Iranian hardliners demand military response to Israel's attack on diplomatic mission in Syria

Just a week after Ali Khamenei, Iran's Supreme Leader, emphasised the dominance of media over missiles and drones in modern conflicts, Israel's attack flattened Iran's consular annexe in Damascus, compelling Khamenei to adopt a more aggressive stance, vowing retaliation against Israel.

Following this attack, which claimed the lives of at least 13 individuals, including seven high-ranking commanders and officers of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Iran's president and foreign minister swiftly threatened Israel with reprisals. However, these assurances failed to satisfy Tehran's hardline politicians.

Since the beginning of the Gaza war, Israel has repeatedly targeted top IRGC officials. In response, Tehran pledged retaliation while emphasising a strategy of 'strategic patience,' reasoning that avoiding wider regional conflict would deny Israel the opportunity to divert international attention from civilian casualties in Gaza.

Despite extensive propaganda within the establishment endorsing this foreign policy approach, the recent attack—directly targeting Iran's consulate—prompted vocal criticism from hardliners in the establishment.

Yasser Jebraily, a conservative politician closely aligned with President Ebrahim Raisi's government, demanded immediate action of a similar magnitude against Israel. Jebraily openly dismissed the officials' 'strategic patience,' arguing that Iran's response would not escalate into all-out war.

He suggested that Israel would increase its use of "measures short of war" and deployment of a Gray Zone Strategy if it did not respond decisively.

"In this situation, rationality demands reciprocal action at an equivalent level. Such a response will convey the message that Iran's avoidance of full-scale war does not stop retaliation for actions below the threshold of war. It signifies that the next strike will inevitably invite a counter-strike," he stressed.

Jebraily went even further, criticising the establishment's attack on the Ain-Al Sad military base in Iraq as a response to the killing of Qassem Soleimani, the commander of the IRGC foreign operations arm. Soleimani was killed by the US Army in an air raid on Baghdad International Airport in 2020.

"If this strategy were adopted, the appropriate response to the assassination of Haj Qassem would have been to target a US military figure, not launch a missile attack on Ain al-Assad base. If the US possessed the power, determination, and capability to attack Iran, it would not require an excuse. The same holds true for the Zionist regime," he added.

The pro-conservative Alef website also demanded a strong response from Israel, cautioning that any action lacking consideration of military measures would harm Iran's national interests.

"Throughout decades of its disgraceful existence, the occupying regime of Jerusalem has shown it only understands occupation, war, and killing... The attack on our country's consulate building underscores that the only language the Zionists comprehend is that of force and resistance," the Alef website asserted.

Meanwhile, even some advocates of the "strategic patience" theory, including Iran's former ambassador to Iraq, doubted its effectiveness in light of targeting Iran's official diplomatic mission in Syria, which demonstrated a new level of violence in Israel's regional policies.

Hassan Danaeifar, a former IRGC commander and Iran's ambassador to Iraq from 2010 to 2017, underlined that Israel's attack on Iran's consulate in Syria amounted to an attack on Iranian territory, leaving no recourse but retaliation.

"The Islamic Republic of Iran must respond; its territory has been violated, and it cannot afford to remain inactive," he insisted.

The former Iranian diplomat even proposed considering Israel's diplomatic missions in European countries as potential targets for retaliation.

"Iran must deliver an appropriate response to the Zionist regime's attack, even if it occurs in a European country, to convey the seriousness of our stance... This could mirror the Zionist regime's aggression, targeting diplomatic centres of this regime in Europe or the region," he suggested.