It was very close. American officials feared that if just one missile or drone had passed and killed many Israelis, the area could have been set ablaze.
So when Israeli and American forces, with the support of their Arab allies, mounted a near-perfect defense against last weekend's air attack from Iran, it represented an extraordinary military and diplomatic feat. It was also a major victory for President Biden's efforts to prevent escalation. About the Middle East war.
Biden and his team had hoped that developments over the weekend would give all three major parties enough to walk away declaring victory. Iran could claim legitimacy for taking aggressive action in response to an Israeli attack that killed some of its military leaders. Israel showed the world that its military was too strong to challenge and that Iran was powerless against Israel. And the US prevented another eruption in the region.
However, it may not work out that way. Israeli officials said Monday they would respond rather than seize a victory, without specifying when or how, and Biden's advisers said they were waiting to see what that meant. I am preparing myself to do so.
A low-profile cyber attack or pointed but limited military action could satisfy Israel's desire to re-establish deterrence without provoking Iran's renewed bombardment. On the other hand, a larger, frontal attack on Iranian soil could prompt the Iranian government to launch a counterattack, and the conflict could suddenly explode into a sustained and increasingly dangerous war.
“We saw the best of Biden this weekend,” said Laura Blumenfeld, a Middle East analyst at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and a former State Department policy adviser. She said, “The U.S.-led air display with European and Arab regional partners was like a trailer for a new Middle East air defense alliance action movie.”
However, she added that the reality is that the IDF will definitely respond. “Turning the other cheek is not in the IDF's strategy,” she said. “A simple 'don't' won't work. It's not a question of how Israel responds, it's a question of when and how. There's no getting around the math of the Middle East. Grave 1 There's one on the other side of the tomb.
Some hawkish analysts said Mr. Biden's thinking was all wrong. His efforts to avoid escalation as Iran and other adversaries face increasing public disagreements between the United States and Jerusalem over Israel's war effort against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. They argued that this could actually lead to escalation.
“This perception of separation may have been a factor in Iran taking the unprecedented step of attacking Israel directly,” said Ray Teikei, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
It wasn't enough to shoot down the Iranian missile, he added.
“Stopping an attack after it has started is not the same as stopping an attack,” he said. “If Biden's team attempts to distance itself from Israel again, it will invite further conflict.”
The success in defending Israel is the result of 10 days of intensive diplomatic and military coordination by the Biden administration and years of security relationships built by multiple administrations across the region. After decades of shadow warfare, American officials rushed to activate their long-in-the-making regional air defense plan for the first time after it became clear that Iran was planning to attack Israel for the first time. .
U.S. military officials are working closely with the Israeli side to develop plans to shoot down incoming missiles and drones, working with British and French forces in the region, and working with Arab allies to provide intelligence and tracking data and improve their airspace. We agreed to obtain permission to use the .
Jordan has been highly critical of Israel's war in Gaza, but nevertheless shot down an Iranian drone crossing the territory toward Israel. An American Patriot squadron based in Iraq shot down an Iranian ballistic missile as it passed through Iraqi airspace.
In some ways, greater cooperation against Iran is a result of political changes in the region, as exemplified by the Abraham Accords signed under President Donald J. Arab countries such as Iran have established normal diplomatic relations with Iran. First time in Israel. The Biden administration is trying to bring Saudi Arabia into the deal, and although no deal has been reached, Riyadh's leaders are ready to forge ties with Israel because of their shared hostility toward Iran.
The fact that Israel intercepted almost all of the more than 300 missiles and drones launched within Israel, resulting in no fatalities or even major physical damage, shows that a web-like security system has been established in the region. It felt like validation for those who had worked on it.
White House national security spokesman John F. Kirby called it a “remarkable” success. “That's the result here,” he said at a briefing Monday. “A stronger Israel, a weaker Iran, a more unified alliance and partners. When Iran launched this attack on Saturday night, it was not their intention, nor was it anything close to that. Once again they They failed. They completely failed.”
Kirby disputed speculation that Iran had been telegraphing the attack for more than a week and had no actual intention to cause any damage, saying that Iran had used intermediaries to control time and targets. He denied reports that he had even sent a message giving details. He scoffed at suggestions that the more than 300 missiles and drones were merely a face-saving exercise.
“Perhaps they want to make it seem like this is some kind of small attack that was never meant to be successful,” he says. “To realistically convince someone that they weren't trying to cause casualties or cause damage by throwing that much metal into the air in the time frame that they did. “I can't do that.” They definitely were. ”
Biden himself has said little publicly about the attack. “Together with our partners, we defeated that attack,” he said Monday in a White House meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani in his first public appearance since the attack. “The United States is committed to Israel's security.”
Sudani, whose country maintains a fragile balance between the United States and Iran, said he supports efforts to stop the “expansion of the conflict zone, especially recent developments.”
But he also used the opportunity to press Biden on his support for Israel's war in Gaza. “We are actually very committed to stopping this war that has taken the lives of thousands of civilians, women and children,” Sudani said.
Just as Mr. Biden was beginning to ramp up pressure on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to do more to alleviate civilian suffering, the escalation with Iran diverted attention from the Gaza war.
Shibley Telhami, a Middle East scholar at the University of Maryland, said Netanyahu is prolonging the conflict with Tehran “both as a distraction from the horrors in Gaza and as a way to shift the conversation to issues he needs to discuss.” He said he was interested. It is likely to garner sympathy in the United States and other Western countries. ”
Telhami said the weekend's successes did little to undo the “damage of Biden's strategic failure” in stemming the Gaza crisis. “We should not divert our attention from this huge strategic failure. The costs have been and are continuing to be enormous,” he said.
Still, Natan Sachs, director of the Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution in Washington, said avoiding a larger regional war is not a simple matter, at least for now.
“Biden deserves great credit,” he said. At the same time, he added, it could disappear quickly. “We remain on the brink as the situation is extraordinary and the crisis could escalate at any time.”
