As the White House responds to Iran’s attack against Israel, Catholic experts said U.S. officials should seek to prevent further escalation in the region.
Iran’s unprecedented aerial attack on Israel overnight April 13-14 followed a suspected Israeli strike two weeks prior on an Iranian consular building in Damascus, killing 16 people including two Iranian generals. Iran launched over 300 drones, ballistic missiles and cruise missiles at Israel, 99% of which were intercepted by Israel’s military in coordination with a U.S.-led coalition of allies, according to Israel’s military. […]
Biden said that at his direction, “to support the defense of Israel, the U.S. military moved aircraft and ballistic missile defense destroyers to the region over the course of the past week. Thanks to these deployments and the extraordinary skill of our servicemembers, we helped Israel take down nearly all of the incoming drones and missiles.”
Biden added he spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu “to reaffirm America’s ironclad commitment to the security of Israel.” […]
Mary Ellen O’Connell, a professor at Notre Dame Law School who specializes in international law and conflict resolution, told OSV News that “the clear success in countering Iran’s missile and drone strikes on Israel is a dramatic demonstration of the true legal and moral meaning of ‘self-defense.’”
“It is not pre-empting potential attacks that may never happen or assassinating a person and killing those around him or carrying out punitive strikes,” O’Connell said. “True self-defense means to ‘halt and repel’ incoming attacks.”
However, O’Connell added, “If Israel carries out an attack on Iran in the aftermath of drone and missile attacks, Israel, too will be violating the law and morality. Because such a response will not be in self-defense. Israel’s attack in Syria on Iran’s diplomatic premises was not self-defense.”
O’Connell said “the tit-for-tat retaliatory cycle needs to end — replaced by true self-defense.” Läs artikel