US President Joe Biden gave the green light Thursday, February 25, to airstrikes against facilities belonging, according to the Pentagon, to militias supported by Iran, in eastern Syria.
A first in this country, ordered in response to recent rocket attacks against US interests in Iraq.
The Biden administration has paid particular attention to its communication on this military operation, the first since the entry into the White House of the new president, the Pentagon having largely insisted on its defensive and proportionate nature.
As a sign of caution from Washington, an official US representative, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that these calibrated strikes were decided to punish the militias without causing an escalation of the situation military.
Several options were presented to Joe Biden, who chose the least likely to ignite the situation, he even clarified.
Tehran and Washington remain focused on the essentials
In addition to its defensive justification, this operation resembles above all a message of firmness addressed to Iran, which has the custom of "testing" each new American administration.
"Experts agree in seeing in this operation a message from Joe Biden, who thus lets the Iranians know that he is the new president of the United States, that he is certainly not Donald Trump, but that he is ready to respond to attacks against American interests and to blame Iran for them, "said Reza Sayah, France 24 correspondent in Iran.
It remains to be seen whether there will be a reaction from the militias targeted by Washington in Syria.
The balance of power is not in their favor, because an escalation could impact the current steps taken by the US administration to revive the issue of the Iran nuclear deal.
So far, Iran has not reacted to the operation.
But the United States has let him and American allies in the region know that despite their willingness to revive the 2015 agreement - which was supposed to prevent the Iranians from acquiring the atomic bomb and which was abandoned by Donald Trump in 2018 - they will not leave attacks against their interests unanswered.
"The stakes are too high, both for the Islamic Republic and for the United States, for the situation to slip to the point of stopping the priority file that is the 2015 agreement, tempers Reza Sayah. In recent weeks , there have been many positive signs around this issue, and it is unlikely that these regional frictions will distract Tehran and Washington from the essential.
Indeed, this operation carried out in Syria takes place in a context of recalibration of American diplomacy in the Middle East after the Trump years, and one of the axes of which is the declared desire to reinstate the Vienna agreement.
If the defeat of Donald Trump, a follower of a hard line to bend the Islamic Republic, was greeted with relief on the side of Tehran, the time is not yet for relaxation with the Biden administration.
And this, in spite of some gestures of the American diplomacy on the regional scene with the end of the support for the war in Yemen and a "marginalization" of the Saudi crown prince Mohammed ben Salman.
The United States has also made direct gestures in favor of Tehran.
Washington in particular canceled, on February 18, a unilateral proclamation made in September 2020 by the Trump administration on a return of international sanctions against Iran.
Initiatives insufficient in the eyes of the Iranian power, which does not forgive Washington for the assassination of the influential General Qassem Soleimani ordered by Donald Trump, and which, since 2018, has gradually freed itself from limits - previously accepted - on its program nuclear.
Arm wrestling
While, on the American side, we demand that the Iranians return to full respect for their commitments planned for 2015, Tehran is raising the stakes and waiting for pledges from Washington.
In particular, he demands that the United States "unconditionally lift all sanctions imposed, reimposed or renamed by Trump", in the words of Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.
"There is a break in form and in words under Biden, with a policy of reaching out to the Iranians, but the new president has not yet reversed Donald Trump's decisions, since the heavy sanctions imposed by the Republican billionaire in Iran, which strangles the country's economy, are still in place, "notes Antoine Mariotti, journalist specializing in the Middle East at France 24.
So far, the United States and Iran remain stuck in their positions and stuck in a standoff over whoever gives in first.
"And this, while the two parties have an interest in being able to move forward on this file," adds Antoine Mariotti.
Recently questioned on the antenna of France 24, the Iranian ambassador to the UN, Majid Takht-Ravanchi, affirmed that it is in Washington, which withdrew from the agreement, "to make the first not "and" to restore the confidence of the Iranians ".
But time is running out for Joe Biden, because at the end of the presidential election scheduled for June in Iran, a conservative president could succeed Hassan Rouhani, and would perhaps be less inclined to negotiate with Washington.
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