According to widespread sentiment—expressed, most notably, by Secretary of State John Kerry—last month’s bloody attacks in Paris were different from those in January, which targeted only the staff of Charlie Hebdo and Jews rather than “just anybody.” Douglas Murray comments on what this attitude reveals:

The true problem with the line that it used to be “just the Jews, the writers, or [the] cartoonists,” is not that it is offensive or inelegant or any of the other words that are now used to shut down a discussion—though all these things it may be. The problem is that it suggests that people were not paying attention during those earlier attacks. It suggests a belief that the terrorism in January was a different order of terrorism—call it “understandable terrorism”—rather than part of a continuum of terrorism that now reached its logical endpoint as “impossible-to-understand terrorism”—because “Jews, writers, or cartoonists” were missing. . . .

The latest attacks in Paris were, indeed, targeted at absolutely everybody. In that, there should be a lesson of a kind. The lesson should remind us that in a free society, no one can wholly dodge the bullets of these particular fanatics. In the conflict that faces us now, there is no opt-out if you happen to be “lucky” enough not to be Jewish. There is no opt-out if you happen to think that people should not draw or publish opinions that are anything other than 100-percent agreeable to 100 percent of the people, 100 percent of the time. Because one day, you will be targeted for being at a restaurant or a concert, or for having the “decadent” temerity to attend a soccer match. That this has not yet sunk in to the public imagination is one thing. That it has still not permeated the understanding of the heads of the world’s only superpower is quite another. . . .

So here we are, at the end of what should be one of the world’s sharpest and most painful learning curves in recent history. At the end of this curve, we ought finally to be living with the realization we might have acquired earlier: that since we cannot live with Islamic State and [similar] groups, we had better live without them. We therefore had better do whatever it takes to speed up an end of our choosing before they speed up an end of their choosing.

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.