This week Israel attacked Lebanon, Yemen, the West Bank and Gaza, but the real target was Tehran. Israel accuses Iran of inciting the Hamas attack on October 7 last year and of sponsoring attacks on Israeli territory by Hezbollah, the Houthis and Iraq. Indeed, many in the United States and the region attribute instability in the Middle East to Iran and the so-called “Axis of Resistance,” a network of Iranian-aligned militant groups and ousted governments.
Israel aims to neutralize and warn its enemiesall of themthat “There is no place in the Middle East that Israel cannot reach.But force alone is unlikely to collapse the Axis powers or neutralize Iran. Instead, military measures must be taken alongside diplomatic efforts to pull these groups out of Iran's orbit.
ofThe Axis powers were key to Iran's expansion of influence.in the Middle East over the past quarter century. The Iranian government, wary of direct confrontation with Israel or the United States, has found ways to frustrate and confuse its opponents. Proxies came cheap. With modest subsidies and a little ideological indoctrination, these acolytes were able to receive training in improvised weapons and guerrilla tactics. manydied fightingEven in places where Iran is afraid to step in, such as defending the Assad regime in Syria. Meanwhile, Iran retained enough plausible deniability to escape blame and avoid escalation.
Israeli attacks shatter this trust, at least temporarily. Iran fired a ballistic missile at Israel but signaled reluctance to launch itUse your own army to protect junior allies. On the other hand, HezbollahamazingAnd Hamas is in hiding. However, all these groups have managed to rebuild and recover after experiencing intensive bombing and military setbacks in the past. maximum pressure,Including decapitation attackshas rarely been proven to be sustainable or effective.
The military approach must be accompanied by efforts to counter the political inertia that keeps the Axis powers spinning. Thomas Schelling, a pioneering game theorist and strategic thinker, pointed out that Iran is waging a kind of proxy war:Lots of problems with principal agent and agent. Iran is keen to transfer risk to its proxies. But does the agent intend to follow the principal's orders?
While there is no doubt that Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis are sympathetic to Iran's larger geopolitical vision, their key interests are more parochial and their politics local. These groups share similar origin stories, emerging during times of civil war and internal conflict, and defending constituencies such as:shia sect in lebanon,Zaidis of Yemen andPalestinianwere subject to oppression and exclusion. Their demands for representation and self-determination were ignored both on the national stage and in the larger international community. These groups were never just terrorist groups. Rather, they combined fighting forces, political parties, and social service organizations into one.
Iran easily played the role of a foreign sponsor, especially since the main domestic adversaries of these groups were seen as pawns of the United States. Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis each grew stronger with support from Iran, butferociousAnd politically there is no compromise. However, these groups alsoprotected their autonomyseeking to apply Iran's resources to their own pursuits.
There was friction between serving Iran as a sponsor and meeting domestic constituency demands for protection, representation, and social support. Iranian support costs these groups both military exposure and reputation. Some have tried more independent lines. Hamas, for example, rejected Iranian efforts to involve Iran in its 2011 Syria operation. However, since there were no other foreign suitors,A settlement was finally reached.
Proxy wars are difficult to stop. Sponsors shift the costs of fighting to other sponsors, postponing a potentially harmful stalemate that could bring the parties into negotiations.
Another approach is to focus on stripping proxies. If those who currently support Hamas, the Houthis, and Hezbollah understand that their political demands for fair representation and self-determination can be achieved through the political process, Iranian agitation will become less persuasive.
The carnage of the Gaza war diverted attention and energy from peace processes in other countries.Plans for Yemen and Lebanon mediated by the United NationsThose outlining plans for a comprehensive political space that addresses the interests of these rejectionist groups have languished. Similarly, what is urgently needed isGaza's humanitarian ceasefire outweighs the issue of a major land deal for peacebetween Israelis and Palestinians.
With fighting continuing and military momentum against Iran, now is the time for the United States and its major regional partners, including Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the Emirates, to revive these discussions and encourage junior Axis partners to step aside. It's time to provide real incentives to enter. The yoke of their agency.
Ariel I. Ahlam is a professor of public and international affairs at Virginia Tech and the author of War and Conflict in the Middle East and North Africa (Polity, 2020). From 2017 to 2020, he served as principal investigator for the Proxy Warfare Initiative, sponsored by the Carnegie Corporation of New York.
