The geopolitical cards have just been reshuffled. The long shadow war between Iran and Israel, characterised by deniable operations, sabotage and spookery, has come out in the open in a five-hour drone and missile barrage from Tehran to Jerusalem, with hate.
Iran’s so-called axis of resistance can no longer be regarded as a gang of proxy militias. They are part of a proactive force, summoned into being in the savagery of October 7 and dedicated to fraying the links between Israel and the United States, its main security provider.
Israel’s shooting down of Iran’s airborne attack force seems on the face of it to be quite a success, perhaps even a sign of desperation in Tehran. Iran was proud of its ability to confuse even sophisticated air defences with overwhelming numbers, yet almost no casualties were reported. Only ten out of approximately 120 ballistic missiles penetrated Israeli airspace. A sign that Israel has nothing to fear?
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Think again. In fact the fightback on Saturday night showed that Israel has only a limited self-sufficiency in security matters. It was dependent on US intelligence for the timing of the assault, for the location of many of the firing positions and on US, British and French assistance to help shoot down the incoming munitions.
Michael Kurilla, the chief of US Central Command in the Middle East, went to Israel in advance to co-ordinate the response for the anticipated onslaught. Iran was not intimidated by President Biden’s warnings (“Don’t…”), nor did it appear afraid of confrontation with Israel’s armed forces. The bill for the Iranian hardware was probably in the low millions of dollars — for the defence of Israel more than $1 billion. Tehran had the capacity to send in more than the wave that was unleashed but has so far chosen not to.
The Biden administration had promised an “ironclad” security guarantee for Israel, with the clue in the phrasing — Israelis are not as confident as they once were of the power of their Iron Dome air defence system to shield them from swarms of short-range missiles. Since October 7 there has been a need for reassurance. The result: a broader network of allies is standing guard. They include Jordan and other Arab states.
This could be the beginning of a new geopolitical alignment. On one side of the fence you have the CRINKs — China, Russia, Iran and North Korea — who see their status improving as the US disengages from the Middle East and beyond.
Iran supplies drones and cruise missiles to Russia for use in Ukraine, while North Korea supplies ammunition. The countries help each other to dodge western sanctions.
China invests in Israeli ports and telecoms but votes against Israel in the UN and refuses to call Hamas a terrorist group. All CRINKs use antipathy to Israel as a way of mustering the support of the global south in international forums. The diplomatic isolation of Israel has become part of an initiation rite for this autocrat-led club.
Israel’s allies and wellwishers include the west Europeans — though some like Spain are vocal supporters of diplomatic statehood for the Palestinians by July and many others are beginning to demand arms embargoes on the country. The signatories of the Abraham accords — Bahrain, Morocco, Sudan, the United Arab Emirates — which maintain a diplomatic relationship with Israel, as well as Jordan and Egypt which already have those links, bond with Israel in their mutual antipathy to the Muslim Brotherhood and its cousin Hamas.
Jordan’s defence of Israel, despite having a large, often restless Palestinian population, shows that with appropriate prodding by the US, the states grouping around the Abraham accords could form a modernising lobby in the Arab world, one that doesn’t depend on shouting hate slogans at Israel. Saudi Arabia, which wants to tone down its rivalry with Iran, may be ready to develop links with Israel but sits on the fence until a settlement is found in Gaza.
When the war is over, and the spoils are allocated for the economic and political rebuilding of Gaza, the dice will be thrown again. By then the players may have forgotten how a ham-fisted Biden administration once released $16 billion in frozen funds to Tehran — including $6 billion to pay for the release of five hostages.
That was weeks before October 7 and may have encouraged Hamas to grab as many prisoners as possible. Everyone will have to learn the lessons of the present war, review the misjudgments especially about Iran’s supposed readiness to abandon its nuclear programme. It’s time for a rethink: the fear of a militantly hostile Iran is a real one but it cannot be treated as the central organising principle for an entire region.
