Iran’s autocratic rulers hold one of the matches that could set the region alight: an “axis of resistance”, or network of violent proxies across the region.
The warning signs that Israel’s war with Hamas may become a wider Middle East conflagration are flashing ominously. America has sent a second carrier strike group led by the“There’s a likelihood of escalation,” said Antony Blinken, the American Secretary of State, on October 22nd. The chances of further attacks by Iranian proxies on American forces are growing, he continued: “We don’t want to see a second or third front develop.
Iran’s goal right now, as it has been over the past decade, is not to provoke outright war with the West and its allies but to sow uncertainty and instability. Just as it has hovered on the threshold of becoming a nuclear power, so it maintains strategic ambiguity with the axis.
As many as 19 of Hizbullah’s fighters have been killed. The Houthis, who control Yemen’s capital, have launched three medium-range cruise missiles, recently acquired from Iran, and a number of drones towards Eilat, Israel’s port city . And Iranian-backed Shia militias in Syria and Iraq have broadened the struggle by repeatedly targeting bases housing American troops with rockets and drones .For Iran, there are some obvious benefits.
Government-organised protests have been sparsely attended. A minute’s silence at a football match in Tehran for those killed in Gaza was interrupted by raucous guffaws. “Neither Gaza nor Lebanon,” protesters chanted from their windows. “We sacrifice our lives for Iran.” The proxies must also balance their military aspirations with the interests of their host countries. According to Iranian officials, Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president,. In his view, Hamas betrayed him by siding with the rebellion against him in 2011 after he gave them sanctuary. He does not want to fight for them now.
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