WorthyNews: Iran Cancels Plans To Attack Israel After Trump Victory (Worthy News Focus)

[WorthyNewsBot]

By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News

TEHRAN/JERUSALEM (Worthy News) – Iran has canceled plans to attack Israel following Donald J. Trump’s victory in the recent U.S. presidential elections, Israeli and Iranian officials say.

Israeli sources said the incoming administration is drafting plans “to bring down the Islamist regime,” which has ruled Iran for more than four decades.

Tehran’s decision to refrain from attacking Israel at this time was reportedly made to head off this scenario.

But it was also driven by Israel’s decimation in Lebanon of Hezbollah — the closest and most important of Iran’s allies, Iranian sources suggested.

Also, Trump’s stated plans to end the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine appealed to Iran, the officials said.

Before the U.S. election was even held, Iran reportedly told the Biden administration that, contrary to claims by some American intelligence officials, “it was not plotting to assassinate Trump.”

In comments monitored by Worthy News, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran welcomed the U.S.-backed truce between Hezbollah and Israel.

‘RIGHT TO RESPOND’

He added that “Tehran maintains its right to respond to Israel’s airstrikes on Iran last month, but it will take into consideration regional developments such as the cease-fire in Lebanon.”

Sanam Vakil, the Middle East director for Chatham House, a British policy research group, told The New York Times newspaper that Iran is responding to the coming changes in Washington and the changed domestic and regional geopolitical landscape.

“It all came together, and the shift in tone is about protecting Iran’s interests,” Vakil said.

Additionally, Iran faces economic crises at home. Its currency has dropped steadily against the dollar, and an energy shortage looms as winter approaches.

These economic and social tensions are seen as another reason why Tehran can’t afford another costly armed confrontation with Israel and its allies.

That seemed different on October 1, when Iran fired more than 180 ballistic missiles at Israel in the second-ever direct attack by Tehran against the Jewish state.

The Israel Defense Forces, with assistance from the U.S., downed most of the missiles, with the sole casualty of the attack being a Palestinian man from Gaza struck by falling missile debris near Jericho.

ISRAELI JETS HIT

In response, on October 26, Israeli jets hit 20 sites in Iran, reportedly knocking out air defenses and setting back the country’s missile production industry. The Israeli air strikes also destroyed radar systems required to guide the Islamic Republic’s ballistic missiles, Israeli and Iranian sources said.

Initially, Tehran downplayed the impact of the strikes, but Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reportedly told his associates later that the scope of Jerusalem’s retaliation was “too large to ignore.”

It also explained why, after the U.S. election, Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, Amir Saeid Iravani, met with Elon Musk, the billionaire entrepreneur with Trump’s ear, at the ambassador’s residence in New York.

Iranian officials described the meeting aimed at easing tensions “as promising.”

However, while Iran’s reformist and centrist factions rejoiced at the news, conservatives

reportedly called the ambassador “a traitor”.

Analysts said it underscored Tehran’s internal struggle to engage with anyone in Trump’s orbit.

Iranian critics of Trump remember he exited a nuclear deal with Iran in 2018, imposed tough sanctions on the country, and ordered the killing of a top general, Qassim Suleimani, in 2020.

Yet with Trump on his way to the White House and his envoys soon to Jerusalem, Iranian officials seem more reluctant to attack Israel, though the nations feared Supreme Leader has the last word.

The post Iran Cancels Plans To Attack Israel After Trump Victory (Worthy News Focus) appeared first on Worthy Christian News.

View the full article