Is Israel heading for a preemptive strike?

The smartphone buzzes all day long. Every single message sent via the Israeli app Tzofar warns of the next air strike: the target area is marked on the map as precisely as possible. Hezbollah fires rockets across the border into Israel almost every hour. Every day.

Immediately after the Hamas massacre in southern Israel on October 7, 2023, the Shiite terrorist militia opened a second front in the north – with the intention of terrorizing the local population until the Israeli army leaves Gaza to Hamas. Around 60,000 Israelis were evacuated and have been waiting to return to their homes.

The killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah last Friday did not change this – on the contrary: on Tuesday evening the situation escalated further: Iran attacked Israel directly, for the second time this year. Israel is engaged in a regional war on three fronts simultaneously.

Combined air defense

The first attack in April, with which the regime in Tehran responded to an Israeli airstrike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus, took place after it had been announced. This time, Iran fired 181 ballistic missiles without diplomatic warning. Iranian airspace was also closed at very short notice and only partially.

Footage from commercial aircraft showing the launch of the guided missiles from the air is circulating online:

The American sensors – probably mostly satellites and drones – had detected the preparations just a few hours before the order to fire. At least there was still enough time to put the air defense at the highest level of readiness and to warn the population in good time. There were just under 15 minutes left between the first sirens and entry into Israeli airspace.

Similar to April, the attack was largely repelled thanks to a joint military effort: The command was probably once again carried out from the forward air force command post of the American Central Command (Centcom) in Qatar. There, the individual guided missile packages arriving from Iran were assigned to the spatially appropriate defense systems.

Ballistic missiles are particularly difficult to intercept because of their steep trajectory: they reach their apex outside the Earth’s atmosphere. That’s why the missiles move at particularly high speeds in the descending branch.

Israel’s three-stage, ground-based air defense is able to partially intercept the guided missiles with the Arrow system in space, but with “David’s Slingshot” it also has a chance of intercepting the missile at medium range and the Iron Dome even just above the target area to meet.

 

Israel received support from the American and French air forces. There is no information as to whether Jordanian jets were in use again on Tuesday, as they were in April.

Like France and Great Britain, Jordan is part of the Centcom coalition, which has existed since the terrorist attacks on the USA on September 11, 2001. Today, the loose alliance is a key pillar of American efforts to stabilize the Middle East: for example, in operations against the Yemeni Houthi militias’ attacks on international shipping.

Israel wants back control of the escalation dynamics

Iran also deployed Fatah-2 hypersonic missiles on Tuesday, one of which was reported to have hit the Nevatim air base in the Negev desert. No serious damage was reported, but one thing remains: there is no complete air defense.

Part of the F-35I fleet is stationed in Nevatim. A failure of this key system would limit Israel’s ability to attack its adversaries, particularly Iran. The Israeli actions of the last few weeks are therefore highly risky. For its defense, Israel needs its offensive assets such as the F-35I.

In recent years, Tehran’s goal has been to surround Israel with various militias: Hamas operates in the Gaza Strip, Hezbollah occupies part of Lebanon, and the Houthis are attacking from Yemen, as well as armed groups under Iranian control in Syria and in Iraq.

Israel obviously wants to free itself from this conventional stalemate – and has been taking heavy action against Hezbollah, the strongest actor in this “Axis of Resistance”, for a fortnight. The middle management was first eliminated using prepared pagers and radios, then Nasrallah was killed with a bunker-busting bomb in the middle of southern Beirut. Since the beginning of this week, the Israeli army has also been deployed with ground troops in southern Lebanon.

The Hamas massacre and the taking of over 200 people hostage almost a year ago not only surprised Israel, but also put it on the defensive. Now it’s obviously a matter of controlling the escalation dynamics again – or to put it another way: Israel wants to be able to control how the conflict develops again.

The main risk is the ground offensive in southern Lebanon

To this end, the Israeli security forces – the intelligence services and all branches of the army combined – appear to have developed a so-called “multi-domain operation” that could set a new military benchmark. In a combination of actions from the air, on the ground, in cyberspace and also in the information space, Israel is trying to sustainably weaken the “Axis of Resistance” or, in the best case, to destroy it.

The operational plan should follow the following key points:

In other words: Israel is using the situation in the north to launch an actual preemptive strike against Iran.

 

Currently, the actions on the ground pose the greatest risk that the plan will not work: On Wednesday, eight Israeli soldiers died in southern Lebanon – the majority of them members of elite units, including three with the rank of captain, the other five were senior non-commissioned officers. This is an indication that the Israeli army’s portrayal is correct: at the moment it is all about coups and raids.

The public knows how challenging a ground offensive is in the hilly terrain of southern Lebanon – until 2000, Israel occupied a buffer zone up to the Litani River, and in 2006 the Israeli army was once again involved in a war across the border instead of pursuing its goals with limited actions to reach.

To advance into southern Lebanon, the troops must first march uphill. According to the tactical principle “He who has the highs, has the lows,” Hezbollah has a starting advantage when it comes to defense. In addition, the marsh axes run practically parallel to the rivers and valleys. Hezbollah took advantage of this topography and dug in. He can block anywhere and fire at the Israelis from bunkered positions.

The Israeli army has indicated that its actions on the ground this week prevented a possible Hezbollah offensive into northern Israel. This cannot be checked. According to publicly available sources, possible Hezbollah attack tunnels have actually been discovered and some of them have been blown up.

The army also wants to use its attacks to test whether and, above all, how organized Hezbollah can still fight after the attacks of the past fortnight.

Second carrier strike group on its way to the Middle East

For an actual offensive with the aim of creating a new buffer zone, too few Israeli ground troops appear to have been mobilized and relocated to the north. This could also indicate that Israel is primarily focused on escalation with Iran. Tuesday’s wave of attacks offers a golden opportunity to eliminate Iran’s nuclear program.

With the F-35I, the Air Force can penetrate Iran’s airspace undetected. With the killing of Nasrallah in Beirut, Israel also demonstrated its ability to destroy targets deep beneath the ground. American President Joe Biden is still calling for moderation. At the same time, the Navy sent a “carrier strike group,” an aircraft carrier with escort ships, from Norfolk to the Middle East.

Israel would thus have the backing of the USA for an air offensive against Iran. The fact that the evacuated population can return to the north and the whirring on their smartphones finally stops would be a side effect of the operation plan. Israel’s strategic goal remains to remain the only nuclear power in the region.

The Israeli operational plan is also likely to have set the escalation window precisely at the end of Biden’s term in office. Washington no longer seems to have much authority over the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.