The Syrian civil war, notes Reuel Marc Gerecht, is the most destructive in modern Middle Eastern history, at least in terms of its effects on civilians. Although an end does not seem to be in sight, there is no doubt that the Russia-Iran-Assad regime alliance has achieved far more than the disparate forces that oppose it, which include Israel and the U.S. Gerecht examines where the current situation leaves the latter two:
Jerusalem is now unavoidably invested in denying the Islamic Republic the means in Syria to launch missiles, a ground war, and terrorist/paramilitary operations against the Jewish state. However, Jerusalem is so far not willing to put Israeli troops into action, using only air power to dissuade its enemies.
Neither has Israel shown any desire to develop a Syrian proxy army, as it once did among the Lebanese Christians. It isn’t clear that the Israelis have the will or the means to prevent the clerical regime from creating a land route from Iran to Hizballah-controlled Lebanon. Israeli aircraft haven’t once, so far as we know, interdicted Iranian troop and supply planes that travel frequently from Iran and Iraq to the Levant. Israel surely has the intelligence to do so. Jerusalem appears willing so far to play only an aggressive defense, reacting to Iranian and Russian moves.
Given the Islamic Republic’s longstanding desire to have a front-row seat in the “resistance” against the Jewish state, [and] given the integral role anti-Zionism plays in the development of Iranian-controlled Shiite militias, a war between Israel and Iran is now likely, in either Syria or Lebanon or both, with a possible exchange of missiles between Israel and the Islamic Republic, and even conceivably Israeli air raids on Iranian Revolutionary Guard or Shiite-militia bases inside Iraq and Iran. But Jerusalem will surely try to avoid a regional war. . . .
Israel’s predicament is acute because Washington is willing to do so little. The United States is presently more “in” than Israel in Syria, but its post-Islamic State objectives remain unclear and its resolve appears to be declining. American foreign policy is fundamentally shifting as large slices of the American left and right see intervention abroad as baleful and the Muslim Middle East as too complicated, recalcitrant, and demanding. . . .
What the United States appears to be gearing up to do is to harass Iran, the Lebanese Hizballah, and the Assad regime primarily through sanctions. Such sanctions are worthwhile. As the recent nationwide anti-regime demonstrations revealed, average Iranians aren’t enamored of the theocracy’s expensive adventurism. The mullahs, their stepchild, the Hizballah, and their Alawite dependent desperately need more money to maintain the status quo.
But, asks Gerecht, will economic pressure be enough?
Read more on Caravan: https://www.hoover.org/research/syrian-great-game