Is Israel on ‘red alert’ yet?

Israel retaliated against the 8 April attacks by hitting positions of the Syrian army in southwest Syria. Israeli artillery and armed drones struck the Syrian army's 90th and 52nd Brigades, while Israeli fighter jets targeted Syrian radar sites, the Iran-backed 4th Division of the Syrian army, and a road leading to a mansion located near the Syrian presidential palace owned by Maher al-Assad, the notorious commander of the 4th Division and brother Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

A deteriorating strategic environment

Several factors have driven Israel to more quickly resort to military force to address perceived security threats. It all starts with the potential structural changes in the strategic environment in which it lives.

Not too long ago, Israel was excited about two major strategic developments in the region: One, US Central Command (CENTCOM)'s inclusion of the Jewish state into its area of responsibility, which meant increased tactical and operational cooperation on the Iranian threat.

Two, the possibility of expanding the Abraham Accords, which saw the UAE and Bahrain normalise ties with the Jewish state in 2020, and of building a stronger regional coalition against Iran. 

Today, Israel seems less upbeat about the new relationship with CENTCOM because the level of strategic coordination and intelligence sharing has yet to meet Israeli expectations. Regionally, the thought of an Arab-Israeli bloc emerging to counter the threat of Iran seems too far-fetched now given the latest flurry of Arab diplomatic activity toward Tehran.

In a dramatic shift in policy, on 10 March, Saudi Arabia signed a Chinese-brokered diplomatic accord with Iran, ending decades of hostilities.

Read more: Will the Saudi-Iran deal reshuffle the regional security deck?

The agreement has not only restored political relations between the two bitter rivals but also has begun to address shared grievances and most importantly for Riyadh, to put an end to the war in Yemen, which has been the kingdom's biggest concern. 

Yet, Saudi Arabia is not alone in attempting to reconcile with Iran. The UAE, too, has been involved in a process of rapprochement with Tehran. Several high-level meetings between Emirati and Iranian officials have occurred in recent months, the latest on 16 March where Ali Shamkhani, the head of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, visited Abu Dhabi and held talks with the president of the UAE, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan on a range of issues.

Even Bahrain, the island-nation that often blames Iran for fomenting instability on its soil through local Bahraini militants and saboteurs, held secret talks with Iranian officials in recent weeks amid the Saudi-Iranian détente.

Adding to these significant regional changes is Washington's much reduced involvement in the Middle East, which worries Israel a great deal. The United States remains Israel's closest partner in the world, but it's clear that there's a crisis of trust between the two sides.

Read more: Biden's security strategy reflects waning US interest in the Middle East

Washington is concerned about Israel's democratic future, given Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's controversial policies against the judiciary, while Israel is much less assured by US policy toward Iran.

Read more: Will Netanyahu's antagonism jeapordise US support?

Israel views US tolerance of Iranian aggression against even its own troops in the region as deeply problematic and incredibly dangerous because it weakens deterrence (Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently mentioned that Iran launched 83 attacks on US forces since Biden came to office, to which Washington responded only four times). Israel also is less confident that the United States is willing to use force in time to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

Read more: The credibility of American deterrence in the Middle East

If the strategic picture for Israel isn't encouraging, neither is the tactical/operational one. Israel has been extra sensitive to developing threats in its neighbourhood and eager to strike hard and often because it assesses that Iran is working on changing the rules of the game and with it the balance of power.

More specifically, Israel has been increasingly aggressive with its responses to Iranian-directed attacks, activities, and provocations because it believes that Tehran wants to build an integrated air defence network in Syria.

In recent months, Iran has sought to transfer air defence assets and precision-guided munitions into Syria to achieve that strategic objective and ultimately constrain potential Israeli plans to strike Iranian nuclear facilities.

Should that forward defensive position be built in Syria, it could provide early warning to Iran-based air defence systems. Israel's operational priority has been to deny Iran that objective by disrupting transportation networks into Syria and destroying sites that store and produce advanced weapons in Syria.

Deterrence at risk but still in play

The sky isn't falling for Israel, but the Jewish state may be feeling, once again, alone and even cornered in this shifting strategic environment that is producing more serious dangers, and on multiple fronts.

Diplomacy is not an option for Israel to remove or contain these Iran-centric threats (always a major handicap in Israeli statecraft), which means that Tel Aviv has no other recourse but to use the military instrument. This option will always carry great risks because it can easily lead to accidents and miscalculations, and ultimately to war – which is precisely what happened in the 2006 conflict with Hezbollah.

So far, deterrence has held in large part because neither side wants a war. But if Iran continues to build its military presence in Syria and develop its nuclear programme, this pattern of escalation will persist, and it will be only a matter of time before a direct military confrontation occurs.