Israel strikes Iran: "It really was thirty years in the making"

CGTN Europe

CGTN Europe interviewed Laura Blumenfeld, a Middle East analyst and senior fellow at the Philip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

Transcript

00:00Well, Laura Blumenfeld is a Middle East analyst and a former U.S. State Department advisor for the Middle East

00:05and a current senior fellow at the Philip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies at Johns Hopkins.

00:11Thank you very much for being with us today. Very busy day, a lot going on.

00:15Were you surprised that this happened, these strikes were launched on Iran now, or was this very much on the cards, do you think?

00:23Well, I think that when you flex muscle, which is what Israel was doing, and frankly, Iran,

00:28sometimes when the shirt's too tight, you pop buttons.

00:31And I think that so much tension has been building up really since October 7th,

00:36since Israel and Iran have already traded tit-for-tat strikes.

00:41So, yes, Friday the 13th is a fateful day in Israel's military history and Iran's,

00:46but it really was 30 years in the making, if you go all the way back to the time that Prime Minister Netanyahu,

00:51who was just a young Israeli leader, made that his kind of raison d'etre.

00:55This was his, you know, kind of point of no return, but he's been heading in that direction for decades.

01:01And do you think that Israel has achieved its targets?

01:04How much has this attack likely to have diminished Iran's nuclear program in a way that makes Israel feel safer?

01:12And were they likely, given the recent IAEA warnings about the strengthening of the nuclear program?

01:19Yeah, I think that there are some real, tangible military accomplishments here,

01:25and there's also some symbolic success as well.

01:28I mean, just talking about what kind of targets that they struck and were successful with,

01:33there were from personnel, there were at least three top generals from Iran that were taken out,

01:38two nuclear scientists.

01:40Also, in terms of military infrastructure, they managed to damage one of the main nuclear enrichment sites

01:46and several other military facilities.

01:48And finally, from an intelligence point of view, this wasn't only military dominance,

01:53but it was also an intelligence coup, which, as we all know, since October 7th,

01:57Israel's been trying to work their way back up from what was a massive intelligence failure.

02:02I think it was also a symbolic victory.

02:04Look, the operation is called Lion Rising.

02:07Lion is a symbol of Israel. It's the Lion of Judah.

02:11But the lion is also on the flag of the Shah, the leader of Iran, before the Islamic regime took over.

02:17So I just wonder if part of this is also, you know, the question still remains,

02:21is this about a decapitation of the regime?

02:23It's certainly, with the name of the operation, meant to inspire Iranians to take their kind of government back

02:29and make it for the people.

02:31So hugely symbolic.

02:32And what are the immediate dangers now?

02:35Israel in a state of emergency, 100 Iranian drones already intercepted.

02:40How big could the backlash be?

02:42And are groups like, you know, Hezbollah, Hamas, are they in any position to join Iran in retaliating against Israel?

02:50Well, I think that Hezbollah has already said that they won't retaliate,

02:54which, of course, was always the Iranian regime's life insurance policy.

02:58But there are, you know, grave dangers ahead.

03:00I mean, on the one hand, you could say the response team from Iran is dead.

03:05So perhaps Israel doesn't have as much to worry about because Iran has been significantly degraded by this preemptive attack.

03:11On the other hand, as Steve Whitcoff, Trump's, you know, special envoy for just about everything, warned,

03:17there could be a mass casualty retaliation.

03:20You know, if many Israelis died, then that could just sort of escalate things further.

03:25And also, you know, what's next?

03:27What's the day after plan?

03:28Israel hasn't really put forward a coherent plan for Gaza.

03:32Can you imagine what is the day after a plan for Iran?

03:35Will sort of radicals end up sort of fracturing?

03:37And will we have something that looks like ISIS spreading back across the Middle East?

03:41There's a lot at stake today.

03:44This morning, people, at least in Washington, where I'm sitting, are optimistic.

03:47As Trump said, it's looking excellent.

03:50A lot at stake on this Friday, 13th.

03:54Laura Blumenfeld, thank you so much for joining us.

03:56That's Laura Blumenfeld, former U.S. State Department advisor for the Middle East.

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