Palpable fear conflict will spread in unstable region

The war between Israel and Iran will not be confined to an exchange of missile attacks, reports Bel Trew from Damascus

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Israel’s massive bombardment of Iran could be the most significant attack on the country since its devastating war with Iraq in the 1980s. It pushes a broiling Middle East – where slaughter has become a daily reality for so many – to the very edge of another regional bloody conflict.

The deep concern here is that the war will play out on the ground of the countries neighbouring Israel and Iran rather than being another exchange of missile or drone attacks. To explain, Israel’s attack (which it has justified as “pre-emptive”) has apparently killed two of the most powerful military figures in the country.

Iran's elite Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said its leader Major General Hossein Salami, as well as the chief of staff of the Iranian armed forces, Major General Mohammad Bagheri, Iran’s highest-ranking army officer, were among the dead.

Iranian state media reported that the strikes also took out senior IRGC official Gholam Ali Rashid, as well as two of the country’s most prominent nuclear scientists – Fereydoun Abbasi and Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi. It is notable that many Western leaders were quick to distance themselves from Israel's operation.

Destroyed residential blocks in Tehran yesterday (Getty)

US secretary of state Marco Rubio pointedly said that Washington’s closest ally in the region took “unilateral action against Iran”. Although Donald Trump did alert the world to something on the horizon when he evacuated some personnel from embassies in the Middle East region earlier this week.

“We are not involved in strikes against Iran and our top priority is protecting American forces in the region," Mr Rubio said in a statement edged with a kind of desperation.