There is little mystery about the motivations behind terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians: the perpetrators do not seek to create a Palestinian state, but to destroy the Jewish one. Although Congress does not have the power to stop terrorism, it can take steps to prevent the U.S. government from encouraging it, argues William Kristol:

Americans and the members of Congress who represent them should ask: what is the reason for further delaying the move of the American embassy to Jerusalem, the capital of Israel since 1948? What is the rationale for the State Department not recognizing Israel as the land of your birth if you’re born in West Jerusalem? Why shouldn’t at least some of the aid to Abbas’s Palestinian Authority be suspended and made contingent on their stopping incitement against Israelis and Jews? Why should U.S. taxpayers continue sending money to the Palestinian Authority as long as that entity continues to provide funds to support the families of terrorists? . . .

Congress can’t bring about “peace” between Israel and its enemies. But it can help bring about relative quiet and stability. One way it can do so is to tell the administration to stop making things worse with the “peace process,” which has become a terror process. An obsession with the “peace process” encourages Palestinians and their backers around the world to think that with a little more pressure—ranging from terror to boycotts—Israel can be forced to make concessions. But having pulled out of Gaza, and having tried time and again to respect Palestinian wishes and demands (God forbid Jews should intone prayers themselves on the Temple Mount!), Israel is not now going to make further concessions under pressure. Nor should it.

Early Friday morning, Israel attacked military installations near the Iranian cities of Isfahan and nearby Natanz, the latter being one of the hubs of the country’s nuclear program. Jerusalem is not taking credit for the attack, and none of the details are too certain, but it seems that the attack involved multiple drones, likely launched from within Iran, as well as one or more missiles fired from Syrian or Iraqi airspace. Strikes on Syrian radar systems shortly beforehand probably helped make the attack possible, and there were reportedly strikes on Iraq as well.

Iran itself is downplaying the attack, but the S-300 air-defense batteries in Isfahan appear to have been destroyed or damaged. This is a sophisticated Russian-made system positioned to protect the Natanz nuclear installation. In other words, Israel has demonstrated that Iran’s best technology can’t protect the country’s skies from the IDF. As Yossi Kuperwasser puts it, the attack, combined with the response to the assault on April 13,

clarified to the Iranians that whereas we [Israelis] are not as vulnerable as they thought, they are more vulnerable than they thought. They have difficulty hitting us, but we have no difficulty hitting them.

Nobody knows exactly how the operation was carried out. . . . It is good that a question mark hovers over . . . what exactly Israel did. Let’s keep them wondering. It is good for deniability and good for keeping the enemy uncertain.

The fact that we chose targets that were in the vicinity of a major nuclear facility but were linked to the Iranian missile and air forces was a good message. It communicated that we can reach other targets as well but, as we don’t want escalation, we chose targets nearby that were involved in the attack against Israel. I think it sends the message that if we want to, we can send a stronger message. Israel is not seeking escalation at the moment.