A war without borders

The terror attack in New Delhi and the attempted attack in Tbilisi on Monday had a similar signature: Hezbollah, together with their patrons in Tehran, were responsible for both.

Last month’s attempted attacks on Israeli targets in Baku and Bangkok were also manufactured on the same assembly line. Hezbollah has vowed to avenge the assassination of Imad Mughniyeh, the terror group's military commander assassinated in a Damascus car bombing in 2008. Iran, in its unique way, knows its target markets: It exports oil to China and terror to Israel.

One could surmise the reasons for these coordinated attacks on different Israeli targets around the globe. In Hezbollah’s case it is likely vengeance for the death of the commander of its military wing, for which it blames Israel. A worthy replacement has yet to be found. The recent assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientist could very well be the motivation for Tehran, especially since the same method (riding up to the target car on a motorcycle and affixing a bomb to its window) used to assassinate its scientists was used in the New Delhi attack on the Israeli target.

But Shiite terror didn’t start yesterday. Let us recall the 1992 terror attack at the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires or the murder of the chief security officer at the Israeli Embassy in Ankara that same year. Hezbollah, and its Iranian bosses, don’t need a reason to attack Israel and its representatives. It is in their DNA.

Officials in Jerusalem believe that the current terror threat has not subsided. The terror alerts surrounding Israeli and Jewish institutions abroad are still in place. It is extremely unpleasant to be an Israeli diplomat these days. I know the feeling, from personal experience. I remember the fear and the anxiety I felt as employees of the Israeli Embassy in Mauritania huddled together at the ambassador’s house for 10 days, with everyone’s children, due to a concrete terror threat in October 2005. I also know what it is like to wake up at 2:20 a.m. with a wife and a baby as the adjacent workplace, the embassy, is being pelted with hand grenades. Back then it was al-Qaida. Today it is Iran.

The deliberations on whether to attack Iran have pushed aside for a moment the fact that we are still in the midst of a war against terror. It is a war without boundaries, with Iran supplying not only the know-how but also the logistics.

The specific targets of both attacks Monday were parents picking up their children from school. In New Delhi the target was a mother, the wife of an Israeli diplomat. For Iran and its proxies, being the wife of an Israeli diplomat is enough.

One can take comfort in the “disappointing” outcome, as far as the terrorists are concerned: Only four people were wounded in four attempted attacks. But the incidents should also raise our concern that more attacks are in the works. Iran, of course, denies any involvement, but blames Israel for killing its nuclear scientists. Several “kind” souls in Washington made sure to leak hints that Israel was involved to the press.

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