Israel’s right fights over who gets to rule the Jewish state

The promise of ‘unity’ leaves Palestinians facing the same state project – regardless of who becomes prime minister.

Mohammad al-Ayoubi

OCT 20, 2026

https://thecradle.co/articles/israels-right-fights-over-who-gets-to-rule-the-jewish-state

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his principal challenger, Gadi Eisenkot, are competing for the authority to govern a state whose Jewish identity neither contest (27 October election). Their camps remain short of a parliamentary majority. Yet the political deadlock is already prompting discussion of arrangements both sides had presented to voters as unacceptable.

Recent polls put the prime minister’s bloc and the Zionist opposition close to a tie, with neither securing the 61 seats needed for a majority in the 120-member Knesset. Another election remains possible, especially while opposition leaders reject governing partnerships with Palestinian parties. 

The struggle over who can assemble a coalition is sharpening a more fundamental competition: who can best defend Jewish security and administer the Jewish state.

Understanding that contest requires looking at the transformation of Israeli society, Suleiman Bisharat, director of the Yabous Center, tells The Cradle. 

That shift toward the right took hold roughly a decade ago, rather than emerging only during the past two or three years. The electorate has continued moving toward the right and far right, narrowing the political ground on which the main contenders compete.

For Bisharat, the claim that Netanyahu represents the right while Eisenkot stands outside misreads this transformation. Netanyahu represents the far right or extreme right; Eisenkot also belongs to the right and far right. Their rivalry concerns who can take a harder line on Jewish identity and the principles underpinning the state.

The right competes with itself

The campaign revolves around the identity of the state, enshrined in the 2018 Nation-State Law, and its religious-national character. These questions concern the future organization of a Jewish religious nation-state, including the relationship between its military, religious institutions, and political leadership.

Bisharat argues that Netanyahu and Eisenkot are competing to make their respective right-wing visions more convincing to far-right parties. Netanyahu brought extremist National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir into his governing coalition after the previous election and is trying to work with the same electoral logic again. The two candidates’ rhetoric, despite their rivalry, remains within the same ideological orbit.

Dr Saad Nimr, a political science professor at Birzeit University, offers a similar assessment. These elections pit the right against the right, he tells The Cradle, with both contenders operating within the right and far right. He sees little substantive disagreement over the nature of the state: both invoke a Jewish and democratic nation-state.

Their dispute centers on its management. Eisenkot regards Netanyahu as an overbearing leader with whom he cannot work, Nimr says. But both pursue broadly the same direction and share the same general ideas.

Opposition to Netanyahu has brought together politicians whose disagreements over coalition partners exceed their differences over the state they seek to govern.

Netanyahu bargains for survival

Netanyahu enters the election under legal and political pressure, while remaining the dominant figure in his camp. His campaign turns the vote into a referendum on national security and the Jewish identity of the state, presenting him as the indispensable guarantor of both. His emphasis on the multi-front “War of Redemption” also serves to minimize his responsibility for the intelligence failures exposed by Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.

Appealing to his religious and nationalist base, Netanyahu uses the unfinished war to deflect scrutiny of his corruption trial and responsibility for 7 October, casting his removal as a threat to the state’s security and Jewish identity.

At the same time, Netanyahu has begun putting distance between himself and Ben Gvir. Likud signed a surplus-vote agreement with Religious Zionism, leaving Ben Gvir’s Jewish Power outside that arrangement. Netanyahu has also said Likud would retain the defense, national security, and justice portfolios, rejecting Ben Gvir’s ministerial demands.

Culture Minister Miki Zohar has gone further, publicly proposing a rotation government with Eisenkot, with Netanyahu serving first. President Isaac Herzog has also pledged to work to prevent another election. These signals leave open the possibility that Netanyahu’s pressure on Ben Gvir serves a second purpose: making room for an agreement with Eisenkot after the vote.

Nimr says Netanyahu may dispense with Ben Gvir if a broader political arrangement offers a better route to power. Much will depend on Likud’s seat count. With divisions running through the prospective coalitions, Netanyahu will calculate how many partners he needs and what he must concede to secure them.

If his bloc falls short, he will try to gather the necessary votes despite his partners’ conditions, including those of the religious parties. Nimr argues that Netanyahu’s overriding objective is a government he heads, even when the price conflicts with the preferences of his own party.

Eisenkot’s security alternative

Eisenkot has emerged as Netanyahu’s strongest challenger. A 16 October Maariv poll put him ahead on suitability for the premiership, with 48 percent support to Netanyahu’s 41 percent, and projected his Yashar party to win 21 seats against Likud’s 18. Other surveys differ in their margins, but repeatedly leave both camps without a governing majority.

