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Mahesh

15/04/24 10:22 AM IST

A short history of Iran-Israel

In News
  • Iran was one of the first countries in the region to recognise Israel after its formation in 1948. It was only after 1979 that their diplomatic ties ended.
Pre-1979 Iran-Israel ties
  • In 1948, the opposition of Arab states to Israel led to the first Arab-Israeli war.
  • Iran was not a part of that conflict, and after Israel won, it established ties with the Jewish state. It was the second Muslim-majority country to do so after Turkey.
  • The Pahlavi dynasty, under the Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, ruled Iran then.
  • It had US support, as did Israel, and the two countries maintained ties with each other, with Iran also selling oil to Israel amid its economic boycott by Arab states.
The 1979 revolution
  • A religious state was established in Iran after the Shah was overthrown in the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
  • The regime’s view of Israel changed, and it was seen as an occupier of Palestinian land.
  • Israel’s Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini termed Israel “Little Satan” and the United States the “Great Satan”, seeing the two as parties interfering in the region.
  • Iran also sought to grow its presence in the region, challenging the two major powers Saudi Arabia and Israel – both of whom were US allies.
  • Meanwhile, Egypt’s leader Gamal Abdel Nasser had long championed the idea of “pan-Arabism” in the region, for the cultural commonalities between the Arab states to be translated into larger solidarity and unity.
  • This put Iran, a non-Arab country, at odds with it.
  • The signing of an accord between Iran and Iraq in 1975 – in which Iran agreed to stop arming Kurdish-Iraqi separatists – led to a temporary lessening of hostility between those implacable enemies. In both cases, Israel’s strategic value to Iran suffered.
A Shadow War after 1979
  • As a result, the ties between the countries worsened.
  • While Israel and Iran have never engaged in direct military confrontation, both have attempted to inflict damage on the other through proxies and limited strategic attacks.
  • Israel has attacked Iranian nuclear facilities from time to time.
  • In the early 2010s, it targeted several facilities and nuclear scientists in a bit to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons.
  • In 2010, the US and Israel are believed to have developed Stuxnet, a malicious computer virus.
  • Used to attack a uranium enrichment facility at Iran’s Natanz nuclear site, it was the “first publicly known cyberattack on industrial machinery”.
  • Iran, meanwhile, is seen as responsible for funding and supporting several militant groups in the region that are anti-Israel and anti-US, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
  • This support was why concerns of a widening conflict or a confrontation have been raised in the last few months.
  • Along with how Iran, its proxies and Israel react in the various situations that have unfolded, a significant factor is the US reaction.
Source- Indian Express

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