Again, all eyes are on Israel. Shortly after Iran’s barrage of nearly 200 ballistic missiles toward Israel on October 1, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, “Iran made a big mistake tonight – and it will pay for it. The regime in Tehran does not understand our determination to defend ourselves and to exact a price from our enemies.”
The whole world is waiting for a response from Israel. Will it be a severe response or simply symbolic? Israel has several options at its disposal—and they could carry out one, a combination, or all of these possibilities.
Israel may hit Iran’s oil infrastructure.
Iran’s oil infrastructure is the main source of revenue for the terror-funding nation. Israel’s purpose in knocking this out would be to cut down the flow of money into Iran and greatly curtail its ability to keep funding its proxies like Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis.
Israel may target Iranian leadership.
Israel could possibly set conditions for regime change. We know they have been eliminating leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah. If Israel targets leaders in Iran, it could include:
- The Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
- The ruling Mullahs in the regime
- The new Iranian President, Masoud Pezeshkian
- Senior IRGC Commanders
All of these individuals could be in Israel’s sights to try to destabilize the leadership in Iran.
There was an interesting quote from the exiled Crown Prince of Iran, Reza Pahlavi. The Crown Prince is the eldest son of the last Shah of Iran, who was deposed during the Islamic Revolution. In an interview with CBN, Pahlavi said that he believes Iran is ripe for a revolution. Israel might seek to destabilize the leadership in Iran enough that it could give rise to a revolution that would depose the Mullahs’ regime.
Israel may hit Iran’s nuclear facilities.
This is the most complicated and dangerous of the options. It’s also the one that is the most risky in terms of success. The New York Times has a headline this week that says, “Washington Worries the Israelis Will Bomb Iran’s Nuclear Sites. But Can They?”
President Biden is advising Israel not to hit these nuclear facilities or its oil infrastructure. Now, I don’t think Israel will likely take much heed to his advice, but there are a lot of logistical issues for Israel hitting these nuclear facilities. First of all, Iran is 1,000 miles away, which in and of itself is a logistical difficulty. Israel can refuel planes in the air; however, taking the kind of payload needed to hit these nuclear facilities would add a lot of complications to this kind of operation.
The Iranians have been smart enough not to concentrate in one area but to have eight nuclear facilities scattered all over the country. Let me give you an idea of how difficult this would be. One of these nuclear facilities is located in a place called Natanz, which is reported to be “a hardened Fuel Enrichment Plant (FEP) covering 100,000 square meters that is built 8 meters underground and protected by a concrete wall 2.5 meters thick, itself protected by another concrete wall.”
These are hardened facilities underground. Israel does have “Bunker Busters” that they can use, but it is worth noting that they would need to drop them one on top of another, further adding to the elaborateness necessary for that operation. We don’t know at this time whether or not targeting nuclear facilities is the road Israel plans to take at this time.
‘Eating The Elephant One Bite At A Time‘
Speaking of Hezbollah, this week, Israel killed two successors to Hassan Nasrallah, the former head of the terror organization. Only weeks ago, Israel took out the terror leader himself in Beruit after he had led Hezbollah for over 30 years. It was his assassination that was the stated reason by Iran for its retaliation against Israel—when it sent the world’s largest ballistic missile barrage toward the Jewish State on October 1.
On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said: “We’ve degraded Hezbollah’s capabilities. We took out thousands of terrorists, including Nasrallah himself and Nasrallah’s replacement, and the replacement of the replacement.”
Israel right now is on a mission to take out this leadership. An article in The Hill this week insisted that this attack by Israel against Iran “will not be accomplished in one large retaliatory strike, but rather a series of strikes building upon one another.” This could be a wave of strikes. One person put it this way, saying that what Israel is going to have to do is “eat the elephant one bite at a time.” I think that’s a pretty apt description of what may be getting ready to take place.
Russia And Iran To Meet In ‘Magog’
On another front, while Iran is currently crossing the nuclear threshold and awaiting a military response from Israel, the new Iranian president is meeting for the first time with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. The Times of Israel, in its article “Iran president set to meet Putin for first time as clash with Israel escalates,” reported this high-level meeting planned for Friday, October 11.
It will be a meeting of Central Asian nations, most of which were part of the former Soviet Union before they broke away when the USSR was split up in the early 90s. It also takes place in Turkmenistan, a nation that is very closely allied with Iran.
It’s interesting to note that these Central Asian nations meeting together are all part of what is called in Ezekiel 38 “Magog.” Magog was the land of the ancient Scythians, a people who inhabited this area in what today is Southern Russia along with nations often referred to as the “stans”— Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan.
So you have Russia, referred to in Ezekiel 38 as “Rosh,” meeting with Iran, referred to as “Persia,” in the area of ancient Magog. All of this while Israel is planning a retaliatory strike against Iran.
Many believe that Russia is now helping Iran with its nuclear program. Iran also has close ties with North Korea. The question is not “will Israel strike?” but “when and how will they strike?” The answer will go a long way in determining the extent and the existence of a broader regional war.
Either way, the buildup of the “Gog Magog War” continues before our eyes.
The Goal Of A Nuclear Iran
I keep asking myself: how much longer can this go on until the lid blows off? How much longer can Iran be contained? If Iran does get nuclear weapons, that is going to be the greatest existential threat to the existence of Israel since 1948.
To me, Iran’s nuclear capability is a clear sign of the impending end. Logically, if Iran gets the nuclear weapons they want to wipe Israel off the face of the Earth, how much longer can Israel really exist as a nation? As students of Biblical Prophecy, we know that Israel will never again cease from being a nation. Therefore, we also know with certainty that, nuclear weapon-wielding or not, Iran will fail in their ultimate goal.
Iran obtaining nuclear weapons, to me, just pushes these end-times prophecies forward and underscores the urgency of our times and the need for spiritual preparedness.
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