Third night of fire exchange in the Middle East: When will it back down ? • FRANCE 24 English

Third night of fire exchange in the Middle East: When will it back down ? • FRANCE 24 English

um but to continue with this story we’re going to bring in Ali Vayz the Iran project director and senior adviser to the president it’s the International Crisis Group ali thank you so much for joining us on the program to be with you so uh a third night of air strikes on both sides damage and death tolls mounting what will it take to get Iran and Israel to uh back down look I think there are only two ways that this would end one is that a a new equilibrium is created a balance of terror where both sides uh come to the conclusion that the cost of continuation uh outweighs the potential benefits of it uh the second scenario is a scenario in which uh the uh this expanding and escalatoring uh titat would end in a situation that uh the energy markets are rattled even further than uh is the case right now and President Trump starts getting worried about uh the gas prices at the pump in the United States and the political backlash that that would create especially within his bay uh and then moves to pull the plug on Prime Minister Netanyahu’s ability to continue this conflict now uh one of Israel’s goals has been to hobble Iran’s nuclear program they’ve struck multiple sites in Iran um but some of those sites are far are far underground so how much impact can Israel’s actions really end up having on Iran’s nuclear capabilities look experts have been known for years and US intelligence community has also uh been saying this for years u that Israel on its own is only able to damage and degrade Iran’s nuclear program is not able to destroy it uh some of these uh bunkered facilities uh could only be affected by uh massive ordinance bombs uh these uh bunker buster weapons that the United States only possesses um so there is no way that Israel would be able to completely destroy uh Iran’s nuclear program and in fact it risks in the process uh to push Iran uh towards nuclear weaponization because the key ingredient that Iran needs to achieve that objective are these highly enriched stockpile of file material uh that Iran is keeping uh storing in these underground facilities that Israel cannot touch uh so this could become a self-fulfill fulfilling prophecy uh if uh if it continues and a diplomatic solution is not found uh another Israeli goal appears to be regime change at least from what they’ve sort of been saying is that a likely outcome so look if the goal is uh nuclear uh capitulation again as I said it’s very unlikely that it would happen uh if the goal is regime change it’s also very unlikely that it would happen now what is possible is regime destabilization uh if Israel continues uh assassinating senior leadership in Iran uh and uh basically uh prevents the the Iranian regime from being able to deliver services even to its own core constituents then yes there is risk increasing risk of uprising uh and if Israel starts arming some of the minority separatist groups in Iran then it is possible that Iran would descend into some sort of civil strife uh which might be uh the solution that Israel is seeking because if Iran becomes another Syria another Yemen another Lebanon then it would have to be internally focused and would not be able to uh project power beyond its borders and challenge Israel one could argue that in the long run uh destabilization of a country of 90 million uh is not in Israel’s interest uh but some of Israel’s leaders these days don’t think in long term right so we had talked about some options there at the beginning now I want to say if both sides dig in their heels don’t deescalate you know continue to expand their targets what are the chances that we’re looking that this spirals into a bigger regional conflict that does draw in other countries um in the Persian Gulf so if you think about the escalation ladder um it started first by Iran and Israel targeting more or less military sites uh now it’s expanding to energy infrastructure it could then extend to critical infrastructure um and then uh once Iranian energy uh exports are affected Iran might externalize the cost of this conflict by targeting uh shipping lanes in the Persian Gulf um which could then eventually drag the United States into the conflict and in that scenario then Iran could start targeting Iran US bases in Gulf Arab Arab states in Iraq uh and so this could become very ugly very quickly uh if it continues and again at the end of the day it would have no winners and I just want to follow up with one final question and that’s about as you mentioned there Washington’s role in all of this i mean Trump has campaigned as a dealmaker originally both sides were supposed to be meeting today to uh discuss terms of a nuclear negotiation a possible deal there obviously this uh you know preluded that um as you mentioned that there’s a concern about US military entanglements bases in this but he’s been giving mixed messages about what the US position is so what you know what could Washington do in this situation well President Trump in fact is the only world leader uh who can stop this uh from escalating further uh that requires a dual uh approach of holding Israel back by uh threatening that if Israel continues this conflict which puts American lives at risk whether it’s Americans who live in Israel or American uh soldiers in the region um uh he would stop provision of offensive weapons to Israel but he also has to hold Iran back by threatening that if Iran continues uh the cycle of escalation that the US will get involved and he also has to put a positive incentive on the table for the Iranians a uh reasonable nuclear uh deal and uh sanctions really that’s the only way that this could stop uh uh as as early as as President Trump decides uh but again its continuation could also include consequences uh that no one has uh thought about at this stage i mentioned what Iran could do on its own but take into account that some of Iran’s allies in the region like the Houthis in Yemen or the Shia militias in Iraq are still standing and they could join the battle too ally thank you so much for your analysis joining us on the program that’s Alli Vayz the Iran project director senior adviser to the president at the International Crisis Group

Ali Vaez, Senior Advisor to the President & Project Director, Iran at the International Crisis Group, gives us his analyze.
#Israel #Iran #War

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