The Israeli attack that could be even more devastating than the aid convoy airstrike

The killing of seven World Central Kitchen charity workers has overshadowed Israel’s deadly bombing of the Iranian consulate in Syria on Monday. But, says Mary Dejevsky, this clear violation of international law has taken the war to a new level – and could yet spark a conflagration across the entire region

Iranian protesters burn US and Israeli flags after an airstrike on Tehran’s consulate in Syria (AP)

The news spotlight, in another week of death and devastation in the Middle East, has understandably been on the seven aid workers killed in a series of Israeli missile strikes as they drove along the coast road in Gaza.

This was especially understandable in the UK, which is where three of those travelling in the World Central Kitchen convoy came from, and where their bodies have now been returned.

Some have criticised the narrow focus on the aid workers’ deaths as implying that white lives from the rich world were somehow more valuable than those of Palestinians, tens of thousands of whom have also died as a result of Israeli airstrikes. Yet it can also be said that the aid workers’ deaths made for a poignant approach to the half-year mark of this conflict, which falls on Sunday: seven individuals with no personal stake in the fighting, struck down by a weapon of the very war whose consequences they were trying to mitigate.

But it is not just the scale of so many other lives lost that the aid workers’ deaths may have obscured – across much of the Western world, at least. On the very same day and just a few hours before, there had been another series of lethal strikes in an attack that may in the longer term prove of wider consequence than the killings on the Gaza coast road that Israel Defense Forces belatedly regretted as a tragic mistake.

This earlier attack, also a multi-missile attack, destroyed the Iranian consulate, which stood next door to Iran’s embassy in Damascus. The death toll currently stands at 16, and among those killed was a senior commander in Iran’s revolutionary guard, his deputy and other officers. In this case, there was no expression of regret, and, it must be assumed, no mistake. In fact, there was no admission of responsibility either. But then Israel as a rule makes no comment on such “successful” attacks, leaving others to draw their own conclusions.

At this point, I should stress that, in contrasting the killing of the aid workers in Gaza with the killings in Damascus, I do not want to belittle what happened in Gaza – the gravity of Israel’s “mistake”, the permanent loss to the family and friends of those who died, or the catastrophic effect the attack is already having on the provision of essential aid to Gaza, as organisations suspend their work. There may even be some secondary effect on arms supplies to Israel from the UK, and perhaps even the US – though this looks unlikely.

The difference is that what happened in Gaza, however heinous, and possibly a war crime, has very little chance of spreading or escalating the conflict. There is even a chance – a slight chance – that these particular Gaza killings could have a restraining effect, even if it is only temporary.

To some extent at least, Israel appears to comprehend the damage the aid workers’ deaths have done to its cause – hence the promise of a swift investigation and the abject apology, the likes of which I cannot recall ever having heard from an Israeli official, still less from the chief of staff of Israel’s military. Dare one hope that there could be lessons learned?

Contrast the attack on Iran’s consulate in Damascus, which could have exceptionally dangerous and far-reaching repercussions. Like the airstrikes in January in south Beirut, which killed the deputy leader of Hamas, among others, this was no mistake. It was a deliberate, targeted assault on representatives of a military organisation that Israel regards as a prime enemy. It was an attack on the top brass of Iran’s revolutionary guard and, by extension, on Iran itself.

And while the attack on Hamas leaders in Beirut was deplored by the Lebanese authorities as a violation of its territory – which indeed it was – the attack on Iran’s consulate in Damascus constituted an even more flagrant breach of international rules. Not only did it entail an intrusion into Syrian airspace, but it also flouted the whole concept of diplomatic immunity. The Iranian consulate has diplomatic protection, as a territory of Iran. A third country has come along and destroyed it.

The US, at least, understood the seriousness of such an act when it – mistakenly – struck the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in 1999 as part of Nato’s bombing campaign against Serbia. The error was subsequently put down to outdated CIA maps, but the risk of international opprobrium and Chinese reprisals took the then secretary of state, Madeleine Albright, to the Chinese embassy in Washington the very next morning to apologise in person. It hardly needs to be said that this is not what Israel is about to do in relation to Iran.

On the contrary, Israel seems to be taking advantage of the general lawlessness unleashed by Hamas on 7 October, not just to attack Hamas and its leaders, wherever they may lurk, but to pick off those it sees as its protectors and sponsors – in other words, Iran. The strikes on Iran’s diplomatic representation in Damascus, albeit targeting military officers rather than civilian diplomats, take this campaign to a new level.

And even if Israel sees such raids as an example of attack being the most effective defence, this is a gamble of high risk. Targeting Iran’s proxies is one thing; targeting Iran itself and its own interests is quite another. Such thinking relies on Iran being too weak to respond, as it well may be, given the volatile state of its politics.

But it also shows contempt for undertakings given soon after the Hamas 7 October attacks by none other than Iran’s supreme leader, to the effect that Iran would stay out of Israel’s quarrel with Hamas. Again, this might offer more evidence of Iran’s weakness, but that undertaking has largely been honoured.

A similar message came from the Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, in southern Lebanon, and that too has largely been honoured. Since 7 October, there has been no major escalation of anti-Israel activity by Hezbollah in southern Lebanon – which had been feared – or any other Iranian escalation impinging on what Israel might see as its interests.

Rather than testing Iran’s intentions, however, Israel seems to have treated its stated stance almost as an invitation to probe and then to destroy. It has now resulted in a clear violation of international law in the attack on Iran’s consulate in Syria.

For the moment, a perilous three-cornered game seems to be in progress, with Israel picking off Iran’s proxies and other Arab states standing by, as it suits them to have Iran weakened still further. The risk here, though, is that Iran’s forbearance may one day reach its limits, and, weak though it may be, it could snap, precipitating an out-and-out confrontation, up to and including war.

Directly attacking the interests of an adversary, however long-standing that adversary may be, hardly seems to make sense for Israel at a time when it has its hands full with its war against Hamas in Gaza. This is doubly so, given that this war appears to be taking a lot more time and resources than Israel surely envisaged at the outset – not to speak of the diplomatic troubles it has created with almost everyone, including erstwhile loyal friends, and the divisions it has exposed within Israel itself.

One of the – very few – positives about the Gaza war is that it has so far, even six months on, not really spread as had been feared. That may owe something to Iran’s current weakness, but perhaps more to the reluctance of many Arab states, as well as Turkey and Egypt, to become involved in anything other than attempts at securing a ceasefire and the release of more hostages.

The more Israel strikes directly at Iran and its interests, however, the greater the risk of escalation must be – which is why Israel’s two air strikes last Monday are so different, and why Israel’s unacknowledged attack on Iran’s consulate in Damascus should have received more attention – and more condemnation – than it did.

The first could influence the war, if at all, by curbing some of Israel’s excesses. The latter could help spark a conflagration throughout the region.