Iran-Israel ceasefire may endure, but what lies ahead for the Middle East and global stability?

The Iran-Israel war ceasefire that has been watched with bated breath by nations around the world since it started last week is likely to continue for some considerable time. And if broken it will likely not be by Iran, but by Mossad – Israel’s intelligence agency that played a major role in the recent series of strikes against the Islamic Republic of Iran and its nuclear programme.

That is part of what emerged during a recent webinar on the subject hosted by Political Tours, an investors’ travel and current affairs analysis and information company with links to South Africa.

Charlie Gammell, a historian and former UK diplomat, said the June 22 strikes by the US, during which it claimed to have “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear facilities, left the Islamic republic in a strategically stronger rather than weaker position.

Despite Israel’s and the US’s claims of victory, Gammell said the raid was “not as successful as it was”. Iran is now in a stronger position and there’s still a “core of the regime” and “some state apparatus” still committed to the “very secretive policy of getting a bomb”.

By simply surviving, the Iranian regime is as good as having won after the recent battles, he argued. And what’s “nerve-inducing” for Western-aligned observers and those yearning for the Tehran regime’s demise is that the Europeans and Americans are now saying it’s time for negotiations with Iran. This, as Gammell put it, is an “implicit acknowledgement” that Iran’s nuclear facilities were not “obliterated”, as US president Donald Trump put it, and negotiations would likely lead to sanctions relief for Iran, which would strengthen it economically and politically, enabling it to crack down against internal dissent and continue with its “destabilising activities” at home and abroad and resume its nuclear programme.

Asked by the seminar’s facilitator, former BBC correspondent Owen Bennet-Jones, whether he thought Iran would push ahead with its nuclear weapons programme, Gammell replied emphatically to the affirmative.

"The motivation for Iran to have a bomb is a threat perception. How they see the region. And they see the region - they see themselves - as vulnerable in the region from American military bases but also, they see themselves as the regional hegemon … It's the same doctrine: we want to be the regional hegemon.

“So, that threat perception plus that sort of natural Iranian sense of itself in the region - those two things now are still there. In fact, the threat perception is even more. So, the impetus to get a bomb remains and, perhaps, has been amplified."

Despite this, Gammell is of the opinion that the Iranian regime will not want to break the ceasefire. Instead, it would opt to use the truce period to rebuild its economy and internal strength while the negotiations – at which they are masters – continued.

Iran did indeed suffer “heavy blows”, with 19 out of 25 of its senior military and intelligence leaders assassinated, Gammell explained. “There has been an earthquake at the top of the Islamic republic, however, there hasn’t been a fatal earthquake,” he said.

The US-Israel intelligence infiltration and targeted strikes were “pretty all-encompassing” and a “huge tactical achievement”, something they had been working on for the last 15 years, said Gammell. What was lacking, however, which is “often the case with Israel”, was strategy.

“They are tactical masters, but they can overlook the strategic objectives.”

And having survived the regime change – or obliteration - attempts and with the enriched uranium “still hidden”, the Iranian regime is now cracking down on dissent and buttressing its position at home and abroad.

Despite suffering some heavy blows, the regime is still in control. Citizens are “terrified of coming out” onto the streets, afraid of “savage reprisals at the tiniest whiff of resistance”. Therefore, the fact that the regime seems to be surviving is a “form of victory”, hence the US is now seeing this as a time for negotiations.

Asked to comment on the possibility of further strikes on or by Iran, Gammell said it was not in Tehran’s interests to break the ceasefire.

“It’s not in their interests to break the ceasefire. It’s in their interests to play nice and then get through the negotiation and do what they always do, which is pull the wool over diplomats’ eyes, get a negotiated settlement or get some kind of sanctions relief, which means that in parallel they can continue their destabilising activities at home and abroad. So, in that respect, I don’t think that if there is a break it would be (by) Iran.”

With the US having done its job of setting back Iran’s nuclear programme, the only strikes that can be foreseen in the near future would be by Mossad. Which is good news for global peace and stability as these would likely be limited to covert operations that are nothing like the all-out war many feared would break out in the region.

However, the future stability of the region and Israel’s policy going forward are still not clear. Gammell agreed with those raising questions about the sustainability of Israel’s policy of “keeping everyone in the region” in a state of “weakness and turmoil” to ensure its security.

“And the question that has hovered over Israel’s involvement in the region since October 8 (2003) has been: 'what's the end state here, what's the desired end state for Israel?’”

He cast doubt on the wisdom of Israel preferring to react tactically and leave “the strategy” to the Americans. As he explained, “a crocodile nears the boat, and we have to have tactical solutions to these problems”, but simply killing people associated with threats “creates more loyalty” and produces more “fighters”.

He said this was not to say that Israel shouldn’t do what it’s doing, but simply killing people associated with groups such as Hamas “creates more loyalty”, “more hardcore” fighters, which has been a strategic challenge for Israel and others who have attempted to wage war against those they view as terrorists or posing existential threats to their states.

Another challenge for Israel is that it would need to “sort out Gaza”, find a regionally acceptable final settlement at some point in the future to win more support from regional powers such as Saudi Arabia. Otherwise, it may soon find itself stranded as its relationship with the US is fast evolving while its economy is suffering.

Trump’s trip to the Middle East in May, which excluded a visit to Israel, is probably one clear sign of these age-old allies starting to drift apart.

Therefore, while Israel may seem to have “come out top” from last month’s conflict, and no all-out war has resulted from the US strikes - as had been feared and predicted by many analysts for years - the Iranian regime seems to have emerged stronger strategically from the recent conflict.