Israel and US preparing for potential ‘short campaign’ to pressure Iran into talks: Report
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Iranians drive past a huge billboard with an image of the slain supreme leader Ali Khamenei, in Tehran on Tuesday. Photograph: (AFP)
Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has been holding consultations in limited and tightly controlled security forums. He has also instructed his ministers not to comment publicly on Iran. The renewed Iranian missile fire toward the Gulf on Monday accelerated preparations and potential escalation.
Israel and the US are coordinating as escalating tensions over Strait of Hormuz shipping put the Iran ceasefire at risk, reported CNN, citing an Israeli source, which added that the coordination includes preparation for a potential new round of strikes on Iran on energy infrastructure and targeted killing of senior Iranian officials.
Most of these plans were largely prepared and ready for execution on the eve of the ceasefire in early-April, the report said.
“The intention would be to carry out a short campaign aimed at pressuring Iran into further concessions in negotiations,” the Israeli source told CNN, adding that the strikes were mostly prepared ahead of the ceasefire last month.
Escalating tensions in Strait of Hormuz put Iran ceasefire at risk
President Donald Trump has grown frustrated at the deadlock in negotiations and the inability to open the Strait of Hormuz, but he has also signalled that he does not want to resume a full-scale conflict with Iran.
The source emphasised that any decision to resume hostilities ultimately rests with President Trump.
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Israel has been sceptical about the prospects of negotiations between Iran and the United States from the very outset, an Israeli official told CNN, but Monday’s renewed Iranian missile fire toward the Gulf accelerated preparations and potential escalation in hostilities.
Over the past week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been holding consultations in limited, tightly-controlled security forums, according to an Israeli source familiar with the matter. Netanyahu also instructed government ministers not to comment publicly on Iran.
‘Ceasefire between Iran and US not over’
A day after Iran fired missiles and drones at the UAE and Oman, US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said at a Pentagon press conference on Tuesday that the ceasefire between Iran and the US “is not over.”
Hegseth also denied that President Donald Trump is being pulled in by Prime Minister Netanyahu on the Iran issue and said, “The US is grateful for [Israel’s] input, their insights, the existential nature of the threat they face from an Iranian bomb.”
