Israel strikes Iran

According to the Bible (Ezra 1:1-4), the famous founder of the Persian Empire, Cyrus the Great, ironically freed the Israelites from their Babylonian captivity and allowed them to return to Jerusalem and rebuild their temple in 550 BCE. For this generosity, the Jews venerate the great Persian ruler as the only non-Jewish messiah. Unfortunately, relations between the two peoples have deteriorated in modern times given the hatred aroused by the creation of the State of Israel in 1948 on what many view as the back of the largely indigenous Muslim people. The Islamic Republic of Iran and its Axis of Resistance consisting of Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, among others, has been one of the leaders of this drive to annihilate the modern State of Israel. Iran’s apparent program to build nuclear weapons spearheaded what Israel has long viewed as an existential threat to its very existence. 

Thus, on Friday June 13, 2025, Israel struck Iran’s reputed nascent nuclear weapons facilities, long-range missile bases and aerial defenses, while killing numerous high-ranking members of its military chain of command and nuclear scientists. The central Iranian city of Natanz suffered severe damage to its nuclear fuel enrichment facility. The site had underground halls thought to contain centrifuges to enrich uranium. Mohammad Bagheri, the commander in chief of the military and the second highest person after the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed along with General Hossein Salami, the commander in chief of the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps,  among others. Iran’s Fars news agency reported that at least 78 people had been killed and 329 injured. Photos showed buildings in the capital Tehran in ruins. What are the implications of this step-level escalation of military action?

U.S. president Donald J. Trump had been actively pursuing a peaceful settlement of Iran’s nuclear program. The two sides were scheduled to meet in Oman on Sunday June 15 in an attempt to reach an agreement. In the meanwhile, Trump had publicly urged Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to refrain from striking Iran’s nascent nuclear facilities. However, to what extent were the United States and Israel secretly in cahoots? We do not know, although given Trump’s track record of trying to avoid war because he views it transactionally as bad for business, it is not a given that he secretly approved the deadly Israeli strikes. 

Immediately following the Israeli attacks, Trump urged Tehran to make a deal to eliminate its nuclear program or risk “even more brutal” attacks. The U.S. president added that Iran “must make a deal, before there is nothing left.” Trump added that Iran had brought the Israeli attacks upon itself by failing to accept an offer that he had made about two weeks ago regarding the Iranian nuclear program. In immediate response the United States moved warships and other military support in the Middle East to help protect its troops from possible Iranian retaliation. 

However, Iran undoubtedly viewed Trump’s proposal as humiliating since it would have forced it to discontinue its nuclear program which it viewed as its sovereign right to pursue. Following the Israeli strikes, Iran requested an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council to consider the situation. In a letter to the UN security organ, Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s foreign minister, characterized the Israeli attacks as a “declaration of war,” and added that his country would “respond decisively and proportionally.” He added that Israel had “now crossed every red line,” and declared that the Jewish state would “deeply regret this reckless aggression and the grave strategic miscalculation it has made.” 

Realistically, it would be impossible for Iran not to respond militarily now  because it would lose all self-respect in world politics. Indeed, in immediate retaliation, the Islamic Republic fired approximately 100 drones at the Jewish state. However, most of them were intercepted and there were no immediate reports of damage done to Israel.  

In truth, the Israeli strikes did not come from out of the blue. For years, Israeli prime minister Netanyahu, had carried out a clandestine conflict against Iran, but calculated to avoid all-out war between the two powerful regional enemies. Less than a year ago, when both sides blatantly had attacked each other for the first time, Israel still eschewed actions that risked detonating all-out war given its regional and even global implications. However, this time Netanyahu has brazenly escalated the situation by launching attacks that could well ignite a regional or even world-wide conflagration. 

To pull off strikes like this, Israel once again illustrated its extensive intelligence apparatus that it had so aptly demonstrated last autumn in strikes that decimated Hezbollah’s leadership and overall infrastructure in Lebanon. Indeed, the systematic dismantling of Hezbollah and Hamas had opened the door to these new strikes against Iran. Thus, this time Israeli intelligence clearly had gathered information about not only possible Iranian nuclear facilities, but also the whereabouts of top-level Iranian officials and scientists. The present reality exceeds fictious James-Bond novels. Netanyahu has successfully unhinged diplomatic negotiations between the United States and Iran over Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Instead, the Israeli leader has taken matters into his own hands to prevent what Israel views at the existential threat of an Iranian nuclear bomb.

However, these actions now risk ensnaring the entire region and potentially the United States itself in deadly and uncertain conflict. Indeed, Israel’s strikes not only humiliate Iran but also the United States which supposedly had warned the Jewish state against such actions. What kind of future is this where the junior Israeli partner risks leading the senior American one into a war it does not want? Are new terrorist attacks possible in the United States? Certainly, the  price of gas will jump. For how long will the other world powers like China, Russia, the European Union, India, and the United Kingdom allow such reckless actions that might plunge all into a disastrous world war? Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad or at least unable to control events necessary to protect their future existence.