Disclaimer: This article was written on October 2, 2024. The analyses and perspectives reflect the events and information available at the time of writing. Developments in the region may have since occurred.
Iran’s nighttime missile attack on Israeli territory on October 1 was another step up in the region’s escalating ladder of conflict, a scenario many were hoping to avoid but are now increasingly resigned to accept, given the developments of recent weeks.
Unlike the previous strike in April, this time, there was minimal telegraphing from Iran about its decision to launch another direct attack on Israeli territory—the second in six months. An Israeli response is expected and is generally assessed as only a matter of time. This time around, Israel is unlikely to demonstrate the restraint it had shown in April.
Iran’s Missile Strikes
Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson Daniel Hagari confirmed that Iran had launched over 180 ballistic missiles, with a “small number of hits” in the center and a few others in the South. Israel’s air defense systems had intercepted a “majority of the incoming missiles.” Hagari described the attack as a “severe and dangerous escalation” and emphasized, “Operational plans are ready. We will respond wherever, whenever and however we choose.” He further reminded the public, “Iran and its proxies have been attacking Israel since the seventh of October on several fronts. Iran and its proxies seek the destruction of Israel.”
Hagari gave no details about casualties or the extent of the damage caused by the missiles, which are said to consist of Iran’s most technically advanced hypersonic missile, the “Fateh-1.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu too responded immediately with an ominous warning to Iran, calling the missile strike a “big mistake.” He exhorted a war-exhausted populace to prepare for “a campaign against the axis of evil… [and for] great challenges and great achievements ahead.” Separately, U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, in a press briefing, said that the United States had “made clear that there will be consequences, severe consequences, for this Iranian missile attack on Israel and we will work with Israel to make that the case.”
Over in Tehran, officials announced that the strikes were to avenge the deaths of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) Abbas Nilforoushan, both of whom died in Israeli strikes on September 27 in Beirut, and Ismael Haniyeh, who died in July in Tehran.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi called the attack “self-defense under Article 51 of the UN Charter, targeting solely military & security sites in charge of genocide in Gaza and Lebanon” and that Iran had done so “after exercising tremendous self-restraint for almost two months to give space for a ceasefire in Gaza.” Araghchi also declared their action concluded, “unless the Israeli regime decides to invite further retaliation.”
However, this time may be different. Back in mid-April 2024, when Iran, for the first time ever, directly launched several hundred ballistic missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) onto Israel’s territory, United States President Joe Biden persuaded Netanyahu to limit the scope of a counterstrike. Israel’s counter-response, though muted in terms of damage, was effective in signaling its ability to breach Iranian air defense systems. Israeli airborne assets are reported to have penetrated deep inside Iranian territory and, in one incident, damaged S-300 air defense systems positioned to protect the Natanz nuclear complex.
The signaling of the prevailing asymmetry in defense capabilities between the two sides was made starkly evident. This fact appears to have been uppermost among Iran’s decision makers who, in the preceding months, assiduously avoided getting into another direct confrontation with Israel.
Nevertheless, since the April tit-for-tat limited strikes, both Iran and Israel reverted to form, engaging in their decades-long “shadow war” but keeping kinetic engagements within manageable thresholds. The Iranian calculus was that with April’s “Operation True Promise” deterrence had been restored. In fact, soon after Iran’s unprecedented missile strikes, Hossein Salami, head of the IRGC, claimed that a “new equation” had been established vis-à-vis Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has, however, repeatedly shown a penchant for rewriting the rules of engagement and pushing the so-called redlines well beyond their limit. To briefly recap, beginning November 2023, Iran suffered a series of body blows from Israeli airstrikes and covert operations resulting in the deaths of numerous Iranian military leaders and commanders of the so-called “Axis of Resistance,” Iran’s self-reference to its militia proxies in the region. In December 2023, senior IRGC commander Syed Razi Mousavi was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Damascus. Reports are that Mousavi had emerged as the highest-ranking IRGC official in the Levant, replacing the late Qasem Soleimani, the IRGC (Qods Force) commander who was killed in a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad in January 2020.
In January this year, top Hamas leader Saleh el-Arouri was killed in Beirut. Arouri was considered the go-between for Hamas, Hezbollah, and his handlers in Tehran. Arouri’s death came a day before the twin suicide bombings that killed over eighty in the Iranian city of Kerman on January 3, 2024. Though the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the bombing, Iran blamed Israel for its own political interest and to cover up its lapses in security. April’s “Operation True Promise” was Iran’s retaliation over the death of Mohammad Reza Zahedi, the IRGC Commander, in Israel’s airstrikes on the annex of the Iranian Consulate in Damascus on April 1. Reports are that Zahedi was Iran’s representative on Hezbollah’s top decision-making body, the Shura Council. Other high-value targets killed this year include Mohammad Deif, a senior Hamas military commander; Ibrahim Aqeel, head of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force; and the long-elusive head of military operations Fuad Shukr (in Beirut in July). Within hours, Shukr’s death was followed by the assassination of Ismael Haniyeh, Hamas’s political chief, in an IRGC safe house in the heart of Tehran. The incident took place within a day of the swearing-in ceremony of incoming Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.
