New intelligence obtained by the United States suggests that Israel is preparing to strike Iranian nuclear facilities, CNN reported on Tuesday, citing multiple US officials familiar with the matter.
It was not clear whether Israeli leaders have made a final decision, CNN added, citing the officials, adding that there is “deep disagreement within the US government about the likelihood that Israel will ultimately act.”
Any Israeli strike on Iran would be “a brazen break with President Donald Trump,” the officials told CNN. They added that it could also risk triggering a broader regional war.
“Whether and how Israel strikes will likely depend” on Jerusalem’s views of US-Iran nuclear negotiations, CNN added.
However, another source told CNN that “the chance of an Israeli strike on an Iranian nuclear facility has gone up significantly in recent months, and the prospect of a Trump-negotiated US-Iran deal that doesn’t remove all of Iran’s uranium makes the chance of a strike more likely.”
The concerns of an Israeli strike are based on public and private messaging from senior Israeli officials that they are considering a move, and from intercepted Israeli communications and observations of Israeli military movements, multiple sources told CNN.
These military movements included moving air munitions and completing an air exercise, two sources added.
These could also, however, be Israel simply “trying to pressure Iran to abandon key tenets of its nuclear program by signaling the consequences if it doesn’t — underscoring the ever-shifting complexities the White House is navigating,” CNN added.
Israel ‘between a rock and a hard place’
Trump’s desire to pursue diplomacy over striking Iran has put Israel “between a rock and a hard place,” according to Jonathan Panikoff, a former senior intelligence official specializing in the region, cited by CNN.
This has led Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to face pressure both to avoid a US-Iran deal that Israel “doesn’t view as satisfactory, while also not alienating Trump, CNN added.
“At the end of the day, the Israeli decision-making is going to be predicated on US policy determinations and actions, and what agreements President Trump does or does not come to with Iran,” Panikoff said, adding that he did not believe Netanyahu would be willing to risk fracturing Israel’s US relationship by launching a strike without at least tacit US approval.
Israel does not have the capacity to destroy Iran’s nuclear program without US support, including midair refueling and bombs to penetrate facilities deep underground, according to a source familiar with the matter, cited by CNN.
However, Israel would be prepared to carry out military action on its own if the US were to negotiate a deal with Iran that Israel cannot accept, an Israeli source told CNN.
“I think it’s more likely they strike to try and get the deal to fall apart if they think Trump is going to settle for a ‘bad deal,’” said the other person familiar with US intelligence cited by CNN. “The Israelis have not been shy about signaling that to us … both publicly and privately.”
Israel’s National Security Council, Prime Minister’s Office, and the Embassy in Washington did not reply to CNN’s request for a comment.
With Israel concerned that the Trump administration may cut a weak new nuclear deal with Iran, one way out of such a scenario could be a theoretical Mossad operation that kills the key Iranian official who ordered 400 ballistic missiles fired on Israel in 2024, think-tank sources conjectured to The Jerusalem Post in April.
There is a real danger that Trump could agree to a mediocre nuclear deal with Iran, multiple top Israeli sources have told the Post in April. If Trump does agree to such a deal, some of the sources are deeply concerned that the president may circumscribe the IDF’s current unique opportunity to strike the Islamic Republic.
Yonah Jeremy Bob and Reuters contributed to this report.
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