War between Israel and Iran is not inevitable

It took 25 days, but today Israel responded in the early hours to Iran’s rocket salvo earlier this month. The operation, called ‘Days of Repentance’, was the most significant attack on Iran by any country since the 1980s. The years of the Iranian regime waging a shadow war against Israel have finally exposed the violence, something the regime has done repeatedly promised his people would avoid it.

The attacks were significant and likely to cause significant damage. At least four Iranian military officers serving in missile defense units were killed. Nevertheless, Iran is relieved that its worst fears have not come true. A day before the attacks, Israel had used intermediaries to warn Iran about them, to ensure they would not cause huge losses, Mostafa Najafi, a security expert in Tehran with connections to the regime’s elites, told me. He said the attacks were not “as massive and painful as Israeli officials had claimed” they would be. Israel did not target Iranian infrastructure, such as its oil and gas refineries, nor did it assassinate political or military leaders.

This gives Iran the opportunity to desist by providing a weak enough response that does not provoke Israeli retaliation. Iran can stop the tit-for-tat if it is willing to stand up to the hardline voices that want the country to escalate and even expand the conflict.

Read: Iran is not ready for war with Israel

Life in Tehran has quickly returned to normal. The city’s streets were clogged with traffic as usual on Saturday, the first day of the week in the country. Although all flights were initially suspended, Tehran’s two main airports are back in service.

“I believe Iran will respond to the attacks,” Afifeh Abedi, a security expert in Iran who supports the government, told me. “But I doubt there will be any escalation,” she said. “Countries in the region will stop this, and the US will try to get the situation under control.”

Abas Aslani of the Tehran-based Center for Strategic Studies of the Middle East agrees. “The evidence currently does not point to a broader war,” he told me. “But this does not necessarily mean that Iran will not respond.”

I also spoke with two senior Iranian politicians, a conservative and a reformist, who both requested anonymity for fear of reprisals. They said Iran is now not looking to expand the conflict. Iran and the US had implicitly agreed to allow a limited Israeli strike, followed by no significant Iranian response, the conservative figure, who is close to parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, told me.

The reformist politician, who previously served at cabinet level, said diplomatic efforts by Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi ensured that Israeli attacks were limited to military targets. Araghchi has visited a dozen nearby countries in recent weeks and is said to have asked them to put pressure on the US and Israel to limit attacks.

There is broad opposition across the region to an expansion of the conflict. Saudi Arabia convicted the latest Israeli attacks on Iran as “a violation of its sovereignty and a violation of international laws and norms” and reiterated its “firm position in rejecting the continued escalation.” Similar condemnations have been issued by Turkey, Iraq, Lebanon, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, OmanQatar, Kuwait, JordanAlgeria, Mauritania and, further afield, Switzerland, Pakistan, Indonesia and the Maldives. Jordan, which is a neighbor of Israel and signed a peace treaty with Israel 30 years ago to this day, also confirmed that no Israeli striker had been allowed to use Jordanian airspace. In an effort to maintain neutrality, Jordan had previously helped Israel defend itself against Iranian drone and missile attacks.

Read: Iran cannot be reconciled

Iran knows that its future prosperity and success depend on economic development, which is actively harmed by its isolation from the international economy and its current war position. Yesterday, the Paris-based Financial Action Task Force, a G7 initiative that helps enforce global anti-money laundering rules, said it would keep Iran on the blacklist alongside just two other countries, North Korea and Myanmar. Saturday was the US dollar to sell for 680,000 Iranian rials, an all-time high. These are not problems you can solve by fighting Israel.

Yesterday, in a rare candid moment, Ghalibaf acknowledged what was at stake: “Unfortunately, our economy is not doing as well as our missiles. But it should.”

And yet Iran is still far from taking the necessary steps to drop its anti-Israel campaign, overcome its international isolation and focus on its domestic problems. Currently, any deviation from anti-Israel orthodoxy leads to a swift response from hardliners. Last month, the Assembly of Scholars and Instructors of Qom Seminary, a reformist body of Shia clerics, issued a statement which condemned Israel’s continued attacks on Lebanon, while calling on the country to “return to the legal borders before the 1967 aggression” and pushing for the “formation of an independent Palestinian state.” This endorsement of the two-state solution infuriated hardliners, some of whom called for the seminary to be closed, but its position is defended by the reformist press.

And some hardliners are calling for all-out war with Israel.

“The Zionist regime is in decline, and Iran will not let this attack continue without a response,” said Hossein Shariatmadari, editor-in-chief of the hardline daily. Kayhantold me. “Our response will be increasingly decisive and crushing.”

Shariatmadari is known for bizarre statements. Najafi, who is generally more level-headed, also believes that Iranian-Israeli clashes will continue “in the medium term, especially after the US elections.”

Some Israel supporters also hope the conflict will escalate. Mark Dubowitz, the CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington, DC-based think tank, said on X that Israel must now prepare for the “next phase” of its strategy: helping the Iranians overthrow their regime, followed by “decisive beheading attacks.”

As long as Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is alive and in power, the country’s attitude toward Israel will not change decisively. But he is 85, and in preparation for a possible succession battle, the regime’s various factions are already bickering over the country’s future direction. The hardliners are no longer as politically powerful as they once were. They recently lost the presidency and are also marginalized in other institutions.

“The kind of Shariatmadari doesn’t matter to anyone,” the conservative politician told me. “Iran is on the verge of change.”

If Iran wants to avoid war, that cannot change quickly enough.