It is clear that the aggressive anti-Iranian clique within the American and Israeli governments will continue their policies towards Iran, as the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, the architect of Iran’s nuclear program, has shown us.
The assassination taking place right after the election of Joe Biden, who, unlike Trump, has taken a positive approach on the nuclear agreement with Iran could be regarded as Israel pushing Iran to take steps which will disrupt the process of the US-EU-Iran nuclear deal to be in effect again.
THE ISRAELI TRAP
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani gave the following statements after the assassination, confirming that it was in fact a deterrent move from Israel; “This brutal assassination shows that our enemies are passing through anxious weeks, weeks where they feel their era of pressure is coming to an end and the global conditions are changing. They both want to create instability in the region and draw the attention away from the terror and threats they have recently engaged in in the occupied territories (Palestine) … Iran’s enemies should know that the people [and officials] of Iran are too brave to leave this criminal act unanswered. In due time, they will answer for this crime. Iran is smarter than to fall into the trap of the conspiracy set by the Zionists.”
Rouhani’s statement about “weeks that they feel their pressure era is coming to an end”, that they meant the end of Trump’s presidential term and the process by which Biden will be sworn in to the White House.
Rouhani’s emphasis on “In due time” and a “trap”, means that they believe Israel is involved in such provocations hoping to undermine the US-EU-Iran nuclear deal once again.
THE GOAL IS TO DISRUPT THE IRANIAN STATE
Yakup Aslan, a journalist who has lived in Tehran for many years and knows the country’s political climate well, says that with the assassinations of Quds Force Commander Qasem Soleimani and Fakhrizadeh, Israel’s actual target was Iranian military and nuclear power.
On the other hand, it is not difficult to understand that Israeli officials, who have claimed responsibility and spoken to the international press anonymously regarding the attack, made statements such as “the world should thank us” in an effort to humiliate Iran and provoke them to retaliate, as well as putting Rouhani administration in difficult situation with the domestic policy.
Accordingly, when we consider these assassinations and acts of terrorism as a whole, we see that Israel intends to destroy Iran’s institutional structure, as well as to break its deterrent factor in the international arena and weaken the government from within.
Another claim about the assassination of Fakhrizadeh, is that “some Arab countries” supported the action alongside Israel.
Given their aggressive politics towards Iran, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia are the likely candidates.
THE ARABIC FRONT AGAINST TURKEY AND IRAN
Israel has also taken actions against Iran, not only militarily, but in the diplomatic field as well.
Israel continues its efforts to normalize the relations with the Arab countries, especially in the Gulf region, as a part of its “Deal of the Century” with the excessive support from the Trump administration.
While the UAE, Bahrain, and Oman have taken the lead in this process in the Gulf region, Qatar has not been involved and Saudi Arabia has been taking a neutral stance so far.
While the Saudi leadership has denied the Israeli media reports about the talks between Netanyahu and the crown prince Bin Salman, they did cancel the permission they had given to the Israeli passenger flights to use the Saudi airspace immediately after the assassination of Fakhrizadeh.
According to the media reports, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and his adviser Awi Berkowitz are expected to visit Saudi Arabia and Qatar in the coming days in order to persuade them to improve their relations with Israel.
Beneath the so-called Israeli-Arab normalization plan, lies the Tel Aviv administration’s plans to confront the Arab countries together against Iran and against Turkey.
The recent meeting between President Erdogan and the Saudi King Salman had even more importance as a result.
The media reported that the meeting went well, that the Saudis might revoke the embargo on Turkish products, and that they even ordered the purchase of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV drones) from Turkey.
THE SIMILARITY BETWEEN THE CONFRONTATION IN EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN AND THE FAKHRIZADEH ASSASSINATION
It is clear that a front is being set up against Turkey in the Eastern Mediterranean, from Europe to the Gulf countries, and that the United States and Israel are the leader of this front.
As the Fakhrizadeh assassination shows, the same front is acting against Iran as well.
There are many similarities between the German-led intervention of the Turkish freighter in the Eastern Mediterranean and the assassination of Fakhrizadeh, for istance: both were acts of provocation.
While efforts are being made to prevent the normalization of the Turkish-EU relations over the German intervention to the Turkish freighter, Iran’s nuclear energy agreement with the West was also targeted in the assassination of Fakhrizadeh.
Yet, Ankara and Tehran have taken a cautious stance against these incidents.
Yes, it is clear that these are just traps in both cases, but it does not seem possible to overcome these traps only with caution as the pressure from imperialism is increasing more than ever.
ANKARA AND TEHRAN SHOULD TAKE ACTION TOGETHER
Turkey and Iran working together on such issues will make it much easier to crumble these types of traps all together.
If Iran takes a clear stance alongside Turkey in the Eastern Mediterranean (such as diplomaticly recognizing the TRNC), and if Turkey clearly supports Iran on issues such as the assassination of Fakhrizadeh in return, there will be no need to rely on the sudden changes, contradictions, and deterioriations within the West.
At this point, another step that Turkey can take could be to act against hostile Arab countries, given that Turkey has relatively more “normal” relations with these nations than Iran has.
As the Ankara-Riyadh talks prove, Turkey can improve its relations with some of these Arab countries on the opposite front, and then play a mediator role between them and Iran.
In the end, the interventions of imperialism in Western Asia can only be prevented by easing down the regional contradictions to the lowest level possible, otherwise, there will always be someone to be used as an instrument for outside interests.
Of course, in order to take these steps, a political program built on solid grounds must be put in place, as negotiations with imperialism are not an option.