Iran has not backed down from its promise to retaliate against Israel for the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, but its silence in recent weeks has left onlookers feeling uneasy. However, neither Hezbollah nor Israel want a full-scale war as it would upend “normal life” in their countries as well as Tehran’s hopes for diplomacy, an observer told Sputnik last month.
Yet Israel does not appear to be backing down from its assault on Palestinian territory – quite the opposite. The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have reportedly been conducting violent raids in the occupied West Bank for more than a week now. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently announced his intentions to ignore mass protests and pleas for a ceasefire in Gaza that would allow for the return of hostages.
Ehsan Safarnejad, an Iran-based journalist and geopolitical analyst, joined Sputnik’s The Backstory on Thursday and explained Iran’s position regarding Israel and its unwavering ally, the United States.
“We first have to understand why it has taken Iran so long to respond. And it is paramount for us to understand the environment in which Iran has decided to postpone – please, take note of the term – postpone rather than cancel its retaliatory strike on Israel,” said Safarnejad.
The show’s guest explained that the March of Arbaeen, which this year falls on August 25, is a major religious event in which “Shias from different countries in the region, make pilgrimage to Iraq, the city of Karbala, and visit the mausoleum of Imam Hussein.” He added that the group of those who would make the pilgrimage are the most likely to “go on and enlist in an army or join an insurgent group in a possible full-on war between Iran and Israel, or the US.” And based on statistics given by the Office of Caretakers of Imam Hussein's mausoleum, 21 million people visited the mausoleum of Imam Hussein, he added.
“First of all, there [has been] no Iranian retaliation. So, any attack on those pilgrims would be considered as an act by either ISIS or Israel in order to carry out a sabotage within Iran. Or Israel, as they were threatening, would decide to carry out a so-called preemptive strike, which then Iran would use as a justification to carry out even a harsher response on Israel,” he explained.
“Both of these things would have been considered as a sort of win for Iran. Obviously, this strategy worked and there was no civil war in Iraq. That scenario was prevented. And, in fact, they actually tried to cause unrest and a civil war within Iraq, but due to the vigilance of the Iraqi security officials and their Iranian counterparts, fortunately, these things were folded,” the analyst added.
“...what I'm trying to say is that everything is going according to the plan. You know, Iran didn't plan to respond within this very sensitive timeframe. The Iranian response will surely come. All the rumors that are circulating around on social media that Iran has decided to cancel its retaliatory strike are completely nonsense,” said Safarnejad. “Based on [a source’s] statement, I would say that the Iranian establishment and the Iranian armed forces are still very much keen on carrying out the retaliatory strike for the assassination of Mr. Ismail Haniyeh... in Tehran.”
Violent raids in the occupied West Bank have been occurring for more than a week, according to Sputnik and Al Jazeera. On Tuesday Sputnik reported that much of the Israeli Defense Forces’ (IDF) assaults have been focused on Jenin.
As of Tuesday, power in Jenin has been cut off amid IDF raids and telecommunications services have been affected. Key infrastructure such as roads, water and sewage networks, and homes have also been destroyed by IDF soldiers. While the IDF has called their actions “counterterrorism operations”, Palestinians continue to maintain that these are attempts by Israel to push them out of their homes.
“We don't really perceive it as out of character for the Israelis to then lash out on the West Bank, which has nothing to do with Hamas. It doesn't have Hamas in it. The West Bank is controlled by the Palestinian organization that is governed basically by Mahmoud Abbas,” the analyst explained. “So, they didn't have any reason to do that. But they have the Dahiya doctrine. This is the doctrine that says in order to create a deterrence, Israel should carry out attacks against civilian targets, civilian infrastructure, in order to pose deterrence against this enemy.”
“Iran never rules out diplomatic approaches in order to reach a ceasefire or, you know, putting an end to war,” Safarnejad added. “[But] we don't really have the best experience dealing with the West. The West says something and then behaves in a completely different way. And all this talk about the ceasefire and some sort of agreements being reached, Iran is not going to sabotage those efforts.”
Since October, at least 685 Palestinians, including 157 children, have been killed by Israeli soldiers and settlers in the occupied West Bank, Al Jazeera reported. It was reported on Thursday that at least five Palestinians were killed in an Israeli air attack in the West Bank city of Tubas and that Israeli soldiers killed a teenager in the Far’a refugee camp. On Wednesday, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said the IDF were using “lethal war-like tactics” in the West Bank.
“In Iran, we don't have the best experience when dealing with NATO countries. As such, I think Iran is betting most of its resources on a potential military solution to the conflict that we are seeing. I mean, I can't really even call it a conflict because there is this senseless genocide against unarmed civilians. So it's very hard to refer to it as a conflict,” he added.
“One of the things that I think is general understanding within the Iranian population is that the US has its hand in so many different conflicts that it becomes really hard to justify its actions as a benevolent and a force for good kind of actor within not just the region but across the globe as well,” Safarnejad explained.
“...apart from the fact that Iran doesn't want to start a war, but is also ready in order to respond to any action by the US, I think that there is also this ease of mind inside the Iran political class that they still consider US and its politicians as a semi-rational actors, that they understand that they have far too much to lose to gamble everything on Israel and the genocide it is carrying out within the region,” the analyst added.