Iran’s new leaders are taking risks their predecessors avoided
Iran’s strikes on Israel this week were some of its most audacious attempts yet to redefine the boundaries of a confrontation that for decades has largely been fought through proxies, covert operations and carefully calibrated retaliation.
By targeting Israel in response to attacks in Lebanon, Tehran appeared to be signaling that its red lines no longer stop at its own borders – and that its leaders are ready to take greater risks.
Since the April 8 US-Iran ceasefire, Tehran has repeatedly accused Israel and the United States of eroding the truce through military action. The US has carried out strikes on Iranian targets even as indirect negotiations continued. Israel, meanwhile, has launched nearly 3,500 strikes in Lebanon, according to the country’s prime minister, including in the capital Beirut, despite restrictions imposed by the truce.
Iran responded with a series of calibrated retaliatory strikes against US and Gulf targets, while warning that if diplomacy failed it was prepared to resume the war and expand it beyond the Persian Gulf, potentially threatening shipping routes stretching from the Indian Ocean to the Red Sea and the Mediterranean.
Overnight Tuesday into Wednesday there were renewed exchanges of fire between the US and Iran following the downing of a US Army helicopter earlier in the week, underscoring the ongoing precariousness across the region.
Iran’s strikes on Israel signal broader shift
This week’s strikes on Israel, however, appeared to mark a further step. Tehran signaled that Israeli military action against its regional allies could also trigger a direct Iranian response. The objective was to break the diplomatic deadlock in talks to reach an interim peace agreement and support Hezbollah.
“We have overturned the ceasefire equation that existed on paper while being repeatedly violated in practice on the ground,” Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s chief negotiator in the talks, said Monday. “Until there is a genuine willingness to build trust, Iran’s response will remain the same.”
Iran has insisted it will not allow Israel and the US to continue their attacks while claiming to remain committed to a ceasefire that Tehran says is being repeatedly violated. “Under no circumstances” would it accept such an arrangement, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said Monday.
The move suggests a broader shift in Tehran, where a new generation of leaders is increasingly abandoning the cautious, reactive approach that long defined the Islamic Republic’s strategy towards its adversaries. Rather than relying primarily on deterrence and strategic patience, they now appear more willing to take risks and to deploy Iran’s military, economic and regional leverage to shape events in the Middle East.
It is also the same Iranian leadership that US President Donald Trump has described as “more rational” and “pretty reasonable.”
“The Iranians have put both the Israelis and the US in a box now,” Aaron David Miller, a former US Middle East peace negotiator, told CNN’s Jessica Dean. “They’re risk ready. They think they’re winning. They don’t think the ceasefire is serving their interests.”
In 2020, the first Trump administration broke a longstanding taboo by assassinating Qasem Soleimani, the highest-ranking Iranian official killed by the United States at the time. Tehran’s response, under the leadership of then-Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, reflected his preference for calibrated retaliation over uncontrolled escalation: Iran launched a missile strike at a US airbase in Iraq after warnings were passed on that gave US forces time to seek shelter.
In June 2025, when the US joined Israel in attacking Iran, Tehran again opted for a proportional response, signaling that despite its fiery rhetoric it still viewed escalation management as necessary.
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