In a speech last Wednesday, Hizballah’s secretary general Hassan Nasrallah not only declared that “nowhere will be safe” in Israel in the event of an all-out war, but also that his forces would attack the island nation of Cyprus. Hanin Ghaddar, Farzin Nadimi, and David Schenker observe that this is no idle threat, but one the Iran-backed terrorist group has “a range of options” for carrying out. They explain: 

Nasrallah’s threat to Cyprus was not random—the republic has long maintained close ties with Israel, much to Hizballah’s irritation. In recent years, the island has hosted multiple joint air-defense drills and annual special-forces exercises with Israel focused on potential threats from Hizballah and Iran.

Nasrallah’s threat should also be viewed in the context of wartime statements by Iran and its proxies about disrupting vital shipping lanes to Israel through the East Mediterranean.

This scenario should be particularly troubling to Washington given the large allied military presence in Cyprus, which includes a few thousand British troops, more than a hundred U.S. Air Force personnel, and a detachment of U-2 surveillance aircraft from the 1st Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron.

Yoni Ben Menachem suggests there is an additional aspect to Nasrallah’s designs on Cyprus, involving a plan

to neutralize the Israeli air force through two primary actions: a surprise attack with precision missiles and UAVs on Israeli air-force bases and against radar and air-defense facilities, including paralyzing Ben-Gurion Airport.

Nasrallah’s goal is to ground Israeli aircraft to prevent them from conducting missions in Lebanon against mid- and long-range missile launchers. Nasrallah fears that Israel might preempt his planned attack by deploying its air force to Cypriot bases, a scenario the Israeli air force practiced with Cyprus during military exercises over the past year.

Recent reports suggest that the White House has at last acted to allow the shipments of weapons that had been withheld from Israel and to end further the delays. On this topic, Elliott Abrams comments, “I don’t know what and how much has been held up, but it shouldn’t have happened. The level of delay should be zero.”

In this interview with Ariel Kahana, Abrams also comments on the failings of U.S. policy toward Iran, and the Biden administration’s refusal to enforce existing sanctions:

According to Abrams, Iran has indeed halted the advancement of its nuclear program on rare occasions. “This happened when Bush invaded Iraq in 2003, and when [President] Trump eliminated Qassem Suleimani in 2020. The U.S. needs to be ready to use force in Iran, but credibility is critical here. Only if [Iran’s leaders] are convinced that the U.S. is willing to act will they stop.”

Abrams claims that the U.S. president tried for two-and-a-half years to revive the nuclear deal with Iran until he realized it wasn’t interested. “Iran has benefited from this situation, and everyone outside the administration sees it as a failure.”