Not a lot of details but it seems Israel has retaliated against Iran. This was expected but still, this is ratcheting up global tensions and that can’t be good.
Five explosions were reported heard across Tehran and the nearby city of Karaj early on Saturday morning, according to Iranian media, in what is alleged to be the beginning of an Israeli retaliatory attack on Iran.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant was directing the attacks from a secure complex in IDF headquarters in Tel Aviv, according to Israeli media.
There were reports of widespread internet outages across Iran as the attacks continued.
Israeli officials confirmed to Army Radio that Israel had started striking targets across Iran.
Fars News, affiliated with Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, said that Israel attacked several military bases located in the western and southern part of Tehran. IRNA, Iran’s state news agency, reported that Imam Khomeini International Airport has been operational and that the civil aviation agency has not issued an order to cancel flights.
Reports from Iran over the last several days had included their likely not responding unless leadership or critical infrastructure was targeted. Fingers crossed this is a just right level of attack that allows both sides to step back now.
People keep saying this will lead to a wider Mideast war, to which I can only say, hasn’t that already been ongoing for the past 6 months or so?
Not to say that any situation can’t get worse by adding more violence. But unless someone’s got nukes that nobody knows about, I struggle to see any significant players that are interested in getting into the fray, and have enough resources to project force beyond these sporadic ballistic missile slapfights.
I’m kinda surprised by that. I’d be shocked if Israel didn’t have thousands of contingency plans ready for almost any eventuality. I’d have thought Israel could hit back at Iran within hours of Iran’s attack on Israel.
This suggests the wait was part of the plan but I can’t figure why. Doubtless they have smarter people than me planning this stuff and they have their reasons.
Well…sure but that is like saying the Cold War was always between the US and the Soviet Union. But neither the US nor the Soviet Union threw missiles directly at each other. That’s an escalation and a dangerous one (and to be fair Iran crossed that line first).
Which Israel said was military targets and Iran has identified as “several military bases located in the western and southern part of Tehran” as quoted above.
“The thinking now is that if Israel’s attack is symbolic and limited, we ought to let go and end the ping pong of attacks,” said Nasser Imani, a political analyst close to the government in a telephone interview from Tehran. “Iran is really not keen on having a major war with Israel. We don’t see any benefits in the region exploding.”
And the Soviets had planes in Vietnam and Korea and shot down US pilots and the US armed Afghani’s when the Soviets were there with missiles that shot down Soviet helicopters and so on.
But missiles were never thrown at the US or USSR directly.
Hezbollah or Hamas tossing missiles is different than Iran tossing missiles.
If these a$$hat belligerents would just learn to leave Israel alone they’d have nothing to worry about. How many times Israel has been attacked in the last 70+ years and they’ve made the aggressors pay, every time.
The people of Iran and other middle-east countries have awful governments. Those governments stay in power by telling their populace that the problem is those people over there (the US and Israel). If not for them everything would be swell. And Iran can point to sanctions which hurt their people. Add in religious animosity. It’s Tyrant-101.
Heck, we have it in the US. See everything Trump runs on. It’s not a nuanced approach to economics and global relations. It’s ALL about “those other people” that are making your life bad.
Anyway I see this as a surprisingly restrained response which is in turn being downplayed by leadership in Iran.
Diplomacy by missile attacks is dangerous. In this case with Iran messages have been sent, received, and apparently some level of understanding reached.
Netanyahu won’t allow any ceasefire to occur until after the American election, but after that it will happen quickly. Hamas is rudderless. Iran is not going to have Hizbullah’s back and is basically writing off that investment.
Despite scary headlines about risk of this getting much larger my understanding is that the path to deescalation is much larger now than it was 24 hours ago.
Supposedly they hit a missile fuel plant, which will take a few years to get back to regular capacity.
My understanding is they hit Islamic revolutionary guard corps sites as well as various sites involved in the production and storage of missiles. Also they hit Iranian air defenses.
Israel also destroyed 3 different Russian S300 air defense systems in Iran, which will make it easier for Israel to hit Iran in the future since now Iran has no S300 systems left.
Reports now indicate that the Israeli strikes on Saturday targeted around 20 military bases and facilities, across Iran, including missile and drone manufacturing sites, as well as the S-300 air defense systems. The attack killed at least four soldiers.