Noah Pollak suggests what the U.S. can do to move relations with the Jewish state in a new and better direction after Barack Obama leaves office:

The first thing the next president, Democrat or Republican, might consider doing is downgrading the peace process as the central feature of the U.S.-Israel relationship. . . . The pursuit of Palestinian statehood over the past quarter-century has damaged U.S. credibility. It has committed our country to a diplomatic proceeding whose expectations have always been set too high, and in which corrupt and violent figures are promoted as peace partners while an ally is set up to play the role of scapegoat.

It doesn’t have to be like this. The next president can acknowledge the benefits of a Palestinian state that is truly and permanently at peace with Israel, yet recognize that such a state is unlikely to emerge soon, given Hamas’s control of Gaza and the corruption, sclerosis, and terror-friendliness of the Palestinian Authority (PA). There will be a time, the next president could say, to discuss statehood. Until then, our emphasis should be on encouraging Palestinian reform. A good place to start would be by insisting that the PA stop paying benefits to terrorists and their families, and conditioning further American aid on the cessation of such payments.

Freed from this diplomatic rut, the next president can move to rebuild the alliance on a foundation that serves American interests and strengthens Israel’s security and legitimacy. The broad goal should be a reduction of the kind of ambiguities about Israel’s borders and territory that have created opportunities for mischief-makers around the world to manufacture diplomatic crises.

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.