Decisive attack, unknown result
Israel’s blitz on Iran is fraught with uncertainty
Much hinges on the stubborn supreme leader and America’s mercurial president
JUST OVER a month ago, Donald Trump was in Saudi Arabia denouncing “interventionists” who tried to reshape the Middle East.
The president decided not to stop in Israel on his way back home, a sign of his strained relationship with the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, who was also facing a series of political crises at home.
Instead Mr Trump was eager to negotiate with Iran, which he hoped would become a “really successful” country.
He shared a video of a top adviser to Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, proposing a deal over its nuclear-weapons programme.
Those feel like scenes from a different world.
Israel went to war with Iran on June 13th, a decision that will reshape the Middle East.
A week later Mr Netanyahu is riding high, overseeing a campaign that he has dreamed of for decades.
Mr Trump seems to have forgotten his qualms about intervention.
He may send American troops to join the fighting; he has called for Iran’s “unconditional surrender”.
As for Mr Khamenei, he is in hiding.
The adviser in the video, Ali Shamkhani, was the target of an Israeli assassination attempt and is either dead or grievously wounded.
Israel said it decided on war after it picked up intelligence that Iran had “accelerated significantly” towards building a nuclear weapon.
It has not substantiated that claim in public.
It has shared intelligence with allies, not all of whom are convinced.
There is no doubt that Iran had enriched 400kg of uranium to 60% purity, a short hop from weapons-grade, a figure reported by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN’s nuclear watchdog.
America’s spies also believe that Iran was researching other aspects of bomb-making.
But they are sceptical that Iran was as close to building one as Israel posits.
The debate now feels almost academic.
The die is cast.
Israel is halfway through what Mr Netanyahu has described as a two-week campaign.
But the war may expand before it ends and it may not end on schedule.
Three factors will shape what happens next: how long Israel and Iran can keep up a costly long-range war; whether Mr Trump orders America into the fray; and if Mr Khamenei will agree to concessions to save his imperilled regime.
Rapid ascent
Since the war began before dawn on June 13th Israel has assassinated Iran’s top generals and nuclear scientists, obliterated air defences in the west of the country and bombed various nuclear sites.
It has not yet damaged Iran’s main nuclear facility at Fordow, however, which is dug into the side of a mountain, too deep for Israeli ordnance to reach.
That is where it hopes to enlist American help.
More than 500 people have been killed in Israeli strikes, authorities say, many of them civilians.
Motorways out of Tehran have been clogged with traffic as residents flee.
Petrol stations are rationing fuel.
Iran has retaliated with daily barrages of ballistic missiles aimed mostly at Tel Aviv and Haifa, two of Israel’s biggest cities.
The projectiles have sent Israelis running to bomb shelters every few hours.
Most have been shot down by Israeli and American air defences, or missed their targets and landed in deserted spots.
A few dozen have got through, however; at least 24 Israelis have been killed.
Cruising
Still, Israeli officials say the first week has gone largely to plan.
The attacks on nuclear sites and assassinations of scientists make it impossible for Iran to build a bomb quickly.
At home, the damage from Iranian missile strikes has been less than anticipated.
The second week of fighting will probably see Israel attack Fordow, with or without America.
At some point, both Israel and Iran will need to look for a way to stop.
Theirs is a curious sort of war: their capitals are 1,500km apart and they do not share a border.
A jet that takes off from Israel crosses two other countries before it reaches Iran’s airspace.
Neither side can sustain a long-distance air war indefinitely.
“It’s almost impossible to decisively win,” says Amos Yadlin, a former Israeli general.
Before the conflict began, Iran was thought to have around 2,000 ballistic missiles with the range to hit Israel.
It has fired around 400 of those; the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) reckons it has destroyed a roughly equal number in air strikes.
That still leaves Iran with a sizeable stockpile, stashed underground in deep tunnels.
But its salvoes have been shrinking, from more than 150 on the night of June 13th to just 30 six days later.
It may be rationing missiles for fear of a long conflict.
More likely, though, is that it is struggling to launch them. Its missile bases are under constant threat from Israeli jets and drones.
As a mobile launcher prepares to fire, it is vulnerable.
The IDF says it has already hit around 120 of them, a third of the total.
“The total collapse of Iranian air defences means Iran cannot manoeuvre effectively,” says Decker Eveleth of CNA, an American think-tank.
Iran does have other weapons in its arsenal.
