Analysis: Iran reluctant so far to retaliate against Israel after airstrike kills Hezbollah leader

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Analysis: Iran reluctant so far to retaliate against Israel after airstrike kills Hezbollah leader

2024-09-30 22:49 Last Updated At：22:51

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran lost its most reliable ally in the Middle East when an Israeli airstrike killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. But Iran isn’t leading the charge to retaliate.

That's put Tehran in a bind: Not responding could see it alienate the militias it relies on in the region. Meanwhile, any possible retaliation risks a wider war as its theocracy faces intense challenges at home.

“By the grace and power of God, Lebanon will make the transgressing, malicious enemy regret its actions,” Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in the wake of Nasrallah's death Friday. But the 85-year-old paramount ruler in Iran gave no mention of his country taking action over the death of a man he once praised as "an exceptional face in the world of Islam” after the Israel-Hezbollah war in 2006.

That reluctance continued into Monday, as Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani told journalists that “the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Iranian people are not after war" but rather “peace and stability in the region.”

Though Kananni added that, “any adventurous move or action against our national security or interests and our hands will never be tied,” at one point wearing a checkered Palestinian keffiyeh scarf during his remarks.

These comments highlight a reticence in responding to Nasrallah’s death. Though his leadership of Hezbollah was the crown jewel in Iran’s decades-long strategy of arming regional militias to counter both Israel and the United States, Iran remains cautious about when — or if — it will strike back.

That's not to say that it hasn't launched retaliatory strikes during the yearlong Israel-Hamas war that's riven the Middle East and threatens to erupt into a regional conflict. Iran launched an unprecedented direct attack on Israel in April. It even launched a missile strike against sites in Iraq, Syria and Pakistan in January.

But those attacks stemmed from direct attacks on Iranian targets, like the suspected Israeli strike on an Iranian diplomatic post in Syria.

“Iran I think in its priorities have been very much misunderstood since Oct. 8,” said Sanam Vakil, the director of the Middle East and North Africa program at the London-based international affairs think tank Chatham House. “There was a misconception Iran would pile in.”

Instead, it hung back after Hamas — another militant group it has armed — launched its Oct. 7 attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people and saw another 250 taken hostage. Even as millions of Iranians purportedly volunteered online to fight on behalf of the Palestinians, Iran didn't enter the war as an Israeli offensive devastated the Gaza Strip, killing over 41,000 people.

In the time since, an increasingly emboldened Israel has attacked Hezbollah, Yemen's Houthi rebels and other groups. In marking Nasrallah's killing, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cited a line in the Jewish Talmud fitting that strategy — "If someone rises up to kill you, kill him first."

For Netanyahu, whose political career has revolved around the threat he perceives from Iran, that includes striking back at those Iranian allies Tehran refers to as the “Axis of Resistance.” Those militias grew in prominence and power in the chaos that followed the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the 2011 Arab Spring and the rise of Yemen's Houthi rebels.

That created what Iran's opponents feared would become a “Shiite crescent” of influence that Tehran would be able to wield, something Israel may be aiming to roll back.

“An increasingly emboldened Israel appears to be considering a more expansive plan to confront Iran across the Middle East with the ambition of creating a new regional order,” said Julien Barnes-Dacey, the director of the Middle East and North Africa program at the European Council on Foreign Relations. “This is a dangerous illusion. Despite Iran’s current weakness, this will be seen as an existential threat by Tehran and its regional allies."

Iran could encourage more asymmetric attacks, targeting Jewish tourists, synagogues or Israeli diplomatic missions as it has done in the past. Netanyahu issued a warning Monday to Iran likely over that risk, saying: “There is nowhere in the Middle East Israel cannot reach.”

Tehran also could weaponize its nuclear program. It already enriches uranium to near-weapons-grade levels after the collapse of its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. Hard-line voices within Iran's theocracy, like its daily Kahyan newspaper, already are calling for a response “harsher” than its April attack, which caused very little damage.

That, however, runs directly counter to the plans of Iran's new reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian, who campaigned on a promise to get crushing economic sanctions lifted against Iran. That's grown in importance as energy prices continue to fall and Iran likely sells its oil at a discount due to being locked out of many nations.

