In a First, U.S. Deploys Combat Jets to Israel for Potential Wartime Mission in Iran

The U.S. has sent top-of-the-line fighters to Israel, marking the first time it has deployed combat aircraft to the country for a potential wartime mission as the two nations prepare to square off against Iran.

The deployment of the F-22 Raptors this week will enable the U.S. to better defend Israeli territory and American forces in the Middle East from Iranian retaliation should President Trump proceed with his threats to strike Tehran’s nuclear and missile programs. It will also provide the U.S. with an aircraft that could carry out offensive operations.

The move marks a major step toward deepening U.S. and Israeli military cooperation. Yet it isn’t the first U.S. military deployment there. The U.S. has sent Army troops to Israel to operate the Thaad antimissile system and has previously stationed ballistic-missile defense-equipped destroyers near Israel to help protect the country from missile and drone attacks.

Taken together, these deployments mark a sea change in the American military posture following the Abraham Accords during the first Trump administration, which led to the normalization of Israel’s relations with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and others. For decades prior to the accords, U.S. forces in the Middle East had sought to avoid the impression that they were closely integrated with the Israeli military.

“Operating aircraft from Israeli bases is a first,” said Dennis Ross, a former senior U.S. official who has worked for Republican and Democratic administrations.

The Trump administration hasn’t officially announced the deployment, and U.S. Central Command, which oversees U.S. military forces in the region, declined to comment. Videos of the aircraft arriving in Israel, however, began appearing on social media Tuesday.

The F-22 deployment comes as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have said they won’t let the U.S. use their airspace or territory for an attack on Iran, limiting American options for basing the hundreds of aircraft necessary for a major operation.

The use of Israeli air bases will enable the U.S. to disperse its warplanes among a variety of bases, rather than concentrating all of its air power in a handful of regional airfields, U.S. officials say. Many of the U.S. aircraft that have been sent to the region as Trump puts pressure on Tehran to agree to a nuclear deal are parked at Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan.

Last year, F-22s escorted B-2 bombers during their attack on Iran’s nuclear sites. “The F-22 is the world’s premier fighter,” said Charles Corcoran, a retired Air Force major general and a former F-22 pilot. “It can be used to conduct strikes, escort bombers and in a defensive role against cruise missiles and one-way attack drones.”

Nearly a dozen F-22s have arrived at the Ovda air base in southern Israel, according to Chinese commercial satellite photos and experts familiar with the longstanding plans.

A report issued last year by the Jewish Institute for National Security of America says the Ovda base has been also used by American aircraft during exercises with the Israelis and can accommodate more than 100 aircraft, including refueling tankers. Built in the early 1980s, the base has shelters for aircraft, fuel bunkers and ammunition dumps. The report was written by Corcoran, two other retired U.S. Air Force generals and Jonathan Ruhe of the institute.

The issue of working with Israel’s military had been sensitive for decades. Before 2021, the U.S. military’s responsibility for Israel fell under its European Command. That arrangement made it easier for American generals in the Central Command area to deal with their Arab counterparts without interacting with Israel, which was considered a foe by much of the Arab world at the time.

After the Abraham Accords were announced, Trump directed that Israel be placed under Central Command’s area of responsibility.

The F-22 deployment “is the product of two developments: the growing cooperation between the United States and Israel, and the refusal of so many countries to allow the U.S. to use their bases,” said Elliott Abrams, who held senior positions in several Republican administrations and has been a strong supporter of Israel. “I have to wonder if, over time, Americans will wonder why we have bases in countries that don’t cooperate when we ask.”

The U.S. military made strenuous efforts to distance itself from Israel when it mounted its Desert Storm campaign in 1991 to evict Iraqi forces from Kuwait. When Israel contributed badly needed mine-clearing equipment for the operation, a U.S. Marine Corps officer had the gear repainted with the American service’s markings. Then it was loaded onto American C-5 cargo planes that flew over the Mediterranean before turning toward Saudi Arabia, bolstering the ruse that it was American equipment that was being delivered from the U.S.

The U.S. also sent Patriot antimissile batteries that year to Israel to defend the country from the Scud missile attacks then Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had ordered. The goal was to prevent Israel from taking military action inside Iraq to try to stop the missile launches, a step Washington feared could roil the Arab members of its coalition.

Now the situation is somewhat reversed and it is Israel’s antimissile defenses that will help protect the F-22s based in the country.

“If I was going to put a very high value asset somewhere, I totally would want to go for a country that has pretty robust air and missile defense,” said Douglas Birkey, executive director for the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies.

Originally published in the Wall Street Journal.