Escalating missile strikes raise risk of wider Middle East conflict

Washington/Baghdad — Missile attacks in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen at the weekend threw into sharp focus the increasing risk of the war in Gaza triggering a wider regional conflict that pits Iran and its allies against Israel and the US.

Iran said five of its Revolutionary Guards were killed in a missile strike, which it blamed on Israel, on a house in Damascus on Saturday. Security sources in Lebanon said an Israeli strike there killed a member of Iranian-backed Hezbollah.

Later on Saturday, missiles and rockets launched by Iranian-backed militants in Iraq, where such groups have targeted US forces, hit al-Asad airbase, the US central command said. A number of US personnel are being evaluated for traumatic brain injuries and one Iraqi service member was wounded, it said.

The US also said it targeted a missile that the Iran-backed Houthi group in Yemen was aiming into the Red Sea, which it called a threat to shipping.

The conflict in Gaza began on October 7 when Hamas fighters stormed border defences to attack Israeli bases and towns, killing more than 1,200 people and seizing more than 200 hostages.

Israel pounded targets across the Gaza Strip on Saturday while its planes dropped leaflets on the southern area of Rafah urging Palestinians seeking refuge there to help locate hostages held by Hamas, residents said.

Hamas is part of Iran’s “Axis of Resistance”, a regional alliance that also includes Lebanon’s Hezbollah, the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad, Shiite militia groups in Iraq and the Houthis who control much of Yemen.

Amid increased regional tensions, Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi vowed to punish Israel for its strike in Syria, calling it “crimes” that would not go unanswered, according to a statement on Iran state broadcaster IRIB.

Three of the Revolutionary Guards officers killed in the Israeli strike were described in Iranian state media with an honorific used only for generals, suggesting the targets were senior commanders.

There was no comment from Israel, which typically does not discuss such attacks publicly.

Israel’s intense bombardment of Gaza since October 7 quickly triggered border clashes between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah. Over the past three months Israel has also repeatedly struck at Iranian targets in Syria, while Iranian-backed groups in Syria and Iraq have fired at US targets in those countries.

Aside from Gaza, the theatre of conflict with the widest international repercussions has been the Red Sea, where the Houthis have repeatedly targeted shipping they say is bound for or linked to Israel. Some companies are avoiding the key waterway, dealing a blow to global trade.

US and British strikes over the past week have targeted Houthis forces in Yemen.

Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister expressed concern that tensions in the Red Sea over Houthi strikes and US counterattacks could spiral out of control in the Middle East. “Of course we are very worried,” Prince Faisal bin Farhan told CNN in an interview aired on Saturday. “We are in a very difficult and dangerous time in the region, and that’s why we are calling for de-escalation.”

Regional and Iranian sources say Iran and Hezbollah have personnel in Yemen helping direct attacks on shipping, though the Houthis have denied that.

In Gaza on Saturday, Palestinian fighters battled tanks trying to push back into the eastern suburbs of the Jabalia area in the northern strip, where Israel had started pulling out troops and shifting to smaller-scale operations, residents and militants said.

The Israeli military said aircraft struck militant squads trying to plant explosives near troops and fire missiles at tanks in northern Gaza and said it is striking targets throughout Gaza.

Also on Saturday, the Israeli military said that at the end of a kilometre-long, booby-trapped tunnel in Gaza, soldiers discovered cramped cells where Hamas had kept about 20 hostages. No hostages were there when it was found.

A total of 25,105 Palestinians have been killed and 62,681 have been injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since October 7, the Gaza health ministry said in a statement on Sunday. About 178 Palestinians were killed and 293 injured between Saturday and Sunday, it said.

Israel’s military said its soldiers had killed 15 Palestinian gunmen during fighting in the northern Gaza Strip. In the southern city of Khan Yunis, the military said snipers, backed by air support, have “eliminated a number of terrorists”. 

Reuters