Thinking About Israeli Retaliation
American Enterprise Institute
October 02, 2024
After last night’s Iranian missile barrage, Israel will undoubtedly respond, and it will seek to do so as quickly as possible.
Moreover, the Israelis believe they need to mount a more punishing response this time than they did after Iran’s April 13 missile attack because that Israeli response failed to convince Iran never to try again. Israel has always followed the logic of deterrence: when someone hits you, you hit them back even harder to persuade them never try again.
(As an aside, I actually think that both the failure of the Iranian strike on April 13 and the incredible success of the limited Israeli response did have the hoped for impact on Tehran. It is exactly why Iran did not retaliate for a wide range of Israeli military actions until Jerusalem killed Ismail Haniyeh and launched the ongoing, massive campaign against Hizballah. Those were threats/humiliations to Iran so great that the regime felt it simply could not do nothing in response. But last night’s strike was smaller than that on April 13 and was once again directed only at Israeli military targets. It was largely symbolic.)
What will Israel Likely Strike?
Because Israel wants to humiliate Iran and wants to signal to everyone else in the region that there is a heavy price to be paid for attacking the Jewish state, Jerusalem’s response will almost certainly be an overt military operation.
That said, Israel has two crucial strategic considerations. First, it is now engaged in a major campaign against Hizballah in Lebanon and that is its priority. It does not want to get distracted by a protracted and escalating set of exchanges with Iran right now. Once it has done what it wants to do to Hizballah, it will start thinking about whether to go after Iran, but it would prefer not to have to deal with that question in this moment. Such an exchange could require pulling air assets away from the campaign in Lebanon, which is not the IDF’s preference. Moreover, the U.S. and other countries are pressing Jerusalem to limit its response to Iran and Israel wants international forbearance, if not support, for its operations in Lebanon, creating another incentive to show restraint in responding to Iran this time.
Second, Israel will want to ensure that its response is seen as a success. As in April, Iranian impotence needs to be contrasted with Israeli omnipotence to preserve Israel’s deterrent against Iran and all of its other regional enemies. So whatever the Israelis hit, they are going to want to ensure that the strike is seen as another victory.
For all of these reasons, Israel is most likely to hit a discrete Iranian military target. There are lots available—an Iranian naval ship in port or at sea, an air defense unit, as in April; a major logistical facility; an important headquarters.
More provocative, but possible, would be a regime leadership target. The Israelis almost certainly would not target Iranian Supreme Leader Khamene’i or President Pezeshkian themselves. However, they might choose to kill a senior Revolutionary Guard commander or destroy one the Guard’s facilities—and if they hit one inside a major city, that would be even more provocative, and so less likely.
In a similar category, the Israelis might choose to strike an important civilian facility—a power plant, oil refinery, or oil storage farm—as they have in both Lebanon and Yemen at times. Prime Minister Netanyahu is already encouraging the Iranian people to rise up against the regime and the Israelis may hope that such a strike could help move an already unhappy Iranian populace to revolution (or merely conjure such fears in the mind of Iran’s leaders). Israel has tried this strategy repeatedly in Lebanon with decidedly mixed results; it has deepened Lebanese dislike for Hizballah, which Hizballah leaders must consider, but it has not had any demonstrable effects on Hizballah decision-making.
What seems least likely is that Israel would attack Iran’s nuclear facilities or mount a major operation against Iran’s oil exports. The former might cause Iran to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and openly build a nuclear arsenal. The latter could cause oil prices to spike, which would infuriate the U.S. and other Western nations. Moreover, both could easily trigger a major Iranian response at a moment when Israel is not looking for one.
How Might Iran Respond to Israel’s Response?
Even more than Jerusalem, Tehran is not looking for a wider war. The destruction of Hamas was a major blow to Iran’s Axis of Resistance. The abject failure of its missile strikes against Israel on April 13 and last night was another one. The fact that Israel has effectively decapitated Hizballah and suppressed its rocket attacks is still another one. Moreover, Israel has secured the international support it needs, and whatever condemnation it has faced has not been enough to meaningfully hamper its military operations. The Iranian leadership now knows that Israel can do a lot of damage to Iran, whereas Iran cannot do very much to Israel at all.
Consequently, Iran would love to be able to take whatever Israel metes out in response and call it a day. Iran will still seek any other way to harm Israel, but direct military exchanges do not play to its strength, and threaten severe losses. In a related vein, it is important to understand that Tehran threatens all-out retaliation all the time and never follows through on it. On occasion, it has engaged in limited responses, but that’s it. So the fact that they are threatening Armageddon in response to whatever Israel does should not be seen as reflecting their likely, actual reaction.
If Israel hits a military target, Iran’s most likely response will be to insist that the strike did no damage, regardless of evidence to the contrary—which is exactly what Tehran claimed in April—and leave it at that.
If the IDF strikes an Iranian leadership target or civilian infrastructure, Tehran will again want to dismiss it as a lesser blow than what it did to Israel. If they conclude that is impossible, they may feel they have to mount another missile attack like last night’s, largely for honor’s sake. But that too is not a foregone conclusion because they now understand that they are unlikely to do any real damage to Israel, and it will just invite yet another punishing Israeli response.
In the unlikely but not impossible event that Israel goes after a nuclear facility, large swathes of Iran’s oil industry, or a high-level leader, then all bets are off—which again is why those are unlikely Israeli targets, at least at this point in time.
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