Why did 🇮🇱Israel strike 🇮🇷Iran now, and not months or years ago or in the future?
A unique combination of a dozen factors converged to make the moment unique for 🇮🇱Israel: 🧵
1. No Hamas to its southwest
2. No Hezbollah to its north
3. No Assad threat to the northeast
4...
4. No more Syrian army to attack 🇮🇱Israel's planes: As the new forces of HTS took over Syria, Israel bombed all the existing Syrian military. No more fighter jets or surface-to-air missiles to threaten 🇮🇱Israel
5. Ability to fly over Syria to refuel
This is critical, because 🇮🇷Iran is ~600-1000 miles away from 🇮🇱Israel, so 1200-2000 miles round trip
The range of Israel’s stealth F35 is only about 1,350 mi
To operate inside 🇮🇷Iran, 🇮🇱Israel needed refueling over Syria
6. Full visibility atop Mt Hermon
After the fall of the Assad Regime, Israel took over some border ground with Syria, which includes Mt Hermon, the tallest peak in the region. With that, there are no more blind spots in Israel's visibility in the region
7. Russia is too weak to help, bogged down by war in Ukraine
8. Netanyahu has a window of opportunity: There are parliamentary elections in a bit over a year
9. Trump is in power too: Dems have been in the White House for 12 of the last 17 years, and are less aggressive re Iran
10. In April & October 2024, 🇮🇷Iran sent missiles & drones to 🇮🇱Israel, but failed to make serious damage. 🇮🇱Israel reacted by bombing several military facilities in 🇮🇷Iran, seriously degrading its air defense. That gave a window for 🇮🇱Israel to continue attacking now
11. 🇮🇷Iran has witnessed how all its weapons against 🇮🇱Israel have been defeated:
• All proxies neutralized
• All weapons, including drones & ballistic missiles, failed to make serious damage to 🇮🇱Israel
So 🇮🇷Iran moved closer to getting the bomb
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