The Iranian Threat: Israeli Defense Minister Predicts Multi-Front War

The Israeli defense minister has warned that his country will likely no longer see limited conflicts on single fronts in the near future, but rather will have to face a multi-front escalation where Iran plays a major role.

“This is the end of the era of limited conflicts,” Yoav Gallant told reporters in a briefing on April 20. “We are facing a new security era in which there may be a real threat to all arenas at the same time.

“Iran is the driving force in the convergence of the arenas. It transfers resources, ideology, knowledge, and training to its proxies,” he added, referring to Palestinian militant groups in the Gaza Strip, Lebanon’s Hezbollah and other Iran-backed militias across the region.

According to the minister, the Islamic Republic provides Hezbollah with $700 million a year, as well as “knowledge and strategic weaponry” lime precision-guided munitions.

The Hamas group that rules Gaza is funded by Tehran with $100 million annually, with additional funding worth tens of millions of dollars going to Palestinian Islamic Jihad, he said.

In Syria, Gallant said hundreds of millions of dollars are sent to Iranian-backed militias each year, and the government of President Bashar Assad receives billions of dollars from Tehran.

He said Iran-backed groups in Iraq receive weaponry worth hundreds of millions of dollars annually, and Yemen’s Houthi rebels receive hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

“The increasing dependence [of the proxies] on Iran leads them to step over the boundaries and become more brazen,” Gallant warned.

Gallant also expressed concern about Iran's atomic program, saying that the Islamic Republic is  "closer than ever before to reaching military nuclear capability." 

“In the face of this threat, we must act in one of two ways: military action or a credible military threat,” he added.

Israel has been pushing for the United States to prepare military contingency plans in order to prevent Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. President Joe Biden has said he is prepared to use military force if necessary, but still prefers to exhaust the diplomatic route first.