Iran's Ballistic Missile Attack Changed Nothing. What Will Israel Do Now?

Rockets fly in the sky, amid cross-border hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, as seen from Tel Aviv on October 1, 2024.

(Photo: Reuters)

The clock continues to tick in the Middle East as the world awaits the promised Israeli response to the Iranian ballistic missile attack of 1 October. Just what form it will take, and its timing, remain a matter of speculation.

Some observers think that the attack will focus on Iran’s oil production infrastructure, while others believe that it could target its nuclear facilities. As for the timing, the suggestions are that it will take place only after the Jewish New Year of Rosh Hashanah which ends on Friday evening.

A day before the Iranian ballistic missile strike, on Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu directly addressed the Iranian people and attacked its theocratic regime for plunging the region “deeper into darkness and deeper into war.”

His remarks suggested that Israeli policy could well involve efforts towards regime change. “When Iran is finally free—and that moment will come a lot sooner than people think—everything will be different.” He also spoke of the ancient ties between the Jewish and Persian people, who would then finally be at peace, and minus the mullahs, Iran would thrive through global investments, tourism, and technological innovation.

But that message was for the future. What concerns the world is the immediate situation in which Israel continues to battle Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and prepares for a military strike on Iran.

For years, in a proxy war, Iran has supported Hezbollah and Hamas in attacking Israel, while the Israelis have used a campaign of sabotage and assassination to hit Iran.

Then, with the Hamas-Israel war raging, Iran launched a massive drone and missile attack in April in retaliation for an Israeli strike that killed a top Iranian general in Damascus. Israel, aided by the American, the British, the French, the Jordanian and the Saudi forces, intercepted most of the drones and missiles and there were no fatalities, though some people had been injured. The Israeli retaliation was measured.

A few days later, it took out an S-300 surface-to-air missile system which was part of the protective ring around Iran’s nuclear facilities. The message was that if they could knock out the missile system, they could also strike at the nuclear facilities.

Iran said that its ballistic missile strike of Tuesday was to avenge the July assassination in Tehran of Ismail Haniyeh, the top political leader of Hamas, as well as last week’s killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.

Even though on Tuesday they were able to intercept most of the ballistic missiles fired, the Israeli response is bound to be stronger this time around. Tel Aviv no longer has to factor in the Hezbollah reaction since that outfit is down and out. Further, the ballistic missile strike was much more serious. Even though Tehran claimed it was targeting only military facilities and the Mossad headquarters, some missiles did manage to hit Tel Aviv

Netanyahu adopted a tough tone in the wake of the attack, noting, “This (Tuesday) evening, Iran made a big mistake— and it will pay for it.” He said the momentum was now with Israel and that the “‘axis of evil’ is in retreat.”

Any Israeli decision with respect to the nature of its response would depend on the extent of support the US is willing to offer. This is important because an extensive strike on Iran’s oil production and export facilities could result in an Iranian closure of the Straits of Hormuz and the blocking of all oil exports from the region. This has wider implications and could well send the world economy into a spin just a month before the US elections.

President Biden said on Wednesday that he would not support Israel striking Iran’s nuclear facilities, though he said the US and its allies were discussing new sanctions on Iran in response to its Tuesday attack. American officials are pointing to the fact that the attack inflicted relatively light damage on Israel.

An Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities could have unforeseen consequences. For one thing, Iran may be closer to making nuclear weapons than estimated, and the action could actually trigger a nuclear breakout. An attack on facilities that could be used to fabricate nuclear weapons would require American assistance if only to deal with the political fallout.

The decapitation of the Hezbollah leadership and the disruption of the organisation is an important element here. Till now, the threat of Hezbollah across Israel’s northern borders served to deter Israeli actions against Iran. With Hezbollah on its knees, Iran’s vulnerability has come to the fore, which has been deepened by the failure of its two attacks on Israel. This could well encourage Tehran to accelerate its nuclear weapons programme anyway.

The problem for Iran is that its conventional weapons gap with Israel has widened. Given the distance, a ground war between the two is improbable. But an aerial war would pit the state-of-the-art Israeli air force against an obsolete Iranian one equipped with Western aircraft acquired before the fall of the Shah’s regime in 1979.

Iran does have a few Russian and Chinese aircraft, but these are no match for the Saudi, UAE and Israeli aircraft. It also has a large stock of ballistic missiles, and repeated salvos could be troublesome for Israel, but given the outcome of the two previous attacks, Tel Aviv is unlikely to be worried about it.

The mullah-led government also needs to worry about the growing dissent at home. The 2022-23 protests against the government following the custodial death of Mahsa Amini over the hijab issue were viewed as the most serious ones that the regime had faced since 1979.

The killing of Nasrallah and the various assassinations in Iran have indicated the deep reach of Israeli intelligence but this does not mean that the Israelis have the wherewithal of dealing with Iran by themselves. Flush with its success in Lebanon, Tel Aviv may talk of regime change in Iran but that is probably something beyond the capacity of even a state like Israel.

(The writer is a Distinguished Fellow, Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi. This is an opinion article and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)