After carrying out an explosive act of vengeance against Israel, Iran is preparing for the country to strike back in another dangerous round of escalation that has the potential to push the Middle East into an all-out war.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed that Iran would “pay” after the Islamic Republic fired up to 200 missiles against its longtime foe in response to the assassination of Hamas’s chief in Tehran, the killing of the leader of Hezbollah and a senior Iranian military official in Beirut and other Israel-linked actions across the Middle East.
The tensions are the latest to rattle the region, already in crisis over ongoing wars pitting Israel against Hamas in Gaza and against Hezbollah in Lebanon.
As experts and former Israeli and United States officials recently told Newsweek, Israel’s options include striking Iranian military infrastructure, oil facilities and nuclear sites, as well as potentially going after high-level individuals. However, as Iranian officials declared the latest bout over, they also issued warnings of even more intensive measures should Israel pursue further action.
Tehran-based security analyst Alireza Taghavinia argued that the length to which Iran goes is likely to depend on the nature and extent of Israel’s attack, but, in any case, could have vast consequences.
“I know that Iranian officials have decided to deal with Israel seriously in case of any attack on Iran,” Taghavinia told Newsweek, “because Iran will not tolerate any attack on its territory, even a symbolic attack.”
“Any attack on Iran’s territory will strengthen the position of those who want to change Iran’s nuclear doctrine and build nuclear weapons,” he said. “And making nuclear weapons is technically possible for Iran and depends only on Ayatollah Khamenei’s political decision.”
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Nuclear Options
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s longtime supreme leader, has for decades officially banned the production of nuclear weapons. But Israel, which possesses its own semisecret nuclear arsenal, has long accused the country of also clandestinely pursuing weapons of mass destruction.
Iran has openly accelerated its enrichment of uranium and adopted other nuclear-related measures since then-President Donald Trump’s administration abandoned the multilateral Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear deal in 2019 and reimposed sanctions against Tehran. As negotiations toward a restoration of the agreement failed, President Joe Biden’s administration has said all options were on the table to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Israeli officials have also previously called for preemptive joint strikes with the U.S. against Iran’s nuclear program. But responding to a reporter’s question on Wednesday, Biden said he would not support an Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear facilities in response to the Iranian missile strike the day before.
Such an operation could prove seriously challenging without the aid of Washington, as Taghavinia pointed out.
“I believe that if Israel does this, it will not be successful because Iran’s nuclear facilities are under the mountains, and Israel cannot damage these facilities,” Taghavinia said. “Another point is that Israel cannot attack Iran’s nuclear facilities with long-range weapons, and its planes must enter Iran’s territory about a thousand kilometers away.”
“This operation has a high risk,” he added, “and there is a possibility of losing a large number of Israeli fighters and Israeli pilots will be captured by Iran.”
Such an operation would also be especially influential in promoting already growing calls “to change Iran’s nuclear doctrine, and Iran will be determined in this regard for its survival and security.”
Amir Hossein Vazirian, also a Tehran-based analyst, agreed that Iran’s nuclear facilities would be “difficult to hit” due to their heavily fortified, underground and decentralized nature. This contrasts substantially, he pointed out, with the reactor sites destroyed by Israeli strikes in Iraq and Syria in 1981 and 2007, respectively.
But Israel has had a history of success in striking Iran’s nuclear program in other ways. The assassinations of nuclear scientists and various acts of sabotage, from cyberattacks to explosions, have been widely attributed to Israel’s Mossad overseas intelligence agency, which has been deployed substantially since the outbreak of the war in Gaza one year ago.
“Israel may decide to sabotage Iran’s nuclear sites, as in previous times,” Vazirian told Newsweek, “and it’s important to note that in any such situation, Iran will accelerate nuclear activities.”
Israel’s extensive espionage prowess raised another wildcard. If Israel sought to direct its covert operations toward assassinating senior political or military officials, Vazirian said, “Iran’s reaction is unpredictable.”
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‘The Battle of Infrastructure’
Iran’s nuclear sector is just one of several kinds of targets being considered by Israeli decision-makers.
Another option would be to strike Iran’s vast arsenal of missiles. Here, too, however, the operation would be complicated by Iran’s strategy of hiding some of its most valuable assets in sprawling subterranean complexes sometimes referred to as “missile cities.”
Yet a number of military bases, air defense systems, radar arrays and other sites remain relatively exposed. Should Israel seek to pursue strikes against military positions, Vazirian argued that Iran’s follow-up response might be to answer in kind with another, potentially more intensive round of missile strikes against its archfoe.
However, Iran’s energy sector is even more potentially vulnerable, including refineries, power plants and other facilities critical to Iran’s economic well-being. If Israel strikes here, Vazirian said, “We enter a new phase of war, the battle of infrastructure.”
