Israel scraps two planned revenge attacks against Iran
Israel planned and cancelled two strikes against Iran over the past week, officials said, as a former colonel said the targets for the planned retaliation could range across the Middle East.
Israeli deliberations continued yesterday over a response to Iranian air strikes on Saturday night, with foreign diplomats now accepting that some form of response is inevitable and seeking to contain escalation and prevent full-scale war.
Israel’s war cabinet had prepared plans for the air force to bomb targets in Iran within hours of the Iranian attack. But those were abandoned after a call between Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and the US President, Joe Biden, The New York Times reported, citing US, Israeli and Middle East officials.
A second set of strikes against Iran was later cancelled for “operational reasons”, Israeli sources said. Israel’s allies will need to “find a creative way to harm Iran in a significant manner” to avoid Israeli strikes against Iran, said Professor Kobi Michael, a senior researcher at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies and the Misgav Institute. Miri Eisin, a former Israel Defence Forces colonel and senior intelligence officer, and incoming head of the International Institute for Counter Terrorism, said Israel’s next move would target the Iranian regime. “It’s about direct action against Persian-speaking Iranians,” said Dr Eisin. “I say that because you have Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran. This is not about the country Iran. It is about the regime, its leaders, their statements and actions against us.”
Israel is already in a “multi-front war” across several countries in
the region at varying degrees of intensity, she added, suggesting that Hezbollah forces “could be one of the Israeli targets against the Iranian challenge”.
She does not believe the plan has been finalised. “If they had made a decision then they wouldn’t be meeting every day,” she said, suggesting that Israel would seek to balance the wishes of allies with a perceived need to restore deterrence, which could involve attacks on Iranians abroad.
The US was reported to have offered to support an Israeli operation in the city of Rafah, southern Gaza, in exchange for limits on retaliation against Iran, according to the Qatari newspaper Al-Araby AlJadeed, which cited Egyptian and Western diplomats.
However, US officials denied that the Biden administration had given the green light to an assault on Rafah, according to Axios.
Senior US and Israeli officials were set to meet virtually yesterday to discuss Israel’s plans for Rafah. The National Security Adviser, Jake Sullivan, was expected to chair the meeting, which included representatives from the Pentagon including senior US military planners. Mr Biden was not expected to attend.
Israel’s defence minister, Yoav Gallant (inset), said that Israel has “freedom of action” while meeting fighter pilots at an air base yesterday. “Our missions will not be reduced.”