2024-04-18 04:01:44
Israeli and American media reported on Wednesday night that the Hebrew state considered quickly launching retaliatory strikes once morest Tehran in response to the unprecedented Iranian bombing of its territory last weekend, but it eventually changed its mind.
The Israeli public television channel Kan said that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu decided, following a conversation with US President Joe Biden, not to implement the previously approved plans to launch retaliatory strikes once morest Tehran if it carried out its threat to attack the Jewish state.
The channel quoted a senior official who asked it not to publish his name, saying, “Diplomatic sensitivities played a role… There will inevitably be a response, but it will be different from what was initially planned.”
In turn, the American news site Axios quoted unnamed Israeli sources as saying that during the meeting held by the Israeli War Council on Monday, which was its second meeting since the Iranian bombing, the ministers carefully discussed the possibility of issuing the order to carry out retaliatory strikes, but in the end they did not. that.
Axios also quoted an American official as saying, “We do not know why and to what extent the attack was imminent ( once morest Iran).”
According to the same website, Israel informed the US administration on Monday that it had decided to wait to strike Iran.
For its part, the American ABC News network said that the Israeli government had considered launching strikes once morest Iran on two occasions, but without issuing an order to do so.
But Netanyahu stressed, on Wednesday, that Israel “reserves the right to protect itself” in the face of international pressure on his government to avoid launching a strike once morest Iran, which threatens to drag the region into further escalation in the midst of the war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
In turn, Tehran reiterated, on Wednesday, that any Israeli response would be met with a “harsh and violent” response.
On Saturday night and Sunday, Tehran launched an unprecedented attack on Israel, during which it launched more than 300 projectiles, including a ballistic missile, a winged missile, and a drone, with a total payload of 85 tons.
Israel confirmed that it succeeded, with the help of its allies, in intercepting the vast majority of these missiles and drones, with the exception of a few ballistic missiles, which caused only limited damage.
Iran announced that it carried out the attack within the framework of “legitimate defense”, following the destruction of its consulate headquarters in Damascus on April 1, in a strike that Tehran attributed to Israel.
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