‘A devastating, humiliating blow for Iran’ • FRANCE 24 English

jasmine Elgamal joins us from London political analyst and former Pentagon Middle East advisor jasmine Iran just said quote “Israel strike is a declaration of war what do we know?” Um look obviously this was an a devastating uh humiliating blow for Iran i mean the fact that so many of its personnel were killed these nuclear facilities were attacked Iran is going to see this as uh as as a red line that’s been crossed really and it’s going to have to respond somehow the question is what can Iran do that won’t invite even more aggression towards it either by Israel or the US in defense of Israel or if Iran decides to retaliate against American personnel and uh assets in the region so Iran is in a real bind now on one hand if it doesn’t retaliate at all um it not only loses face uh it’s not just a symbolic thing but also I think it reveals um to Israel to other actors that it is in fact a paper tiger that it has no moves that it has no uh uh ability to retaliate and that could make it seem uh really really weak in front of its adversaries um so it’s in a real bind it’s going to have to figure out how to respond in a way that allows it to maintain some sort of credibility moving forward in these negotiations if it decides to go back to them without inviting ever more military action against it and the US is calling for an urgent deescalation any diplomacy that can help avoid further escalation here do you think Israel will listen uh look I think that Prime Minister Netanyahu um sees this as a once-ina-lifetime opportunity to once and for all decapitate the Iranian regime and its nuclear program um he has been wanting to do this for years he has been saying publicly that he’s been wanting to do this for years there’s a very strong branch both within the US government in Congress outside in lobby organizations in the US that supports this so I think he sees this as his moment to realize that dream that vision especially since he spent the last year weakening Iran in all other kinds of ways by going after its proxies Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza and so on and so I think it’ll be very difficult for the US right now to reign in Netanyahu when he thinks he is this close to fulfilling that long-standing vision and strategy but at the same time the longer that the US allows this to go on the more likely it will be that the US gets dragged into this war which we know absolutely without a doubt that Donald Trump and the America first camp of the Republican party doesn’t want so I think the next few hours are going to be really critical in shaping both the US response and the Iranian response in the hours to come as you said it will be hard for the US not to be dragged into this conflict how when and what ways do you think that the US could be preparing for a possible Iranian retaliation i mean they’re going to be looking at everything right now the Department of Defense intelligence officials are going to be providing the president with as clear of a picture as they can so that he can make decisions in the next few hours so some of the things they’re going to be looking at for example are trying to assess the extent of the damage inside of Iran trying to assess what Iran’s response might be both against Israel and possibly against the US in the region and then quickly preparing military responses for the president in case he needs to use them so that’s what the defense and intelligence departments are going to be working on uh I imagine right now to try to guess what’s going to happen next and prepare the president to respond as necessary

Political analyst and former Pentagon Middle East advisor Jasmine El-Gamal joins France 24 to discuss Israel’s attack on Iran Friday which she describes as a “a devastating, humiliating blow” for the country and one to which Tehran will feel requires a strong response.
#Israel #strikes #Iran

🔔 Subscribe to France 24 now: https://f24.my/YTen
🔴 LIVE – Watch FRANCE 24 English 24/7 here: https://f24.my/YTliveEN

🌍 Read the latest International News and Top Stories: https://www.france24.com/en/

Like us on Facebook: https://f24.my/FBen
Follow us on X: https://f24.my/Xen
Bluesky: https://f24.my/BSen and Threads: https://f24.my/THen
Browse the news in pictures on Instagram: https://f24.my/IGen
Discover our TikTok videos: https://f24.my/TKen
Get the latest top stories on Telegram: https://f24.my/TGen

14 comments

  2. Iran's intelligence organizations are not that intelligent. They couldn't protect their late president, army generals, or top scientists. It's just a big country with a weak military.

  7. Iran doesn't need another nuclear deal, they are part of BRICS, they don't need European markets and finance. 😂😂😂😂😂

  9. The fact that Iran had no way of defending itself against these attacks shows it wasn't necessary. The fact their drones can't get through the Iron Dome even in retaliation shows Iran presents no 'existential threat' as Israel falsely claims.

Comments are closed.