Drawing on his tenure as military chief of staff between 2015 and 2019, Eisenkot presents himself as the candidate of security and unity. His program includes a state commission of inquiry into the October failures, a new national security doctrine, and a comprehensive service law covering Haredim and Palestinians with Israeli citizenship. For the Palestinians, the proposed obligation includes national civilian service, rather than universal military enlistment.

His alternative remains firmly within the state’s Zionist framework. He has made recognition of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, adherence to the Declaration of Independence, and acceptance of service obligations conditions for coalition partners. He has excluded Palestinian parties on that basis.

Netanyahu and Eisenkot agree on preserving the Jewish state and its security doctrine. They disagree over who should lead it, which parties should share power, and who must serve in its armed forces. 

The Haredi price of power

Shas and United Torah Judaism, polling at roughly 14–16 seats between them, sit at the sharpest point of disagreement. They remain central to Netanyahu’s coalition calculations, while their opposition to compulsory military service clashes with Eisenkot’s platform. 

Their parliamentary weight makes any settlement over conscription inseparable from negotiations over the next government. Netanyahu has repeatedly sought to shield their constituency from the draft to preserve their support.

The legal basis for blanket Haredi exemptions was struck down in 2024. By October 2026, Israeli reporting put the total number of people classified as evading military service at around 110,000, approximately 80 percent of them Haredim. 

The widening pool of draft evaders has made the religious parties’ exemptions increasingly difficult to separate from the burdens imposed on serving soldiers and reservists.

In July, military chief Eyal Zamir opposed legislation suspending arrests and enforcement against Haredi draft evaders, warning that it would encourage noncompliance amid personnel shortages. 

The law sought seven months of protection for yeshiva students. The courts subsequently struck it down, but enforcement remained stalled, allowing Netanyahu’s religious partners to retain much of the protection they sought.

Bisharat locates the dispute within a society organized around security and the perception of existential danger. Eisenkot demands a more equal distribution of security duties, while Netanyahu treats the Haredim as the “spoiled child,” granting their demands without requiring equivalent military participation. Conscription will consequently be one of the principal bargaining issues after the election.

Nimr says Eisenkot’s insistence on Haredi military service has been clear from the outset, as has the religious parties’ rejection of it. Netanyahu, meanwhile, seeks compromises, including recruiting only 30 percent into noncombat roles. The question is how much the religious parties would accept without abandoning the exemptions their leadership has defended for decades.

If both contenders reject broad exemptions, the Haredi parties will face a difficult choice. They prefer participation in government because it secures budgets for their religious schools and institutions. 

A Netanyahu offer that falls short of full conscription could therefore keep them within his camp, even after a campaign marked by disputes over their privileges.

A unity government for the Jewish state

The deadlock has revived discussion of a Netanyahu–Eisenkot unity government. In the 16 October Maariv survey, 55 percent favored unity over another election if the vote produced no decisive result.

Avigdor Lieberman has accused Eisenkot of preparing to rescue Netanyahu again through an arrangement involving Likud and the Haredim. His attacks reflect the fear that the opposition’s campaign to remove Netanyahu could end with its strongest candidate entering a government alongside him. Lieberman has explicitly ruled out joining a Netanyahu-led coalition.

Israel Hayom has reported a proposal for a broad government tied to Washington’s regional plans. Under the reported arrangement, Netanyahu would remain for up to two years to conclude wars and pursue agreements with regional states before retiring. Eisenkot could claim the removal of Ben Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, an October inquiry, and a halt to the judicial overhaul.

US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee has met Eisenkot and other political contenders – but he publicly denied that Washington was pushing the reported unity arrangement. 

Under such an arrangement, Netanyahu would retain the premiership, oversee the next stage of regional negotiations, and claim that his political course had prevailed even after surrendering some of his current allies.

Israel’s political history offers a precedent for bitter electoral rivals sharing power. After the 1984 election, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Shamir formed a national unity government with a rotating premiership, despite the hostility between their camps. 

The absence of comparable personal animosity between Netanyahu and Eisenkot could make an agreement conceivable if both consider the alternatives worse. Netanyahu could sell the bargain as securing another term in power; Eisenkot could claim credit for removing the ministers most closely associated with the government’s excesses.

Nimr remains skeptical. Each presents himself as the leader and resists serving beneath the other. A pact would also threaten Eisenkot’s relationships with opposition partners such as Lieberman. 

Even if preserving the Jewish state under perceived existential threat brought the two together, disputes over leadership and coalition terms could quickly undermine the arrangement.

A two-year rotation is conceivable in Nimr’s assessment, but Netanyahu would insist on serving first. Eisenkot has, for his part, publicly rejected rotation and called for one prime minister to serve a full term. Netanyahu’s demand to go first would require Eisenkot to abandon that position before taking office.

Bisharat stresses that the electoral map remains unsettled. Turnout among Palestinian citizens in the territories occupied in 1948 could make it harder for Netanyahu to assemble a majority; lower participation would give him greater room. 

