Israel's war cabinet has reportedly agreed on which Iranian targets to attack in response to the October 1 Iranian missile attack. The question now is what method Israel will use to carry out the attacks in order to effectively deter Tehran without escalating this fight into an all-out war. Israel has two options: either publicly disparage the regime or launch a series of covert attacks, the latter of which is less likely to result in retaliation from Tehran.

After a series of meetings with US officials, Israel has reportedly assured Washington that its upcoming response to the Islamic Republic will target the regime's “military and intelligence” infrastructure. By contrast, an attack on Iranian oil facilities would have serious implications for the global economy, a concern shared by both the United States and Iran's Arab Gulf neighbors. Fearing an all-out war, the Biden administration is also said to have discouraged Israel from targeting Iran's nuclear infrastructure. Washington and Jerusalem appeared to have reached a compromise in which Israel's response would forego attacks on nuclear and oil sites, while the US would supply Israel with the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile defense system.

Although it is still unclear what Israel's goals are, the aim is likely to be to contain the threat posed by Iran's ballistic missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). In such a scenario, the primary military target would be the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, its missile and drone production facilities, and the bases that house ammunition and equipment. Destroying these resources would not only limit Tehran's ability to fire ballistic missiles from its own soil, but also restrict the use of Iranian-made drones and missiles by the Islamic Republic's proxy network.

With Israel and the US now apparently in agreement on objectives, the question is how the response will be implemented: whether it will be a series of covert attacks or whether Israel will seek to publicly assert its military superiority over the Islamic Republic to undermine Iran's image in the eyes of its supporters, both domestically and regionally. Tehran prefers the former.

The theocratic Islamic Republic is well aware of its unpopularity among Iranians, and several waves of nationwide anti-regime movements have heightened this fear. Tehran’s calculations assume that it is able to maintain its image as a formidable force against the “Great Satan” and the “malevolent Zionist entity.” Iran has shown that it will refrain from retaliation as long as it is not publicly undermined, as was the case with the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyah in a supposedly “safe” hideout in Iran.

The wave of attacks on Iran's nuclear and military infrastructure in 2020 has highlighted Tehran's strategic approach: the willingness to refrain from retaliatory measures if they can raise doubts about the actual occurrence of the attack. From June 25 to July 19, 2020, approximately 11 cyber and sabotage attacks targeted Iranian missile production sites, nuclear facilities, and petrochemical and power plants. Although all incidents were attributed to Israel and the Mossad, the covert and scattered nature of the attacks allowed the regime to ignore them as incidents that “caused no casualties” and claim that “Iran will replace the damage with more advanced equipment.”

More recently, Iranian state media quickly downplayed Israel's limited airstrike in April that targeted the S-400 air defense system near the Natanz nuclear site. The Saudi Asharq Al-Awsat The newspaper claimed on October 12 that Tehran had sent an indirect message to Israel saying it was “shrugging off a limited Israeli attack.”

The back-and-forth between U.S. and Israeli officials and statements from Jerusalem suggest that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's war cabinet is pushing for a stronger response than in April. Israel's public messages to Iranians suggest that Jerusalem is preparing an attack whose aim goes beyond weakening the Islamic Republic's military capabilities and which could further weaken the regime's standing among ordinary Iranians. In a three-minute video posted on social media on September 30, Netanyahu expressed solidarity with the Iranian people: “When Iran is finally free, and that moment will come much sooner than people think, everything will be be different.”

Janatan Sayeh is a research analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies who focuses on Iran's internal affairs and the Islamic Republic's damaging influence in the region.

Tags: Axis of Resistance, IDF, Iran, Israel, Israel Iran, Mossad