Timing, targets of Israeli counterstrike on Iran come into focus

Israel appears closer to showing its hand on how and when it will strike back at Iran as as a critical US election looms, Jewish holidays wrap up and US-Israeli diplomacy accelerates.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has decided on the response to this month’s aerial bombardment from Iran, according to Israel’s Kan 11 News on Tuesday, and the strategy will now be referred to Israel’s cabinet.

Netanyahu's government is made up of a right-wing coalition mostly calling for a tough response to the 181 ballistic missiles launched towards Israel.

It comes as the United States has sent 100 troops and deployed the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (Thaad) antimissile battery, ahead of an expected retaliatory strike from Israel on Iran that may provoke yet another attack from Iran.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu assured US President Joe Biden in a phone call last week that Israel will refrain from attacking Iran's nuclear or energy facilities, US newspapers reported citing officials.

It is not the first time that the Israeli premier is said to have made a plan of action, but as the psychological war between the two sides continues, timing may be key.

Israel is currently in the middle of a month of religious holidays, and after last year’s October 7 attack caught troops off guard amid the final one of the month, many believe that the government is giving the country time to breathe.

Last year's October 7 attack happened in the middle of the Simchat Torah festival, and Israel may be reluctant to invite an escalation to the war one year later.

Also crucial is the US presidential election, which is less than three weeks away.

“The US will want to get this done soon so it’s faded out of the news story before the election. Generally speaking incumbents don’t like wars around elections," said Michael Knights, an Iran expert at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

"It’s a distraction and looks like things aren’t under control. So once the holidays are over Israel and the US will want to get this over in a matter of weeks so the US can draw a line under it,” he added.

On Monday, a massive bombardment from Hezbollah saw swathes of central Israel sent to shelters as sirens sounded across most of the region.

Israeli intelligence and defense analyst, Ronen Solomon, predicts Israel will in fact carry out a multi-dimensional attack which may already have begun.

“Maybe one of the responses was the explosion we saw this week at the iron market in Tehran,” he explained, referring to a mysterious fire that broke out in a market housing companies manufacturing parts for Iran’s nuclear development.

“Those facilities supporting the nuclear project could well have been part of this multi-dimensional attack,” he added. “It means that Isfahan can also be a target, with Ministry of Defense facilities for developing a nuclear bomb. It could be hit without being considered a nuclear facility like Natanz.

Other options are the UAV manufacturing facilities in Isfahan, Solomon said, and the missile launching sites in Tabriz which gives Iran a unique position to attack Israel from north to south.

Psychological warfare

An Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Iran International that the delay could as easily be a part of the psychological war as the ongoing discussions with the US. Biden has said sending the THAAD system to Israel is to defend Israel, but said he will not support a direct hit on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

“Israel will keep its cards close to its chest and strike when it’s ready. Bibi knows that timing is key and is the master of psychological warfare with Iran."

It took Iran over two months to avenge the killing of Hamas's political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in an IRGC compound in Tehran, and Iran's retaliation came only after an airstrike killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut.

A year's worth of bombardments on Israel from rockets, missiles and drones launched by Iran itself and its regional allies Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon has left Israel facing a looming shortage of interceptor missiles, the FT reported.

Since the Hamas invasion now known as the Black Sabbath, over 20,000 rockets and missiles have been fired from Gaza and Lebanon alone.

So far, the Iron Dome has shot down the short-range rockets and drones from Hamas in Gaza, but it is the system known as David’s Sling which has intercepted the heavier rockets from Hezbollah’s huge arsenal in Lebanon.

In the multi-layered system, the Arrow defence has been used to block the ballistic missiles from Iran, but several of these in the recent attack struck, more than 30 of them hitting Nevatim air base alone, as shown in open source analysis.

Another missile exploded less than a kilometer from Israel’s foreign intelligence agency, Mossad.

Drone attacks

Attacks have also come from Yemen, Syria and Iraq, with low-quality drones also penetrating the country’s air defences. On Sunday, a drone from Hezbollah killed four soldiers and injured dozens more when a precise hit on a military base caught soldiers in the mess eating dinner.

Solomon, who spent 10 years as an advisor to one of the military's intelligence units and is writing a book on Iran’s nuclear program, said bolstering Israel’s defences is key as tensions between the two archenemies escalate.

“Israel is using hundreds of their interceptors by the day against Hezbollah, but the problem is not the rockets, but the missiles. What we really need the THAAD for is against Iran. We would expect double the kind of attack from before.”

However, Dana Stroul, a former senior US defence official with responsibility for the Middle East, told the FT, “Israel’s munitions issue is serious”.

She said: “If Iran responds to an Israel attack [with a massive air strike campaign], and Hezbollah joins in too, Israel air defences will be stretched,” she said, adding that US stockpiles were not limitless.

“The US can’t continue supplying Ukraine and Israel at the same pace. We are reaching a tipping point.”

Boaz Levy, chief executive of Israel Aerospace Industries, a state-owned company which makes the Arrow interceptors used to shoot down ballistic missiles, admitted in an interview with the FT that operations were running triple shifts to keep production lines running.

“Some of our lines are working 24 hours, seven days a week. Our goal is to meet all our obligations,” Levy said, adding that the time required to produce interceptor missiles was “not a matter of days”. While Israel does not disclose the size of its stockpiles, he added: “It is no secret that we need to replenish stocks.”