IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir and Defense Minister Israel Katz threatened Iran and the Yemen Houthis with paying “an immediate and grave price” if it attacks Israel in response to a potential American attack on it.
Zamir said that the IDF’s metaphorical finger was “on the trigger” if its enemies were to make any operational change.
Katz referred to Israel’s success at assassinating a number of top Yemeni Houthi officials as a down payment on what could be a much more severe response if the terror group were to attack the Jewish state in response to Washington attacking the Islamic Republic.
Late Wednesday night, sources told The Jerusalem Post that the US is likely to attack Iran eventually, but not necessarily in the coming days, despite the spike in global media “noise” surrounding the conflict.
Possibility of US strike on Iran
Sources indicated that Israel’s impression is that US President Donald Trump has not yet decided on his final course of action, even if his disappointment in Iran’s negotiating positions this week made an eventual American attack on Tehran more likely.
Rather, many of the latest reports are viewed by some Israeli officials as global media noise, picking up on the general sense of Trump administration officials after this week’s negotiations, rather than crossing the threshold.
There has also been intense focus on whether Trump’s two weeks now for the Islamic Republic to return with a new offer is parallel to the two weeks from June 2025, which turned out to be a fake-out and cover for Trump’s attack on the Fordow nuclear facility after only three days of the two-week deadline had passed.
But the circumstances are not the same.
When Trump broke his own deadline early, he had already sat on the sidelines for around a week and a half, where Israel had already cleared out most of Iran’s air defenses, and he faced little risk by sending in B-2 high altitude bombers to drop bombs on Fordow uncontested.
In contrast, Trump is currently considering whether to be the lead party in a much longer campaign in which he could lose many American soldiers as well as expensive sea vessels, and in which the broader goals of regime change might not be realized.
Under the circumstances, some Israeli officials believe that the current noise is at most venting frustration and expressing to the Iranians the seriousness of the next two weeks, as opposed to signaling an imminent attack in the coming days.
All of that said, most acknowledge that Trump is unpredictable, and even an imminent attack cannot be completely ruled out.
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Zamir also called on the haredi sector to join the country’s commitment to keeping the IDF “the nation’s army.”
Further, he appealed to the reservists to remain committed to the IDF and honor their service, while seeming to recognize the massive challenges they have faced due to unprecedented service since 2023.