Iran launches drones at Israel in retaliatory attack

[SteveG]

IDF lifts order for Israelis to stay near safe rooms, indicating Iran attack over for now

[bfd]

Guess they spent all their SCUD missiles last time they failed…

Iron Dome works. Let the fools blow their wad. Means they'll have fewer to sell to Russia to use against Ukraine.

[RAMd®d]

holy @#$%&! this is bad


EXACTLY my thought reading the subject line a minute or two ago.

I was very apprehensive reading the rest of the thread.

Things seem a little better with the last few posts.

[special]

So this raises the question: did Israel really had to strike the Iranian Embassy?

[gabester]

None of this is good.
While Iran's missiles may be uselessly expended, the cost of the Israeli defensive countermeasures is likely an order of magnitude greater per missile intercepted (in other words, if the Iranian missile cost $100k to build the Israeli one cost $1 million.) Over time this could get very expensive. And take resources away from other things.

All because Bibi can't back down. Hopefully the stress of his situation adversely impacts his health soon.

[Ca Bob]

If I understand correctly, Israel claims that an Iranian officer who was directly involved in the October 7 atrocities was the target. It is no secret that Israel has a policy that those who engage in terrorist attacks against them (such as the attack on their Olympic athletes) will be tracked down, no matter how long it takes. Iran was engaging in a direct act of war and committing war crimes when it made itself a party to the October 7 massacres. It would appear that Iran has basically engaged in face saving by shooting at Israel in what turned out to be a time-limited way. This is perhaps in contrast to Israel's refusal to put any time limits on its retaliation, at least so far.

[SteveG]

Iran just tried to murder tens of thousands of Israelis.

[pdq]

special wrote:
So this raises the question: did Israel really had to strike the Iranian Embassy?

I was surprised that we got this far in the thread before someone even brought up the initial event - which was, after all, one government’s intentionally leveling a diplomatic facility of another’s - an embassy - in a third country.

Suppose, for example, Iran had destroyed the American embassy in Saudi Arabia with a missile launched from Iran, killing one of our generals and 15 other soldiers and civilians in support roles. What would be our response?

It’s not hard to imagine that this was not about killing one man (and a bunch of bystanders). It’s not hard to imagine this was an intentional provocation of Iran by Netanyahu.

Why? Why now?

[special]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-68812094

So what are Israel's options?

It could listen to its neighbours in the region and exercise what is known as "strategic patience", holding off from responding in kind and instead continuing to target Iran's proxy allies in the region such as Hezbollah in Lebanon or military supply sites in Syria, as it has been doing for years.

Israel could retaliate with a series of similar, carefully calibrated, long-range missile strikes, targeting only those missile bases from which Iran launched last night's attack.

That would still be seen by Iran as an escalation, since it would be the first time Israel had attacked Iran directly, as opposed to hitting its proxy militias around the region.

Or, Israel could choose to climb one more rung up the escalatory ladder, by broadening its possible response to include bases, training camps and command-and-control centres belonging to Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards Corps - the IRGC.

Either of the latter two options risk prompting further retaliation by Iran.

The key question here is whether this all drags in the US, leading to a full-scale shooting war between Iran and US forces in the region.

[Mr645]

How is firing 300 missiles at another country not an act of war?