Wallace: West must resist Iran but Ukraine needs Israel

IRAN is acting like a “bully” and must be “hit back twice as hard”, Ben Wallace says today, as Israel prepares to retaliate after direct missile attacks from Tehran.

It comes as Rishi Sunak is expected to tell Benjamin Netanyahu to “show restraint” in his first phone call with the Israeli leader since the strikes.

No 10 and the White House are concerned that an Israeli response could trigger a wider conflict. But Mr Sunak and Joe Biden were last night under mounting pressure to stand up to Iran.

Mr Wallace warns in an article for The Telegraph that the Government has done “almost nothing in response” to Iran’s malign activity in the Middle East, and calls for the West to come “together to defeat their drones and missiles”.

The former defence secretary adds: “The only way to deal with a bully is to retaliate. The only option when Iran and Russia hit, I have concluded, is to hit back twice as hard and not stop until they get the message.”

Mr Wallace compares the threat of Iran to Russia’s conflict in Ukraine, arguing that both countries “view Britain as an enemy”, and calls for Israel to support Ukraine in its war effort. Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, said yesterday that Kyiv “could have received the same level of protection [as Israel] long ago if Ukraine received similar full support from its partners in intercepting drones and missiles”.

Mr Sunak will speak to Mr Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, today for the first time since Iran launched more than 350 drones, missiles and rockets at Israel on Saturday. He said he would urge “restraint” from both sides, after Israel said it had drawn up plans to retaliate with a strike on Iran.

“Our aim is to support stability and security because it is right for the region and because, although the Middle East is thousands of miles away, it has a direct effect on our security and prosperity at home,” he told MPS. Mr Biden has also told Mr Netanyahu that the US would not join or support a retaliation.

However, the US and UK are under pressure to confront Iran, which has supported attacks on Israel from proxies in Lebanon and Gaza, and armed a group that killed three American troops in Jordan in January.

Conservative MPS Suella Braverman and Sir Iain Duncan Smith, and the Labour Party, have called for Mr Sunak to proscribe Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), while Republicans have demanded that Mr Biden enforce financial sanctions on Tehran’s international energy trade. Mr Biden is also facing pressure to withdraw a $10billion sanction relief package from Iran.

Israel is thought to have drawn up plans for a “painful” retaliatory attack on Iran, but will not launch a strike that would jeopardise the support of the US.

Mr Netanyahu has not commented publicly on the plans, but options are thought to include a precision strike on a facility in Tehran or a cyber attack.

Israel, the US and their allies shot down approximately 100 drones and dozens of missiles in an unprecedented show of force on Saturday. US officials believe that at least nine ballistic missiles hit Israeli military bases, evading air defence, although the damage appeared to be minimal.

Meanwhile, Iran has said that a retaliation by Israel would be met with a counter-strike, and claims its attack was “legitimate self-defence” after its consulate compound in Damascus was bombed on April 1.

There is something terribly British about the way the West has dealt with Iran over the last decade. We have treated them like a child having a tantrum in a restaurant. We have tolerated the proxies and the malign influence. And many of us, including me, hoped that the “reformers” would one day triumph over the hardliners and that the vast swathes of decent Iranian people would one day rise up and rid themselves of the “crazies”.

But the charge sheet of Iranian aggression is growing. They have armed, trained and directed Hamas, the Houthis and Hezbollah. They have hosted Al-qaeda leaders, seized ships and taken hostages. We have done almost nothing in response. In Iran’s eyes we are weak. We need to wake up.

The only way to deal with a bully is to retaliate. The only option when Iran and Russia hit is to hit back twice as hard and not stop until they get the message. These autocracies thrive on the West’s lack of resolve, revel in sowing division and delight in weakening us. Step by step they test us. But like all bullies, deep down they are cowards. They avoid direct confrontation where they can. Their weapons of choice terrorist groups, disinformation, cyber hate and corruption. We can’t let them succeed in their strategy of divide-and-rule. It is not just our resolve which is being tested, however, but whether we know our enemies and friends when we see them. I have been critical of Israel in these pages for the IDF’S methods in Gaza, but I have also always supported its right to defend itself and defeat the Hamas terrorists. Hamas is not just an enemy of Israel, it is an enemy of us all – Britain, Europe and our friends in the wider Gulf. Read their charter – they are a block on any two-state solution.

We stand by Israel because we share common values, oppose terrorism and respect sovereignty. But if pilots of the RAF are to help protect Israel, then we should expect Israel to help Ukraine with lethal weapons and other assets, because alliances work both ways.

I distinctly remember my meeting with the Israeli ambassador to London. The international community were rallying round Kyiv and there wasn’t a week that passed when Russia didn’t indiscriminately try and send drones to kill Ukrainian people. Ukraine was receiving donations from nations that supported them openly, and even from countries that supported Russia in public but quietly backed Kyiv’s cause.

Among the countries absent from the list of donors was Israel. I pleaded with the ambassador. But all she would say was that “Israel doesn’t want to upset Russia”. I pointed out that Russia was spending at least $500 million on the Iranian drone programme and that Israel would directly feel the consequences of that investment. But still, Israel refused.

Think about that. Britain asks for help from an ally to support Ukraine in its war against our direct adversary – Russia – and our ally, Israel, refuses. It also refuses to help the only other democratic nation on earth whose president is himself Jewish. In addition to that, and not for the first time, Israel welcomes dodgy Russian oligarchs into its citizenship (yes, we too have been guilty of that!). The hundreds of millions of dollars ploughed into the Iranian drone programme is flying over Jordanian and Iraqi airspace.

I am genuinely pleased that Iran’s efforts have failed, but let’s not lose sight of the fact that nearly every day for the past few months Ukraine has been suffering the same onslaught. Both Russia and Iran seek to attack us and our allies. Both are joined at the hip when it comes to a disdain for other people’s sovereignty, and both see Britain as an enemy.

Perhaps as Israel benefits from the RAF’S support it will decide whose side it is on when it comes to Russia and help Ukraine. Europe needs Israel’s help just as Israel needs Europe’s. Together we can all help defeat these drones and missiles, and send a message to both Russia and Iran that no more will we tolerate their behaviour.

The Rt Hon Ben Wallace MP served as defence secretary from 2019-23

Hamas is not just an enemy of Israel – it is an enemy of us all and a block on any two-state solution