Earlier this month, a group of self-styled progressive organizations—including the Center for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR, a group with significant ties to Hamas), the Jewish group If Not Now, and the U.S. Presbyterian Church—petitioned Congress not to support the normalization agreements that Israel has signed with four Arab countries, as well as further peacemaking efforts in this vein. While this view might be extreme, it’s worth noting that, in a bizarre exchange in the early days of the Biden administration, a State Department official appeared reluctant even to use the term “Abraham Accords” to describe these agreements. David M. Weinberg comments on this hostility to good relations between former adversaries:

[Contrary to the claims] of the American “progressive” groups mentioned above, the Abraham Accords are not a Trump-tainted gimmick or a Netanyahu-stained end-run around the Palestinians. Rather, they are an authentic breakthrough for both peace and security in the Middle East; a transformation that evinces staying power and deepens by the day.

To assert that only Trumpian razzle-dazzle and arms deals were the basis for the Abraham Accords, as do [these] partisan grouches, is a complete misread of Emirati, Bahraini, and Moroccan purposes in pursuit of peace with Israel. The leaders of the countries want to redefine the self-understanding and global image of Arab Muslims by blending tradition with enlightenment, anchored in an admirable discourse of religious moderation and broadmindedness.

Affiliating with Israel fits perfectly into this agenda because this is exactly how they view Israel too—as a nation that successfully synthesizes strong ethnic and religious identity with modernity. Therefore, the Abraham Accords are deeply rooted in genuine ideological intentions, as well as urgent security realties, and are locked-in for the long term.

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.