Just before sunrise on Sunday, United States B-2 stealth bombers and destroyers smashed Iran’s three principal nuclear sites – Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan – in an operation conducted with Israeli intelligence.
US President Donald Trump declared the facilities “completely and totally obliterated” and warned that “far greater” blows would follow if Tehran provoked further. No previous US president had crossed that line, and for Israel, it signals a brighter day – perhaps the birth of a new Middle East.
Six bunker-busters collapsed Fordow’s mountain chambers, while more than 30 Tomahawks cratered Natanz and Isfahan, Reuters reported. Iran fired about 40 missiles toward Tel Aviv and Haifa, wounding dozens of people and damaging apartments, but it scrupulously avoided US assets.
That restraint betrays Tehran’s dilemma: Full retaliation now means catastrophe.
Washington discreetly informed Tehran that the strike was a “one-off,” confined to nuclear infrastructure, The Jerusalem Post reported. Translation: America can strike at will; Iran finds out only after the flash.
Many doubted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s warnings and dismissed Trump’s threats. Both men delivered.
Netanyahu, Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, and a tight war cabinet ran an elaborate decoy campaign with fake trips and staged family photos to lull Iranian intelligence. When the green light was given, Israel’s targeting data and America’s firepower fused seamlessly.
US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called the operation “bold and brilliant.” Even opposition leader Yair Lapid admitted, “The world is safer today.” Credit, too, goes to Trump: Rhetoric became reality.
Sweeping broken glass in Israel
Israelis swept broken glass on Sunday morning, yet the existential cloud was lifted. Deterrence, not debris, is the headline.
A regime that vowed Israel’s destruction now watches drone footage of its nuclear pride reduced to rubble. Gulf monarchies, which are publicly cautious but privately relieved, sense Persian hegemony receding. European diplomats who preached restraint now concede that a nuclear Iran would have been worse.
Israeli missile defenses intercepted more than half of the incoming rockets, and hospitals treated fewer than 60 wounded – a painful but bearable price for erasing an existential threat.
The International Atomic Energy Agency called an emergency session, confirmed there had been no radiation leak, and urged restraint. EU foreign ministers demanded calm yet privately welcomed the end of Iran’s nuclear blackmail. Riyadh said the strike had “neutralized a common threat.” Even cautious Cairo suggested the region could “pivot from fear to prosperity.”
Sunday’s operation is the latest chapter in the Begin Doctrine: Israel’s vow that no existential foe will acquire doomsday arms. From Osirak in 1981 to Syria’s al-Kibar reactor in 2007, preemptive strikes have bought time.
This one may have won a generation. Strategically, Israel gains breathing room to invest in missile defense, diplomacy, and domestic resilience – all while the ayatollahs survey smoking craters where centrifuges once spun.
Inside Washington, isolationists argued against intervention, but after Iranian missiles rained on Israeli cities, Trump overrode them. That choice now looks prescient: Allies applaud, and adversaries absorb the lesson that American redlines are cast in granite.
Deterrence now reaches Hezbollah in Beirut and Houthi cells in Yemen. Proxy rockets may still fly, and cyber skirmishes will continue, yet the nightmare of a mushroom cloud over Tel Aviv has been pushed far into the future.
Israel’s bond with Washington has proved to be ironclad, and its quiet partnerships with Cairo, Amman, and the Abraham Accords capitals will deepen.
Equally notable is what did not happen: Tanker routes stayed open, US bases went unscathed, and oil prices stabilized within hours. The global economy, often hostage to Iranian brinkmanship, breathed a tentative sigh of relief.
Iran’s proxies still hold rockets, and cyberspace remains contested. Jerusalem must keep its defensive shields high and alliances tight. Yet inside Iran, millions who resent clerical rule now see their leaders humiliated.
Sustained pressure, coupled with a path to normalcy, could spark overdue change in Tehran. Regime change is not Israel’s stated aim, but history rewards regimes that avoid suicidal wars.
The Post has long argued that Iran’s nuclear ambitions threaten every nation in the region. On Sunday, the free world responded. We salute the American president who acted, Israeli leaders who prepared, and the pilots and rescuers who executed under fire.
A new dawn has broken, and Israelis are now safer than at any time in a generation.