On escalation after escalation – Susanne Koelbl, Christoph Reuter, Thore Schröder and Bernhard Zand in Der Spiegel:

‘Outside of Israeli security circles, no one knows exactly what possible targets in Iran the military planners are currently discussing in the event that war with Iran does indeed break out one day. But it is likely that, in addition to military bases, airports and oil facilities, the locations of the nuclear program will also be considered.’

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‘An Israeli military strike against the Iranian nuclear program is the maximum variant of retaliation that is currently conceivable. It would be a bold move, feasible, if at all, only with the help of the United Sates – and with incalculable consequences for the rest of the world.’

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‘Reports coming out of Isfahan point to the second option. And it does seem fitting given that in military retaliation operations, states are usually keen to "thematically link" the counterstrike, as Fabian Hinz of the think tank International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) puts it. To strike a specific unit or base that they believe to be responsible for the original attack, for example. That concept is at least one common denominator shared by countries as different and hostile as Israel and Iran.’

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‘It would be a war that could set the entire region between the Levant and the Hindukush on fire. "A war with Iran could destroy emirates such as Abu Dhabi or Dubai within 24 hours," the American Iran expert Vali Nasr said in an interview with DER SPIEGEL. Such a war could jeopardize global oil supplies, disrupt international trade and strengthen Russia and China.’

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‘Hardliners on all sides always wanted to torpedo the Iran deal: in Israel, the forces around Benjamin Netanyahu, the conservatives in Iran – and right-wing Republicans in the U.S. The main argument against the deal was that it didn't include Iran's missile program or its aggressive proxy forces in the Middle East. Proponents of the deal believed that they would be able to negotiate these issues in the next steps. But in 2018, U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew his country from the deal. His successor Joe Biden has tried to revive it, but those efforts have so far been in vain.’

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‘The acrimony between the two countries is not rooted in a long, bellicose history. It began as a propaganda project of the Iranian Revolution, which put an end to the country’s monarchy in 1978-79.
Under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Iran became one of the first countries to recognize Israel in 1948. The secret services of the two countries cooperated, and both states were united by their distance to their Arab neighbors. The young country of Israel helped Iran develop its agricultural sector and bought oil from the country.
Historian David Menashri, 79, was born as the son of Jewish parents in Tehran before emigrating with his parents to Israel, but he also spent several years in Iran in the 1970s. At that time, he says, the two countries had a relationship "like a marriage without a license" – a rapport that was shaped by religion from the very beginning. On the one hand, both countries considered themselves to be "chosen by God" by virtue of their long histories, says Menashri. But on the other, anti-Semitism had a long history in Iran.
There was, for example, a rule according to which Iranian Jews were not allowed to leave their homes when it was raining, because they were considered najis, ritually unclean, and water dripping off of them would allegedly impurify the streets. The shah, says Menashri, knew that he couldn’t be particularly open about his ties with the Israelis. The Israeli Embassy in Tehran did not fly the country’s flag and while the airline El Al had daily flights to the Iranian capital, those flights were not publicly displayed at Mehrabad Airport.’

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‘For Khomeini, the Jewish state was a useful tool for whipping up the fervor of his followers. "If Israel hadn’t existed," says David Menashri, "his regime would have had to invent it."’

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‘General David Petraeus, who led the U.S. forces in Iraq in 2008, received what he says was a secret message at the time: "General Petraeus, you should know that I, Qassem Suleimani, control the policy for Iran with respect to Iraq, Lebanon, Gaza and Afghanistan." It wasn’t bragging, it was just the truth.
Because Soleimani’s troops didn’t just battle it out with local forces, but increasingly with U.S. units as well, then-U.S. President Donald Trump made a far-reaching decision in January 2020: He had General Soleimani killed at the Baghdad airport using Hellfire missiles. Iran still hasn’t completely recovered from the loss, with Soleimani’s successor lacking his stature. But many of the militias once controlled by Soleimani still exist – and some, such as the Houthis in Yemen, have even grown stronger. "Their proximity to Iran gives them power over their competitors," says Middle East expert Charles Lister of the Middle East Institute in Washington. "Then: the weapon systems, suicide drones, missiles, plus the training effects. It's the complete package. It is truly a network, fascinating. Each of them operates in their own environment. They are part and parcel of a regional network."’

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‘Since October 7, the result has been "escalation after escalation and miscalculation after miscalculation." And that has raised fears "of a retribution cycle that could potentially become an all-out war."’

Read the article here.

Too many misjudgments, not in the last place misjudgments by Israeli intelligence.
On the other hand, since October 7 we have heard about the risk of an all-out war, the all-out war is still possible, just read this article.

Nobody can now know if the all-out war is still coming.

But we can count our blessings, despite everything that happened since October 7 (and before October 7, history didn’t start that day), that the all-out war is not yet here.