The UK will not participate in or coordinate any Israeli attack on Iran, but no decisions have been taken on how to respond if Iran then decides to take further retaliatory action against Israel. UK ministers also remain unclear on what military action Israel is preparing to take, or its timing, which shows how far the UK is from endorsing an attack on Iran, and how it would prefer a route to de-escalation. Reports in Israel suggest a decision on the nature of the attack has been delayed until at least a cabinet meeting on Sunday, and after that it is possible the Israeli defence minister, Yoav Gallant, will travel to Washington for further consultations with the US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin.
But UK officials believe the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, emboldened by his victories in damaging Hezbollah in Lebanon, is interested in pursuing a maximalist option against Tehran as part of a once-in-a-lifetime bid to reshape the balance of power in the Middle East and weaken Iran permanently. UK officials even heard fears from Jordanian diplomats this week that Netanyahu may try to annex the West Bank and push Palestinians over the border into Jordan, concerns that prompted Jordanian officials to warn nothing would be off the table in its response. Ministers are considering whether evacuation plans may be needed for British citizens in more countries in the Middle East other than just Lebanon. With the Liberal Democrats directly urging Israel not to attack Iran, the prime minister, Keir Starmer, was equivocal about providing any direct support to an Israeli strike, reminding MPs the British “involvement so far – for example in relation to the attack in April – related to Israel’s self-defence. When missiles were raining in on Israel that is the support we did provide and would always be prepared to provide.” Some Gulf states have also said they will not allow their airspace to be used by Israel to attack Iran. Hugh Lovatt, a Middle East specialist at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said it was possible Netanyahu could yet drag the US and the west into a war with Iran by launching a big enough attack that requires Iran to provide a further response, drawing western powers into helping to defend Israel. He said: “The calculation could be that Israel can start this but then America can finish it, and, despite American reluctance, Israel might be able to bounce the Americans into a full-scale confrontation with Iran. The US administration might not want to do this due to the escalatory risk and its interests in the region, but it is clear that over the past year the Biden administration has been unable to manage and restrain Netanyahu.” On Friday, the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said Iran would not hesitate to respond if Israel retaliated for last week’s missile strikes by Tehran, saying: “Iran is fully prepared to take stronger defensive actions if necessary in response to any further aggression and will not hesitate to do so.” In a justificatory letter to other foreign ministers, he said Iran’s missile strike had been in accordance with the right to self-defence in the wake of the killing of the Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran. In April, after the first Iranian attack, Israel settled for hitting the S-300 anti-missile radar system, which protects the nuclear facilities at Isfahan. The Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said on Friday that Israel should “stop killing innocent people”, and that its actions in the Middle East were backed by the US and the EU. Pezeshkian was speaking to a Russian state TV reporter on the sidelines of an international meeting in Turkmenistan.