“There is a bit of a tendency to focus attention on Netanyahu and on far-right politicians of his government, obviously all extremely harmful. But we must not forget that the vast majority of the Israeli population is supporting the operation in Gaza and would like it to go even further. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Israelis were on the same wavelength as this far right on Iran too.” These are the words spoken into the microphones of One, Nobody, 100Milan (Radio24) yes Manlio Grazianoprofessor of Geopolitics and Geopolitics of Religions at the Paris School of International Affairs of SciencesPo and at the Sorbonne University.
The political scientist, whose book was released recently World disorder (Mondadori), debunks the narrative according to which a large part of the Israeli population opposes Netanyahu’s policy and explains why: “In Israel there is the illusion that the military operation against Gaza can solve the problem of Israeli security. He is alone a harmful illusion because he’s getting exactly the opposite result. But this illusion exists and is strongly supported and fueled not only by the far right but also by the centrists who are in the Israeli war cabinet. The more this position is supported and encouraged, the more difficult it is to free oneself and escape the temptation to go further.”
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Regarding the Iranian retaliation and the announcement of an attack by Israel, Graziano observes: “An Israeli response to the Iranian retaliation is absolutely not inevitable, even if it was absolutely predictable that certain Israeli tones would emerge. All in all, both Iranians and Israelis need to speak to their audiences at home. For Iranians it is different because the public is very limited, in the sense that the current regime is extremely unpopular, but there is a group of people who support the Iranian regime Ayatollah“.
And he underlines: “It is not known whether Israel’s response will be demonstrative or more incisive, but in any case Israel has never limited itself and has always launched attacks: it has already bombed some nuclear installations within Iranian territory, Lebanon, Syria. Most of the time, however, Israel bombs without saying it, now it says it and probably won’t attack. In short, It is not a given that Israel will respond to Iran, also because in this case the situation could get out of hand and therefore cause an escalation. For the moment I don’t think things will go this way.”
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Graziano adds: “It’s likely there is a sort of ongoing negotiation between Israel and the USA, who have been insisting on Israel for its action in Gaza for several months. And it could be that this Israeli threat to attack Iran is in the balance, in the sense that the Israelis could ask the Americans to let them do more in Gaza and in exchange not attack Iran. Or viceversa. However, it is difficult to imagine that the US could support Israel in a possible war with Iran – he concludes – because the Americans have absolutely no interest in throwing themselves back into a Middle Eastern quagmire from which they have never managed to get out despite all the attempts that began in 2011.”