There are many creatures in the animal kingdom—from weasels to spotted skunks to ostriches—that perform a dance to intimidate their enemies.

This week, we saw generals in both Israel and Iran perform their own weasel dances. They made a great show, flexed their muscles in the most visible possible way, and did so with the apparent objective of sending a message to their adversaries.

Both sides launched aerial attacks at one another. But there is plenty of evidence to suggest, in both cases, the objective of the attack was more to ward off a war than to trigger one.

The risks involved with this communications strategy have been immense—either attack could have produced unintended consequences that could have triggered immediate escalation. But for now, the entire Middle East is breathing a momentary sigh of relief that that did not happen.

But the entire region is on edge and for good reason. In the past few days we came closer to a full-scale war between Iran and Israel than we have ever been before.

And while the consequences of this week’s dance suggest that—for the moment—cooler heads have prevailed, possible reactions to this brush with catastrophe may make future confrontations far more dangerous.

Indeed, there are some indications that the recent exchanges may push Iran even closer to being a fully-fledged nuclear weapons state. (A path that, we must remember, was accelerated thanks to the Donald Trump administration’s devastatingly bad decision to blow up the nuclear........

© The Daily Beast