More than a week has passed since at least seven Iranian military personnel, including two senior Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commanders, were slain in a brazen airstrike widely attributed to Israel on a consular building attached to Iran’s embassy in Syria. 

And for more than a week, Iranian officials have vowed retaliation. With the Islamic holy month of Ramadan set to soon come to an end with the feast of Eid al-Fitr, that revenge may be just around the corner. 

Even prior to the war in Gaza that erupted six months ago, Iran and Israel have long been engaged in a shadowy conflict across the region. Iran supports a broad coalition of militias known as the Axis of Resistance, some deployed across Israel’s borders, with the goal of opposing Israel, while the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have targeted Iran and affiliated groups in a largely covert campaign of airstrikes, sabotage and assassinations. 

Axis of Resistance forces, including Lebanon’s Hezbollah, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq and Yemen’s Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthis, have been especially active against Israel since a surprise attack, led by the Palestinian Hamas movement, on October 7 last year sparked the deadliest-ever war in the Gaza Strip. 

But even against this backdrop, the suspected Israeli airstrikes on an ostensibly diplomatic facility in Damascus stunned the region, sparking condemnation even from the United Nations. This international outrage, compounded by growing frustration over the worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza and a deepening divide between the U.S. and Israel throughout the conflict, has fueled speculation that Iran may opt for an unprecedented direct attack on Israel. 

Iran has previously claimed to have targeted Israeli facilities abroad in response to the deaths of its personnel and alleged saboteur operations at home. Such strikes have often hit alleged Mossad outposts in the northern Iraqi region of Kurdistan and somewhat mirror how Iran responded in January 2020 to the U.S. killing of IRGC Quds Force commander Major General Qassem Soleimani in Iraq, where the IRGC launched dozens of missiles against U.S. military positions days later. 

As such, Israel’s presence abroad has been considered a potential prime target. Reports have indicated that, in addition to the IDF, a number of Israeli embassies and consulates worldwide have been put on heightened alert in recent days. Israel has an official diplomatic presence in Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates and is believed to have informal contacts elsewhere in the region. 

But further violence against diplomatic facilities runs the risk of drawing international ire, as well as anger from host countries at a time when Tehran was looking to improve regional relations. 

Today, Israel itself is already under regular rocket and drone attacks from Hezbollah and the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, and Ansar Allah has fired even more sophisticated missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles from 1,000 miles away in Yemen. Iran, however, possesses the largest and most advanced missile arsenal in the region, and any direct strike on Israel would mark perhaps the most serious test yet for both these capabilities and Israel’s renowned air defenses. 

One flashpoint in the spotlight is the Golan Heights. While internationally recognized as part of Syria, most of the 700 square-mile region was seized by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War and later unilaterally annexed in 1980. In 2019, the U.S. became the first country to recognize Israel’s claim to the Golan Heights under then-President Donald Trump. While President Joe Biden’s administration has continued this policy, it has signaled a willingness to review it. 

Today, the Israel-occupied Golan Heights hosts frontline IDF units across the border from an array of Syrian troops, Russian military police, and Axis of Resistance militia positions. The Golan Heights and a Lebanon-claimed section known as the Shebaa Farms have been favored targets for operations by Hezbollah and the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, and the IDF announced a new set of air and artillery strikes against Syria in response to a reported attack from across the border on Tuesday. 

While volatile as any regional frontier, the Golan Heights’ disputed status and sparse population density may ease the inevitable wave of anger and concern associated with any Iranian response. Still, Israeli officials have asserted that their military has “completed preparations for responses in the event of any scenario,” and U.S. officials have called on Tehran to “not escalate in any event — whether that means inside Israel or elsewhere in the region.”

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