Why Netanyahu decides to strike Iran now

Earlier on Friday, Israel launched a major attack on Iran’s nuclear sites and weapons facilities, targeting many of its senior military officials. In retaliation, Iran launched dozens of ballistic missiles in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem late Friday. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the strike will “continue for several days to eliminate this threat.” In response, President Trump recently said he wanted to renegotiate a nuclear deal with Iran – in his first term, he withdrew from the original nuclear deal signed during the Obama administration – expressing strong support for the Israeli attacks and said: “I think it’s great.” [the Iranians] Opportunity, they didn’t catch it. They are hard to get hit. . . . And more. ”

On Friday, I spoke to Aluf Benn by phone, Harez. In our conversation, we have edited for a long time and clarity, we discuss the motivations of Netanyahu’s orders to strike, how the Prime Minister uses his understanding of Trump to pursue his agenda, and what this attack means for the future of the region.

Why do you think this is happening in June 2025 rather than earlier or later?

First, Israel has been fighting the “Axis of Resistance” with Iran for nearly two years. Second, Israel has been designing and preparing a plan to attack Iran under a continuous leadership for more than two decades. In most cases, it was Netanyahu’s responsibility, but military leaders have long been considering demolishing Iran’s nuclear facilities, just as Israel bombed Iraq’s nuclear reactors in 1981 and then bombed them in Syria in 2007. In both cases, these nuclear programs are seen as a threat to Israel and are targeted to major nuclear power facilities, either to delay or damage nuclear power.

Therefore, the idea of ​​bombing Iran has been around for twenty years. It peaked under the leadership of Netanyahu and Defense Secretary Ehud Barak in 2012, but the Obama administration blocked them, which eventually signed an agreement with Iran to limit its nuclear program. By then, some Israeli security and intelligence leaders believed that Israel should not walk alone and not attack Iran without the consent and prior knowledge of the United States. In 1981, Prime Minister Menachem began bombing nuclear reactors near Baghdad without telling the Americans. This has caused some time between the two governments. But in 2007, Ehud Olmert told George W. Bush that the reactor was being built in the Syrian desert. This is a secret facility. We shared intelligence with Bush, who is considering an attack with the U.S. military. But then the Americans decided not to do so, and they just let Israel destroy the facility. Israel has not been responsible for the strike for nearly a decade to avoid embarrassing Bashar al-Assad and forcing him to retaliate.

This is not the case today. The attack was very obvious, with two fires between Iran and Israel last year, and Iran retaliated against Iran in April to assassinate one of its generals in Damascus. They launched various drones. But their attack failed because Israel was protected by the alliance, including the alliance Centcom [the U.S. Central Command]. Then in October, Iran launched another missile attack, and the Israeli attack successfully removed Iranian air defenses. Next is the collapse of Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Assad regime in Syria, two of the major allies of Iran near us. This paved the way and opened corridors for the eventual attack on nuclear facilities. But they waited for Trump to give the green light.

Among some Hokesh Israelis, there have been concerns that Trump will not green light on the strike because he wants to reach a deal with Iran. But what you seem to be saying is that something important happened, and it is actually the time and Trump is in office.

First, due to the suppression of Iran’s air defense in October, it is important to have an operational opportunity for open corridors, and the Russians did not replenish Iran’s inventory and systems since then. The IDF was then defeated by Hezbollah, decapitated by its leadership, destroyed by most powerful ballistic ballistic forces, and then Assad fell. So now you can deploy a very large force to destroy the targets within Iran. Israel has recently completed preparations and Netanyahu is pushing for an attack on Iran. Even this week, there were some different signs, such as Trump’s public objection, but apparently Netanyahu told him about the matter in advance.

Today, Trump has been very supportive.

With the president’s support, we have one thing that is crucial, and it’s one of the last decisions in Trump’s first term, which is to include Israel. Centcom. This makes Israel part of the U.S. regional air defense and defense system. So Israel now does not rely on American bombers and American soldiers on the ground, but you have Coördination, Coöperation, Intelligence sharing, etc.

In Iran and Gaza, Netanyahu seems to have a good understanding of Trump. Trump will say he wants to reach a deal with Iran. He would say he wanted a ceasefire in Gaza, but whether it was his attention or lack of genuine concern, he wasn’t really about putting pressure on Israel to prevent it from doing what it wanted to do.

In Gaza, there are a lot of criticisms about what Israel is doing. But overall, historically, the United States has given Israel a free hand compared to the Palestinians. In regional affairs, this is always different, even if we follow what Israel wants, the United States always has the last word. Just like Trump’s decision to leave the nuclear deal in 2018, it always has a last word. And, in this case, Trump wants to reach an agreement. If Iranians agree to U.S. terms to prevent uranium enrichment, they may reach an agreement. Trump gave them time and then they didn’t respond, so Israel attacked. In a similar way, Israel begged for a ceasefire with Hezbollah in the north, and the now-dead Hezbollah leader was saying, “No, we will support our brothers in the Gaza Strip, we will continue to fire Israel and keep the second front open.” They could have been saved.

You can say that Israel could have stopped the war in Gaza, which could have helped things in the region as well.

really. But Netanyahu remains committed to ultimately occupying Gaza and destroying the Palestinians. . . Hamas, and eventually drove out the Palestinians from there, and followed what he called Trump’s plan: hand over the land to resorts and Israeli settlements. This remains Gaza’s official Israeli policy.

Now, Israel’s attack on Iran can let go of Gaza, or instead, use the failure of the resistance axis to end the occupation of Gaza and the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians? This remains to be seen.

Reading your newspaper, it is clear to me that many people think Netanyahu extends the war in Gaza for their own political reasons, and that you cannot distinguish the war from Netanyahu’s personal desires. Is this the case here?

Well, first of all, with the attack on Iran, at least in Jewish society, there is a very strong support within Israel – I would say a virtual consensus. We wrote an editorial saying “Don’t go to war”, but it’s a minority stance that would be a smaller minority if Israel succeeds in eliminating the Iran nuclear program and forcing Iran to dump in some way, or if there is a change in the Iranian regime. But beyond that, one of Netanyahu’s abilities throughout the war, even though he and his leaders were unpopular and still lag behind public investigations, has been following popular policies. Gaza’s destruction and even partial occupation policies were very popular to punish what Hamas did on October 7. The policy of attacking Iran is very popular and there is no real opposition in Israel. The opposition is simply fear of alienating the United States, or fearing that such an action is too risky to succeed.