Editorial: Brink of a cataclysm

With Iran responding late Saturday to Israel’s reckless air raid on its consular building in Damascus on April 1, the world has been thrown into a state of frightening possibilities. If a wider interstate war now looms on the horizon, it is entirely the fault of the rogue regime in Tel Aviv and its indulgent sponsor, the Biden administration in Washington. Appeals for reason and restraint went up from capitals on all continents on Sunday, but how might that be achieved when the aggressor state in this case is aided and abetted by the world’s only superpower? The night of dread experienced in the Middle East represents the failure, or betrays the duplicity, of the US’s stated goal of preventing a wider spread of hostilities.

Iran’s response of firing hundreds of drones into Israel was expected, inevitable and unprecedented. For his Eid speech at Tehran’s Grand Mosalla Mosque last Wednesday, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei appeared toting a gun and made it clear that Iran was treating the Israeli attack on the consulate in Damascus, in which two front-ranking generals of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) were killed, as an “attack on our soil.” Treating consular premises as an extension of a nation’s sovereign area may only be a diplomatic convention, but to not treat it as such would have gone down as a sign of weakness. Iran’s reaction thus had to be measured and proportionate without igniting a wider conflagration in the Middle East.

As it turned out, the barrage of drones and cruise missiles fired into Israel marked the first-ever attack launched at Israel from Iranian territory and served to make its point. They were intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome air defence system, partly aided by the US military, without causing any major damage or inflicting fatalities. Iran’s statement at the UN after the barrage indicated there is likely to be no further escalation from its side for now. Tehran said it “deemed the matter concluded” but warned of a “considerably more severe” response should the “Israeli regime make another mistake”.

It will be a favour to the world if Israel understands this as a calibrated response from Iran and pipes down. However, all we get from the regime of Benjamin Netanyahu is gratuitous belligerence. Starting with its disproportionate and genocidal response to the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, the government in Tel Aviv has only acted to widen hostilities, using it as a ruse to draw Iran into a showdown. It has repeatedly attacked Iran’s proxies in southern Lebanon and Syria and carried out a series of assassinations of adversaries. It continues to break international law, defy the International Court of Justice and ignore Security Council resolutions under the cover of impunity afforded by US coddling.

Through all this, its pursuit of genocide of Palestinians in Gaza has been ruthless and relentless, leaving no one in doubt that its real purpose in pushing the world to this point of a cataclysm is to empty Gaza and expand its settlements in West Bank. That Washington stands by while Netanyahu executes this evil design, albeit while dropping supplies to the unfortunate children of Gaza, makes Biden a genocide prevaricator at best. He will be remembered, of course, even if he loses his election in November. But for what, is the question.