GNITN - Special Edition

Israel At War – Day 197

Message Sent

The Evacuation Begins

According to a report from i24news.tv moving the evacuated Gazans away from Rafah, a move needed to complete the war against Hamas is well on its way:

Since the partial withdrawal of Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) from the Gaza Strip, approximately 250,000 Palestinians have relocated from the town of Rafah to other areas further north, particularly between Nuseirat and Khan Younes, south of the Wadi Gaza line.

This mass exodus follows the peak of the military operation in the Gaza Strip when Rafah was home to 1.3 million Palestinians.

The decision to start the relocation may have happened before the strike on Iran:

Reports from Kan 11 channel indicate that Israel has approved an action plan in Rafah, allegedly in exchange for refraining from a large-scale attack against Iran. However, Biden administration officials have refuted these claims, stating that there has been no discussion of such a deal between Israel and the United States.

Israel is doing other things to move the Gazans:

In response to the population movement, Israel has announced plans to establish 10,000 tents in the area outside Rafah within the next two weeks. Additionally, an additional 30,000 tents are being acquired for deployment at a later date.

Initially, the IDF intended to distribute leaflets urging residents of Rafah to leave the area this week.

However, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu opted to postpone this action to ensure continued American support in potential retaliatory measures against Iran following an attack attributed to the country.

The Gazans needed to be moved regardless of who approved it and it appears to be a prelude to the offensive against Hamas

Confirmation Of Damage

I said we’d be getting more information on the attack by Israel on Iranian sites as well as in Iraq and Syria and in spite of Iran’s assessment of the attack we read in an article from The Jerusalem Post that the Israel Defense Force (IDF) that the strikes were significant:

An Israeli weapon launched in the strike against Iran on Friday damaged a defense mechanism responsible for detecting and destroying aerial threats near Natanz without detection, The New York Times (NYT) reported on Saturday, citing two Western and two Iranian officials.

The weapon struck an S-300 antiaircraft system at a military base in Isfahan province. Natanz is a central city in Iran and a base for Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

There were images to back up the account:

The account from the Western and Iranian officials is supported by satellite images viewed and analyzed by the NYT. The footage showed damage to the radar of an S-300 system at the Eighth Shekari Air Base in Isfahan, although it is unclear what type of weapon was used to strike.

Israel launched aerial drones and at least one missile fired from a fighter jet, The Times noted. A missile was fired from a fighter jet far from Israeli or Iranian airspace and included technology that enabled it to bypass Iran’s radar defenses.

I agree that the intended message was sent to Iran:

Officials reportedly strategically attacked Iran this way to deliver a message to Iran that Israel could bypass and paralyze the Islamic Republic's defense systems undetected.

Simultaneously, Israel was able to show it could do so while using significantly less firepower than Iran used last Saturday in its attack, the two Western officials claimed.

All accounts were that Israel was going to go big with this attack, but they changed their minds:

According to the officials, Israel had decided earlier not to launch a full-scale attack against Iran. This tactic was used instead to send a message with the aim of ending the cycle of attacks. The attack was coordinated to make Iran reconsider launching a direct attack on Israel in the future, the officials said.

Technology Won The Day

In an article from The Times Of Israel we see that the IDF used a missile that Iran didn’t see coming:

The alleged Israeli strike overnight Thursday-Friday on Iranian air defenses near the Natanz nuclear site used a high-tech missile that was able to evade Iran’s radar systems, in a move “calibrated to make Iran think twice” before launching another direct attack on Israel, The New York Times reported on Saturday.

We’ve said more than a few times that a message was sent to Iran. And it was sent from a distance:

Two unnamed Western officials cited by the newspaper said the missile aimed to show Tehran that Israel is able to dodge and neutralize its defenses.

Two Iranian officials said the strike hit a Russian-made S-300 air defense system. They told the newspaper that Iran had not detected intrusions into its airspace from drones, missiles or aircraft.

The newspaper said the missile was from a warplane fired “far from Israeli or Iranian airspace.”

The report also said that neither the plane nor the missile entered Jordanian airspace — a calculated move to keep Amman out of any potential ramifications for the reprisal strike, after it helped shoot down some of the hundreds of drones and missiles fired by Iran at Israel last weekend.

Iran continues to maintain that the response was nothing at all, though:

Speaking to NBC News through a translator, Amir-Abdollahian said the drones had taken off from inside Iran and flew for a few hundred meters before being downed.

“What happened last night was no attack,” said Amir-Abdollahian. “It was the flight of two or three quad-copters, which are at the level of toys that our children use in Iran.”

The Iranian responses actually tell me that the message was sent and received since they downplay it at every turn. Israel did exactly what it set out to do, and I think that Iran is making fun of the attack in part to justify not responding. What will happen next is anyone’s guess.

Prayer Keys

Let’s end this with more prayer keys:

  • We thank You for turning Iran's massive attack into a massive geo-political failure (Psa. 33:10-11).
  • Praise You for Your angelic hosts which most assuredly helped to bring down Iran's missiles and drones even before they entered Israelis airspace (2 Kin. 6:16-17; 2 Chr. 20:15; 32:7-8).
  • Continue to overrule Israel's leaders (Prov. 21:1) and provide them with all the wise counsel they need to make decisions that further Your kingdom's goals (Prov. 20:18; 24:6).
  • God of Israel, protect Israel from its "allies" as well as its enemies (Job 32:3; Psa. 9:19-20).
  • Anoint the IDF's Iran Command to have Holy Spirit insight specifically for this time (Job 12:12-13).
  • Lord God, let the many curses, and attacks by its proxies, and now by itself, against Your land and people return onto the heads of Iran's leaders and other Jew-haters (Num. 24:9b; Isa. 34:8; Gal. 6:7).
  • Quickly expose to Israel's intelligence services all of Iran and Hizbullah's plans in the wake of Israel's retaliatory strike (Job 12:22; 28:11b).
  • Teach Israel the lessons of history that no nation will stop Iran just for the Jews' sake, and then show it how to totally eliminate the threat of an Iranian nuclear weapon (Jer. 51:20-26).