On August 29, senior Israeli diplomatic sources stated that Israel’s military will continue to target Iranian weapons and troops in Syria.
The Israeli source promised that the army will continue to act with “full determination” against Iranian attempts to get troops and weaponry onto Syrian ground, and that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu regards preventing Iranian troops from gaining a foothold in Syria as “no less important than getting the Iran nuclear deal canceled.”
Of course, critics of Israel’s stance have long said that while Jerusalem’s eerie attitude toward Iranian presence in the country is understandable, any attempt to force Tehran to disengage will be too little too late. After all, Iran has been slowly building its presence in Syria for years. It now possesses substantial infrastructure throughout the country, including full-fledged military bases of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). This very infrastructure is what allowed Iran to launch incursions into Israel earlier this year. And these same assets have been relentlessly targeted by the Israeli Defense Forces for months.
The Israeli government’s statement reported by several Hebrew language media outlets came as Iran continued to signal it would resist attempts to push its forces out of the country. Iran’s most recent policy announcement regarding Syria asserted that their presence was necessary in order to assist the massive nationwide reconstruction project now underway. In a meeting earlier this week between Iranian Defense Minister Amir Hatami and his Syrian counterpart in Damascus, Iran’s top defense official stated that “Syria is in a very important juncture […] it is passing through the critical stage and it is entering the very important stage of reconstruction.” Hatami added that Iran would have “presence, participation, and assistance” in reconstruction “and no third party will be influential in this issue.” This was just the latest in Iran’s years-long game of providing excuses to establish itself more and more in the country. Late last year, Iran declared that its continued presence in Syria was in order to eliminate the “terrorist groups” that were wreaking havoc on the country. As Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Shamkhani put it back in December 2017, “We will continue presence and providing advisory services in Syria until annihilation of all terrorist groups in the country at the demand of the legal Syrian government.” More recently, in July of this year, Iran vowed to maintain its forces in the country as long as the Syrian leadership requested it. A top aide to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told media sources that Iran would withdraw its “military advisers” from Syria only if Bashar al-Assad’s government wanted it to.
Of course, all of these reasons are only a charade needed in order to mask Iran’s real intentions. These include capitalizing on the chaos in Syria in order to project its power further in the Middle East.
After years of establishing itself in the country, it seems that Iran is not going away. Even though the fighting seems like it is on its way to a final conclusion, Iran is still making long-term plans to stick around. Many of the big stakeholders in Syria, even if they disagree on many things, seem to agree that Iran’s establishing itself in the country is a bad thing. President Trump’s new national security advisor, John Bolton claimed that this is a view shared by Russia as well. “Certainly the objective of the United States, of Israel […] President Putin said it was Russia’s objective to get Iranian forces, Iranian militias, Iranian surrogates out of the offensive operations they’re in, in both Syria and Iraq and frankly, to end Iran’s support for Hezbollah,” Bolton said.
Unfortunately, while everyone recognizes the destabilizing effects Iranian presence has in Syria, especially in threatening escalations with Israel, it seems that no one has a solution on how to get them out. As many regional analysts have noted, even Russia, Syria’s most valuable ally in the war, doesn’t have the leverage to remove Iran.
In truth, the only thing that has the potential for curbing Iran’s activities in Syria, and indeed the region as a whole, is the U.S. sanctions that have begun to kick in. This is why the sanctions are so central to U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East at the moment. Iranian meddling is a major factor in issues ranging from Syria to Yemen. Slowly strangling Iran of resources is the only available option short of all-out conflict.
