Biden wanted to avoid a regional war. Now he’s got one.
President Biden’s cardinal objective since the outset of the Gaza conflict in October has been to prevent a wider war in the Middle East. On Saturday, he got the escalation he sought to avoid. Iran fired more than 300 drones and missiles, marking the first time that Tehran has directly attacked Israel.
With that barrage, Iran has set aside the veneer of deniability it has long tried to exploit by supporting regional proxies. The direct attack forces Israel to confront the question of how to respond militarily and presents the Biden administration with the challenge of finding a way to avert the larger regional conflict it has long feared. For now, the Biden administration is hoping that international political pressure on Iran and quiet suasion with Israel, which has become increasingly dependent on U.S.-led air and missile defense protection for its security, will dial down tensions.
Yet even if escalation can be avoided in the coming hours and days, the U.S. and its foremost Middle East ally will have to grapple with a volatile region that increasingly requires American political and military involvement despite the White House’s early hopes to shift its attention to Asia. “The Middle East has changed.
The red line that Israel and Iran would not directly attack the other country is now erased," said Norman Roule, who served as a top U.S. intelligence official on Iran. “Each country will now claim they can use this option in response to security threats, although any future attacks may not be on this scale." For decades, Iran has primarily worked through a network of Middle East proxies in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen as it sought to avoid a full-scale conventional conflict with the U.S.
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