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Speaker 1: So back to the Middle East, the assassination of the

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Speaker 1: Hamas leader. Of course, in Iran, the fear grows that

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Speaker 1: the war's about to go. Regional foreign face columnists, but

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Speaker 1: the Spectator these days formerly the BBC, of course Paul

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Speaker 1: Woods with us. No one's claimed this, have they.

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Speaker 2: Well, the Israelis are neither confirming nor denying it. But

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Speaker 2: who else would it be In both cases, that strike

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Speaker 2: in Beirut and the assassination in Tehran. We don't exactly

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Speaker 2: know what happened in Tehran, but certainly it would be

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Speaker 2: absurd to think that anybody but the Israelis did this.

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Speaker 1: When the Iranians go, do they go big? In what happens? Then?

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Speaker 2: Well, this is exactly the question, isn't it. Israel has

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Speaker 2: gambled that Iran doesn't want to wider war, but they

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Speaker 2: could have miscalculated. Certainly, Iran will have to respond, and

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Speaker 2: I think the Iranian national security has met and the

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Speaker 2: Iranian Supreme Leader has let it be known through various

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Speaker 2: officials quoted in various media outlets, that there will be

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Speaker 2: a response. They from their point of view, they have

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Speaker 2: to restore to terence, They have to restore their credibility.

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Speaker 2: In the eyes of their allies. This is a humiliate

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Speaker 2: for them. So you may remember that back in April

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Speaker 2: there was a presumed Israeli strike on a diplomatic building

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Speaker 2: in Syria in Damascus, which killed some senior Iranians. Hundreds

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Speaker 2: of missiles were fired by Iran onto Israeli soil, the

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Speaker 2: biggest attack, completely unprecedented. I think they may have to

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Speaker 2: go bigger than that. Now. The Iranians are very rational

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Speaker 2: when they do these things. They are thought to have

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Speaker 2: telegraphed his missile attacks in April, so the Israelis could

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Speaker 2: take them down. We may see. If the region is lucky,

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Speaker 2: it'll be something like that.

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Speaker 1: Again, how strich does nit Nyahoo domestically at the moment

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Speaker 1: on all these fronts, given what's happen with the original

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Speaker 1: war end Gaza and all the pressure he's under internationally.

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Speaker 2: Well, the cynics would say, and the cynics being his

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Speaker 2: critics abroad and his opponents at home, that he needs

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Speaker 2: this ongoing conflict. You need ongoing conflicts of some kind.

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Speaker 2: And one of the things that these two strikes assassinations

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Speaker 2: do is is take a piece deal off the table.

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Speaker 2: Supposedly they were edging towards the ceasefire deal in Gaza.

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Speaker 2: I can't imagine Hams having lost its political leader will

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Speaker 2: contemplate that in the short term. As one Palestinian official said,

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Speaker 2: the rallies have just killed the person they were negotiating

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Speaker 2: with ultimately, and that the Senates would say that helps.

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Speaker 2: Mister Netanyahu, as you say, is under pressure and all

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Speaker 2: sorts of fronts.

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Speaker 1: But that's the difficulty. I mean, if you believe that ritoric,

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Speaker 1: I mean, what was the river going to I mean, yes,

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Speaker 1: they've been talking for months, and yes they keep going

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Speaker 1: back to Egypt, and yes there's lots of people around

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Speaker 1: the table, but I mean, was the river? Is the

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Speaker 1: river going to be a peace deal?

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Speaker 2: It's very hard to imagine that, you know, if you

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Speaker 2: go by President although we're in you know, more Jews

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Speaker 2: were killed on one day on October seventh, and since

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Speaker 2: the Holocaust, the death toll for the Palestinians is shockingly high,

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Speaker 2: perhaps one and a half getting on for two percent

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Speaker 2: of the population of Gaza. So it's very hard to

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Speaker 2: see how things can end, but they always have ended

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Speaker 2: in the past. The Israelis have a terribly a terribly

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Speaker 2: vivid phrase. It's cutting the grass in Gaza, and they've

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Speaker 2: been doing that, but just on a much larger scale.

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Speaker 2: At some point, the diplomatic pressure for the Americans on

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Speaker 2: the Israelis will become too great to resist. At some point,

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Speaker 2: larger than military objectives will have been achieved. They're not

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Speaker 2: going to destroy har Mass, but they could degrade her

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Speaker 2: mass sufficiently to claim victory, and then they will need

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Speaker 2: a deal to bring the hostages home. It's a question

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Speaker 2: really of when all sides exhausted and has there been

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Speaker 2: a regional, a wider war provoked in the meantime. And

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Speaker 2: that's the dangerous point that we're at now.

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Speaker 1: What's a great pleasure? Paul Paul Wood, who's the Foreign

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Speaker 1: AFAS columnst probably the Spectator of course, whether it's This

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Speaker 1: Morning out of London. For more from the Mic Asking Breakfast,

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Speaker 1: listen live to news Talks. It'd be from six am weekdays,

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Speaker 1: or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.