US, Israel Need Strategy to Keep Iran At Bay, Share Defensive Tools With Arab Partners, Per JINSA Report

To build on its successful attacks on Iran in June, Israel must think, as it did in Syria, in terms of a “campaign between the wars” that includes “preemptive military force alongside diplomatic, intelligence and economic measures,” and it and the United States ought to share important defense capability with Arab partners in the region.

That’s according to a report that the Jewish Institute for National Security of America released this month.

Israel’s Operation Rising Lion achieved a “strategic resetting, a reassertion of Israeli strength and diminution of Iranian power, but one that will not last without concerted political will and military might to maintain it,” according to the report.

It added that the U.S. and Israeli “between the wars” approach, which would be defensive and offensive, could “maintain active pressure on Iran to deter and prevent it from rebuilding its military and nuclear capabilities.”

The report’s three authors are former deputy commanders of U.S. European Command and of U.S. Central Command and a former deputy director of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency.

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This time must be used productively,” it says. “Neither Israel nor the United States can afford to rest on the laurels of their success in defending against Iranian missiles in 2024 and 2025.”

To the authors, that means to “double down on defense by expanding interceptor production and investing in joint research and development of next-generation air defense capabilities” and Israel and America ought to share defensive capabilities with Arab partners, “who make peace with Israel.”

“The United States could build not just a new regional order, but also an integrated air and missile defense system that would increase the security of, while reducing the need  for, U.S. deployments to the CENTCOM area of operations,” the report states.

The report is based on conversations that former U.S. military and intelligence leaders had in the Jewish state over the summer with senior Israeli political, military, intelligence and national security officials.

Among its other findings is that many Americans think of a conflict that was “three decades in the making” as just a “12-day war” that “started with a bolt from the blue.”

It also found that Israelis worry about Iran’s expanded ballistic missile program, as global media attention focused mainly on the regime’s nuclear ambitions.

“The distance from Iran to Israel was not 1,000 miles but rather the nine minutes it takes for a ballistic missile to reach Tel Aviv,” the report states. “This made clear the cost and limitations of playing defense against Iran’s missile threat.”

Mark Fox, a retired vice admiral of the U.S. Navy and former CENTCOM commander who is one of the report authors, told reporters at a briefing on Nov. 20 that “even with the capability of conventional ballistic missile attacks, you can overwhelm a defense if you have enough missiles.”

That was what the Iranian regime was trying to do, and it “was part of the calculus of the Israelis to affect this campaign when they did,” he said.

The report authors wrote that Israeli intelligence officials told them that “Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei suffered from a deep depression during, and even in the days after, the war, shaken by the loss of close confidants and by the realization that his commanders—who had assured him of victory over Israel—had deceived him.”

Another report author, Robert Ashley, a retired lieutenant general and former Defense Intelligence Agency director, told reporters that Israel prepared for its strikes well in advance and ran maneuvers each night to throw the enemy off.

“When the strike actually hit, one of the top-tier Iranian leaders was so unprepared for the strike, he actually thought—and earthquakes are rather common occurrences in Iran—that an earthquake had hit,” Ashley said. “That’s what collapsed in his home.”

The report states that the “ongoing scheduling of continued negotiations with Iran helped lull Iranian officials into a false sense of security, reducing their vigilance just before the outbreak of the 12day war.” Surprisingly, the report adds that an Israeli official said that it was “merely coincidental” that it was ready to attack the day after the 60-day negotiating window, which U.S. President Donald Trump set with Iran, had expired.