РУССКИЙ
11:03 23.07.2025 •
Pic.: shutterstock
On 13 June 2025, Israel launched a military operation against Iran at a time when nuclear negotiations – as a peaceful mechanism to manage Iran’s nuclear issue – were still underway. According to Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, the talks were on the verge of a historic breakthrough that could have resolved the contentious issues surrounding Iran’s nuclear program through diplomatic means.
Israeli officials have cited various justifications for their military action. However, a synthesis of their statements reveals two primary objectives that are not only highly dangerous but also deeply destabilizing for the region, stresses Alireza Noori, an assistant professor, Faculty of Economics and Political Science, Shahid Beheshti University (Iran).
The first objective is the pursuit of “absolute security” for Israel – namely, the effort to eliminate any threat, at any time and in any place, from Palestine to Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, Iran, or elsewhere, based solely on Israel’s own assessment and carried out through preemptive and preventive military action.
Israel disregards peaceful instruments including diplomacy, international law and organizations, and, without consideration of regional and international dimensions, prioritizes military action.
The pursuit of absolute security for itself inevitably generates insecurity for others. Since this strategy is not accepted by other states, it leads to a cycle of militarization, a security dilemma, and persistent instability in the region.
The second and more dangerous objective of Israel’s attack on Iran goes beyond mere security concerns and Iran itself; it is the ambition to redraw the map of the Middle East – an aim that Netanyahu has referenced on multiple occasions. Prior to the war with Iran, he emphasized that: “Our war is not just in Gaza, we will change the map of the Middle East”. Following the attacks on Iran,he further asserted that: “The decisions we made in the war have already changed the face of the Middle East…”
In Israeli discourse, the notion of “redrawing the Middle East” refers to the establishment of a new political-security order in the region – imposing through the use of force (military) and grounded in a redefinition of regional balance of power.
In this context, Israel’s objective in attacking Iran was not necessarily the elimination of a nuclear or missile threat, but rather the strategic weakening of Iran. This is because, from Israel’s perspective, the primary threat posed by Iran is neither its missile capabilities (which serve a defensive purpose), nor its nuclear program (which Iran was prepared to limit through negotiations), but rather the Iran’s practical commitment to the concept of “resistance” – a cornerstone of Iran’s foreign policy that opposes Israeli (and American) expansionism.
Thus, Israel launched its war on Iran based on the misguided assumption that weakening Iran strategically would allow it to restructure the region’s political and security architecture in a way that secures Israeli dominance.
A crucial point in this regard is the broad involvement and support of the United States in Israel’s misguided strategic assumption. The idea that by weakening Iran and the Axis of Resistance on the one hand, and integrating Arab states into a regional alignment with Israel under the framework of the Abraham Accords on the other, it would be possible to engineer a new regional order.
Of course, Washington has its own strategic interests in reshaping the regional map. Having suffered two major failures in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past two decades, its costly interventions have not led to greater influence in the region. On the contrary, the vacuum has been filled by rival powers such as Iran, China, and Russia.
Iran, through the Axis of Resistance, expanded its regional presence; Russia, via military intervention in Syria reasserted itself as a balancing power; and China demonstrated its growing clout by signing a strategic agreement with both the United States’ greatest enemy in the region (Iran) and its closest partner (Saudi Arabia).
Naturally, this situation is unsatisfactory for the United States – a power that has long acted with near-complete freedom in the Middle East – so, it must be changed. In this light, the United States shares a strategic interest with Israel in the project of reshaping the Middle Eastern order. Given its far greater capabilities, one might even argue that the US is the principal architect behind the recent developments in the region.
It is evident that despite certain technological advantages, Israel lacks the capacity to fundamentally alter the Middle East map or even to sustain a full-scale war with Iran on its own. Therefore, the United States must be seen as a key variable in Israel’s war against Iran – actively involved at every stage, from the collection of preliminary intelligence to the supply of munitions, logistics, execution of military operations, and even the management of ceasefire negotiations.
Given these considerations, any analysis of Israel’s attack on Iran must move beyond the bilateral level, and instead adopt a regional and international perspective, with a particular emphasis on direct US involvement and the long-term strategic objectives shared by Tel Aviv and Washington.
What strengthens the assumption that there is a comprehensive, premeditated plan is a fundamental question regarding the origins of these developments – specifically, the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel. The question is this: How could a country like Israel – with its extensive intelligence penetration into its regional adversaries, from Hamas and Hezbollah to Iran, and its proven capacity to assassinate highly protected figures (including multiple Hamas leaders, senior Hezbollah officials such as Hassan Nasrallah within one week, and over 30 senior Iranian military commanders and nuclear scientists in a single night) – have failed to detect an operation involving over 1,000 Hamas fighters?
Was Israel, with its surveillance capabilities, truly unaware of such a large-scale attack being prepared – especially given that Hamas had been training for the October 7 assault for more than a year? Could it be that not a single informant existed among those 1,000 fighters, or that Israeli intelligence was unaware of their movements and preparations?
The answer is that yes – Tel Aviv, Netanyahu, and even the United States were fully aware of the impending attack. What they lacked was not intelligence, but a sufficient pretext – a dramatic, high-impact trigger to justify the launch of their broader regional agenda.
However, another critical question remains: Will Israel and the United States succeed in their plan to establish absolute security and achieve regional hegemony through preemptive and preventive strikes? The answer is no. This strategy closely resembles the neoconservative doctrine advanced by the US during the presidency of George W. Bush. Using the September 11 attacks as a pretext, the US launched wars in Afghanistan and Iraq under the banner of fighting terrorism and promoting both American and international security – based on a strategy of preemptive war.
As Israel adopts a more aggressive posture and the United States continues its unconditional support, regional powers will feel compelled to expand their own military capabilities. This dynamic will inevitably intensify the security dilemma, fuel militarism, and accelerate a regional arms race.
Israel’s insistence on eliminating perceived threats through the use of force – at any time and in any place – undermines peaceful mechanisms for conflict management and resolution, such as diplomacy, international organizations and law.
One of the traditional ordering mechanisms in the Middle East has been the “Great Powers Management”.This mechanism is now being weakened by Washington’s unilateralism and its unconditional support for Israel and its manipulation of regional balance in favor of it. This approach is likely to prompt other great powers to seek new alignments and influence strategies, thereby intensifying competition and instability across the region.
Given these obstacles and challenges, not only is the regional strategy of Israel and the United States unlikely to succeed, but their plans concerning Iran are also unlikely to be realized. Although Israel achieved some tactical successes through its surprise attacks on Iran, Iran remains a longstanding regional power capable of reasserting its strategic position and role in the Middle East. Drawing on the experience of the Iran – Iraq war, longstanding US hostility, and years of extensive sanctions, Iran’s strategic resilience vis-à-vis Israel is likely to endure in the event of a prolonged conflict.
Moreover, regardless of the extent of success achieved in striking Iran’s nuclear and missile facilities, one of the immediate consequences of Israel’s and the US preemptive and preventive attacks is the shift in Tehran’s nuclear strategy – from its current “nuclear threshold” toward “nuclear ambiguity.”
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