Israel and US readying for ‘significant’ retaliation to alleged IDF attack that killed 7 IRGC members, including generals; CBS says Tehran may attack with swarm of explosive drones
Iran has reportedly put its military forces on “full high alert,” as it vows revenge for an alleged Israeli strike on Monday that killed a top Iranian commander in Syria and several other Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps members.
Two Iranian officials quoted Friday by The New York Times said Iran has made a decision to directly attack Israel, in a move meant to create deterrence.
Meanwhile, a US official said the United States was on high alert and preparing for a possible attack by Iran targeting Israeli or American assets in the region.
“We’re definitely at a high state of vigilance,” the official said in confirming a CNN report that says an attack could come in the next week.
A senior administration official who spoke with CNN said the US is bracing for a “significant” attack and that both Washington and Jerusalem believe an Iranian response was “inevitable.”
Israel has not commented on Monday’s strike, which leveled the Iranian embassy’s consular annex in Damascus, but analysts saw it as an escalation of its campaign against Iran and its regional proxies that runs the risk of triggering a wider war beyond the Israel-Hamas conflict in the Gaza Strip.
Iran has said that among the dead were two brigadier generals from the Guards’ foreign operations arm, the Quds Force: Mohammad Reza Zahedi and Mohammad Hadi Haji Rahimi.
Zahedi was reportedly responsible for the IRGC’s operations in Syria and in Lebanon, for Iranian militias there, and for ties with Hezbollah, and was thus the most senior commander of Iranian forces in the two countries.
Both Iran and its proxy Hezbollah have vowed that Israel will not go unpunished for the attack. Though that possibility has raised the specter of a wider war, two Iranian sources told Reuters that Tehran’s response would be calibrated to avoid escalation.
“We warn you, no enemy act against our holy system will go unanswered,” Revolutionary Guards chief General Hossein Salami said Friday during the funeral for Zahedi and the other IRGC members.
“The collapse of (the Zionist regime) is very possible and close with God’s grace,” he added, saying the US has become “wildly hated by the world, especially in Muslim-dominated countries” for supporting Israel.
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Wednesday the Damascus strike was a “desperate” effort by Israel that “will not save them from defeat” in Gaza.
On Thursday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to respond to efforts to harm Israelis, as the country geared up for a possible Iranian response.
Speaking at a meeting of the security cabinet soon after a phone call with US President Joe Biden, Netanyahu said “Iran has been acting against us for years — directly and via proxies. And, therefore, Israel acts against Iran and its proxies — defensively and offensively.”
Netanyahu added: “We will know how to defend ourselves, and we will act according to the simple principle: that those who harm us or plan to harm us, we will harm.”
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