If nuclear deal “commitments are implemented fully and in good faith, dialogue on other issues can follow,” Pezeshkian told the United Nations General Assembly last week.

Ending the sanctions requires a deal with the West on the nuclear program, something that will become nearly impossible if Iran enters an all-out war with Israel. Relieving that economic pressure remains crucial for Iran's domestic stability as well, as authorities remember the months of protests that followed the 2022 death of Mahsa Amini.

“For the time being it appears the president and the supreme leader, the latter who is abundantly cautious, want to keep the line open to dialogue and negotiations,” Vakil said.

And to keep that line open, Iran needs someone else to take the lead against Israel.

“Tehran apparently is content to allow Hezbollah to respond to the Nasrallah killing on its own, and perhaps in concert with the Houthi movement in Yemen, which has recently begun firing some of their Iran-supplied missiles against Israel,” the New York-based Soufan Center security think tank said Monday.

EDITOR’S NOTE — Jon Gambrell, the news director for the Gulf and Iran for The Associated Press, has reported from each of the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Iran and other locations across the world since joining the AP in 2006.

Supplies rushed to communities isolated by Helene as death toll rises to at least 107

2024-09-30 22:45 Last Updated At：22:50

ASHEVILLE, N.C. (AP) — The death toll from Hurricane Helene reached at least 107 people in six states on Monday, according an Associated Press tally.

Georgia Governor Brian Kemp said during a news conference Monday that the death toll in that state had risen from 17 to 25, pushing the overall toll to more than 100 people. More than half of those fatalities have been reported in the Carolinas.

A North Carolina county that includes the mountain city of Asheville reported 30 people killed there.

North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper predicted that the toll would rise as rescuers and other emergency workers reached areas isolated by collapsed roads, failing infrastructure and widespread flooding.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.

ASHEVILLE, N.C. (AP) — A crisis unfolded in western North Carolina as officials rushed to get more water, food and other supplies to flood-stricken areas without power and cellular service Monday, three days after Hurricane Helene ripped across the U.S. Southeast. The death toll from the storm approached 100.

At least 94 people across several states were killed. A North Carolina county that includes the mountain city of Asheville reported 30 people killed.

Gov. Roy Cooper predicted the toll would rise as rescuers and other emergency workers reached areas isolated by collapsed roads, failing infrastructure and widespread flooding.

Supplies were being airlifted to the region around the isolated city of Asheville. Buncombe County Manager Avril Pinder pledged that she would have food and water to the city by Monday.

“We hear you. We need food and we need water,” Pinder said on a Sunday call with reporters. “My staff has been making every request possible to the state for support and we’ve been working with every single organization that has reached out. What I promise you is that we are very close.”

Asheville's water system was severely damaged. Residents walked with buckets to a creek to get water to flush toilets, carefully watching their steps where a wall of water three days before ripped away all of the trees and ground, leaving only mud.

Neighbors shared food and water and comforted each other. “That’s the blessing so far in this,” Sommerville Johnston said outside her home.

Officials warned that rebuilding from the widespread loss of homes and property would be lengthy and difficult. The storm upended life throughout the Southeast. Deaths also were reported in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and Virginia.

Federal Emergency Management Agency officials said Monday that hundreds of roads were closed across western North Carolina and that shelters across the area were housing more than 1,000 people.

The governor implored residents in western North Carolina to avoid travel, both for their own safety and to keep roads clear for emergency vehicles. More than 50 search teams spread throughout the region in search of stranded people.

One rescue effort involved saving 41 people north of Asheville. Another mission focused on saving a single infant. The teams found people through both 911 calls and social media messages, North Carolina National Guard Adjutant General Todd Hunt said.

Video showed a mass of debris, including overturned pontoon boats and splintered wooden docks, covering the surface of Lake Lure, a picturesque spot tucked between the mountains outside Asheville.

President Joe Biden described the impact of the storm as “stunning” and said he would visit the area this week as long as it does not disrupt rescues or recovery work. In a brief exchange with reporters, he said the administration is giving states “everything we have” to help with their response to the storm.

