by Riccardo Redaelli*
Netanyahu’s refrain is always the same: just demonize the war. Because it is useful, indeed indispensable for killing the bad guys. And patience if these bad guys are the tens of thousands of Palestinian women and children massacred for 20 months in Gaza, or family of Iranian scientists murdered in sleep by an Israeli missile. However, the most important aspect for the Israeli Prime Minister is that war continues – the “eternal war” – allows him to remain in power; A power to which he clung with tenacity to avoid processes and elections, allying himself to the religious and nationalist ultra -repellent, dangerously xenophobic and racist.
The Islamic Republic of Iran has long been the perfect enemy for Netanyahu, who has for years searched for permission from Washington to attack it. Now that in fact the green light has arrived, has unleashed all the hyper-force of Israel against an enemy weakened by the economic crisis and political legitimacy, from the collapse of Syria and the decimation of his allies, Hezbollah and Hamas among all. This attack shows the protervy and ambition of the Israeli government: not an attack against the infrastructures of the Iranian nuclear program, but a total war to sweep away the political and military leaders of the regime and cause that “change of regime” to Tehran always vainly chased. A choice that opens other conflict fronts for a country like Israel already engaged in war for 20 months: an invincible power performance without any political planning.
In Tehran, on the contrary, a corrupt and unpopular regime tries to save himself from his own errors: insisting on the enrichment of uranium was an ideological madness that is paying dearly. But to think that decapitating military leaders, or killing Khamenei himself, the highest Iranian political and religious authority, means making the system fall, shows the poor knowledge of that country. Although detested by most of the population, the Nezam (the power system), has no organized oppositions like those that acted to overturn the Shah in 1978. And the death of the old garments of the powerful Pasdaran praises the way to a new generation of officers less corrupted by money and power, but always ready to shoot on its population to defend the system. Paradoxically, killing the old and sick supreme guide would reduce the power of the Shiite clergy to the benefit of the security apparatuses: Iran is not Syria, whose regime was without real internal military support. But Netanyahu is convinced that he can redesign the whole Middle East according to Israeli interests, counting only on military force and continuous war of which he has been infatuated.
*Riccardo Redaelli is the full professor of Geopolitics and History and Institutions of Asia at the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences of the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart of Milan. At the same University he directs the research center on the South System and the Allarogato Mediterranean (Crissma) and the Master in Middle Eastern Studies of Aseri (high school of economics and international relations). Author of numerous articles in specialized magazines and contributions to miscellaneous volumes.
