An Iranian attack on Israel seems a matter of time. While many countries in the region are calling for de-escalation, Iran is trying to convince the divided Islamic world that ‘punishing’ the Jewish state is necessary. In this way, Tehran wants to prevent a scenario like in April, when several Arab countries came to the aid of the Western coalition in a large-scale rocket attack on Israel, which had little effect.
Nearly a week after Ismail Haniyeh was killed in Tehran, the world is holding its breath. Is a major regional war in the Middle East imminent? The Iranian regime of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has vowed revenge for killing the Hamas leader in his hotel room in the Iranian capital.
Although Israel has not officially claimed responsibility for the assassination, Iran is convinced that “the Zionist regime” is behind it. According to the country, it is not seeking a major war, but stability in the region. “This can only be done by punishing the aggressor and creating deterrence against the adventurism of the Zionist regime,” an Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman said on Monday. Hossein Salami, commander-in-chief of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, also said that Israel “will be punished appropriately.”
Previous Iranian attack did little damage to Israel
The question now is how much bigger the Iranian attack on Israel will be than the one in April. That came almost two weeks after General Reza Zahedi and seven other members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were killed in an airstrike at an Iranian consular building in the Syrian capital of Damascus – which was also not officially claimed by Israel. On the night of April 13-14, Iran fired more than 300 (cruise) missiles and drones at Israel, the first direct Iranian attack on the Jewish state.
A seven-year-old girl was injured and an army base suffered minor damage, but otherwise the damage to Israel was minimal. First of all thanks to its own air defense systems Iron Dome, Iron Beam and Arrow, but also because American and British fighter planes shot down projectiles from the sky. Jordan also shot down drones over its own airspace that were on their way to Israel. According to the American newspaper The Wall Street Journal Saudi Arabia and several Gulf states shared intelligence with Israel so that it could make preparations.
That was painful for Iran. Despite the anger of many inhabitants of Arab countries, their leaders preferred to (tacitly) support the Western coalition that protects Israel. In their diplomatic reactions, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States (including the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain) and Egypt were also unanimous. They called on both parties to de-escalate. They did not say a word about the killing of Zahedi and the other Iranian generals in Damascus, which according to Iran Israel was behind.
Iran wants to convince Muslim countries of the need for an attack
Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, among others, have also not explicitly condemned the killing of Haniyeh. They did, however, warn of escalation. Egypt has stated that it will not be part of a coalition to repel an Iranian attack on Israel, the Qatari news website said The Arab and the Jadeed. But Cairo has also told Iran to close its airspace to “any military activity that could threaten regional stability.” Jordan also requested on Sunday, August 4 Iran not to use Jordanian airspace in an attack on Israel, reports The Jerusalem Post.
Yet Iran seems determined to attack Israel soon. In an attempt to convince Arab countries of the necessity, Iran has convened the Organization of Islamic Cooperation. The foreign ministers of 57 Islamic countries will meet in the Saudi city of Jeddah on Wednesday, August 7. Officially on the agenda are “the ongoing crimes against the Palestinian people by the Israeli occupation, including the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh (…) and its aggression against the sovereignty of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
Shiite-Sunni divisions deepen
Any support for an Iranian attack on Israel is an important indicator of the extent of division in the Islamic world. The schism between Shiite (led by Iran) and Sunni countries (led by Saudi Arabia) was deepened by the Abraham Accords signed in 2020. Previous US President Donald Trump strengthened Israeli relations with Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco and Sudan.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said in September that normalization of relations with Israel ‘coming closer every day’The October 7 attacks and the war in Gaza put an end to that for now. But Saudi Arabia and its Sunni allies in the Gulf States are still far less hostile to Israel than Iran and its mostly Shiite allies (see the infographic below).
Hezbollah wants revenge for death of commander
Iran knows that an attack on Israel will have the support of the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah. They are also seeking revenge for the death of the top military commander Fuad Shukr. Shukr was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Beirut a week ago, a few hours before Haniyeh’s death. That was in retaliation for a Hezbollah rocket that killed twelve children in the Israeli village of Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights on Saturday, July 27.
In recent days, Hezbollah has fired several rockets from southern Lebanon into northern Israel. Nearly a hundred thousand people have been evacuated there due to the almost daily rocket attacks by the Shiite terrorist group since October 8. However, the real retaliation for the killing of Shukr has yet to come. In an X message in Hebrew Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah is still keeping his followers in the dark about the timing: ‘Maybe tonight, maybe tomorrow, maybe in a week.’
