The writer is vice-president and director of the Foreign Policy programme at the Brookings Institution and an Iran specialist
Hamas’ attack on Israel has reignited the volatile conflict between the Jewish state and the Palestinians and threatens to trigger a wider war with devastating consequences for the Middle East and the world. As grief and fear engulf the region, there is one sinister potential winner: the Islamic Republic of Iran, whose leadership hopes to reap the whirlwind of the violence it has sown.
Speculation has focused on what role, if any, the Iranians had in orchestrating Hamas’s latest brutality. Tehran has sought to avoid explicit culpability, with senior Iranian officials insisting that the attack was solely a Palestinian enterprise, even as they celebrated its horrific toll. The US has also said there is no “direct evidence” of Iranian involvement.