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Comment by cryptoxchange | Hacker News Reader

Every analyst I respect has the same take. This guy even glosses over that it wasn’t a general on a tarmac this time, but a general in a consulate that was extrajudicially murdered. Iran had to respond in a show of force to reestablish deterrence, without escalating the conflict, drawing the US in.

Two kids are on the playground, one has a big brother. They’re both constantly bothering each other. The kid without the big brother has to ride a thin line to not look like he’s trying to kill the other kid (causing the big brother to run over) while still bruising him back enough that the other kid leaves him alone until next week.

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Do we know what motivated Israel's assassination of the Iranian general? It seems unwise to resort to assassination unprovoked.

Easy. They’re losing the Gaza war. Yemen’s blockade and full militarization is crushing Israel’s economy. Bibi is out of a job and possibly his freedom if war stops.

Time for a trump card: escalation of the conflict will keep the extremists happy and keep the hostilities going for possibly years. Bibi’s best choice.

They are losing the Gaza justification. Obviously they have obliterated Gaza and Gaza had no way to defend itself.

HAMAS has retaken Northern Gaza. The area is depopulated but not safe for IDF. Mission Failed (unless the mission was to ethnically cleanse in the first place).

The Iranian general was actively working to help arm Hezbollah, who have been i a low-grade conflict with Israel since October 7th (and before). Think Israel and Hezbollah shooting rockets at each other back and forth for the last 6 months kind of conflict.

Because of this conflict, Israel has ~80k citizens who have had to evacuate their homes because they are too close to the border, and they are afraid to come back with Hezbollah continuing to attack.

See e.g. this random article: https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/explained-global...

> According to a report in The Guardian, Zahedi “commanded units in Lebanon and Syria and was most likely a critical figure in Tehran’s relationship with Hezbollah and Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad”.

> Arab News quoted a US Department of the Treasury statement from August 3, 2010, saying that Zahedi “also acted as a liaison to Hezbollah and Syrian intelligence services and is reportedly charged with guaranteeing weapons shipments to Hezbollah.”

In terms of international law (for what that's worth), that is a dangerous precedent. Is a US general a legitimate target for Russia now, because we're arming their enemy?

AFAIK, even during the Cold War, when the US was arming Russia's enemies (like Afghanistan) and Russia was arming the US's enemies (like Vietnam), neither nation went so far as to assassinate generals from the other.

We even asked Ukraine not to attack a Russian general.[1]

So, historically, it seems like what Israel did would not generally be considered justified.

(OTOH, we did assassinate Yamamoto, but we were actively at war with Japan.)

1: https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=40049703

I mean, the US did assassinate Soleimani, an Iranian general, in 2020: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Qasem_Soleima... . So I wouldn't exactly call this a precedent.

But yes, this is a complicated issue.

That link does say:

> Some experts, including the United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, considered the assassination [of Soleimani] as a likely violation of international law as well as U.S. domestic laws.

Yeah, I was only pointing out that it wasn't a precedent.

(And btw, imagine Iran having then sent 150 missiles aimed at the US. Seems to me like the US would respond.)

Is there any gentlemanlyness at play in those examples or is it just all tactics.

the current regime in Iran has not thought much of the "special" status of embassies historically.

I tend to agree the strikes on embassies/consulates is not a great precedent, but it's hard to think of a less sympathetic victim.

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