Letters | Who benefits from an Israel-Iran clash?

Readers discuss Iran’s missile and drone attack on Israel, and how Benjamin Netanyahu should respond

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An anti-missile system operates after Iran launched drones and missiles towards Israel, as seen from Ashkelon, Israel, on April 14. Photo: Reuters

Published: 2:30pm, 17 Apr 2024

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I’m no fan of Iran’s oppressive rulers, but were they really expected not to retaliate against the bombing of their embassy in Damascus, widely blamed on Israel, that killed seven people, including two generals? Is there really that great of a misplaced sense of Israeli – and, by extension, American – entitlement?

Regardless, additional Western sanctions will be slapped on Iran. There has been a predictable American and British proclivity for sanctioning Iran and its officials ever since the Iranian revolution.

The revolution’s expulsion of major Western nations was largely because of Western corporate interests exploiting Iran’s plentiful fossil fuel resources. Western oil companies would have learned a big lesson from that episode, and with the support of their nations’ political and military leaders, they would do everything they can to avoid a repeat of it. Let’s not forget the 2003-11 US invasion of Iraq and its oilfields.

It would be understandable if corporate fossil-fuel interests wanted Iran’s government to fall, thus enabling Big Oil to access Iran’s rich oilfields. If the leadership of oil companies have been against Iran’s post-revolution governments, then it is likely that Western governments are, too, and the media and the citizens of these countries would follow suit.

Frank Sterle Jnr, British Columbia, Canada