Thus, in recent months, Israeli strikes decimated multiple layers of the command structure of both Hamas and Hezbollah, crippling the vaunted deterrence function they had been tasked with by Iran. The losses were dire enough to compel Iran’s IRGC to pull back its commanders from the field to reduce further fatalities.
In retrospect, and in light of the aforementioned chronology, the killing of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah in the Shia-dominated Dahiyeh suburb of Beirut seems to have been preordained. In the run-up to Nasrallah’s death, Israel had overwhelmed Hezbollah’s forces with a series of unorthodox strikes.
Israel’s tactics advanced along two tracks. First, to strike at the heart of Axis command structures by eliminating as many high-value military personnel as possible. Second, cripple and dismantle Axis military hardware by striking missile storage and launch facilities. This included the psychologically devastating “pager” handheld communication device explosions, which triggered widespread panic among Hezbollah’s rank and file. The exploding pagers resulted in the killing and maiming of scores of Hezbollah operatives. Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon, Mojtaba Amani, was also injured along with an unknown number of IRGC forces, all of whom had to be airlifted to Tehran for treatment.
These developments placed enormous pressure on Iran for a suitable response. Its months-long reticence in the face of such devastating losses was sowing deep divisions among key decisionmakers in Tehran. The two main camps pitted against each other consisted of those calling for a retreat to the homeland to focus on domestic challenges, and supporters of the “forward defense” strategy, fearful of the loss of a decades-long investment in what has today emerged to become the Axis of Resistance.
It may also be noted that long-time Iran observers often point to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s unique style of leadership—a cautious and risk-averse approach with an ideological obsession with safeguarding the theocracy’s rule as embodied in the concept of Vilayat-e-Faqih. Khamenei is known to carefully study the multiple layers of recommendations from different factions, which filter up to his table for a decision. These traits also help explain his three-decade-long reign at the helm of the Islamic Revolution. On balance, the political compulsions of giving a military response to Israel prevailed.
Iran’s October 1 strike on Israeli territory therefore contains different messages for multiple audiences. Domestically, it assuages hardliners who have been pressing for revenge, especially for the death of Hassan Nasrallah. As the Lebanese historian and journalist Kim Ghattas notes in her book Black Wave, the formation of Hezbollah was the Iranian revolution’s most successful export, one which would forever change Lebanon and West Asia. Nasrallah was front and center of this change, shaping Hezbollah since 1992. His death marks a historic setback to Iran and its most prized proxy in the region and a vital cog in its “forward defense” strategy. Nasrallah’s legacy will be hard to replicate, given that he single-handedly reshaped the organization in the preceding decades. For a nonstate militia, Hezbollah remains the best armed and trained force in the Levant. Iran had carefully incubated the group since 1982, initially in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley and now to its current overwhelming dominance in Lebanese politics. The militia group’s overreach has, unsurprisingly, caused widespread resentment in Lebanon.
As things stand, the core components of Iran’s Axis of Resistance and its “forward defense” strategy—Hezbollah and Hamas—have been severely crippled. As such, one of Iran’s objectives through its strikes in Israel would be to assuage worries of abandonment within the Axis ranks and demonstrate its steadfast backing, especially to the Axis rank and file. However, the recovery and reconstitution of Axis command structures will be costly, both in terms of treasure and time. In fact, if Israel’s current offensive into southern Lebanon attains even a fraction of its objective of dismantling Hezbollah units South of the Litani River, it will be apparent that the Axis’s heyday is in the past.
What Next?
Iranian Foreign Affairs Minister Abbas Araghchi is highly experienced and is unlikely to believe his own words that the onus is now on Israel to decide whether or not to invite further retaliation. Any pragmatic observer will know that an Israeli response is the offing. While Iran publicly feigns its desire to avoid escalation, it is no secret that equally, it quietly encourages its proxies to pin down Israel.
Overall coordination among Axis members under Iran’s directive has been to deter and influence Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. In fact, within a day of Hamas’ October 7 attack, Hezbollah began bombing northern Israel, displacing more than 70,000 people. According to a tabulation of Axis kinetic actions, as compiled by the defense journal Janes, “As of September 2024 Hizbullah militants have claimed at least 2,785 attacks against Israel since October 2023.” Iraq’s Islamic Resistance launched more than 170 attacks against U.S. interests in Iraq and Israel between October 2023 and June 2024.1
If there is one thing Netanyahu has repeatedly demonstrated, especially in the preceding year since October 7, it is his appetite to take risks and confidence in stamping Israel’s military dominance. Israel will do well to remember that one can win the war but lose the peace. It is significant that a day before Iran’s missile strikes, Netanyahu telecast an address directly to the Iranian people, assuring them of a future of peace and prosperity once the theocracy is overthrown. Going by the region’s tortured history, such calls for regime change mark a transgression into dangerous territory.
An Israeli response to Iran’s October 1 attack is imminent. The key question is of its intensity and potential fallout, both within Iran, in terms of nuclear security policy changes, and across the broader region. The coming days are likely to reshape West Asia irreversibly.
1Suraj Ganesan, Eliot Chapman, “Hizbullah’s Areas of Operations: Overview and Islamic Resistance Brigades’ Southern Command,” Janes Intelligence Review, September 25, 2025.