Israel’s war against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon highlights the embarrassment of Iran and its new president, as it faces pressure to strike back against Israel to defend an important ally as Pezeskian tries to reach out to the West.

And as tensions escalate, analysts and the international community are turning to Iran and wondering what its stance will be.

Iran says Israel wants to lure it into a direct conflict by bombing Hezbollah as Iran’s new president tries to reach out to the West.

Iran’s hardliners are pressing for action

Many hardline conservatives in Iran are worried about his lack of action as Israel targets the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, their country’s closest and longest-standing ally, the BBC reports.

When President Massoud Pezheskian addressed the UN General Assembly on Tuesday, he criticized Israel’s war on Gaza and warned that its attacks on Lebanon cannot go unanswered.

But Pezeskian, who was elected in July, has adopted a more moderate tone than his hardline predecessors, eschewing hostile rhetoric calling for the extermination of the Islamic Republic’s archenemy.

“We seek peace for all and have no intention of clashing with any country,” he said.

He also expressed his government’s readiness to resume nuclear talks with Western powers, saying: “We are ready to work with the participants in the 2015 nuclear deal.”

The attitude of the Revolutionary Guards

Other senior Iranian officials and commanders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) also showed unusual restraint in expressing their intentions to retaliate against Israel for its actions against their country and key allies Hamas and Hezbollah.

Iran has armed, funded and trained both armed groups, but Tehran’s leaders rely on Hezbollah as a major deterrent against direct attacks on their country by Israel.

Iran’s support has been critical to Hezbollah’s evolution into Lebanon’s most powerful armed force and political actor since the IRGC helped found the group in the 1980s.

It is the main supplier of the weapons Hezbollah can deploy against Israel, particularly advanced missiles and drones, while the US claims it also provides it with $700 million in funds annually.

Last week, Mojtaba Amani, Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon, was seriously injured when his buzzer exploded last week at the embassy in Beirut. Thousands more buzzers and communication devices used by Hezbollah members were also detonated in two attacks that killed a total of 39 people.

Iran blamed Israel, but made no direct public threats of retaliation.

In contrast, when Israel struck the Iranian consulate in Damascus in April, killing eight high-ranking commanders of the IRGC’s Quds Force, Iran quickly responded by launching hundreds of drones and missiles at Israel.

Iran has also vowed to retaliate after it blamed Israel for the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniya in Tehran in late July, but has yet to act.

A former IRGC commander told the BBC that Israel’s continued threats without a follow-up response against it further damaged the force’s credibility among its supporters inside Iran and its proxies abroad.

On Monday, President Pezheskian told members of the American media in New York that Israel is seeking to drag Iran into war.

“Iran is ready to ease tensions with Israel and lay down its arms if Israel does the same,” he insisted.

Some hardline conservatives close to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei criticized the president for talking about de-escalating tensions with Israel, arguing that he should acknowledge his position and avoid giving live interviews.

Pezeskian was scheduled to hold a press conference in New York on Wednesday, but it was canceled. It was unclear if he was forced to cancel because of his comments.

In Iran, power rests in the hands of Ayatollah Khamenei and the IRGC, who make key strategic decisions instead of the president.

Notably, Ayatollah Khamenei also did not mention plans to retaliate or threaten Israel, which is unusual for him.

Barak Ravid, an Israeli reporter for the US news website Axios, reported on Tuesday that two Israeli officials and Western diplomats had said that Hezbollah was urging Iran to help it attack Israel. Israeli officials claimed that Iran responded to Hezbollah that “the timing is not right,” according to Ravid.

Last week, the host of Iran’s Maydan online TV network, which is affiliated with the IRGC, cited Iranian intelligence sources as saying that Israel “also conducted a special operation last month, killing members of the IRGC and stealing documents.”

He claimed that the Iranian press had been banned from reporting on the incident, which allegedly happened inside Iran, and that authorities were trying to control the narrative.

In response, the Tasnim News Agency, which is also affiliated with the IRGC, denied the allegations.

The Islamic Republic is in a precarious situation.

He worries that attacking Israel could trigger a US military response, drawing the country into a wider conflict.

With a crippled economy due to US sanctions and ongoing internal unrest, a potential US strike against the IRGC could further weaken the regime’s security apparatus, possibly encouraging Iranian rivals to rise up against it once again.

However, if Iran refrains from directly intervening in Hezbollah’s conflict with Israel, it risks sending the message to other allied militias in the region that, in times of crisis, the Islamic Republic may prioritize its own survival and interests over those of their own.

This could weaken Iran’s influence and alliances across the region.