Awaiting Israeli retaliation against Iran in response to last week’s ballistic missile attack, fears are growing that Iran’s nuclear facilities could be targeted. However, the New York Times reports that this scenario is not very likely.

Two years ago, dozens of Israeli fighter jets roared over the Mediterranean Sea in a simulated strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, a drill the Israel Defense Forces openly advertised as a “long-range, aerial refueling and strike” exercise, the report said. distant goals”. The purpose of the exercise was not simply to intimidate the Iranians. It was also designed to send a message to the Biden administration: the Israeli air force was trained to conduct the operation alone, even though the chances of success would be much greater if the United States joined the attack.

In interviews, former and current senior Israeli officials were skeptical about the if the country has the ability to cause significant damage to Iran’s nuclear facilities. But in recent days, Pentagon officials have been quietly wondering whether the Israelis are finally preparing for such a major strike even on their own, having concluded that now is the right time to do so.

However, unnamed officials told The New York Times that for now Israel is likely to focus on military bases, or intelligence or leadership targets. Nukes appear to be targets for later, should the Iranians strike back.

The report says there is a growing call inside Israel, echoed by some in the United States, to seize the moment – as voices grow that Iran is on the verge of producing a nuclear bomb. While much of the public debate has focused on the fact that Iran could almost certainly ramp up uranium enrichment to produce bombs within weeks, it is more likely that it will be months or perhaps more than a year before Iranian engineers deliver such a weapon.

US officials, starting with US President Joe Biden, have launched a campaign to take such strikes off the table, saying they would likely be ineffective and could plunge the region into full-scale war. Washington has been trying for the past 15 years to promote alternatives, diplomacy, sabotage and sanctions, but not bombs, and has actively prevented Israel from acquiring the weapons it would need to destroy another centrifuge facility.

The report says that for many years, Israel had no real plan to attack Iran’s nuclear program, instead focusing on Hezbollah, until Naftali Bennett became prime minister in 2021. Bennett, who has increased his calls for days to strike Iran’s nuclear program, he quickly “ordered new long-range flight simulation exercises toward Iran and to put new resources into preparations.”

“The nuclear target is a very difficult target,” said General Frank McKenzie, who was in charge of Iran’s war plans when he ran the United States Central Command. “There are many other alternatives to this goal,” he said, adding that many of them — including energy infrastructure — would be easier to execute.

Iran’s next moves

But whether or not Israel strikes Iran’s nuclear facilities, there are new reasons to worry about its nuclear future.

The first concern is that US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has repeatedly argued in recent weeks that Russia shares nuclear technology with Iran. Officials describe the aid as “technical assistance” and say there is no evidence it is providing Iran with the material it needs to build a warhead. But until the war in Ukraine broke out, Russia had worked with the United States and Europe to curb Iran’s nuclear program, even participating in the 2015 negotiations alongside Western nations. Now, if the US reports are correct, Russia’s need for Iranian drones and other weapons means it could accelerate Iran’s progress toward building a nuclear device.

The second concern is that the damage done to Hezbollah in recent weeks, including the beheading of its leadership, could leave Iran feeling vulnerable. He can no longer count on the terrorist group’s ability to strike Israel. The move to acquire a nuclear weapon may become the only real way to deter Israel.

And finally, the third concern is that the Iranian program will become more difficult to strike. Several years ago, under the watchful eye of American and Israeli satellites, Iran began digging a vast tunnel network just south of Natanz. It is not yet operational. In the past — when Israel destroyed still-uncompleted nuclear reactors in Iraq in 1981 and in Syria in 2007 — that was precisely the moment it chose to launch preemptive strikes.