Iran – Israel
The current situation in West Asia, particularly speaking of Israel and Iran (12 days war, keeping in mind the ceasefire called out by the US President). Israel had bombed 2 major nuclear facilities in Iran which were Natanz and Isfahan (Fordow with the help of the USA).
To really understand this, we have to look back at the roots of Iran and Israel. These two countries are the major reason for conflicts in the Middle East. Some efforts must be put into understanding both of them and listening to both sides of the arguments of these imperious nations. The conflict is not just about the nuclear warhead, it’s more about the ideology deeply rooted in the ancestry of both nations.
Historical Background
The conflict dates back to the formation of Israel as a state (1948) and has escalated since the Iranian Revolution of 1979. Israel is a Jewish state and Iran is Islamic, and these religious disparities created even more suspicion between them.
In the Persian Empire, during the Middle Ages, Jews contributed to Persian society but as Persia became more Islamic, the Jews suffered religious persecution. Later, the Zionist movement divided the Iranian Jews.
The Zionist movement gave a backbone to the Jews to build their own state, hence Palestine gaining stance in 1917 through the Balfour Declaration of Britain.
Iran
They view Israel as an illegal state and its total destruction is much needed to settle the issue of Palestine. It is an open secret that Iran backs a condominium of terrorist organizations (according to Israel) like Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthi rebels, and the Assad regime. However, this wasn’t the stance of Iranians from the beginning. Notions of antisemitism also circulated.
When Iran Provided Oil to Israel
During the Arab-Israeli War of 1948, Iran was officially supporting the Arabs but on the other side was supplying oil to Israel, whereas Israel provided weapons and military technology to Iran. Later came the Camp David Accords.
Iran also helped Israel to move Jews out from Iraq. Israel even maintained a de facto diplomat’s mission in Tehran. Only after the Pahlavi Dynasty collapsed and the establishment of the Islamic Republic through the Iranian Revolution (1979), the relations between the two countries completely turned upside down. It was then that the Islamic state described Israel as an illegal state.
This Iranian Revolution went beyond just ideological or religious differences between the two countries (Islamic and Zionism). It went deep into political instability, economic sanctions, and the cutting of diplomatic ties.
From Common Grounds to Differences
From the eye of any person interested in geopolitics, these sanctions can be considered as the beginning of where countries usually part ways. However, unlike that, during the Iran-Iraq War (1980–88), Israel provided military support to Iran while Iran was on the frontier with Iraq (though Iran still denies this to the present day).
However, with the 1988 ceasefire, there were no indirect links after the war. Iran shifted towards impressing Arabs and Muslim states.
Proxy Wars
No one can deny the truth of proxy wars between Iran and Israel; Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, Houthi in Yemen. Every time Israel fought against them, it was a proxy war between the two foes. Iran provides military and non-military aid to Hezbollah which is estimated around 200 million dollars per year (according to Pentagon in 2010), and now the estimation stands near 700 million dollars per year (according to The Times of Israel).
In Syria, Iran provided military and non-military assistance to Bashar al-Assad’s regime during the Syrian civil war. Israel perceived this as threatening and bombed Iran’s military bases and routes that were followed from Baghdad.
Israel targeting Islamic countries’ (not all) nuclear facilities deeply signifies their ancestral ideology. They attacked Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor in 1981, Syria’s Al-Kibar reactor in 2007, and consistently Iran. This is more than just nuclear reactors—these are the ideologies of Islamists and Zionists.
