‘Iran knows it can’t outmatch Israel’, says global affairs expert

We spoke to Ali Vaez – who is the Iran Project Director at the Wilson Centre’s international crisis group.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Do you think Iran’s supreme leader has miscalculated?

Ali Vaez: It’s very hard to say because he didn’t really have any good options in front of him. His choices were basically not to respond, which would diminish this Iranian alliance system to one that could be described by ‘all for one and one for none’, basically meaning that none of Iran’s allies could count on it. Or to respond and risk a potentially devastating Israeli retaliation. But I think because option A of demonstrating restraint was pursued over the past two months, and in the Iranian view, it only made Israel more aggressive, signalling that Iran is in a position of weakness, the Iranians decided to take this action to change the dynamics.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: What do you make of those people who are saying the Iranian missile attack last night was about restoring Iran’s deterrent so that Israel does not get drawn into a full scale war?

Ali Vaez: Look, I don’t think the Iranians have any delusions that they can restore deterrence with Israel at this point. Israel, of course, is a much more superior military power backed by the world’s number one military superpower. And therefore, there is no way that Iran can outmatch Israel in any way, including in its willingness to go up the escalation ladder. I think what the Iranians wanted to do was to remind the United States that if it continues with this permissive attitude towards Israel, that what the Biden administration has tried very hard to avoid over the past 11, 12 months, which is a regional conflagration, might actually happen. And the Iranians have the willingness and the tolerance of risk to enter into the arena if the United States does not hold Israel back.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Are there any outside players now that do have significant influence over Iran? They said that they told the Russians about their impending attack. I mean, what would their role be in trying to prevent a full scale war?

Ali Vaez: The Russians have influence over Iran, but I think the Russians actually enjoy more instability in that part of the world. That would drag the attention away from what’s happening in Ukraine, especially that of the United States and the West. The Chinese are more worried because this is the area of the world they get one third of their energy imports from. And the Chinese have influence over the Iranians, over the Saudis, the Emiratis, etc., but not necessarily over the Israelis. The only actor here who has influence over Israel is the United States. But the United States is also, with only four weeks to go before presidential elections, almost politically paralysed. And even when it was not, it wasn’t really willing to exercise its influence over Israel. So there is not a lot of hope that any outside actor could effectively stop this dynamic from ending in disaster.