Iran Remains Quiet  

Another week is coming to a close here in Israel and, thankfully, we have yet to see the massive response from either Iran or Hezbollah. Sure, there have been nightly barrages of 20-40 rockets from Lebanon and yesterday even two from Hamas aimed at Tel Aviv, but this is not new…it has been going on regularly since October 8^th.

What we are hearing out of Iran through publicized back channels, is that if we can make a hostage and cease fire deal with Hamas, Iran will not respond at all. That’s good news although, as I have written about over this past week, a serious attack by Iran in the face of the array of weapons ready to repel such an attack makes the whole operation less attractive for the Iranians in any case. Jordanian and Saudi air space is closed to them, Jordan announced they will actively work on repelling anything that comes our way from Iran, the US has a massive strike force parked in the Mediterranean off of Israel’s costs, Putin has warned the Iranians not to hurt any people here, and the Lebanese government, weak as it may be, has no interest in seeing Beirut destroyed yet again.

The question here is whether Prime Minister Netanyahu will allow a deal for the hostages and an associated cease fire to go through or… would he prefer us to be attached by Iran so he could then authorize a counter attack aimed at the “heart of the snake,” as it were, i.e. Iran’s nuclear complex(es). No one here on the street really knows, nor can we be 100% sure how many of them exist.

Of course, for years we have been told that it is really not possible to destroy Iran’s’ nuclear complex(es) and that the best anyone could do would be to slow their progress towards a bomb. So, it does seem a bit odd that now there is talk in political circles about disabling those facilities.

Here, it seems that Defense Minister Gallant is hot for a cease fire and a release of hostages. One would hope that if that effort is successful the 80,000 residents of northern Israel who have been living out of suitcases for 10 months could return to their homes, or at least those whose homes are still undamaged by the nightly barrages from Hezbollah. And, of course, talk continues as well about the possibility of a pre-emptive strike if we believe Iran and/or its proxies are ready to pounce. This is especially true on the northern border with Lebanon where over 100,000 aerial armaments are poised to be dispatched to Israel.

We continue to watch and be prepared for the worst, but hope for the best and be grateful for the continued quiet from Iran.

On another note, the headlines this morning heaped well deserved praise on the US for its approval of up to $20.3 billion in arms sales to Israel, including 50 upgraded F-15 fighter jets. The sale would also include tactical vehicles, mortar and tank cartridges, as well as missiles. Delivery of the jets would likely begin in 2029.

This all comes in addition to the incredible military support the Biden administration has provided Israel over the last 10 months. When people here complain to me about how badly Biden is treating us, I usually point out that lots more of us would be pushing up daisies now if not for this support which was provided unconditionally and without payment.

It is important to remember the we have fired in excess of 5,500 Iron Dome interceptor missiles alone which cost $50,000 each. Everyone can do the math as well as I can but that’s $275 billion dollars which we had no way to cover and is just one small aspect of what America has provided us for which we should be eternally grateful. Sad that some of our citizens are still complaining about Biden and his administration when it comes to Israel.

The next days will be crucial and let’s hope that deal for a cease fire and release of as many of the hostages as possible will happen so that our people can begin to live normal lives again and that we could reset the World War III clock back to 30 minutes before midnight rather than where we have sat for some weeks, at 5 minutes to destruction.