Mobilizing its entire “Axis of Resistance,” Iran has drawn Israel into a war of attrition, forcing it to conduct costly military operations not just in Gaza and the West Bank, but also in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Iran itself. Properly understood, this war is the second Iranian–Israeli war, the first being the 2006 conflict in Lebanon.
After nearly a year of fighting in Gaza, Israel is well on the way to victory against Hamas, which has already lost forever its ability to function as a terrorist army, a force capable of posing a threat to southern Israeli communities and of firing rockets into the central region. In another year or so, Israel will probably wrest Gazan political institutions from Hamas’s iron grip. Israel’s slow but steady success against Hamas raises a question: Can it achieve a similarly decisive victory against Iran and its other proxies?
If by “victory” we mean compelling enemies to put down their arms permanently, then the simple and crude answer to this question is no. Two factors are conspiring to hamstring the Israelis, the first of which is the disruptive military capabilities that Iran has stockpiled at home and distributed to its proxies around the Middle East.
These capabilities include, among other systems, a vast array of unmanned aerial vehicles, ballistic missiles, and cruise missiles. When combined in the same strike packages, these weapons overwhelm and confuse the sensors and interceptors of Israel’s defensive systems. As a result, the Axis of Resistance has achieved “overmatch.” Also known as “an offense-dominant regime,” “overmatch” refers to a military balance that strongly favors the attacker over the defender.
Even when the warheads of the Axis of Resistance fail to hit their targets, they still compel the Israeli military to take very costly political, military, and economic countermeasures. In addition, they deepen Israel’s dependence on the United States. Eager to prevent an escalation in the war, the Biden administration has taken pains to obscure the costs of a defensive strategy by touting the technological wizardry of Israel’s systems. For example, after the April 14 barrage of missiles that Iran launched at Israel, President Biden called Prime Minister Netanyahu to convince him not to retaliate. “Take the win,” he told Netanyahu, stressing that Iran had failed to hit any militarily significant target.
However, when one considers that the civilians from Israel’s northern border region, between 80,000 and 100,000 souls, have been evacuated for nearly an entire year, this “win,” viewed from Jerusalem, hardly feels like victory.
Biden’s advice to Netanyahu brings us to the second factor that makes a decisive Israeli victory impossible, namely, American restraints on IDF operations. The Biden administration has postured the United States in this war less as the leader of a regional coalition against the Axis of Resistance, and more as a mediator between it and Israel. Arguing that a cessation of fighting in Gaza will lead to a ceasefire on all other fronts, Biden and his aides routinely pressure Israel, often in public, to end the conflict with Hamas. With this goal in mind, Washington has strongly warned the Netanyahu government to refrain from escalating. Strategic analyst Edward Luttwak quips that the American fetishization of “de-escalation” spells out a Biden Doctrine: Iran can attack any country it pleases, including the United States, but no one is allowed to attack Iran.
Instead of mitigating the benefits that Iran’s disruptive military capabilities have delivered to the Axis of Resistance, Biden’s policy has enhanced them. As a matter of hard military science, it is impossible to counter an offense-dominant regime with purely defensive countermeasures. To offset Iran’s weapons, Israel must go on offense, stripping from Iran and its proxies things that they hold very dear, making it clear that a perpetuation of the conflict on terms unacceptable to Israel will lead to the destruction of ever more valuable things.
The Israelis developed their air force and their intelligence services with this very purpose in mind. Recent assassinations attributed to Israel in Beirut and Tehran, to say nothing of the exploding pagers which killed 12 and wounded thousands of Hezbollah operatives, highlight Israel’s resourcefulness. However, Biden’s mania for de-escalation has prevented Jerusalem from deploying its assets to maximum effect.
If backstopped by American power, the Israeli military could certainly force Iran and the other members of its Axis of Resistance to pay a very high price for their aggression. Israel might not be able to defeat Iran, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, but it could certainly deter them. It could ensure a period of prolonged calm, buying Washington time to develop, together with Israel and America’s other allies, a more effective regional strategy. If there is a path to peace and stability in the Middle East, it requires enhancing the firepower of America and its allies, not in redoubling the pursuit of “de-escalation.”
Michael Doran is a senior fellow and director of the Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East at Hudson Institute.
