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Analysis: The ball is in Iran's court after US pressure pays off
What happens next in the escalating but sporadic missile slugfest between Israel and Iran may depend a lot on who wins the US election 10 days from now.
As the dust settles in Iran, early indications are US diplomacy has, for now, headed off fears of tit-for-tat retaliation. A regional source speaking on condition of anonymity, who quickly and accurately predicted Iran wouldn’t respond to Israel’s last strike on the country in April, tells CNN Iran will “contain” this strike, too.
Israelis are divided over the mission, which could make follow-up strikes safer but didn’t hit Iran’s nuclear or oil sites. Where they agree is that the dialing down of the target list is a result of US pressure.
Since Iran’s ballistic missile barrage striking Israeli military targets almost a month ago, US President Joe Biden had called for a “proportional” response. If Biden’s intervention has paid off, it is perhaps the clearest indicator in over a year of war that the White House maintains some influence over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
This comes following a mostly futile — or at best very limited — success in convincing Netanyahu to ease the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza, where over 42,000 have been killed as the Israeli military wages war against Hamas.
It is no secret Netanyahu prefers former President Donald Trump, an Iran hawk, over Vice President Kamala Harris in the coming election.
How the Israeli prime minister plans to prosecute and eventually land his deadly conflicts with Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran could depend on what he hears from the White House. What we may have witnessed last night is a place-holding strike by Netanyahu.
The ball for now, though, is firmly in Iran’s court.
European leaders call for restraint after Israel strikes Iran
European leaders are urging restraint after a wave of retaliatory Israeli strikes targeted Iranian military sites.
France: The French foreign ministry cautioned against any further escalation, writing in a statement: “France has learned of Israel’s announcement of strikes against military targets in Iran last night … France immediately urges the parties to refrain from any escalation or action likely to aggravate the context of the extreme tension prevailing in the region.”
Switzerland: The country’s foreign ministry wrote in a statement on X: “Switzerland condemns the dangerous escalation of violence in the Middle East, including today’s Israel airstrikes in Iran. “Hostilities must cease on all sides to avoid the worsening of the regional escalation.”
Germany: Chancellor Olaf Scholz stressed that Israel had said they “tried to minimize personal injury” during the attacks, adding that “this provides an opportunity to avoid further escalation.”
“My message to Iran is clear: Massive reactions of escalation must not continue. This must end now. Then there will be an opportunity for peaceful development in the Middle East,” Scholz continued in a post on X.
Iran has said Israel’s strikes early Saturday caused “limited damage” although two soldiers were killed. The strikes have long been expected and come as Israel mounts a major operation in northern Gaza and against the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Biden reacts to Israeli strikes on Iran: "My hope is that this is the end"
US President Joe Biden expressed hope Saturday that the Israeli strikes on Iran marks the end of a period of escalation in the Middle East.
“It looks like they didn’t hit anything other than military targets. My hope is this is the end,” he told reporters in Philadelphia, noting that he spent time earlier Saturday being briefed by the intelligence community.
The president said he did receive a heads up ahead of the Israeli strikes. Biden administration officials have said the US was not directly involved with the strike, but had been consulting closely with Israel.
Biden also said he was “not surprised” that former President Donald Trump has spoken with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but acknowledged he was concerned that Trump was not representing the US in those conversations.
How is the world reacting to Israel’s attack on Iran?
- Pakistan and the UAE have condemned Israel’s attack on Iran, emphasising the importance of preventing further escalation.
- Qatar’s Foreign Ministry said the country condemns the attack, urging all parties involved to “exercise restraint”, and “resolve conflicts through dialogue and peaceful means”.
- The UK’s PM stated that Iran should refrain from responding to the series of Israeli strikes, and urged ‘maximum restraint’ on both sides.
- The US said it would “urge Iran to cease its attacks on Israel so that this cycle of fighting can end without further escalation”.
- Oman and Saudi Arabia also condemned the attack, describing it as “violation” of Iran’s “sovereignty”.
- Iraq’s PM said that Israel “continues its aggressive policies and expansion of conflict in the region, employing blatant acts of aggression without deterrence”.
- Malaysia called the strikes a “clear violation of international law” that “seriously undermine regional security”.
- Bahrain’s foreign ministry has condemned Israel’s strike on Iran, urging an immediate ceasefire to protect civilians and reduce regional tensions.
- The Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs “strongly condemns and denounces” Israel’s military strikes on Iran, which it called “heinous aggression”, and called on the international community to halt Israel from escalating conflict in the region.
- Tunisia issued a statement warning of “severe consequences” of Israel’s strikes on Iran and calling on “the international community to urgently assume its responsibilities to put an end to this reckless approach”.
- Russia’s Foreign Ministry said it fears an “explosive escalation” after Israel’s strikes on Iran. “We urge all parties involved to exercise restraint, stop the violence and avoid a catastrophic scenario. It is necessary to stop provoking Iran into retaliatory actions and get out of the spiral of uncontrolled escalation”.
Israeli strikes do not change balance of power
Today is a Saturday. So officials, especially from the religious right, would not be commenting until after Shabbat. However, we’ve heard from the opposition leader Yair Lapid who said not striking strategic economic and strategic assets in Iran was a mistake.
We even heard from a prominent and very vocal member of Netanyahu’s Likud party who said this was a mistake. It was a capitulation, in her own words, to the Biden administration, and this strike does not change the balance of power in the region.
There’s some commentary already in the Israeli media to that effect.
At the very least, some military analysts said this strike gives Iran plausible deniability – it allows Iran not to strike back, and it gives Israel room to claim that it did something big, although it’s in sharp contrast to the statements that we heard before the Israeli strike on Iran.
