirty work? And are we planning to let them? As usual.
@Michael Reynolds:
He doesn’t want eternal war. One thing to understand about Bibi (that most of his strident haters seem blinded to) is that he’s never been much of a military person or supportive of military solutions. The last year has obviously changed that calculus, but Gollant and other members of the cabinet (including Gantz before he left) are and have been MUCH more focused on military solutions than Netanyahu, even over the past year.
After 2006, Bibi didn’t have much faith in military solutions. He preferred special operations and low-level raids as the main kinetic options. Instead, his strategy was to play what he’s good at – factional politics. That is why he played footsie with Hamas for so long; he didn’t see them as a serious threat but as a tool to help keep Israel’s enemies divided.
In another example, after Hezbollah joined the war by attacking Israel last October, Gollant and the military wanted to go after Hezbollah first to take out Israel’s biggest strategic threat. It was Bibi and the Biden administration that opposed that. Bibi didn’t want another 2006. And it’s easy to see now why the military would want to take on Hezbollah first, now that we know the extent to which Israel had goods on them and the comparative lack of good intelligence on Hamas.
And what the Pavlovian Bibi-haters don’t seem to realize is that if/when he is replaced, the person who replaces him is much more likely to be someone who views Israeli strategic interests and defense in terms of military deterrence. They will be much more ready to take military measures to maintain and ensure that deterrence especially because everyone can now see what Netanyahu’s factionalism strategy has wrought.
@TheRyGuy:
Defaming and maligning Israel’s leader was what Netanyahu and Ben-Gvir were doing when they incited Yzithak Rabin’s assassination, because Rabin dared to believe in and seek a durable peace.
Netanyahu is not a victim, not a hero, and the “boo-hoo poor Bibi is being unfairly maligned” routine is a whitewash as thin as the “boo-hoo poor Trump is being unfairly maligned.” Like his buddy Trump, Netanyahu is a selfish, racist, violent far right villain who has done incalculable damage to his homeland — up to and including funding and boosting Hamas — and who deserves every bit the opprobium coming his way. And then some.
The Israelis who took to the streets by the tens of thousands against Netanyahu — first over his authoritarian power grabs then over his secondary abandonment of Hamas-held hostages (they were already abandoned the first time by the his government’s dumb policies and lax security pre-Oct 7) — have been right all along, just like those predicted nine years ago the Trump horror show to come.
But like Trump’s fanboys and Putin’s puppets, Bibi apologists will continue to blame everybody but him, Israel’s longest-serving premier, for his own problems. It’s always somebody else’s fault. The buck always stops somewhere other than the desk of the big alpha strongman. Make it make sense.
A 2019 headline from the Jerusalem Post:
Netanyahu: Money to Hamas part of strategy to keep Palestinians divided
But poor, misunderstood, non-warmongering Netanyahu. Please.
It’s sad how so many people just jump to the conclusion that Israel has no choice but to retaliate. Really? Escalation is always a choice. Given that the attack killed no one and comparatively did little damage at all why couldn’t they just roll their eyes, laugh at Iran’s lack of capacity to hurt them, and continue with the operations they’ve already started in Gaza and Lebanon? That would undercut Iranian influence just as effectively. Maybe more-so–authoritarians hate and fear being mocked.
Sadly, I’m sure this Israeli government will retaliate, because macho dick-measuring is the language of the day, but I’d argue the fact there were no actual casualties is a rare opportunity to NOT escalate and get away from the tit for tat and doing the same thing over and over but this time it will be different insanity that has dominated the region for decades. It probably won’t work to bring peace to the region either, but at least it would be different.