If you were previously unsure about the term “proxy war” — what it means, what one looks like and so on — you know now. Because the US and Israel are engaged in a full-on, hot proxy war with Iran in 2024.
This isn’t new, of course. In Tehran, perpetual proxy war with Israel is part of the regime’s raison d’être. And the never-ending game of cat and mouse in Iraq between the remnants of the US occupation and Iran’s coalition of allied militia is a constant reminder that two decades on from George W. Bush’s invasion, the country is an Iranian client state.
But this is typically a low-intensity proxy war, or as low-intensity as things can be in a region where tensions are always running high. In 2024, by contrast, the situation is very close to an outright conflagration.
Less than two weeks after a US drone killed a senior Al-Nujaba commander who served as a deputy operations chief for the PMF in Baghdad, related militia launched their most ambitious attack yet on US assets in Iraq, targeting the Al Asad Air Base with a dozen rockets and half a dozen short-range ballistic missiles. American soldiers and support personnel were being checked for brain damage. An Iraqi soldier sustained injuries.
Since the onset of full-on war between Israel and Hamas, American troops in Iraq and Syria — who number around 2,500 in total — have been attacked 140 times, according to the Pentagon. All of those attacks were carried out by Iranian proxies.
The bombardment at Al Asad came just hours after Israel carried out what looked to be another assassination targeting a key operative (or operatives) in the IRGC-Syria-Hezbollah nexus. An IDF airstrike on a four-story building in Damascus killed at least five IRGC members and advisors.
Conflicting reports suggested Quds official Sadegh Omidzadeh was among the dead. Omidzadeh was named by The Washington Post last year in an article detailing a Quds-led plan to step up attacks on US assets in Syria. Omidzadeh, the Post said, was involved in an effort to design and deploy more effective IEDs (called explosively-formed penetrators) against American personnel carriers in the country. EFPs were a calling card of Qassem Soleimani in Iraq.
Regardless of the specifics, which were difficult to verify, it seems clear that top Quds officials overseeing intelligence in Syria were killed. Presumably, given their mandate, they would’ve been close to Esmail Qaani, Soleimani’s successor. 10 people in all were killed in the strike, a local human rights monitor said. Hamas called it a “heinous crime.” And they would know.
The weekend strike in Damascus represented yet another material loss for Iran. Earlier this month, an Israeli drone killed Hamas’s envoy to Hezbollah in Beirut. In late December, Soleimani associate Seyed Razi Mousavi was assassinated on a farm outside Damascus, presumably by Israel.
The IDF and Mossad are apparently keen to dismantle Iran’s capacity to coordinate arms shipments to Hezbollah and facilitate cooperation between the group and Hamas. The US and the UK, meanwhile, are reportedly discussing more aggressive steps to cut off Iranian supplies to the Houthis in Yemen. “The considerations stem from a recognition that a series of US and UK strikes against the Houthis so far hasn’t deterred the group or degraded its ability to target commercial shipping,” Bloomberg said.
As discussed here last week, the US and UK were destined to keep hitting Houthi targets in Yemen given that both sides effectively pre-commited to a cycle of self-fulfilling escalations with no obvious off-ramp. Since then, the Houthis have targeted a number of ships and the US responded with at least seven airstrikes.
Israel still hasn’t answered Iranian claims that an IRGC strike on Erbil (part of a multi-directional volley that also saw the Guards hit Pakistan, prompting retaliation from Iran’s neighbor) targeted a Mossad intelligence hub. Ebrahim Raisi, commenting on the weekend strike in Damascus, said Iran “will not leave [Israeli] crimes unanswered.”
I doubt that Iran is so bent on dedicating its economy and international relationship for the sake of fighting the tiny speck on the map that is Israel. They have bigger fish to fry. The U.S. was always the real target.
Again, whatever Iran thought it was doing is unlikely to work out. Fuck around and find out, I guess.
As H mentioned …..”In Tehran, perpetual proxy war with Israel is part of the regimes (reason to exist)”
They really don’t have bigger fish to fry……and, of course, US support of Israel is what has always put the US in their crosshairs.
You are naive to think that Israel is the main target here. Israel has no true value for the extreme Islam, except as the perpetual excuse.
I’ll give you an example: 9/11 was not a random date. Look up the siege of Viena in 1683.
Sorry, Nate, but yes, Israel is the target for Iran. You’re thinking a little too hard about this. Also, Iran didn’t have anything to do with 9/11, and when we talk about Islamic extremism, we typically mean Sunni extremism. Iran’s Shiite proxies, pet armies and militia have different goals. Hamas is Sunni, but their shared interest with Tehran is of course Israel. As to your first comment, this (the US) isn’t a “fish” that the theocracy in Tehran can realistically “fry.” What’s the IRGC going to do? Sail their navy across the Atlantic, land at Myrtle Beach and make their way inland?
The cost to Tehran to “employ” and arm Houthis and others to fly inexpensive and weaponized drones to cause chaos, damage, mayhem and death is relatively inexpensive compared to the military effort required by the US, Israel and, to a lesser extent, western Europe to combat these drone attacks.
With AI, a squad of drones with a programmed target can avoid detection, missiles, etc. This is truly frightening because if an agent of Iran gets into the US, how difficult would it be to build a drone weapon within the US and target our buildings and our people?
The only edit that I recommend for this article is the removal of the word “proxy”.