But Israel has so far shot down all of the drones launched from Iran.
Cruise missiles, which fly lower and slower than their ballistic brethren, are easier to parry as well.
Ballistic missiles have wrecked lots of buildings in Tel Aviv, knocked out an oil refinery in Haifa and damaged army bases.
They have not caused anywhere near the sort of destruction that might hinder Israel’s war effort or compel it to stop fighting.
Still, every night is a test of nerves.
The war is also a fiscal millstone.
Since October 7th 2023, when Hamas, a Palestinian militant group, massacred nearly 1,200 people,
Israel has spent an estimated 300bn shekels ($85bn) fighting various wars.
That was before the campaign against Iran.
An Israeli economist who advises the government estimates that the jet fuel and munitions being used to attack Iran cost 1bn shekels a day.
Each interceptor launched by Arrow, Israel’s ballistic-missile-defence system, costs around $3m, and the IDF usually fires more than one for every approaching missile.
Israel’s stockpiles of such interceptors are also limited, although hundreds more have been manufactured in recent months.
Concern about a long war is one reason why Israel is so eager for American help.
Until last November, it was hard to imagine an American president even giving Israel the green light for a war against Iran—let alone joining it.
Barack Obama barred an Israeli strike in his first term.
He went on to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran during his second, which made it impossible for Israel to act unilaterally.
Joe Biden urged restraint after two rounds of Iranian ballistic-missile attacks on Israel last year.
At first it seemed as if Mr Trump would do the same.
He campaigned on a promise to end America’s “endless wars” in the Middle East.
In April he dispatched Steve Witkoff, his personal envoy, for the first of what would be five rounds of negotiations with Iran.
The president sounded optimistic as recently as late May, when he hailed a “very, very good” round of talks with Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s foreign minister.
By early June, though, Mr Trump’s tone had changed.
He started to suspect that Iran was stalling for time and unwilling to make concessions. Still, Mr Witkoff had scheduled a sixth round of talks for June 15th.
But behind the scenes, Mr Netanyahu and hawks in America were urging Mr Trump to give Israel a green light.
He did so days before the war began, although he seemed to have reservations about it.
Mr Trump’s concerns seem to have evaporated on the morning of June 13th, however, when he woke up to the news that Israel’s first round of strikes had been a success.
He quickly embraced the war plan as his own.
For a president enamoured of quick wins, the idea of joining Israel and striking Fordow no doubt looks appealing.
For a start, America may have to do more than conduct a handful of sorties.
Iran has spent decades anticipating a war in the Persian Gulf.
It has air-defence batteries and missile bases along its southern coast, many of which remain unscathed, since Israel has concentrated its efforts in western Iran.
Iran’s naval forces have trained to use fast-attack boats, anti-ship missiles and mines to target both American warships and commercial vessels.
America would probably need to destroy some of this, to protect both its own aircraft and its allies in the region.
Then there is the question of how Iran might retaliate.
It would almost certainly tap its proxies.
Militias in Iraq have already threatened to attack the American embassy in Baghdad and American troops elsewhere in the country.
The Houthis, a Shia militia in Yemen, could resume attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea.
A more serious escalation would be for Iran itself to attack its neighbours across the Gulf.
It could fire at the American naval base in Bahrain, home to its Fifth Fleet, or at al-Udeid air base in Qatar.
Or it could attack the Gulf states directly, firing missiles and drones at Saudi oilfields, for example, as it did in 2019.
It could also blockade the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20% of the world’s oil supply passes.
Some of this would be self-defeating.
Attacks on Gulf countries would poison Iran’s relations with its neighbours and might prompt them to retaliate.
Blockading the strait would upset China, which imports almost all of Iran’s crude oil.
It would also disrupt Iranian imports, particularly of petrol: though it is a big oil producer, its ageing refineries struggle to meet domestic demand.
Still, the regime could try it anyway, hoping that mayhem in the Gulf would force countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to beg Mr Trump for a ceasefire.
People look over damage to buildings in Nobonyad Square following Israeli airstrikes in Tehran, Iran / Iran has no answerPhotograph: Getty ImagesArab diplomats have already urged an end to the war.
European diplomats were quick to call for “de-escalation” too.
That would satisfy Iran: Mr Araghchi has told foreign diplomats that his country is willing to accept an immediate ceasefire.
But it is a non-starter for Israel, which spent years planning for war and refuses to stop prematurely.
