Iran’s highest leader faces his decisive moments

For decades, Iran’s supreme leader has sought to balance his ideological hostility towards the United States and Israel with a pragmatic desire to avoid a comprehensive war.

But now that, after US President Donald Trump joined Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in fighting to the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Ali Khalni faces the most subordinate decision for nearly 40 years in power. Is he looking for a diplomatic compromise with Trump, who seeks to escalate or try to maintain the conflict in Israel?

After he ordered the American president to bomb Iran Main nuclear sites – Fordo, Natanz and Estuhan – in the early hours of Sunday, the Supreme Leader of the Republic will want to show that the system, which is being beaten and blood, is still able to fight a battle and will not be placed in submission.

But those familiar with the regime suggested that our crude will not escalate against the United States and risk a more severe response that causes more destruction to the Republic. Instead, they say that Iran’s main response will increase the attacks on Israel.

“Let Trump is happy and feel victory, we will not get into a big war with the United States,” said one of the regime familiar with the United States. “The United States attacked only three sites. If they wanted to go to a big war, they would have destroyed more places, but they did not.”

US Vice President JD Vance insisted on Sunday that the United States “was not a war with Iran,” but with its nuclear program. “We have no interest in a long struggle. We have no interest in shoes on the ground,” NBC told NBC, adding that the Trump administration does not seek to change the system.

However, the Iranian regime will continue to shoot Israel – as happened hours after American attacks and not undergoing unconditional fire. The Iranian Revolutionary Guards said it fired 40 “new generations” missiles in Israel hours of US strikes. Israel said that more than 20 missiles were fired, but no death was reported.

“When Iran accepted a ceasefire in the 1988 Iraq war, the leaders said they were running out of ammunition. The leaders now say we let us go and retreat strongly. Iran will not ask to stop shooting at any circumstances.”

One of those familiar with the second regime said that Iran has no other choice but to provide a “overwhelming response to the United States” – but it will do so through attacks on Israel, which sparked war with waves of strikes against the Islamic Republic last week.

“It is natural for Iran to intensify its attacks on Israel because it is Netanyahu that the United States took a war with Iran,” the informed.

He added that the closure of the Strait of Hermoz – through which more than a quarter of raw passes in the world can be considered – if the conflict escalates.

Analysts have warned of a danger that the regime would rush to develop a nuclear bomb in an attempt to restore its deterrent and that it may have been able to convert some of its stockpiles of enriched uranium near the degree of weapons from Fordow and Natanz to secret sites.

The first system of the interior said this was not a choice after looking at driving.

“We should have been very naive to maintain enriched uranium in those sites – enriched uranium has not touched now,” said the informed. “But this does not change anything because we do not have a plan to use. Iran was not and will not seek nuclear weapons.”

On Sunday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Aragichi said that Tehran had a “wide range of options available” and was counted, with a warning that the United States “crossed a very large red line.”

Iran’s guards said that the United States “placed itself on the line of confrontation with the military aggression” by attacking the country’s peaceful nuclear facilities.

In recent weeks, Iranian officials have warned that if the United States attacked Iran, the Islamic Republic could respond by targeting American bases and assets in the region, as well as energy facilities in the Gulf.

Khamnai warned last week that Trump “should know that any American military participation will undoubtedly lead to irreparable damage.”

Sanam Facille, the Middle East director in Chatham House, said that Khamnai could return to his strategy of seeking “escalation to escalation”-beating, but in a way that reduces the risk of the most fierce American response and leaves the door to open diplomacy.

“They are more trapped than they were ever and they need to find a prize outside the grant,” said Facil. “With the few options in front of them, this is the only scenario that makes the system a lifeline.”

She said that Iran could strike, for example, a base used by some of the 2500 American forces in neighboring Iraq. Such an attack, with prior warning, would cause minimal damage.

It is the tactic that Tehran used after Trump ordered the assassination of Qassem Solimani, the most powerful military commander in Iran, while he was at Baghdad airport in 2020.

The regime responded by firing a large missile in two bases in Iraq, hosting the American forces. This was the biggest attack against an American base in decades, but Tehran used the back channels to receive the attack, and with no death to any death, they quickly seek to avoid a full war, withdrew from the edge of the abyss.

On Sunday, the United States strikes were much more: the first direct American attack on the republic is coming at a time when it faces an existential threat and the most vulnerable since the 1979 revolution brought the theocratic system.

Even before the American attack, Israel’s strikes have already jumped the best ranks of the Iranian military leadership and destroyed many of its launchers and missile plants.

This is why Emile Hookim, at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said, “The full argument is about giving priority for the regime’s survival context and nuances.”

“The Khamanini account account has failed in a catastrophic and caution will be taken by many within the regime as part of the Iranian disaster,” Hikim said. “This new political dynamic in Tehran can still prepare to go strongly in the neighborhood, with more escalation – it can explode.”

If Iran chooses to launch attacks across the Gulf, it can use a shorter missile arsenal, which is more accurate, and given the distances, the defenses in the Gulf will be left with less reaction time.

It can also seek to extract regional militants that belong to part of the alleged axis of resistance.

But its strongest and important agent, Hezbollah, was strongly exhausted because of Israel’s bombing of Lebanon last year.

Tehran can try to mobilize Iranian -backed Shiite fighters in Iraq, which in the past attacked the bases, facilities and forces in that country.

The Houthi rebels can respond in Yemen and have already threatened to attack the US naval ships in the Gulf, as they did previously.

The armed movement has already disrupted severe traffic across the Red Sea since attacks on commercial ships on the vital marine trade route following the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023 on Israel. The Houthis settled an intense American bombing campaign for a month that ended in May when Trump suddenly called for the attacks, while praising the “rebels’ ability to face the punishment.”

But Vakil said that the decisive factor would be what Netanyahu is doing. Trump’s attempt to negotiate with Iran to secure an agreement to resolve the confrontation with Tehran was raised because of its wide nuclear program and has succeeded in its goal in attracting the United States to fight.

She said: “It is not clear whether Trump has an effect on Netanyahu, and this is important in what happens after that.”

If Trump is looking to a return to diplomacy, it may exacerbate the deep lack of confidence of the regime in the United States and European powers. For weeks, the main obstacle to a deal was that Tehran refused to abandon its right to enrich uranium as Trump requested. The question is whether the US bombing of the main enrichment facilities in Iran changes the calculus account in Khamanni.

Trump, who last week called for “unlawful surrender of Iran”, called on Saturday night that Tiran “makes peace” or facing more intense attacks. Iran has pledged not to give us pressure.

“Last week, we were in negotiations with the United States when Israel decided to detonate that diplomacy,” Aragchchi said at a position at X.