Both Netanyahu and Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar gain from stoking the fires of war. That could be perilous for all of us
The abrupt, deeply alarming weekend escalation in fighting between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon is exactly what the US, France and Britain have been working desperately to prevent ever since Israel’s assassination of the Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran almost a month ago.
The renewed violence, which appears to have abated quickly but could plainly flare up again at any moment, represents a potentially serious setback for international peace efforts. It is a further blow in particular to US president Joe Biden, whose hopes of a wider Middle East settlement before he leaves office are in tatters.
The fighting is also likely to negatively affect the already stuttering, indirect Israel-Hamas ceasefire and hostage-release talks in Cairo, which are taking place against the backdrop of continuing violence in Gaza. Hezbollah is closely allied with Hamas. Both organisations are sponsored and to some extent directed by Iran’s rejectionist clerical regime.
Ongoing Israeli airstrikes in Gaza in recent days have reportedly killed dozens more people. In total, more than 40,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, have died there since the 7 October Hamas atrocities that killed about 1,200 Israelis. Jewish settler violence and land grabs are also accelerating in the occupied territories.
The fear today, as in the past, is that all these bitter conflicts will merge together into one huge regional conflagration drawing in other Iranian proxies in Yemen, Syria and Iraq, and forcing, in turn, a military response from the US and its allies, which have built up their military presence in recent weeks. The ultimate nightmare is that Iran itself will directly confront Israel (or the other way around). There was a foretaste of that in April, when Tehran launched an unprecedented barrage of missiles and drones at Israel. Most were shot down.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, declared after Haniyeh’s assassination on 31 July that Iran was duty bound to punish Israel and appeared to threaten full-scale war.
