“It is possible that we were involved” in the conflict between Israel and Iran, but the United States is “at that moment not involved,” said US President Donald Trump this Sunday. After reaffirming that Washington “had nothing to do” with Israeli attacks on Iranian soil on Friday June 13, the question of American involvement arises than ever and could have unpublished consequences. From the first strikes of Israel against Iran on Friday evening, the American secretary of state Marco Rubio had cautiously mentioned “a unilateral action” of Israel against Iran, and recalled that the United States was “not involved” in these strikes. “Our absolute priority is the protection of American forces in the region,” he said.
Donald Trump said on Fox News that he had been warned of the attack, and the United States has helped protect Israel, according to the newspaper The Economistwho writes that American air defense systems have helped protect Israel and that an American navy destroyed the Hebrew State to shoot Iranian projectiles. An American official, under the cover of anonymity, told AFP that the United States had helped Israel to shoot Iranian missiles aimed at Israel, without giving more precision.
The Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Abbas Araghchi, said this Sunday that his country had “solid evidence on support from the American forces and bases in the region” with an unprecedented attack on Friday by Israel against Iranian territory, according to AFP.
An American response in the event of Iranian reprisals?
Even if Donald Trump clearly nourishes the hope of diplomacy, the United States could be “even more involved”, assuming different scenarios, depending on whether Iran decides or not to hit American targets in the Middle East, or to “close the Strait of Ormuz”, crucial for oil transport, and “attack energy installations in the Gulf oil “.
Donald Trump did not fail to threaten Iran this Sunday in a message broadcast on his social social network, saying that “if we are attacked in any way by Iran, all the strength and power of the American armed forces will fall on you at levels never seen before”.
Divided republicans
Outside the Atlantic, some voices are raised against these inclinations in a republican party shared between “hawks”, more favorable to military action than to the diplomatic way, and “doves”, rather isolationist. A division that is not new in American foreign policy. As of June 13, the Republican senator Lindsey Graham said that if diplomacy failed, he would be in the interest of the United States of “embarking on a lost body to help Israel to finish work”.
But other Republicans, such as Senator Rand Paul, rather warn against a war with Iran. “The American people are massively opposed to our endless wars and that is what they did by voting for Donald Trump in 2024”, he wrote on X. “I urge President Trump to keep the course, to continue to give priority to America and to participate in any war between other countries.”
On the democratic side, members of the opposition hastened Friday to call to “defuse the situation before it degenerates into an prolonged regional conflict which […] undermines the interests of national security in the United States, “said senator Patty Murray.
“A dangerous cycle of reprisals”
Analyst Sina Toossi, from the International Policy Center to Washington, told AFP that “Israeli escalation may trigger a dangerous reprisals cycle, while increasing the probability of American involvement”. For Alex Vatanka, specialist in Iran at the Institute of the Middle East (MEI) in Washington, the United States is betting on helping Israel discreetly, even if “the Iranians will obviously be aware of it”, while staying away, “at least publicly”. Hope, according to him, is that “Iranians do a rapid cost/profits analysis and decide that it is not worth fighting”.
“We defend ourselves in the face of the assault. Our defense is completely legitimate,” argued Iranian Minister Abbas Araghchi before foreign diplomats. “If the aggression ceases, our response will naturally stop so”. The attack of Israel on Iran is, for the Iranian minister, an “attempt to undermine diplomacy and to derail the negotiations” on Iranian nuclear. The sixth cycle of talks planned this Sunday in Oman between Washington and Tehran was also canceled.