Iran Trying To Impose A New Equation In Mideast
Iran’s ballistic missile attacks against Israel on June 7 and June 8 were stunning yet not surprising.
Iran – Israel’s arch enemy and Hezbollah’s chief ally in the Middle East – attacked Israel in retaliation for an Israeli air strike in Dahiyeh, a suburb south of Beirut and a Hezbollah stronghold. Israeli aircraft bombed Dahiyeh after Hezbollah fired rockets at northern Israel.
Reacting to Israel’s strikes, the first ones in the Lebanese capital since May 28, a senior Iranian official promised Israel a “painful and decisive response.” Ebrahim Rezaei, a spokesman for Iran’s parliament, posted an inflammatory message on X: “This rabid dog must be disciplined and put in its place. Watch the sky of the occupied territories tonight.”
Within hours, the first of some 30 Iranian missiles rained down on, among other targets, the Ramat David air base in northern Israel. The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps said the facility had been targeted because the Israeli aircraft that bombed Dahiyeh had taken off from Ramat David.
Israel intercepted most the incoming missiles, and there appear to have been no casualties.
Responding to the barrage, the Israeli Air Force launched two waves of strikes across Iran focusing on military and economic sites, including Iran’s strategic defense systems and the vast petrochemical complex in Mahshahr. In addition, Israel conducted raids in Tehran, Isfahan, Kermanshah and Tabriz. Details of these operations have yet to be disclosed.
Israel’s raids led to further Iranian missile attacks in central Israel.
The clashes were the first direct exchanges of hostilities between Israel and Iran in two months.
Iran blamed the United States for Israel’s attacks, even though President Donald Trump asked Israel not to retaliate.
The current crisis stems from the United States’ and Israel’s attacks on Iran on February 28. A ceasefire on April 8 paused the fighting, but US efforts to end the war by diplomatic means have so far failed, despite Trump’s claims that a peace agreement is imminent.
Having succumbed to US pressure to call a halt to all attacks, Iran and Israel both indicated on June 8 that they were prepared to wind down the fighting, which threatened to reignite the war.
Israel said that strikes in southern Lebanon would continue and warned that Beirut’s southern suburbs would be hit again if Hezbollah attacks on Israeli communities persist.
Iran, emboldened by the outcome of the war, warned that “much harsher and more forceful actions than before will follow” if Israel strikes Beirut once again.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in his first recorded statement on the flareup, said that Iran had tried to “force a new equation” by attacking Israel in retaliation for its attacks in Lebanon. “This equation is unbearable, and unacceptable to me,” he said.
As Netanyahu suggested, Iran’s decision to strike Israel in support of Hezbollah, a member of Iran’s Axis of Resistance, is nothing less than momentous.
For decades, Iran refrained from attacking Israel directly, relying on surrogates like Hezbollah and Hamas to launch assaults. With the outbreak of the Israel-Hezbollah war on March 2, Iran hewed to its status quo. However, Iran warned that its policy would change if Israel continued bombing Beirut.
“Iran’s attack in defense of Lebanon was not merely a military response,” but a formal declaration of a new strategic doctrine, Sadegh Larijani, the chairman of Iran’s Expediency Council, told The New York Times yesterday. “If any component of the Axis of Resistance is attacked, the response will extend beyond geographical borders and will alter the regional balance of power,” said Larijani, an advisor of Mojtaba Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader.
The Institute for the Study of War agrees with this assessment: “The Iranian regime is attempting to use force and the threat of force to establish a strategic reality in which any Israeli or US attack on an Iranian proxy or partner would result in a large-scale conflict that would seek to impose significant economic and political costs on Israel and the United States.”
Last week, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi issued a warning that Israeli strikes on Beirut would backfire. “Any attack on Beirut will have grave consequences and will lead to a fullscale resumption of the war. Our armed forces are ready to strike Israel if it attacks Beirut.”
Israeli leaders from Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz on down have threatened to strike Beirut again should Hezbollah bombard Israeli communities with rockets and drones.
Araghchi also said that Iran would suspend negotiations with the United States if Lebanon is not included in last April’s ceasefire.
“Communications with the Americans have not been cut off, and messages have been exchanged regarding the need to stop aggression against Beirut, but no tangible progress has been made in the negotiation process,” he said. “Returning to the negotiating table is conditional on ensuring the rights of the Iranian people, ending the war in Lebanon, and stopping tensions in the region.”
Echoing Hezbollah’s maximalist demands, Iran called for a complete ceasefire in Lebanon and the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Lebanon.
Araghchi said that Iran and Lebanon are “linked,” and that Iran’s conflict with the United States and Israel will not end unless Israeli forces pull out of southern Lebanon, an outcome Israel will resist if Hezbollah refuses to disarm.
Ebrahim Azizi, the chairman of the Iranian Parliamentary National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, said that Iran’s war with the United States and Israel must end on all fronts, “especially in Lebanon.” He added that Lebanon is at the “forefront” of Iran’s ceasefire agreement with the United States.
By contrast, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam have accused Iran of using Lebanon as a “bargaining chip” in US-Iran negotiations.
Netanyahu and Trump have rejected Iran’s formula, but this did not stop Trump from demanding an immediate cessation of hostilities between Israel and Iran. He fears that Israel’s confrontation with Hezbollah will jeopardize diplomacy to end the Iran war.
Israel launched retaliatory strikes on Iran after Trump told the Axios news site that he would tell Netanyahu not to respond to Iranian aggression. “I’m going to call Bibi right now and tell him not to retaliate.” He added that Israel and Iran had attacked each other and had had their “fun.”
In a second Truth Social post on June 8, Trump wrote that “ignorance and stupidity” were hampering the already fragile Iran-Israel ceasefire negotiations.
Netanyahu reportedly called off a major strike on Iran after Trump instructed him not to escalate the battle and warned him that Israel would be on its own if it defied him.
Netanyahu reportedly defended coordination with the Trump administration, arguing that Trump remains aligned with Israel’s broader objectives with respect to Iran. As he put it, “We are on the same page as Trump. He is not releasing Iran’s frozen funds, he is determined to secure the nuclear material, and he is maintaining the pressure. Why should we pick a fight with him?”
Israel’s ambassador in Washington, Yechiel Leiter, said in a post on X that Israel had no alternative but to retaliate. “Iran fired ballistic missiles at Israel today. Each one of those missiles can level an entire neighborhood and kill hundreds. No self-respecting country in the world would tolerate such an attack, and neither will Israel.”
Leiter’s comment summarizes Israel’s position on this pivotal matter. If Iran attacks Israel again, which is likely, the Israeli government would presumably respond. A new round of Israel-Iran clashes would upend what little stability is still left in the Middle East since last winter’s war.
