Iran faces tough choices in deciding how to respond to Israeli strikes

[Pelican Press 0]

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Iran faces tough choices in deciding how to respond to ******** strikes

JERUSALEM (AP) — It’s Iran’s move now.

How the Islamic Republic chooses to respond to the unusually public ******** aerial ******** on its homeland could determine whether the region spirals further toward all-out war or holds steady at an already

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In the coldly calculating realm of

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, a strike of the kind that ******* delivered before dawn Saturday would typically be met with a forceful response.

Retaliating militarily would allow Iran’s clerical leadership to show strength not only to its own citizens but also to

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in Gaza and Lebanon’s

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, the militant groups battling ******* that are the vanguard of Tehran’s so-called

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.

It is too soon to say whether Iran’s leadership will follow that path.

Tehran may opt to hold back from forcefully retaliating directly for now, not least because doing so might reveal its weaknesses and invite a more potent ******** response, analysts say.

“Iran will play down the impact of the strikes, which are in fact quite serious,” said Sanam Vakil, the director of the Middle East and North ******* program at the London-based think tank Chatham House.

She said Iran is “boxed in” by military and economic constraints, and the uncertainty caused by the U.S. election and its impact on ********* policy in the region.

Even while the ******** wars rage,

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has been signaling

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to ease crushing international sanctions.

A carefully worded statement from Iran’s military issued Saturday night appeared to offer some wiggle room for the Islamic Republic to back away from further escalation. It suggested that a cease-***** in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon was more important than any retaliation against *******.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s ultimate decision-maker, was also measured in his first comments on the strike Sunday. He said the ******* “should not be exaggerated nor downplayed,” and he stopped short of calling for an immediate military response.

Saturday’s strikes targeted Iranian air defense missile batteries and missile production facilities, according to the ******** military.

With that, ******* has exposed vulnerabilities in Iran’s air defenses and can still step up its attacks, analysts say.

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indicate *******’s raid damaged facilities at the Parchin military base southeast of Tehran that experts previously linked to Iran’s onetime nuclear weapons program and another base tied to its ballistic missile program.

Current nuclear facilities were not struck, however. Rafael Mariano Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, confirmed that on X, saying “Iran’s nuclear facilities have not been impacted.”

******* has been aggressively

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to the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah,

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and targeting operatives in an audacious

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.

“Any Iranian attempt to retaliate will have to contend with the fact that Hezbollah, its most important ally against *******, has been significantly degraded and its conventional weapons systems have twice been largely repelled,” said Ali Vaez, the Iran project director at the International Crisis Group, who expects Iran to hold its ***** for now.

That’s true even if ******* held back, as appears to be the case. Some prominent figures in *******, such as opposition leader Yair Lapid, are already saying the attacks didn’t go far enough.

Regional experts suggested that *******’s relatively limited target list was intentionally calibrated to make it easier for Iran to back away from escalation.

As Yoel Guzansky, who formerly worked for *******’s National Security Council and is now a researcher at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies, put it: *******’s decision to focus on purely military targets “allows them to save face.”

*******’s target choices may also be a reflection at least in part of its capabilities. It is unlikely able to ******** Iran’s nuclear facilities on its own and would require help from the ******* States, Guzansky said.

Besides, ******* still has leverage to go after higher-value targets should Iran retaliate — particularly now that nodes in its air defenses have been destroyed.

“You preserve for yourself all kinds of contingency plans,” Guzansky said.

Thomas Juneau, a University of Ottawa professor focused on Iran and the wider Middle East,

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that the fact Iranian media initially downplayed the strikes suggests Tehran may want to avoid further escalation. Yet it faces a dilemma.

“If it retaliates, it risks an escalation in which its weakness means it loses more,” he wrote. “If it does not retaliate, it projects a signal of weakness.”

Vakil agreed that Iran’s response was likely to be muted and that the strikes were designed to minimize the potential for escalation

“******* has yet again shown its military precision and capabilities are far superior to that of Iran,” she said.

One thing is certain: The ******** is in uncharted territory.

For decades, leaders and strategists in the Middle East leaders have speculated about if and how ******* might one day openly strike Iran, just as they wondered what direct attacks by Iran, rather than by its proxy militant groups, would look like.

Today, it’s a reality. Yet the playbook on either side isn’t clear, and may still be being written.

“There appears to be a major mismatch both in terms of the sword each side wields and the shield it can deploy,” Vaez said.

“While both sides have calibrated and calculated how quickly they climb the escalation ladder, they are in an entirely new territory now, where the new red lines are nebulous and the old ones have turned pink,” he said.

___

EDITOR’S NOTE — Adam Schreck, the Asia-Pacific news director for The Associated Press, spent years covering the ******** and has reported from countries across the region, including both Iran and *******.

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