Ismail Haniya

The international community is anxiously watching what will happen in the Middle East after the assassination of Ismail Haniya and what Iran’s reaction will be.

“I estimate that we will have a serious reaction from the side of Iran, because what happened with the assassination of Haniya is humiliating for Iran. And you know how important prestige is, especially in the countries of the Middle East… So how important is what happened, that is, the assassination of Haniya, a very important ally of Iran, the political leader of Hamas” he said speaking on the First Program of Hellenic Constantinos Philis of Radio, Professor of International Relations.

“And it didn’t happen in Qatar, where he lived, it didn’t happen in Turkey, where he traveled. It did not happen in any other country on the planet or region. It happened in Tehran, the capital of Iran. So this obliges the Iranians for reasons of prestige and not only to react. Because, if they don’t react they will look extremely weak vis-a-vis Israel” he added.

The two versions

Referring now to Netanyahu, who when he made this show of force basically knew that Iran had no choice but to react, Mr. Filis underlined: “Not only did he know, but I can tell you that there are two versions in my own mind: One is that Israel is taking advantage of the current weakness of the Iranian regime. And this has to do with the shake-up at home, with Raishi’s death, with the election of a moderate-by-Iranian-standards-leader to the presidency, with the fact that there is a large part of Iran’s youth that questions the Iranian leadership and with the problems of the economy caused by the American sanctions. All of these are important. And all these have played their part. So, in the good version, in one of the two versions, Israel is investing in Iran’s weakness and constantly showing the weakness that Iran currently has in confronting Israel,” he said.

And he added: “However, the other scenario, which I do not rule out at all, the Israelis are trying to push the Iranians into a response that will be so intense that Israel in turn will respond even by hitting targets that had to do with Iran’s nuclear program. Because, in Israelis right now, there are two thoughts: One is that Iran’s nuclear program should end once and for all, because if it doesn’t end at some point Iran will get nuclear and that will be disastrous for Israel’s security . And the other thing is that regardless of that, we will have to eliminate all of Iran’s proxies, including Iran itself in the region, to end once and for all the danger called Iran and Hamas and Hezbollah and the Houthis and neither so on. But in this scenario, we won’t see good days that we don’t see in the Middle East anyway.”

Will there be a general conflict?

Regarding whether he believes that the above scenario will include Iraq and Lebanon’s Hezbollah as well as Yemen and Syria, in general that is, if they will all be included and therefore, we are talking about a generalized conflict, Mr. Filis pointed out the following:

«It’s not something we can rule out. There are always thoughts of logic, but how many times in the recent past have we seen irrational decisions based on logic being made? Therefore, I cannot rule it out. What I have to say is that Iran would not like to see Hezbollah destroyed by Israel.” he pointed out.

And he concluded: “Israel would not want to go to a confrontation with Hezbollah, whereas in 2006, when they went to a confrontation, we had a draw. It is the only time that Israel, in all the wars it fought with its neighbors against an organization and not a state, has won Jordan, it has won Egypt, Syria, it has won whoever messed with it (…) . The Israelis, however, for their part, opening all these fronts at the same time, is not sane, but I repeat, saneness and international politics do not necessarily go together.”