“If Israel attacked Iran’s infrastructure, especially Iran’s economic infrastructure, Iran can damage gas platforms in the Mediterranean region,” Vazirian said, “and Iran can attack Israeli military industries like Rafael, Israeli power stations, Israeli warehouses of oil and gasoline in Haifa, and especially I can refer to Haifa and Ashdod oil refineries.”
The situation could especially escalate if the U.S. participates in the Israeli strike. In this case, Vazirian said Iran, backed by its network of non-state allies, “may decide to attack American interests in the Middle East,” including U.S. military installations in Iraq and Syria and even disrupt the global oil and gas flow through the Persian Gulf and Red Sea, where the crucial Strait of Hormuz and Bab el-Mandab chokepoints lie, respectively.
Already, factions of the Iran-aligned Axis of Resistance, including Yemen’s Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthi movement, and the militia coalition known as the Islamic Resistance in Iraq have intensified actions against Israel and threatened to strike U.S. positions as well if war escalates.
In a statement shared with Newsweek, the Iranian Mission to the United Nations said Tehran’s response to any new Israeli attacks “will be solely directed at the aggressor.”
But “should any country render assistance to the aggressor, it shall likewise be deemed an accomplice and a legitimate target,” the Iranian Mission added. “We advise countries to refrain from entangling themselves in the conflict between the Israeli regime and Iran.”
As for channels to Washington, the Iranian Mission also noted that “acting as the U.S. Interests Section, the Swiss Embassy in Tehran serves as the sole official communication channel for Iran.”
Newsweek reached out to the Israel Defense Forces and the White House for comment.
Taghavinia said that Israel alone “can undoubtedly damage Iran’s oil and refinery facilities” if it chose to target such sites given their exposed nature. But, he also said, “This action of Israel causes Iran to attack Israel’s oil, gas and refinery facilities such as the Haifa refinery.”
Should the war expand, he said, “Iran can easily destroy all the main oil and energy facilities of Israel and in addition attack the oil facilities of Azerbaijan, the UAE and Saudi Arabia and prevent the export of oil in the Persian Gulf.”
At the same time, he noted that “of course, the attack will not include the countries of Kuwait and Qatar.”
“Therefore,” Taghavinia added, “Netanyahu must understand that any attack on Iran’s energy and oil facilities will cause substantial damage and destruction to the oil facilities of Israel and its allies.”
Taghavinia felt the most likely target for Israel would be military sites in Iran, to which the Islamic Republic would respond in a manner that “destroys the industrial and commercial infrastructure of Israel.”
“Iran’s recent missile attack showed that Israel does not have the ability to deal with Iran’s hypersonic and advanced missiles,” he said.
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A ‘Dangerous Moment’
Israeli and U.S. officials have downplayed the impact of the latest Iranian salvo against Israel, which said military operations were uninterrupted. While the full extent of the damage has yet to be released, at least some air bases appeared to have been hit, and the destruction appeared to outweigh Iran’s previous round of strikes conducted in April over the killing of senior Iranian military officials at a diplomatic site in Syria.
Mostafa Najafi, an Iranian researcher who specializes in Middle East conflicts and Iranian foreign policy, recently told Newsweek that while “the Islamic Republic of Iran has also prepared all its defense capabilities” to tackle the impending Israeli threat, the recent Iranian strike proved that “no country’s air defense is perfect.”
He argued that “Iran is ready to defend its security, and in recent months, it has put its defense capabilities into action, and Israel will not have an easy time getting past Iran’s defenses.”
Having “left the policy of patience and restraint,” he said, Iran “will give a tougher and more immediate response to any Israeli action against its interests.”
“This is a historic and, at the same time, dangerous moment for the Middle East,” Najafi said. “It is a strategic imperative for the U.S. to restrain Israel with the pressure levers it has; Netanyahu wants to start a war in the Middle East at the expense of the United States and involve Washington in a devastating war in the region.”
“Iran is neither Iraq nor Afghanistan,” he added. “Going to war with Iran will destroy the economy and security of the world.”
Taghavinia and Vazirian were skeptical that the U.S. would get directly involved in the strikes, particularly due to the sensitive political climate amid a tight presidential race.
With the election looming in November, Michael DiMino, a former CIA analyst now serving as a fellow and public policy manager at Defense Priorities, said Israel was “pushing to change the facts on the ground as much as they can” during a virtual discussion hosted by his think tank.
“And I think similarly, the Iranians are going to try to hold back,” he added, “maybe in the hopes that the Harris administration is more willing to back to something that looks like the JCPOA or something similar.”
Responding to Newsweek‘s question regarding the limits of Iran’s strategic calculus, DiMino said, “Everybody’s got a line,” and that line “could be a serious attack on their nuclear infrastructure.”
