The intense rocket bombardment that Israeli civilians suffered last week was a reminder that the technologically sophisticated missile-defense system known as the Iron Dome does not provide absolute protection: several houses were destroyed, and one person was killed. Moshe Arens argues that Jerusalem’s strategic calculations must take this fact into account. (Free registration may be required.)

Some rockets get through [the defenses], while others send residents of the country’s south scurrying into bomb shelters. That spells the end of normal life for those who live there, and can be achieved by the launching of a few hundred simple, cheap rockets. The last few weeks have demonstrated this conclusively. Also, the Iron Dome system can be saturated by the launching of a number of rockets at the same target, some of which get through. The bombardment overwhelms the interception system. . . . The tremendous difference in the cost of the simple rocket and the expensive system operated to intercept it also makes it financially unsustainable in the long run.

It is true [that] the Iron Dome saves lives. It has been argued that it provides the government with the time needed to discuss a response to an initial attack. But it does not solve the basic problem: protection of the civilian population in southern Israel. . . .

The only way to stop the launching of rockets at Israel’s civilian population is by physically eliminating the enemy’s capability of doing so. That can be achieved only by troops on the ground—through the entry of the Israel Defense Forces into the launching areas and the destruction of the manufacturing and storage facilities. The belief that terrorist organizations dedicated to destroying the state of Israel can be inveigled to abstain from attacking Israel has proven to be false and is not likely to be borne out in the long run. . . . So long as these organizations continue to rule there, nothing will change.

Between the explosion of thousands of Hizballah pagers on September 17 and now, Iran’s geopolitical clout has shrunk dramatically: Hizballah, Iran’s most important striking force, has retreated to lick its wounds; Iranian influence in Syria has collapsed; Iran’s attempts to attack Israel via Gaza have proved self-defeating; its missile and drone arsenal have proved impotent; and its territorial defenses have proved useless in the face of Israeli airpower. Edward Luttwak considers what might happen next:

The myth of Iranian power was ironically propagated by the United States itself. Right at the start of his first term, in January 2009, Barack Obama was terrified that he would be maneuvered into fighting a war against Iran. . . . Obama started his tenure by apologizing for America’s erstwhile support for the shah. And beyond showing contrition for the past, the then-president also set a new rule, one that lasted all the way to October 2024: Iran may attack anyone, but none may attack Iran.

[Hayat Tahrir al-Sham’s] variegated fighters, in light trucks and jeeps, could have been stopped by a few hundred well-trained soldiers. But neither Hizballah nor Iran’s own Revolutionary Guards could react. Hizballah no longer has any large units capable of crossing the border to fight rebels in Syria, as they had done so many times before. As for the Revolutionary Guards, they were commandeering civilian airliners to fly troops into Damascus airport to support Assad. But then Israel made clear that it would not allow Iran’s troops so close to its border, and Iran no longer had credible counter-threats.

Now Iran’s population is discovering that it has spent decades in poverty to pay for the massive build-up of the Revolutionary Guards and all their militias. And for what? They have elaborate bases and showy headquarters, but their expensive ballistic missiles can only be used against defenseless Arabs, not Israel with its Arrow interceptors. As for Hizballah, clearly it cannot even defend itself, let alone Iran’s remaining allies in the region. Perhaps, in short, the dictatorship will finally be challenged in the streets of Iran’s cities, at scale and in earnest.