Israel’s drone strike on Iran’s consular building in Damascus on April 1 killed seven Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps officers, including a brigadier-general. Not surprisingly, the strike has further ratcheted up tensions in the Middle East, a region already on the brink of general conflict since the October 7 Hamas attack and subsequent Israeli response.
With the presence of Hezbollah in the north and Houthis in the south (not to mention several Iran-backed militias in Iraq and Syria), horizontal escalation was already a factor. Fear is rife that the Damascus strike could force Iran’s hand and the spiral could lead to vertical escalation. How likely is Iran’s direct response?
Both the United States and Israel think Iran has already planned a reprisal and would execute the plan. In fact, statements made on April 11 suggested Iran would retaliate within a 48-hour window. That window, as this is being written on April 13, would close today at midnight.
Iran has good reason to retaliate. It also has good reasons not to retaliate directly or within the expected window in which its attack is being anticipated. Let’s consider both courses of action.
Case For Retaliation
Iran has so far avoided being sucked directly into the ongoing Middle East conflict. Nonetheless, it remains at the centre of that conflict in multiple ways. Iran has used groups affiliated with it, both operationally and politico-ideologically, to fight an asymmetric war with Israel. That war predates the current conflict by more than two decades but has been aggravated by the current round of armed conflict and horizontal escalation. Israel’s drone assassination strikes against Hezbollah commanders and now the Damascus strike against IRGC personnel are evidence of that escalation threatening to go vertical.
Iranian planners favouring retaliation are likely focusing on establishing deterrence against Israel through a reprisal attack. Their argument would be two-pronged. First, if Iran does not strike back, Israel will be emboldened into mounting other such attacks against Iranian interests outside and inside Iran. This argument would be supported by the prestige argument both in direct relation to Israel as also for Iran’s influence with groups affiliated with it. Second, inaction by Iran will affect the morale of groups are already in this fight. If they see that Iran has remained quiet even after Israel attacked it on its own soil (Iran’s consulate), deterrence will not be established, and prestige will be lost.
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