Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu aims to broaden the scope of the conflict by involving Iran, leveraging the negative perceptions of Iranians in the West

For decades, US-Israel has consistently blamed Iran for most of the terror attacks, even when actual participants have hailed from countries and organisations inimical to Iran. For example, the nationalities of the 19 hijackers of the 9/11 attack were 15 from Saudi Arabia, 2 from the United Arab Emirates and 1 each from Egypt and Lebanon. All were non-Iranians or even non-Shias — each from a country then known to be staunch allies of the United States of America. Yet within months of the attacks, then US President George Bush had gone on to coin the phrase ‘axis of evil’ including the troika of Iran, Iraq and North Korea.

Historical and irreconcilable antipathy between a Shia extremist Iran and between Sunni supremacist forces like Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaida was always conveniently ignored. The fact that most turf wars (earlier and current), be it in the unforgiving swathes of Afghanistan, Iraq or Syria are played out between sectarian and ideological proxies from either of the two distinct sides, has also been ignored.

A creative and often unconvincing conflation of the two historically-at-war forces by somehow linking with specious details of the so-called Iran ‘hand’ whenever there was a terror attack on assets and personnel of the ‘Western’ bloc (read, US-Israel-Sheikhdoms), was always insisted. The fact that Iran and its proxy Shia militias led by the likes of General Qasim Soleimani were at the forefront of taking on forces like ISIL, Al Qaida and other Sunni militias, has been successfully obliterated in larger imagination.

However, while Iran and its co-sectarian proxies like Hezbollah in Lebanon or Houthis in Yemen were naturally pitted against the rival Arab/Sunni forces (sovereign or otherwise) — the disproportionate demonising of Iran with its supposed role in terrorism, almost instinctively led to blaming Iran for all problems whilst overlooking the pernicious role played by the Sheikhdoms in breeding violent forces that were to go their way or even rogue e.g., Al Qaida or ISIL. The much-vilified Iran felt slighted and retained its belligerent posture and rhetoric against the ‘West’ which somehow was then used by the ‘West’ to prove its over-creative accusations against Iran. It became an endless circle of blame game and by owning the ‘monopoly on truth’, Iran was persistently fingered and accused of doing things that it did do and also for things that it probably didn’t do!

Perhaps the only predominantly Sunni militia in the Middle East that has retained a modicum of support from the Iranians has been the Palestinian Hamas — they, have overlooked the sectarian angularity in favour of practicality by accepting Iranian support as the Sheikhdoms had virtually abandoned the Palestinian cause (after legitimising, normalising and formalising relations with Israel) and it was left to Tehran to support a virtually forgotten Hamas which was left to fend for itself. But realistically Iran’s leverage on Hamas is not expected to be like the sort of substantial leverage it has on forces like Hezbollah, Houthis et al. Many independent experts have commented on the ignorance of Iranian authorities in the planning of the 7th October attack on Israel — the difference between ‘support’ and ‘leverage’ is key in understanding the Iranian control over Hamas. So, Iran does support Hamas, but it is highly unlikely that it was privy to the attack plans in Israel, as so secret was the operation that not only was the famed Israeli intelligence caught by complete surprise, but so were many of Hamas operatives themselves. Yet much like the instinctive name-calling of Iran as the principal enemy for everything that goes wrong in the Middle East, Israelis left no stone unturned to blame the Iranians, squarely.

In recent times, beyond the rhetorical sabre-rattling by Iran’s actual proxy i.e., Hezbollah and the odd firing of rockets and gunfire (not exactly the opening of a front), both Hezbollah and Iranians have confined themselves to verbosity as opposed to any major military action.

But the Israelis have way gone beyond pulverising the Gaza Strip killing an unprecedented 30,000 Gazans, attacking NGO-Aid personnel with impunity and now even hitting the Iranian consulate building in Syria’s capital, Damascus.

Two senior Iranian commanders of the Quds Force along with at least 9 others have been killed. Most likely these Iranian forces would have been involved in overlooking and supporting operations in the Syrian theatre along with forces of Syrian President, Bashir al Assad (a co-sectarian ally) against forces of disparate militias from the same fount that germinated ISIL, Al Qaida etc., But like in the killing of the legendary Iranian General Suleiman Qasimi, even this time the Israelis insisted on the rote like that they had, “been behind many attacks on Israeli and American assets and had plans for additional attacks”.

More likely than not, an increasingly isolated (externally and internally) Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is seeking to expand the conflict contours by drawing in Iran as the Iranians remain the favourite ‘bogey’ that elicits negative reactions amongst most Jews and Americans, irrespective of their partisan loyalties. Strangely, it legitimises Netanyahu’s disproportionate belligerence and missteps by deflecting blame games from himself by taking on the Iranians, who were not exactly the primary participants. It is an age-old invocation of a formula of convenience and half-truths.

(The writer, a military veteran, is a former Lt Governor of Andaman & Nicobar Islands and Puducherry. The views expressed are personal)