In the smoke and shrapnel of the war now raging between Israel and Iran, the world confronts more than a regional conflagration. This is no mere border skirmish or tit-for-tat exchange. It is the violent eruption of a long-brewing storm—one that signals the collapse of a global framework once held together by diplomacy, deterrence, and fragile restraint. What we are witnessing is not the start of a conflict, but the consequence of one that the world chose not to defuse.

For decades, Israel and Iran occupied opposite ends of a regional balance, hostile, yes, but contained. That containment is over. And what replaces it is not stability, but asymmetry, volatility, and the creeping normalisation of military force over diplomatic consensus.

Israeli rescue team evacuate Haim Rasin from his apartment after it was destroyed in an Iranian missile strike in Ramat Gan, Israel, on Thursday, June 19, 2025. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty)

The seeds of the present were sown in the past, specifically in 2018, when the United States, under the Trump administration, unilaterally withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The deal had flaws, but it worked: Iran’s nuclear ambitions were stalled, and diplomacy remained a functioning instrument of global order. The withdrawal was cast as a flex of strength. In truth, it was the demolition of a rare success in non-proliferation diplomacy.

What followed was not strategy, but a vacuum. Washington’s “maximum pressure” campaign lacked both coherence and competence. Sanctions replaced negotiation. Threats substituted for policy. When Trump’s envoys met Iranian nuclear negotiators, they brought no technical understanding—just bravado. The result was an imbalance not only of expertise but of vision. And into that void stepped actors with fewer restraints and sharper agendas.

Israel, long sceptical of the JCPOA, seized the moment. As Iran’s proxies weakened and U.S. leadership wavered, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a fateful calculation. With Hezbollah degraded, Hamas reeling from the fallout of the October 7 war, and the Assad regime collapsed in Syria, Israel sensed a historic opening. On the sixty-first day of Trump’s doomed ultimatum to Iran’s leadership—a deadline long since ignored—Israel struck.

These were not symbolic air raids. Israeli jets pierced deep into Iranian territory, hitting uranium enrichment sites at Natanz and Esfahan, IRGC command nodes, missile facilities, and even civilian infrastructure such as Iran’s state broadcaster. It was not just military action—it was strategic messaging: We will redraw the map of power.

Iran’s response was immediate, but measured. Ballistic missiles were launched. Infrastructure was targeted. But the limits of Tehran’s power were laid bare. Isolated, sanctioned, internally unstable, and surrounded by weakened proxies, Iran finds itself not retaliating from a position of strength, but from existential fear.

For years, the uneasy standoff between Israel and Iran was sustained by what analysts called a “balance of terror”—Israel’s conventional military dominance counterbalanced by Iran’s asymmetric capabilities: missiles, militias, cyber tools. But today, that balance is shattered. Israel now enjoys escalation dominance; Iran, by contrast, is boxed in.

Its proxies are battered. Hezbollah is politically paralysed. Hamas, operationally crippled. The Assad regime is gone. Even the Houthis, while defiant, are isolated and technologically outmatched. Meanwhile, Israeli aircraft operate deep inside Iranian airspace with near impunity. Iran’s once-feared missile arsenal is being depleted. Its air defences are breached. Its cyber capabilities, once a deterrent, now risk catastrophic retaliation.

Even Tehran’s most extreme threat—closing the Strait of Hormuz—has lost its sting. The move would alienate China, inflame Gulf neighbours, and strangle Iran’s own oil-reliant economy. What was once a trump card is now a bluff played at the edge of desperation.

Iran has never been more alone. China, once a silent backer, now keeps its distance, unwilling to endanger lucrative ties with the Gulf. Russia, though sympathetic, is overextended and cautious. The West is united in opposition. The Arab world—long wary of Iranian influence—offers Israel tacit support. What was once a cold war is becoming a rout.

This imbalance is more than military—it is systemic. The rules that governed regional behaviour are disintegrating. The informal “red lines” that once prevented total war are blurred. The norm of restraint is gone. In its place, a dangerous doctrine is emerging: strike first, escalate fast, endure the consequences later.

And those consequences are global. Gulf states are bracing for regional spillover. Maritime trade is under threat. Oil markets are jittery. Defence budgets are ballooning. Energy security is being radically recalculated. The international system—already weakened by years of populism, nationalism, and fractured alliances—is now being tested in its foundations.

The war between Israel and Iran is not an isolated event. It is a manifestation of a world drifting into disorder. Institutions once built to prevent exactly this kind of collapse—the IAEA, the Security Council—are paralysed. Treaties are fraying. Norms are eroding. And with each passing week, the threshold for catastrophic escalation lowers.

Some in Washington and Tel Aviv whisper that this is the final reckoning—that with Iran on its heels, now is the moment to finish the job. But this is folly. Desperation is a volatile fuel. Cornered powers do not surrender quietly. They lash out. They miscalculate. They reach for the weapons they swore they would never use.

There is talk that Iran may sprint for a bomb. But that sprint would be slow, telegraphed, and fraught with risk. Israeli intelligence knows the terrain. American bombers are on standby. The more Tehran rushes, the faster its clock ticks down.

We are now living through tectonic shifts not seen since the Cold War’s end. The era of managed hostility—of détente and proxy containment—is over. What replaces it is still forming, but it will be more volatile, more multipolar, and more unforgiving.

Tel Aviv and Tehran may fire the missiles. But the implications will be decided in Riyadh, Beijing, Moscow, and Washington. The old order has cracked. And the new one is not yet built.

This is the world we now inherit: post-balance, post-constraint, post-certainty.

The imbalance has arrived. And it is unstable.

Dimitris Kollias

Junior Research Fellow, ELIAMEP