The warship USS Mahan (DDG-72), part of the Gerald R. Ford Carrier Strike Group, broadcast signals Friday in the Strait of Gibraltar, indicating it is entering the Mediterranean Sea. It will join the massive U.S. forces already concentrated in the Middle East, the largest deployment since the 2003 Iraq War and one carrying enormous costs.
Meanwhile, gaps in negotiations between the United States and Iran are reportedly very wide, and President Donald Trump may be running out of patience. Under these circumstances, a U.S. strike on Iran, likely alongside Israel, may be only a question of timing. Trump has sought to maintain ambiguity by issuing conflicting statements, while contradictory reports have circulated about the nature and scope of any potential attack.
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Given the situation, Israel’s defense establishment is taking into account the possibility that Iran could launch a preemptive strike in an effort to deny the United States and Israel the element of surprise. In the opening blow of Operation Rising Lion a series of Iranian nuclear scientists and senior military officials were killed, caught unprepared for a surprise Israeli Air Force attack.
Danny Citrinowicz, a former head of the Iran branch in the IDF Military Intelligence Directorate’s Research Division and now a senior researcher in the Iran Program at the Institute for National Security Studies, said the likelihood of an Iranian preemptive strike remains very low.
“Of course it’s not zero, but the probability is low because the Iranians have no strategic gain from it,” he said. “They would only be taking a risk by launching an attack, and in the end they would bring an American strike upon themselves.”
“The Iranians are in a very problematic diplomatic position,” he added. “They ostensibly want to reach an agreement, so why attack?”
Still, he said Israel must remain on high alert despite the low probability. “There could be a scenario of miscalculation, where one side mistakenly assesses that the other intends to attack immediately — and then takes action to thwart it,” he said. “Given the tension in the Middle East, that could happen even if Iran has no logic in launching a preliminary strike against Israel.”
Since October 7, which began with an extraordinary intelligence failure, Israel and the United States have demonstrated significant intelligence capabilities regarding launches from Iran and operations inside it.
“Israel will likely be able to detect an attack if there is one,” Citrinowicz said. “When preparing to fire missiles, it doesn’t come out of nowhere. You have to prepare the missile and fuel it. Those preparations take a long time, as we saw in Operation Rising Lion when launchers were struck in advance. So I would assume that both we and the United States would identify those preparations.”
According to Citrinowicz, “Iran currently prefers to focus on its internal situation. That doesn’t mean it isn’t preparing for war, but this idea of ‘let me die with the Philistines’ does not suit the regime. It may be ideologically extreme, but it is not a suicidal regime. If Israel attacks, they will of course respond.”
‘Enough time to seek shelter’
In the event of a surprise attack, warning time is expected to be at least 12 minutes — the time it takes an Iranian ballistic missile to reach Israel — and potentially longer if Iran were to take the even less likely step of launching drones and cruise missiles, which would give Israel several hours to prepare before impact. If preparations to launch ballistic missiles are detected in advance, as has happened before, the warning time could be longer still.
“I believe that’s enough time to seek shelter,” Citrinowicz said. “This is not Gaza or Lebanon. There will be sufficient warning.” He said the key question is what Iran learned from the “12-day war” and whether its force buildup since then has improved its ability to strike Israel’s civilian rear.
“In the event of a campaign against Iran, the Houthis and Shiite militias in Iraq would likely join in, and that could be challenging,” he said. In Israel, officials are also preparing for the possibility that Hezbollah could intervene under pressure from Tehran.
Danny Citrinowicz“Iran was surprised in the previous campaign, and now it won’t be,” he said. “Its ability to respond will be better. Potentially, this could be more challenging. It’s good that the Americans are here in the region, but we have to take into account a more difficult situation than before, because the Iranians are more prepared.”
In any case, he concluded, “The level of preparedness is so high that there won’t be a surprise. Perhaps the Iranians will detect Israeli aircraft and think we are attacking them, so they attack us. They could certainly achieve tactical gains in such an attack, but strategically they will not do it. The regime does not act out of revenge, and right now it needs an arrangement with the United States. But it is better to be prepared for any scenario.”