Why Tehran chose to attack Israel

Israel's Iron Dome anti-missile system intercepts rockets after Iran fired a salvo of ballistic missiles, as seen from Ashkelon in Israel, on October 1. Reuters

Iran is the first Middle Eastern state in the 21st century to strike Israel directly, having fired a massive salvo of ballistic missiles from its territory – not once, but twice – in just one year. But it is not the first Middle Eastern state ever to have done so. That was Iraq in 1991.

From a military perspective, both the Iraqi and Iranian attacks failed to achieve any immediate military objectives. Yet both attacks may have achieved a symbolic victory in the long term.

The events that brought the decades-long shadow war between Iran and Israel out into the open occurred in March. Until then, both states had mostly fought each other through proxy wars and assassinations.

Seven months ago, however, Israel killed a general belonging to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran’s diplomatic facility in Damascus. That provocation was enough for Tehran to retaliate the following month when it fired 300 drones and ballistic and cruise missiles. Israel then responded by conducting a long-distance air raid against a military base in Isfahan that same month, marking its first ever direct attack on Iran.

Both states claimed victory. Iran demonstrated for the first time that it has weapons that can reach Israel, even if most were intercepted. Israel had to rely on American and British aircraft to intercept these projectiles, further elevating Iran’s status as a Middle Eastern actor that provoked all three powers to react. Israel’s retaliation, meanwhile, was a message to Iran that it can conduct long-distance air raids to hit its nuclear facilities in the future.

That episode appeared to have ended, giving each state the chance to claim that they had established deterrence against the other. It appeared to be a repeat of the crisis of January 2020, when then US president Donald Trump ordered the assassination of the IRGC general Qassem Suleimani. Iran retaliated with 22 ballistic missiles launched at US forces in Iraq. No Americans were killed, and the episode ended for both sides.

What upset a similar balance between Iran and Israel came in late July, when Israel conducted a more significant long-range aerial attack that killed Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. At the time, Israel struck Iran’s capital, violating not only its sovereignty but also its reputation of protecting its guests. Yet Iran did not retaliate.

This begs the question as to why Tehran chose to attack Israel last night. After all, its April salvo was intercepted, and it appears even weaker now given that no missiles were able to hit significant targets yesterday either.

There are two explanations for this. Having failed to retaliate for Haniyeh’s death, Tehran would have appeared particularly weak had it not responded to the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah last week. Going farther back, Saddam Hussein’s strike against Israel in 1991 might shed important light, too.

During the 1991 Gulf War, Saddam launched close to 40 Scud ballistic missiles towards Israel, aimed at Tel Aviv and its nuclear facility in Dimona, the same facility that Iran targeted in April.

Saddam had sought to disrupt the large international coalition that the US had assembled, and which had included Egypt and Syria, by attempting to force Israel to strike back and thereby dividing the Arab world. The attacks killed 13 people, but with Washington having restrained Israel from its longstanding policy of swift retaliation, Saddam’s ruse appeared to have failed at the time.

In 1999, just eight years after those events, I got into a taxi in Jerusalem that was being driven by a Palestinian. When he enquired about my origins after I spoke Arabic to him, I responded by saying “Asli Iraqi”. He then praised Saddam with a by-now familiar refrain: “Saddam was the only leader who fought for the Palestinians,” regardless of facts on the ground. Relations between Iraq and Palestinian leaders have, of course, historically been strong. But that’s when I realised that while Saddam had lost the Gulf War, he had won the war for Palestinian memory.

Israel may have intercepted Iran’s missiles last night, but it is painfully clear to every Israeli that Tehran has the ability to target their country on a consistent basis. Further, it has been widely reported that many Gazans mourned the death of Nasrallah, even though it was met largely with indifference in the rest of the Arab world. Many Gazans also reportedly cheered Iran’s overnight attack on Israel, if only because it had forced Israel’s government to divert some of its attention away from the beleaguered enclave.

Palestinians are not going to forget what they have endured since October 7, for generations to come. Many are just as likely to remember Iran’s strikes on Israel, regardless of their merit, as a show of solidarity with Gaza.

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