It is working its way through a so-called “target bank”: after bombing Iran’s air defences and some of its nuclear sites, it has moved on to factories that produce centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium, and missiles.
The question is what happens when Israel runs out of targets.
“Israel can achieve tangible results within a few days,” says Mr Yadlin.
“But for that we need also a diplomatic exit strategy, and Mr Netanyahu hasn’t been adept at devising one of those.”
Target lost
Mr Trump’s intentions are uncertain.
On June 18th he told reporters, “Nobody knows what I’m going to do.”
The day before, he said he was after something “better than a ceasefire”.
As ever, his comments are Delphic: do they suggest America plans to join the war?
Or that it wants a more comprehensive effort at diplomacy?
His supporters would prefer the latter.
A poll from The Economist and YouGov released on June 17th found that 60% of Americans were opposed to joining the conflict between Israel and Iran, with just 16% in favour.
The figures were similarly lopsided among respondents who voted for Mr Trump last year: 53% no, 19% yes.
If Mr Trump opts for diplomacy, he will want something more restrictive than the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the deal Mr Obama struck with Iran to curb its nuclear programme.
At a minimum, Israel and America would expect Iran to forswear domestic enrichment of uranium.
Before the war Mr Witkoff proposed establishing a regional consortium to refine the stuff.
It might have included Saudi Arabia, which is keen to build nuclear reactors; the UAE, which already has four; and Iran.
But Iran balked at the idea, insisting that it would keep its own enrichment facilities.
The proposal will be back on the table in any future negotiations.
This is not the first time America has sought a zero-enrichment deal.
Mr Obama called for one too, early in his presidency, but Iran refused to even discuss the idea.
He eventually settled on a deal that allowed Iran to enrich uranium to 3.67%, the level needed for nuclear power, with limits on its stockpiles of both uranium and centrifuges.
Iran may now have to be more flexible.
Faced with a military threat, the regime has two goals.
It wants to preserve some semblance of a nuclear programme, which it views as a long-term insurance policy.
It also wants to survive—to end the war before it is too weak to retain power.
Eventually those goals could come into conflict.
At the end of the Iran-Iraq war in 1988 Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran’s first supreme leader, likened accepting the ceasefire agreement to drinking from a poisoned chalice.
His successor may have to choose between two cups: “one that risks the regime’s collapse in the short term, and another that could endanger it in the longer term”, argues Raz Zimmt of Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies.
What if the regime refuses to concede?
Mr Khamenei is stubborn at the best of times and many Iranians question the 86-year-old’s decision-making prowess, especially now that he has lost some of his closest advisers.
One possibility is that Israel, and perhaps America, try to overthrow him.
Toppling the regime is not an official aim of the war.
But some of the targets Israel has struck, like the state broadcaster, seem intended to destabilise.
The regime is tenacious, however, and what would follow it is uncertain.
“There’s no endgame for Israel unless it draws in the US or unless the regime falls,” says a Western diplomat.
“Both are big gambles.”
Then again, perhaps Mr Netanyahu does not feel he needs an endgame.
If the war ends after two weeks, and with no nuclear pact, Iran will still be at its weakest in almost 40 years.
Its missile programme and air defences are in tatters.
Its nuclear project has already been set back five to six months, even if Fordow remains intact.
Perhaps more important, the legitimacy of the Islamic Republic is shot: even conservatives are furious that the regime has failed so badly to protect the homeland.
It may survive the war, but it will hardly be stable in the weeks and months that follow.
And what happens next may not be Israel’s immediate concern.
Being 1,500km away has its advantages.
Countries closer to Iran are more nervous.
Officials in the Gulf fret about a range of bad outcomes.
Iran could splinter, with ethnic separatists causing trouble near its borders with Iraq, Pakistan and Turkey.
Or the clerical regime could give way to a military one, which might be tempted to make a clandestine dash for a nuclear bomb in order to deter future attacks.
In the first scenario, Iran would come to resemble Libya; in the second it would be North Korea.
Neither is an appealing choice for its neighbours.
There are more optimistic scenarios, too.
Mr Khamenei is old and unpopular; one way or another, he will not be in power for long.
His decades-long effort to bring Iran to the nuclear threshold, protected by a ring of proxies, has ended in disaster.
His successor might sensibly decide to chart a different, less confrontational and ideological course.
But as with so much else in this conflict, there are no guarantees.
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