Iran and the Axis of Resistance are facing an existential threat. A whole new strategic thinking is needed.
Former British spy chief John Sawers thinks that the Axis of Resistance is facing its final chapter as Israel takes on its regional foes with devastating lethal force – and seeming impunity.
Writing an opinion article in the Financial Times this week, the former director of Britain’s foreign intelligence agency, MI6, relished the view that Israel is on a winning roll against Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and ultimately Iran, the leader of the resistance axis.
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The bravado thinking of the former MI6 boss reflects the arrogance and similar miscalculation among Israeli and U.S. leaders.
Now Iran has hit back after a long delay. On Tuesday night, up to 200 ballistic missiles struck Israel. Video footage appears to show most of them hitting their targets. A major blow was extensive damage at Israel’s Nevatim airbase.
The wave of Iranian attacks mirrors the earlier barrage in April. Israel and the United States are threatening retaliation. It seems the gates of war have opened.
But is the Iranian response too little and too late? The long delay has only emboldened the U.S.-backed Israeli regime to keep escalating.
The delay in Iran’s legitimate defensive actions has been interpreted as weakness, and hence, the Israeli regime and its Western backers have miscalculated.
Why the cockiness from Israel and its Western backers?
There are several reasons. First, Israel knows it has the back of the United States, with all the firepower that entails. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli leader, knows he can get away with mass murder because Washington is reliant on Israel as its imperial enforcer in a vital geo-strategic region. Israel has a license to kill and genocide, authorized by US imperialism.
The genocide of over 41,000 people in Gaza over the past year has resulted in feeble rhetoric about ceasefires and “restraint” from the Biden administration while, at the same time, endless supplies of military aid to conduct this genocide. Netanyahu and the fanatics in his cabinet know that they can dismiss American admonitions about “ceasefires” and “restraint” as meaningless duplicity.
As Israel now steps up its aggression on Lebanon with a ground invasion following the massive bombing of civilian centers in Beirut, the U.S. is sending more combat forces to the region to “defend Israel.” What more evidence is needed that Washington is not just complicit in the Israeli hostility but actively endorsing it?
Second, Israel has a nuclear arsenal and is crazy enough to use it. There is little doubt that the amoral and unscrupulous Israeli regime would not balk at launching nuclear missiles on its enemies. The ruthless crossing of all red lines by the Israeli regime shows that it has no regard for international law or rules of war. The sense of entitlement is compounded by the knowledge that it has America’s nuclear arsenal also in support if its warmongering should go awry.
But also up there fueling these psychopathic tendencies is the impunity that the Israeli regime has been afforded.
Its mass murder of Palestinians over the past year has gone on unchecked in full view of the world. Infuriatingly, Israeli politicians stand in front of the UN and shred the UN Charter. The contempt for international law is astounding.
Yes, there have been rockets fired from Lebanon by Hezbollah and missiles from Yemen by the Houthis, and on two occasions by Iran. But by and large, these attacks have been pinpricks in the scale of suffering inflicted on Gaza.
The Arab and Islamic nations have done nothing to defend Palestinians from the barbaric U.S.-backed Israeli genocide. Indeed, some of these Arab states, like Jordan and Saudi Arabia, are facilitating the U.S. defense of Israel.
Not even Iran has responded adequately – despite its righteous rhetoric about revenge and justice.
When Israel bombed the Iranian embassy in Damascus on April 1, killing a top Iranian commander, Mohammad Reza Zahedi, along with several other military personnel, the response from Iran was ultimately one of reluctance.
The “retaliatory” missile strikes on Israel by Iran two weeks later on April 13 were conducted with a choreography that emphasized to Israel and the United States that Tehran did not want escalation. Some commentators extolled the Iranian strikes as “masterful” tactics, but is it masterful to permit an aggressor to get away with murder?
In a column at the time, this author argued that the lame Iranian response would only incite further Israeli aggression and criminality.
Five months on, the death toll in Gaza has continued to mount, the genocidal siege continues, and Israel is now repeating the same genocidal aggression against Lebanon.
Not only that, the Israeli regime has truculently embarked on an assassination spree of Hamas and Hezbollah leaders. The elimination of Hassan Nasrallah and Hezbollah’s leadership on September 27 with U.S. bunker-buster bombs dropped on its Beirut HQ surely raises the question: has Iran and its Axis of Resistance been outplayed?
Iran has unleashed its existential enemy owing to perceived weakness.
Not responding to the bombing of its embassy in Damascus was one thing. The killing of several of its top commanders was another. The assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on July 31 – attending the inauguration of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian – was another flashing red line. Tehran did nothing then to avenge Haniyeh’s death despite the act of war on its capital – until this week. Two months on, but what took so long?
Indeed, President Pezeshkian reportedly said that retaliation for Haniyeh’s killing was not taken earlier because the U.S. vowed it would work on a ceasefire deal for Gaza. That ceasefire deal is a fraud, and one wonders if Iran knew all along that it was an empty promise. But by going along with it, the Israelis could deduce that Iran was acting weakly.
The brutal killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut last week was arguably a result of Iran’s fatal delay.
Israel’s deranged leaders believe they can act with impunity because they have so far. The regime can reach and kill anywhere, as Netanyahu boasted to the United Nations just before ordering the assassination of Nasrallah in a phone call from New York.
The Israeli rogue state sees itself as above the law to carry out genocide and assassinations because it has an American military machine and malleable American leaders at its disposal. Its monstrous threat to use nuclear weapons is not idle and Israel’s enemies know that.
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But most of all, as the British spy chief arrogantly remarked in his Financial Times article referenced above, Israel can “smell Iran’s weakness”.
Iran’s leaders have repeatedly said they do not want a regional war. The sentiments against war are understandable and magnanimous. But virtue has no value when dealing with psychopaths and war criminals.
Iran and the Axis of Resistance are facing an existential threat. A whole new strategic thinking is needed.
It’s not clear what Iran and its allies can do. But they can’t go on as it is. They’re effectively being held hostage by the U.S.-backed Israeli regime and methodically being killed. To do nothing in the face of aggression is fatal.
In a speech just before his death last week, Hassan Nasrallah said as much: the right thing should be done, and so be it.
The views of individual contributors do not necessarily represent those of the Strategic Culture Foundation.
