Maariv: Israel is concerned about Iran’s pre-emptive attack due to intense protests

“Iran is increasingly being eroded and facing a real predicament, but the question that worries the Israeli security establishment is whether the regime, in a desperate attempt, will resort to launching a missile attack on Israel, while the security establishment is currently watching with great caution the events in Tehran and its readiness to launch a surprise attack,” said Avi Ashkenazi, a military correspondent for the Israeli Maariv newspaper.

Ashkenazi added in his report that the defense establishment appreciates that Iran currently doesn’t want to go to war with Israel, and claims that its military capabilities are very limited.

The air defense is completely exposed, and that its ability to launch an Israeli attack is non-existent in its view.

At the same time, Iran is seeking to bolster its arsenal, but on a limited scale and with low quality.

“Work is also underway to rebuild the ballistic missile arsenal at an accelerated pace by relying on Iran’s domestic industry,” he said.

However, the Israeli defense establishment claims that Iran hasn’t reached the number of missiles and launchers it had on the eve of the “Year of Clavi” war (the Hebrew name for the war against Iran), and the Israelis believe that the number of missiles produced doesn’t match the number reported in the Western media.

An Israeli army source was quoted as saying, “The Iranian government has set its priorities, and has primarily set up an offensive system against Israel before addressing Iran’s economic crisis, water and social welfare problems”.

Ashkenazi said that according to Israeli assessments, the Iranian government is going through a difficult and deteriorating situation.

Externally, its struggling to recover from the collapse of the “Year of Clavi” war and the blow it received from Israel.

At the same time, this war will change Israel’s combat strategy on various fronts, resulting in Iran losing all its allies, from Hezbollah and Hamas, to militias in Syria and Iraq, and now the Houthi crisis in Yemen is making the situation even more difficult.

“This is where the internal distress arose… The water crisis in light of the severe economic crisis pushed the people to take to the streets, and this coincided with the outbreak of the Islamic Revolution of 1978-1979”.

Iran’s secular-oriented middle class has been pushed to the brink by economic burdens.

This class agreed to join the religious movement and carried out the coup, which has already turned into a religious revolution, but in essence a socio-economic revolution.

“The Iranian government is well aware of this, and it also understands that no military or police force can stop the flow of hungry and thirsty citizens”.

“Therefore, the concern in the Israeli regime stems from the keenness of the intelligence service, the Mossad, the Israeli air force and the Israeli air defense system to monitor what is happening in the east… The Iranian government, while currently unable or unwilling to fight another war with Israel, is likely to feel trapped”.

“Even after Donald Trump’s remarks this week during his meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and of course because of the demonstrations and protests that seem to be spiraling out of control, some fear that the ongoing economic collapse in Iran will lead to an external attack, targeting Israel’s home front,” he said.

“The military maintains that there will be no escape from striking Iran again in the face of its attempts to rebuild its air defense systems and ballistic missiles, but now they are saying in Israel that the red line drawn by Israel hasn’t been crossed, and therefore there are more urgent matters that need to be addressed,” he said.