In the last stage, the “shadow war” between Iran and Israel escalated when Naftali Bennett, the former prime minister of that country, announced that his country was adopting the “octopus head” plan to confront Tehran.
The pace of operations attributed to Israel inside Iran has recently increased, including high-ranking IRGC leaders, after the attacks were limited to targeting the nuclear program, while Tehran threatened to retaliate. .
Last week, Israel shot down drones belonging to Lebanon’s Hezbollah that targeted an Israeli gas rig in the disputed Mediterranean Sea.
The attempted attack, which Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz described as “on behalf of Iran,” came as Lebanon and Israel were in US-brokered negotiations to demarcate maritime borders.
And the American magazine “National Review” said after “Iran’s failed attempt to assassinate Israeli citizens in Turkey” that the destruction of Hezbollah’s marches is “nothing but Iran’s new military defeat”.
And on Thursday, the United States announced the involvement of the U.S. military in an operation that led to the seizure of an Iranian-origin arms shipment in the Gulf of Oman last February.
“On February 25, a US Navy destroyer supporting the British Navy intercepted an arms shipment in the Gulf of Oman, and this operation led to the seizure of surface-to-air missiles and cruise missile engines from Iran,” said a spokesman for US Central Command. Joe Puccino said in a statement.
Frank Mesmar, a non-resident researcher at the Begin Sadat Institute for Strategic Studies, believes that the pace of the shadow war increased after Israel’s “infiltration of Iran” became more visible than Tehran’s operations against Israel.
“This is actually a war that the West, including the United States, is trying to contain in order to avoid a direct confrontation in an important strategic region like the Middle East,” Masmar told Al-Hura TV website.
According to British-Israeli researcher Jonathan Spier, a fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategic Studies, the killing of Colonel Hassan Sayad Khodayi outside his home in Tehran last May “represents a major shift in Israel’s strategy toward Iran” after Israel. “Efforts were on the ground,” he wrote to the Wall Street Journal. Iran has already directed its nuclear program.
According to the Economist, in the past, Israel’s attacks focused on Iran’s nuclear program and related scientists, and when it targeted the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the Quds Force, it was in a third country, such as Syria.
In April, Israel’s intelligence service, the Mossad, released a recording of the interrogation of a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps by Israeli agents inside Iran.
Israel has always refused to acknowledge such an operation in Iran, but now it has become more public, with senior Israeli officials often making informal statements about such operations.
In June, people familiar with the matter told The Wall Street Journal that Israel was stepping up its campaign to thwart Iran’s nuclear, missile and drone programs through a series of covert operations targeting a broader set of key targets.
These new measures are the latest development of the so-called “Octopus Doctrine” strategy by former Israeli Prime Minister Bennett, which aims to bring Israel’s war against Iran to Iranian soil after years of targeting Iranian agents and Tehran’s proxies in other countries, such as Syria.
According to Eddie Cohen, an Israeli political analyst and academic, Israel is “the only country that is fighting Iran deep down in Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon.”
He told Al-Hura website that Tehran is isolated after “the alliance of the Persian Gulf countries with Israel in one front against a shaky Iran”.
In this regard, “National Review” magazine announced that Iran’s unsuccessful attempts to assassinate Israeli citizens in Turkey damaged Tehran’s diplomatic relations with one of its allies in the region.
After Israel warned its citizens about a possible targeting operation in Istanbul, Iran fired a senior IRGC official.
Last week, The Telegraph reported that Iran was working on a “cleansing” campaign within the IRGC after fears of Israeli infiltration. This newspaper reported the arrest of a general in the IRGC on suspicion of spying for Israel following the decision to dismiss Hossein Taib, the head of the intelligence organization in the same military system.
Kelly Moore Gilbert, a researcher specializing in Iran affairs, in his interview with an English newspaper, stated that the reason for the dismissal of Taib – one of the people close to the leader of the revolution – was the inability of the IRGC intelligence to do this. Preventing Israeli operations inside Iran.
For his part, Mesmar, an academic from the University of Maryland, USA, said that Iran has deliberately tried to target the citizens of Istanbul in order to hit the “warm” relations between Turkey and Israel recently.
He added: “Tehran feels that the closer Turkey is to Israel, the further away Iran will be from the region.”
In the same context, four sources familiar with the matter told Reuters that the United States and Israel are seeking to prepare space and pave the way for a security alliance with Arab countries that would link air defense systems between them to counter Iranian attacks with drones and drones. Missiles in the Middle East
Two sources familiar with the plan said the idea, which relies on the use of Israeli technology, may get a boost when US President Joe Biden visits Israel, the Palestinian territories and Saudi Arabia from July 13-16.
And regional tensions have escalated over Tehran’s nuclear program, while Israel, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and parts of Iraq have come under airstrikes using drones and missiles, which Iranian-backed militias have claimed responsibility for.
Mesmar said: The West is trying to contain the war by creating economic and military gatherings in the region by exploiting and expanding Ibrahim contracts because it is the first spark of peace.
He noted that by entering Saudi Arabia, President Biden is trying to find a security understanding with the countries of Abraham without establishing full diplomatic relations from the oil-rich kingdom of the Persian Gulf.
On the other hand, Hossein Roeran, an Iranian political analyst, confirms the existence of a “shadow war” between Tehran and Israel and says: “It is a fact that even if the countries do not announce the dimensions of this war, it exists.”
He told Al-Hurarah: “Terrors and cyber and media war are a clear sign of the existence of war in different fields.”
But Roeran says Israel is pursuing a media war against Iran, including announcing efforts to target its citizens in Turkey.
He added: Israel says that Iran wanted to target civilians and we stopped it. This is part of a media war and it is not true. Iran responded and said that Israel knows that it has responded, but the way to respond is not clear due to its nature. . of war.”
For his part, an Israeli noted that Israel will continue its pressure to deter Iran and its proxies in the region, which are “a threat to Israel’s neighborhood.”
Source: Lebanon Debate
