For now, An all-out war between Israel and Iran has been avoided!

There is still uncertainty on the extent of Israel’s military reaction to Iran’s first-ever direct attack on the nation. The explosions that were claimed to have occurred in some sections of Iran overnight on Friday have not yet been publicly attributed to Israeli officials. Tehran has brushed these off as “tiny drone” strikes that its air defense systems shot down.

Iran might be downplaying what was probably a major but contained Israeli attack, but that appears to be secondary to the more powerful forces involved. It is obvious that Iran and Israel want to put an end to the riskiest escalation of hostilities between the two major regional powers to date.

Sounds of explosions near an Iranian military base.

A US official said that Israel has launched an attack inside Iran as the region prepares for additional escalation.
The significant increase that began this month with what appeared to be an Israeli bombardment on Iran’s consulate in Damascus and ended with an Iranian attack on Israel involving over 300 airborne weapons that was largely thwarted appears to have given way to a swift retreat. A regional intelligence, Robertson says shortly after the attack on Friday morning in Iran that Iran was not anticipated to retaliate further and that the two adversary states’ direct state-to-state strikes were now complete.

The latest flare-up brought the stakes into sharp focus, but it also exposed the limits of a direct confrontation between Iran and Israel.

By attacking Iran’s consulate in Syria on April 1 and killing a senior Iranian commander that serves as a key intermediary between Tehran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Israel risked provoking a response from the powerful Shia militant group on its northern border. As part of Iran’s retaliatory attack on Israel, its weapons navigated over at least two neighboring countries that house US bases.

What happens between Iran and Israel rarely stays between Iran and Israel. The region is deeply intertwined. That heightens the risks of military action, but it also acts as guardrails against a potential conflagration.

Thus, the announcement this weekend by US officials that Washington would not assist Israel in retaliating against Iran’s strike on Israel appeared to quickly deflate expectations of a possible escalation.

Over seventy of Iran’s weapons were shot down by US forces en route to Israel. In bolstering Israel’s defenses, the US had presumably done its share of shielding its dependable alliance. However, taking part in Friday’s attack would have been too much for the US, sending a region filled with states that are allies into the unknown.

Given its regional concerns, Tehran could want to proceed with care. Iran’s developing ties with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, two important US allies, are the cornerstone of President Ebrahim Raisi’s foreign policy. Restoring diplomatic ties between Tehran and Riyadh, the former archenemies, was made possible last year through talks mediated by China, which supported the preservation of the normalization agreements. There is a chance that the region’s unrest will compromise such crucial ties.

Following Iranian drone and missile attacks against Israel, an Israeli anti-missile system entered service on April 14.

Tehran’s worries about the area call for caution as well. Iran’s president, Ebrahim Raisi, based a large portion of his foreign policy on his recent relationships with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, two significant US allies. China advocated last year for the maintenance of the normalization agreements, mediating negotiations that brought the long-standing adversaries of Tehran and Riyadh back to diplomatic ties. Unrest across the area could pose a threat to such crucial alliances.

On April 14, Israel activated its anti-missile system in response to Iran firing missiles and drones into Israel.

Domestic tensions will surely rise as a result of this month’s flare-up, when the two sworn foes resume their protracted shadow war. Iran’s non-state supporters have sworn to fight Israel and the US as long as Israel’s horrific war in Gaza continues, and they will continue to do so in various parts of the Middle East. The more such conflicts rage across Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen, the more intricate they get.

Parties to these conflicts will keep pushing the boundaries of the unwritten rules of engagement in the interim in an effort to maintain control over the situation and avoid a full-scale breakdown into war.

The most recent flare-up has a lot of information hidden between the lines. However, it is evident that all sides in the regional conflict have come to the conclusion that an all-out conflict would be too costly.

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