By: Aryeh Savir
Iran may attack Israel, a close US ally, in retaliation for the strikes the US conducted against Iranian-backed Shia militia in Iraq and Syria, two former senior IDF generals warned.
Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs Jonathan Rath Hoffman stated Sunday that the US conducted ”precision defensive strikes” in Iraq and Syria against five Kata’ib Hezbollah (KH) facilities in response to their recent attacks against coalition forces.
The targets hit in the US strikes included weapon storage facilities and command and control locations and reports say that at least 25 militia members were killed in the strike and dozens of others were wounded.
Amos Yadlin, a former general in the Israeli Air Force (IAF) and former head of the IDF Military Intelligence Directorate, said that the IDF must be ready for an escalation.
He noted that the US carried out the military strikes only after a US civilian was killed during an attack on an Iraqi base near Kirkuk. He was the first civilian to be killed by Iranian-backed militia since the US withdrew from the nuclear deal with Iran in 2015.
Four US service members and two members of the Iraqi Security Forces were injured as well.
Yadlin explained that the US’ message in the attacks was that the Iranians had crossed a red line by killing an American and that the “maximum pressure” campaign on Iran, which is only diplomatic and economic, can also “expand to a kinetic dimension,” meaning military action involving active warfare, including lethal force.
However, he cautioned that as with any attempt to achieve deterrence, there is also the potential for escalation.
The escalation can come in the form of a request from the Iraqi government, which is supported by Iran, that the US forces leave Iraq, or an Iraqi militia’s retaliatory attack, or direct Iranian action against US allies or the Americans, attacks in the scope of the Iranian drone attack on the Saudi oil fields in September or the downing of the US drone by Iran.
As for Israeli policy, he said the government should not have any illusions that “the Americans have crossed the Rubicon” and will now act militarily against the Iranians on a more extensive scale.
Several US-Iranian clashes in recent months saw Iran emerging victoriously and the US not responding forcefully and that is not expected to change.
Yadlin said Israel should be prepared for the US leaving Iraq as it left Syria.
Israel fears Iran and its proxies will stage long-range attacks on its territory from Iraq or Syria and has reportedly carried out strikes against Iranian-backed militia who were stockpiling weapons and preparing attacks on Israel from Iraq. A US departure from Iraq could amplify this threat.
Brigadier General Yossi Kupervser, former head of the IDF Intelligence Research Division, told IDF Radio on Monday that the “Iranian attempts to exact a price from the Americans have intensified.”
Iran may attempt to strike at a US ally, namely Israel, and the continued Iranian attempts to hurt Israel are what “should bother us more than anything,” he said.
(Tazpit Press Service)