Iran is reeling from Israel’s attack

The Israel operation “rising lion”, as he calls his attack on Iran, is unprecedented. It is much more extensive and ambitious than everything that was preceded, including the two exchanges of missiles and drones it had with Iran last year. For Iran, it is the greatest assault on its territory since the Iran-Iraq war in 1980-1988.

In the darkest hours before dawn The Israel Air Force not only targeted sites linked to the Iranian nuclear program, but also to the country’s air defenses and the base of ballistic missiles, thus reducing Iran’s ability to retaliate.

In the field and in the shade, the network of agents working for Mossad, the intelligence agency abroad of Israel, would have helped to determine the exact location of the key characters both in military command and nuclear scientists.

People killed overnight include the head of the body of the Guards of the Islamic Revolution (IRGC), the Islamic revolution guards who overthrew the Shah regime in 1979, as well as the chief of the traditional armed forces and the head of the IRGC Air Force. Iran says that at least six of its scientists have been killed.

Once again, the Israel spy agency has proven to have successfully penetrated the very heart of the Iranian security establishment, proving that no one is sure.

Iranian state television reported that 78 people had been killed and said civilians, including children, were one of the dead. (This is an unofficial figure and has not been verified independently.)

Mossad could have launched drones from inside Iran as part of this attack. The main targets of all this operation were the installation of nuclear enrichment in Natanz and the bases belonging to the IRGC. For Israeli military planners, it has long been to come.

Iran is in shock and it is perhaps the first wave. There will be many more potential objectives on the Hit’s list of Israel, although some can be out of its reach, buried deep underground in reinforced bases under a solid rock.

So what led to this attack on Israel and why now?

Israel, and several Western countries, suspect that Iran has secretly worked on what is called “escape capacity”, which means the point of no return in the development of a viable nuclear weapon.

Iran denies this and has always insisted on the fact that its civil nuclear program – which has received the help of Russia – is for fully peaceful purposes.

For more than a decade, Israel has tried, with various degrees of success, to slow down and to find the nuclear progress of Iran. Iranian scientists were mysteriously murdered by unknown attackers, the military leader of the nuclear program, the Brigan-General Fakhrizadeh was killed by a remote-controlled machine gun on a lonely road near Tehran in 2020.

Before that, we and the Israeli cyber-detectives were able to insert a devastating computer virus, named Stoxnet, in Iranian centrifuge, which led them to become out of control.

This week, the United Nations nuclear custody, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), found Iran in violation of its non-proliferation obligations and threatened to refer it to the United Nations Security Council.

Many concerns about the Iran nuclear program arise from its highly enriched uranium storage (UHE) which has been enriched up to 60%, far beyond the level necessary to generate a civil nuclear power and a relatively short jump at the level necessary to start building a bomb.

There was an agreement to curb the nuclear program of Iran. He was concluded in 2015 during the presidency of Obama, but Donald Trump called him “the worst business of the world” and when he entered the White House, he removed the United States. The following year, Iran stopped respecting it.

No one outside Iran wants the Islamic Republic has the nuclear bomb. Israel, a small country with a large part of its population 9.5 million people concentrated in urban areas, considers an Iran with nuclear arms as an existential threat.

He underlines the many statements of Iranian personalities for the destruction of the State of Israel. Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the Arab States of the Gulf do not care much about the revolutionary Islamic Republic of Iran, but they learned to live with it as a neighbor.

They will now be extremely nervous about the risks of this conflict spreading to their own ribs.

For Israel, timing was crucial. Iran has already been weakened by the defeat or effective elimination of its proxies and allies in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza. Its air defenses were strongly compromised after the attacks last October by Israel.

There is a sympathetic president in the White House and finally, Israel would have feared that some of the main equipment for enriching Iranian uranium will be about to be moved underground.

It is clear what Israel wants by this operation: it aims at the very least from the Iranian nuclear program by years. Preferably, he wants to stop completely.

There will also be a lot in the military, political and intelligence circles of Israel which hope that this operation could even weaken Iran leadership that it collapses completely, inaugurating a more benign regime which no longer represents a threat in the region. It can be a vow pile from them.

President Trump said on Friday that Iran was “a second chance” to accept an agreement. A sixth cycle of American negotiations from Iran was to take place in Muscat on Sunday, but Israel does not define many stores by these discussions.

Just as Russia is accused of launching Trump during peace talks with Ukraine, Israel thinks that Iran does the same here.

Israel thinks that it is his best and perhaps the last chance to kill the presumed nuclear weapons program of Iran.

“The unprecedented strikes of Israel through Iran overnight were designed to kill the chances of President Trump to conclude an agreement to contain the Iranian nuclear program,” said Ellie Geranmayeh, member of the Main Policy at the European Council for Foreign Relations (ECFR).

“It is clear their [the attacks] Timing and large -scale nature aimed to completely derail the talks. “”

Washington made efforts to relay Iran that he was not involved in this attack. But if Iran decides to retaliate against one of the many American bases in the region, either directly or via its proxies, there is a risk that the United States could be trained in another Middle East conflict.

The supreme leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has promised a “severe punishment” for Israel, but Iran is in a much lower position today than two years ago and its reprisals are limited.

However, there is an even greater risk here. Israel’s operation could still turn against him, triggering a nuclear arms race.

The Hardline Hawks inside the Iranian security establishment has long argued that the best deterrence against future attacks in Israel or the United States would be that it will acquire the nuclear bomb. They will have taken note of the different fate of leaders in Libya and North Korea.

The colonel in Libya, Gaddafi, renounced his program of weapons of mass destruction in 2003; Eight years later, he died in a ditch, overthrown by the Arab Printemps who were supported by Western Air Power.

On the other hand, North Korea has challenged all international sanctions to build a formidable arsenal of nuclear warheads and intercontinental ballistic missiles, enough to make any potential attacker think twice.

Whatever the final damage of which the Israel operation increasing Lion, if the Iran regime survives – and it has already challenged the chances – then there is a risk, it will now accelerate its race towards construction and even the test of a nuclear bomb.

If this happens, it will almost inevitably trigger a nuclear arms race in the Middle East, with Saudi Arabia, Turkey and perhaps Egypt deciding that they also need it.

Independent BBC is the house on the website and the application for the best analysis, with new perspectives that question the hypotheses and deep relationships on the biggest problems of the day. And we present stimulating content of reflection through the sounds of the BBC and Iplayer too. You can send us your comments on the independent section by clicking on the button below.