Escalation Between Iran and Israel
The recent escalation of the conflict between Israel and Iran cannot be fully understood outside of the context of American politics.
In order to understand the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran, it is absolutely essential to focus on some aspects of the timeline leading up to the recent Israel retaliation. The timeline could go back for decades, or perhaps centuries, but it is also fruitful to turn to the much more immediate past.
March 14: Senator Chuck Schumer delivers a speech on the floor of the US Senate reaffirming his strong support for Israel while criticizing Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and calling for new elections in that country.
April 1: Israel strikes the Iranian Consulate in Damascus, killing seven.
April 13: Iran launches a missile and drone attack against Israel. Israel, the US, Jordan and other countries shoot down the drones and missiles before they can significantly damage Israel.
April 18: Israel, despite urging from the US to show restraint, strikes back at Iran.
The second through fourth items in this timeline are pretty straightforward, an exchange of strikes by both Iran and Israel each meant to both do military damage and send a message, However, the relationship between the first and second items might explain a great deal about this escalation.
Senator Schumer’s speech on March 14th was enormously important. Because of Schumer’s stature both in within the Senate and the pro-Israel wing of the Democratic Party, Schumer’s words very quickly changed the discourse within Washington and within his own party.
A very senior Jewish Democratic leader with a record going back for many decades of being firmly pro-Israel firmly criticizing the leader of the Jewish state and holding Israel responsible for its actions, particularly because as Schumer himself noted, he spoke for substantial proportion, probably a majority of American Jews, rearranged political calculations in Washington.
There were other developments here as well, notably the Israeli strike in Gaza on April 2nd that killed seven people from the aid organization World Central Kitchen. On the call the next day between Biden and Netanyahu, the President was much tougher on the Israeli Prime Minister than ever before, but Schumer’s speech and the tone it struck was part of the context in which Biden spoke to Netanyahu.
Shifting political winds in Washington that would lead to more pressure and conditions on Israel were an enormous threat to Netanyahu. Israel’s attack on Iran on April 1st cannot be understood outside of that context.
While it is certainly true that given Iran’s support for Hamas and Hezbollah, there were ample military reasons for Israeli anger towards Iran, the decision to escalate the conflict by striking an Iranian target in Damascus was very significant, as was the timing. It is impossible to prove, and probably an overstatement, that Netanyahu’s decision to attack the Iranian compound in Damascus was a direct response to Schumer’s speech, but it would be a mistake to dismiss the connection altogether.
The strike against Iran made by Israel 1st was inevitably going to draw an Iranian response. That response, and the possibility of a larger war between the two countries, has reset, at least somewhat, US attitudes towards Israel. Once Iran retaliated, the US had no choice other than to help Israel defend itself. Even countries like Jordan or France where attitudes towards Israel have always been very different than in the US, felt compelled to help Israel because of their own strategic interests.
In the US President Biden, after a period of suggesting he was reexamining his ironclad and largely uncritical support for Israel, backtracked following Israel’s strike against Damascus, even before Iran’s inevitable response, and restated his strong commitment to Israel. Even European countries began calling for further sanctions against Iran.
Netanyahu’s decision to attack the Iranian consulate in Damascus was not without a military rationale, but it also has paid substantial political dividends for the embattled Israeli Prime Minister-at least for now.
Nobody should have been surprised when Netanyahu ignored pleas from the US and retaliated against Iran on April 18th. Although at first glance it may seem, Israel has ample reason to have great hostility towards Iran but many fewer reasons to escalate this conflict, forcing Biden’s hand and reframing the war in Gaza as being about Iran is very good fo Israel
Once again, the Israel-Iran conflict cannot be fully understood outside of the US-Israel relationship. Israel is currently fighting Iranian proxies in Gaza and the north of Israel, but Israel’s ability to do that is extremely reliant on American support. Thus the war in Gaza is largely a proxy war not between the Israel and Iran, but between the US and Iran.
The grave danger for the US is that its proxy will drag it into a direct conflict with Iran. Despite American views about the Iranian regime, there is almost no appetite among the American people for a direct conflict with Iran. President Biden understands this, which is a primary reason he urged Netanyahu not to retaliate in the first place.
With the American election only about six-and-a-half months away, Biden does not want the US engaged in another war and the world to look increasingly chaotic to the American electorate. And that is a reason why Netanyahu, who would like to see Trump back in the White House, just may continue this escalation.