"Brothers, if you keep doing this, so can we."

"...Simply put, Iran's message to Turkey and its Arab allies (which are arming and supporting the Syrian opposition) will be: "Brothers, if you keep doing this, so can we." There is much food for thought here for these countries - especially the oil monarchies - as they gather in Tunis this coming Sunday for the first meeting of the "Friends of Syria". ....... Both Cairo and Tehran are underscoring that the Middle East has phenomenally changed and things can never be the same again. The stunning reality is that Egypt and Iran are not exactly seeing eye-to-eye on the Syrian crisis and yet Cairo waved the warships through as they headed for Tartus.  

On its part, the most important message Iran could be giving is that neither the heightened standoff with the US nor the avalanche of Israeli threats has succeeded in brow-beating it or will detract from its will and capacity to help its Syrian ally. 

However, the danger of an actual confrontation with the US over Syria is very, very unlikely and Tehran never quite estimated that the Barack Obama administration was being swept into a Libya-like intervention in Syria. Tehran, which is well clued in on the ground situation in Syria, remained confident that President Bashar al-Assad was not in any danger. 

Yet, Iran's display of "might" in the eastern Mediterranean will cast its shadows on regional politics. Actually, Lebanon's Hezbollah and the Amal Movement in a joint statement on Saturday reiterated their alliance with Iran. They said events in Syria were part of the "desperate efforts made by the enemies" to destabilize the country and destroy its national unity and undermine Syria's firm support for the Palestinian resistance. 

(Hezbollah chief Seyed Hassan Nasrallah said this month that Iran rendered "moral, political and financial support in all its available forms since 1982" to the movement. He said Hezbollah scored the "most prominent Arab victory" over Israel, this victory couldn't have been achieved without Iranian support and "Syria had a big role in the victory".) 

At any rate, the display of "might" in the Mediterranean, which is historically a "Western lake", is bound to carry resonance within Iran itself. Such displays appeal to the Iranian people's sense of national honor and in turn helps consolidate public opinion, which is particularly important for the regime as the country approaches a crucial parliamentary election in March in which the calculus of power is expected to decisively shift and the alchemy of the Majlis to transform radically."