Iran suffers more humiliation with killing of nuclear chief. But no one in the world's most febrile region wants war

It is the art of anything-but-actual war. The apparent goal of Iran's enemies, and possibly Iran itself, is in the next 50 days -- ahead of the US inauguration -- to be as antagonistic as humanly possible, without actually starting a full-blown conflict.

source https://www.cnn.com/2020/11/28/middleeast/iran-mohsen-fakhrizadeh-killing-analysis-intl/index.html