Israel-Gaza war: Iran and US wary of wider conflict even as Tehran fuels proxy wars
- Iran-backed Hezbollah is taking ‘minimum’ military actions against Israel to show it is supporting other militant groups, an analyst says
- Israel and Arab states are already assessing the scenarios for post-war Gaza including control over the territory and reconstruction
But Tehran and Washington, aided by Arab state intermediaries, appear determined to prevent a spillover of the ongoing war because of the heavy strategic price they would all pay, Middle East observers told This Week In Asia.
“Neither the US nor Iran is interested in expanding the conflict, [but] that said, there is the danger of escalation, as each party seeks to maintain the edge in their tit-for-tat strikes,” said Kristin Diwan, a senior resident scholar of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington.
Parallel to Israel’s military capture of most of northern Gaza over the past week, its forces have become engaged in incrementally more cross-border fighting with the Lebanese Hezbollah.
The Iran-backed militant group has reportedly assumed operational control of the conflict alongside Hamas and has deployed a growing array of increasingly sophisticated weapons against Israeli forces along the border, killing more Israelis and prompting retaliatory air strikes deeper into Lebanese territory.