As Jerusalem decides how to respond to the massive assault on its citizens, it will at some point consider whether—and how—to retaliate against Tehran, which, along with Qatar, is Hamas’s primary patron, and whose proxy, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, has been fighting alongside Hamas. Herb Keinon writes:

Last week, a senior Hamas commander was in Tehran with other Hamas figures and leaders of Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Similar meetings between terror leaders and Iranian officials also reportedly took place last week in Damascus and Beirut. While Iran has long been providing support to Palestinian organizations, Tehran has an added incentive now to support this terrorism in the hopes that it will derail a budding Saudi Arabia-Israel normalization deal.

For Iran, a fierce Israeli response serves Iran’s purposes because it will fill the Arab and Islamic world with images of Israeli warplanes bombing Gaza, inevitably triggering pressure both within Saudi Arabia and from around the Islamic world not to sign a deal with a regime attacking the Gaza Strip.

After Palestinian terrorists murdered Batsheva Nigri near Hebron in late August, [Defense Minister Yoav Gallant stated] that the current wave of terror “Is all guided by Iran, which is looking for any way to harm Israeli citizens.” Without providing any details, he said Israel “will take additional actions that will ensure the security of Israeli citizens and make those responsible pay a price.”

The question in light of Saturday’s massive attack is whether the sheer magnitude of this attack will compel the IDF to send a military message to Iran.

If Iran succeeds in obtaining nuclear weapons, the war in Gaza, let alone the protests on college campuses, will seem like a minor complication. Jonathan Schachter fears that this danger could be much more imminent than decisionmakers in Jerusalem and Washington believe. In his view, Israel seems to be repeating the mistake that allowed it to be taken by surprise on Simchat Torah of 2023 and Yom Kippur of 1973: putting too much faith in an intelligence concept that could be wrong.

Israel and the United States apparently believe that despite Iran’s well-documented progress in developing capabilities necessary for producing and delivering nuclear weapons, as well as its extensive and ongoing record of violating its international nuclear obligations, there is no acute crisis because building a bomb would take time, would be observable, and could be stopped by force. Taken together, these assumptions and their moderating impact on Israeli and American policy form a new Iran concept reminiscent of its 1973 namesake and of the systemic failures that preceded the October 7 massacre.

Meanwhile, most of the restrictions put in place by the 2015 nuclear deal will expire by the end of next year, rendering the question of Iran’s adherence moot. And the forces that could be taking action aren’t:

The European Union regularly issues boilerplate press releases asserting its members’ “grave concern.” American decisionmakers and spokespeople have created the unmistakable impression that their reservations about the use of force are stronger than their commitment to use force to prevent an Iranian atomic bomb. At the same time, the U.S. refuses to enforce its own sanctions comprehensively: Iranian oil exports (especially to China) and foreign-currency reserves have ballooned since January 2021, when the Biden administration took office.

Israel’s response has also been sluggish and ambiguous. Despite its oft-stated policy of never allowing a nuclear Iran, Israel’s words and deeds have sent mixed messages to allies and adversaries—perhaps inadvertently reinforcing the prevailing sense in Washington and elsewhere that Iran’s nuclear efforts do not present an exigent crisis.