Hurricane Helene roared ashore late Thursday in Florida’s Big Bend region as a Category 4 hurricane with 140 mph (225 kph) winds. A weakened Helene quickly moved through Georgia, then soaked the Carolinas and Tennessee with torrential rains that flooded creeks and rivers and strained dams.

There have been hundreds of water rescues, including in rural Unicoi County in East Tennessee, where dozens of patients and staff were plucked by helicopter from a hospital rooftop Friday.

More than 2 million homeowners and other utility customers were still without power Sunday night. South Carolina had the most outages and Gov. Henry McMaster asked for patience as crews dealt with widespread snapped power poles.

“We want people to remain calm. Help is on the way, it is just going to take time,” McMaster told reporters outside the airport in Aiken County.

The storm unleashed the worst flooding in a century in North Carolina. One community, Spruce Pine, was doused with over 2 feet (61 centimeters) of rain from Tuesday through Saturday.

Jessica Drye Turner in Texas had begged for someone to rescue her family members stranded on their rooftop in Asheville amid rising floodwaters. “They are watching 18-wheelers and cars floating by,” Turner wrote in an urgent Facebook post on Friday.

But in a follow-up message Saturday, Turner said help had not arrived in time to save her parents, both in their 70s, and her 6-year-old nephew. The roof collapsed and the three drowned.

“I cannot convey in words the sorrow, heartbreak and devastation my sisters and I are going through,” she wrote.

The state was sending water supplies and other items toward Buncombe County and Asheville, but mudslides blocking Interstate 40 and other highways prevented supplies from making it. The county’s own water supplies were on the other side of the Swannanoa River, away from where most of the 270,000 people in Buncombe County live, officials said.

Law enforcement was making plans to send officers to places that still had water, food or gas because of reports of arguments and threats of violence, the county sheriff said.

FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell toured south Georgia on Sunday and planned to be in North Carolina Monday.

“It’s still very much an active search and rescue mission” in western North Carolina, Criswell said. “And we know that there’s many communities that are cut off just because of the geography” of the mountains, where damage to roads and bridges have cut off certain areas.

Biden on Saturday pledged federal government help for Helene's “overwhelming” devastation. He also approved a disaster declaration for North Carolina, making federal funding available for affected individuals.

In Florida's Big Bend, some lost nearly everything they own. Some churches canceled regular services Sunday while others like Faith Baptist Church in Perry opted to worship outside.

Standing water and tree debris still covers the grounds of Faith Baptist Church. The church called on parishioners to come “pray for our community” in a message posted to the congregation’s Facebook page.

“We have power. We don’t have electricity,” Immaculate Conception Catholic Church parishioner Marie Ruttinger said. “Our God has power. That’s for sure.”

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp said Saturday that it looked “like a bomb went off” after viewing splintered homes and debris-covered highways from the air.

In eastern Georgia near the border with South Carolina, officials notified Augusta residents on Sunday morning that water service would be shut off for 24 to 48 hours because trash and debris blocked the ability to pump water.

With at least 25 killed in South Carolina, Helene was the deadliest tropical cyclone for the state since Hurricane Hugo made landfall north of Charleston in 1989, killing 35 people.

Moody’s Analytics said it expects $15 billion to $26 billion in property damage.

Climate change has exacerbated conditions that allow such storms to thrive, rapidly intensifying in warming waters and turning into powerful cyclones sometimes within hours.

Tropical Storm Kirk formed Monday in the eastern Atlantic Ocean and is expected to become a “large and powerful hurricane” by Tuesday night or Wednesday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said. The storm was located about 700 miles (1,125 kilometers) west of the Cabo Verde Islands with maximum sustained winds of 45 mph (70 kph). There were no coastal watches or warnings in effect, and the storm system was not a threat to land.

Whittle reported from Portland, Maine, and Payne reported from Perry, Florida. Haya Panjwani in Washington, Kate Brumback in Atlanta and Matthew Brown in Billings, Montana, contributed.

Analysis: Iran reluctant so far to retaliate against Israel after airstrike kills Hezbollah leader

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Analysis: Iran reluctant so far to retaliate against Israel after airstrike kills Hezbollah leader

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