The escalation of tension in the Middle East has turned public attention to the domain of diplomacy and ways to avoid the spread and involvement of more countries in the conflict.

“We are seeing an escalation on the part of Israel, Iran and the terrorist groupings, leaving less room for diplomacy. We are moving towards the worst-case scenario, something that was being talked about years ago,” Ivaylo Ivanov, security expert from the Union of Reserve Officers “Atlantic” told the BNR. Netanyahu’s ultimate goal is to force the US to intervene in Israel’s favour and weaken Iran, “whether it will be by air strikes or direct intervention on the ground is for the time being hypothetical,” he believes. “We are on the cusp of things getting out of control and they will have dire consequences for the whole world,” Ivaylo Ivanov says.

For the moment there are no data of any new military attacks on the territory of Israel, after the attack which took the lives of seven in a Tel Aviv quarter – Yafo two days ago, combined with a massive Iranian missile attack against the country.

“Only if you live here can you assess the situation realistically,” says Vesela Raytchinova in an interview with Radio Bulgaria. She was born in Bulgaria but has been living in Israel since the late 1990s, where she works as journalist, teaches and produces several festivals. Just one street separates Bat Yam, the town where she lives, from Tel Aviv:

“Only a person living here can assess the situation in a more realistic way than if you look at it from the outside. The truth is that, seen from the outside, even something that does not look so serious is presented as being exceedingly serious, and I am seeing that in the colleagues who come here believing that the situation is dire. I tell them not to worry because the attack is far from us – in the next street, or in the next town – and I must admit they are very surprised when I tell them that.”

For now, all is quiet, says Vesela Raytchinova further, but goes on that on Wednesday night the alarm sounded in her town once again:

“People in the town jumped from their beds and rushed to the stairs and the safe locations – including myself. It is thought to have been an alarm signaling the incursion of an enemy aircraft into the skies over Israel with a warning to all regions that could be in danger. I feel sure there are critical days lying ahead when important decisions will have to be made, and I sincerely believe that they will be the best decisions for coping with this problem, because with the attack by Iran war broke out in the region.”

Vesela Raytchinova describes the unprecedented attack by Hamas on Israeli territory on 7 October last year as an extremely serious breakthrough on their part:

“I believe that back then Israel just let them enter. We had to shut ourselves up here – I live on the first floor – to lock ourselves in because they don’t care, they are drugged, fanatically following an ideology whose only aim is to kill, they don’t care who. That was how people from Thailand were killed. Ideology, drugs, stimulating substances… and that’s it! I have to admit that though I am a journalist and I am strong what I saw after the attack was devastating. It was really hard to talk in my first comments for Bulgarian media because they wanted to hear the human side after what had happened.”

Translated and posted by Milena Daynova
Photos: BGNES, BNR