Israeli army officials announced that some 40 top military commanders, including the chief of staff of the Iranian armed forces, were killed in the opening strike.<\/p>\n
They also said that US and Israeli military jets hit hundreds of ballistic missile sites, launchers, and multiple weapons manufacturing plants, preventing the embittered regime from producing additional rockets, UAVs, cruise missiles, and more.<\/p>\n
However, Iran\u2019s retaliatory strikes seemed to continue with intensity throughout Sunday, even scoring a direct hit on a building in Beit Shemesh<\/a>, just outside of Jerusalem, which authorities said killed at least a dozen people.<\/p>\n So, what has really been achieved so far? And what can Israelis \u2013 and others in the region \u2013 expect from a significantly weakened Iran as this war continues to unfold?<\/p>\n \u201cIn relation to the threats and intimidation of the supposedly great Iranian power, I think that we are encountering a relatively very small threat from their side,\u201d Sagiv Asulin, a former senior officer in Israel\u2019s security forces and an expert on Iran, told The Jerusalem Post.<\/p>\n Calling the Iranians a \u201cpaper tiger,\u201d Asulin, a scholar at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs (JCFA), said that the opening strike \u201cwas a lethal opening blow\u2026 we see today that they are having a very hard time carrying out significant attacks, certainly not hundreds of missiles like they threatened.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt will take a few days for us to receive all the data that proves how strong this opening blow was and how much chaos it created in the Iranian leadership, both security and political,\u201d he continued.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a blow that will be studied in the history books, not only by statesmen but also by intelligence people and militaries.\u201d<\/p>\n Asulin said the assessment prior to Saturday\u2019s strike had been that Iran possessed between 2,500 and 3,000 ballistic missiles and that their methods of launching those missiles ranged widely.<\/p>\n \u201cThey had everything from everything \u2013 underground launchers, launchers in warehouses, and mobile ones,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIran is a huge country, twice the area of Germany, and this operation will take time. Obviously, they can still shoot and issue threats; one must be careful yet happy.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThis joint operation between the US and Israel was no less than perfect,\u201d Asulin continued.<\/p>\n \u201cThey managed to hit three places focused on the Iranian leadership and eliminated the entire top of the political and military command. This is dramatic beyond measure, and it only proved the perfect coordination between the US and Israel \u2013 coordination unlike any other in the history of armies in the modern era.\u201d<\/p>\n Israel’s defenses not perfect<\/p>\n So why are the sirens still blaring and the missiles still raining down? Why are we seeing mass casualty events such as the one in Beit Shemesh?<\/p>\n \u201cIsrael\u2019s defense is the best in the world, but it is still not hermetic; therefore one must be very careful and listen,\u201d Asulin cautioned, adding that people needed to be \u201cpatient.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere were no assessments that this would take only a day or two. Most people spoke of weeks, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu<\/a> has said this operation will continue as long as needed,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n However, in Asulin\u2019s assessment, the Iranians are clearly in such disarray that they are making \u201cbig mistakes,\u201d including striking sites across the region, which is stoking tensions with the Sunni Gulf states.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is very significant,\u201d he said. \u201cEven Qatar is suddenly on the Sunni side of this struggle against Iran.\u201d<\/p>\n He also said that the Iranians were trying to drag out the process, hence the sporadic but regular barrages of missiles being fired throughout the day.<\/p>\n \u201cIf this is the price that we need to pay in order to remove the existential threat to the State of Israel and end the Iranian regime \u2013 which is an active threat, a nuclear threat, a threat that will not be removed and will not be stopped until this regime passes from this world \u2013 and it makes us stay in shelters for several days or weeks, then this is an event that is absolutely worth it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\nThe scene where a ballistic missile fired from Iran hit Bet Shemesh, central Israel, causing heavy damage, March 1, 2026 (credit: YONATAN SINDEL\/FLASH90)<\/p>\n