Following Iran's large-scale counterattack on Israel, whether Israel will take military action to retaliate against Iran again has become the focus of attention of the United States and Western countries. They unanimously called for "calm restraint" in Israel, but at the same time they were sending a subtle signal to Israel that there is more than military action to harm the Iranian regime... In what areas does the United States and the West want to contain Iran? The United States has called on China to join the action against Iran.
After Iran fired a large number of missiles and drones at Israel, Israel almost immediately announced that it would respond to Iran's attack. Of course, Biden also clearly warned Netaliahu that the United States will not participate in any counterattack against Iran, and other Western countries have also reassured Israel, for fear that Israel's actions will lead to another escalation of the situation. However, the fact that the United States and Western countries do not support Israel's military attack does not mean that they will not support other forms of retaliation against Iran.
On the morning of the 16th local time, Israeli Foreign Minister Islam Katz sent letters to 32 countries one after another, calling on them to impose sanctions on Iran. There is no doubt that the United States will not miss such a great opportunity to weaken Iran, and US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has unabashedly said that "the United States intends to impose new sanctions on Iran in the coming days." The U.S. news website "Axios" also further confirmed Yellen's words on the same day, vowing that the "United States" will not hesitate to "impose economic penalties in response to Iran's unprecedented attack on Israel." In addition, some Western countries have followed the lead of the United States in their efforts to contain Iran, and at the same time, these containment methods have shifted from military action to armaments, economic sanctions, and diplomacy.
First of all, in terms of armaments and weapons, European Commission President von der Leyen made it clear that the EU will limit Iran's drone and missile manufacturing capabilities, and even the EU has set its sights on Russia, European Commission Vice President Borrell said that a number of EU member states proposed to expand a sanction aimed at curbing Iran's supply of drones to Russia, a proposal that was publicly supported by Germany, France and several other EU member states.
Second, the United States and the West are seeking to strike at Iran's ability to export oil. Yellen said frankly at a press conference held on April 16 local time that she wanted to curb Iran's "destabilizing behavior" by weakening Iran's ability to export oil. In order to achieve the goal of containing Iran, Yellen even set her sights on China, knowing that one of the most effective options for the United States to sanction Iran's oil exports is to expand sanctions on Chinese companies that buy large quantities of Iranian crude oil exports.
In addition, the United States has expanded restrictions on Iranian personnel in the diplomatic field. According to US media reports, the United States will restrict the actions of Iranian Foreign Minister Abdollahian and his delegation in New York this week. All in all, there are countless actions by the United States and the West to contain Iran, and some countries have proposed sanctions against Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and so on.
It is worth mentioning that, according to Reuters, the US Treasury Department is trying to win China into the ranks of the containment of Iran, and a senior Treasury department executive, who asked not to be named, said that "all these countries, including China, must have a role to play." I have to say that the double standards of the United States and the West have really reached the point of "perfection", and they have kept silent about the "unprecedented" incident of Israel's attack on Iranian embassies abroad, which violates international law, and when Iran counterattacked in order to safeguard national sovereignty, they have come out one after another to condemn, suppress, and encircle, which really exposes the essence of the double standards.
On the other hand, the United States is well aware that China has always maintained a neutral and impartial stance on regional conflicts, and the United States has always regarded China as an adversary. There is no doubt that China is now having more and more say in regional countries and even in the international community, and this is of course due to the fact that China's position has always been fair, and it is clear that China's position on this Iran-Israel conflict is as fair as ever.
On April 15, in the face of the increasingly tense situation in the Middle East, Foreign Minister Wang Yi had a telephone conversation with Iran and Saudi Arabia, and it must be pointed out that these two phone calls pointed out a key issue that cannot be ignored: the key issue in the development of the Iran-Israel conflict is the Gaza conflict, and the current situation in the Middle East is clearly a spillover manifestation of the escalation of the conflict in Gaza, and the top priority is to immediately implement Security Council Resolution 2728 and achieve a ceasefire and cease fighting in Gaza. However, the so-called revenge of the United States and the West for Israel, without any regard for tracing the root causes, will only "pull the strings" without thinking, and the result will inevitably lead to more and more complicated situations in the Middle East and greater contradictions among countries in the region. In this regard, we can see the uniqueness of China's diplomacy.