Israel on High Alert as Iran Retaliates with Missile and Drone Attack
Iran has launched aerial drones towards Israel, indicating what appears to be a long-expected retaliatory strike. Israeli television reports that the attack is anticipated to reach Israel by 02:00 on Sunday (23:00 GMT on Saturday). According to Iranian state media, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards claim to have launched both missiles and drones at Israel.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have declared a state of high alert, asserting they are closely monitoring all potential targets. In response to the escalating situation, Israel’s Prime Minister has convened a meeting of his war cabinet.
As tensions mount, several countries in the region have taken precautionary measures. Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, and Iraq have closed their airspace, while Syria and Jordan have heightened their air defence systems.
The recent attack follows Iran’s vow to retaliate for the airstrike on its consulate in Syria on April 1, which resulted in the death of seven military officers, including a high-ranking commander. Iran has accused Israel of orchestrating the attack, a claim Israel has neither confirmed nor denied.
And so the dogs of war have been unleashed once more, baying for blood in that perpetual charnel house known as the Middle East.
This latest act of aerial bombardment, with Iran raining missiles upon the vastly outmatched Israeli population, was as inevitable as it is deplorable. For what were the mullahs to do after their diplomatic soil was so brazenly violated by the Israeli war machine? Respond with sternly worded letters of condemnation, perchance?
No, when the world’s pre-eminent rogue state – that cherished client regime of the American empire – tramples upon the most basic tenets of sovereignty and human decency, the rigged rules based order on yes, that word again – “self-defence” now dictates overwhelming force be met with overwhelming force. An eye for an eye until the entire region is rendered blind, deaf and dumb by the endless cycles of violent retribution.
Let’s dispense with the handwringing over who cast the first stone, shall we? In the grave matter of war and peace, such distinctions are mere trifles to be hammered into propaganda by whichever side possesses the loudest megaphone.
No, the true root causes here are inseparable from the brutish realpolitik impulses that compel the great powers to pursue global hegemony at all costs – human, economic and moral. It is the poor huddled masses, Palestinian, Iranian and Israeli alike, who shall bear the brunt of this latest plume of man’s inhumanity to man.
How utterly antithetical to the unifying spirit of the international socialist movement, which dares to imagine a world where the bombs are beaten into ploughshares and pluralism reigns over puritanical hatred. Where the inalienable right of self-determination for all peoples supersedes the avaricious land grabs of client state and overlord alike.
Alas, for such a world to be achieved, the global proletariat must first slough off the dead weight of its ideological shackles – those tribalistic mentalities that blind us to our common struggle against the true locus of power and oppression: the capitalist oligarchs.
So let the Zionist bombs fall where they may. Let the Ayatollahs exhaust their missile stockpiles in recompense. Just another knell tolling for the death of human potential, sacrificed on the twin altars of religious fervour and capitalist rapacity. Truly, a fate more senseless and avoidable than any.
But make no mistake, my friends. This is no localised skirmish born of ancient sectarian divides. It is a calculated ploy by the global capitalist elite to sow chaos and reap the profits of perpetual conflict of their ‘Forever Wars’. Profound human suffering is merely the expendable collateral damage.
So spare me the pious hand-wringing over Iran’s so-called belligerence. When the bloody hounds of war are unleashed, the dispossessed and disenfranchised inevitably suffer most. We would all do better to heed the words of that great socialist thinker, Jean-Paul Sartre: “When the rich wage war, it’s the poor who die.”
But let’s look on the bright side, we get to watch Armageddon, live on TV…
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