Haredi turnout and the fate of smaller lists will also matter. The decisive contest begins after the vote, when the parties must turn their seats into bargaining power and decide which campaign commitments they are prepared to trade for office.

Palestinians face the same project

Replacing the prime minister would leave the foundations of the state intact. Netanyahu depends on religious and nationalist allies, while Eisenkot offers military authority and more orderly administration. 

A broad unity government could redistribute power among them while preserving the same commitments to Jewish statehood and Israeli security. Excluding the most overtly extremist ministers would allow its architects to advertise a political break while leaving the state’s relationship with Palestinians largely untouched.

Bisharat expects no fundamental transformation in the state’s nature or principles. The right dominates, and its principal contenders compete over who can defend those principles more forcefully. Their confrontation may rearrange the coalition without opening a political alternative for Palestinians.

Nimr similarly argues that the occupying state’s approach to Palestine will endure regardless of the winner. The coalition may change its ministers and its public language, but the electorate is being asked to choose between rival custodians of the same state. 

He identifies rejection of Palestinian statehood, claims to the whole Land of Israel, and ethnic cleansing as continuities in that project. For Palestinians, a change of leadership offers little prospect of ending dispossession and military domination.

An Eisenkot government would have to reconcile its service promises with the demands of any Haredi partners. A Netanyahu victory would renew bargaining with the religious and nationalist right. 

In either case, the state remains bound to the same formula: Jewish and democratic, with its leaders fighting over the boundaries of those terms while Palestinians remain subject to the power both camps seek to wield.

'Escalation is coming': Middle East on edge as new Israeli-US attack on Iran looms

Neither Iran nor the US feel the need to make concessions, risking a second round of war that is likely to devastate the Gulf

Sean Mathews

Published date: 23 October 2026

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/escalation-coming-middle-east-edge-new-israeli-us-attack-iran-looms

US diplomats are preparing for embassy evacuations. Israeli fighter jets are conducting sorties on the Iranian border. The mood among Arab and US officials in the region who spoke to Middle East Eye is that it’s a question of when, not if, the US and Israel resume attacking Iran.

With Iran threatening to retaliate by bombing trillions of dollars’ worth of US-linked data centres and AI facilities in the Gulf, along with energy installations and airports, the stage seems set for round two of the war.

“An escalation is coming. Whether it’s before the US midterms or after is not relevant. The purpose of the escalation is,” Aaron David Miller, a former Middle East negotiator for Republican and Democratic US presidents, told MEE.

Direct fighting between the US and Iran largely stopped after the signing of a fragile ceasefire in April, but the two never implemented a 14-point Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed in June to advance a settlement.

The agreement was widely seen as giving Iran sweeping concessions that experts say the Trump administration simply cannot stomach.

“There is a foundational gap, galactic in scope, that can’t be bridged. The Iranians are not going to change their position on the Strait of Hormuz, the nuclear issue or the Houthis to the extent that Trump needs in order to spin a win,” Miller said.

Trump's emissaries are laying the ground for a return to fighting. 

“We are going to have to keep working at this to make sure there’s a regime change eventually,” Republican Senator Rick Scott, a key Trump ally, said in an interview with Fox on Thursday.

Mike Waltz, Trump's ambassador to the United Nations, told The Financial Times that the White House is ready for a prolonged conflict.

"The president and the US Navy can maintain this blockade [on Iranian ports] for the foreseeable future,” he said in an interview released on Friday. 

A war that started over what the US claimed to be strikes aimed at crippling Iran’s nuclear programme has drifted into an all-encompassing battle over who calls the shots in the Middle East.

For example, Iran wants to impose fees on vessels in the Strait of Hormuz. Iran and the US have conducted tit-for-tat strikes in the waterway. The US has imposed a blockade against Iran that is devastating its economy, while Iran is attacking vessels there, sending shipping rates soaring.

At least 27 ships have been attacked this month alone, the highest number since March.

The tensions between the two have also contributed to the collapse of a ceasefire in Yemen, where fighting between the Iran-aligned Houthis and Saudi-backed internationally recognised government is raging.

Experts say a return to war may be inevitable because the status quo suits neither the Trump administration nor Tehran, but neither side feels weak enough to make concessions.

'US watches oil volumes, Iran watches the price'

Iran and Trump are both watching the oil market and gleaning different lessons from it, Gregory Brew, an expert on energy and Iran at Eurasia Group, a geopolitical consultancy, told MEE.

This week, energy firm Kpler published data showing that Middle East oil and product exports reached pre-Iran war levels last week. Some experts cautioned that the data is skewed towards a burst in activity, but more oil is coming out of the region from US allies, while Iran’s exports are choked by the US blockade.

Saudi Arabia is exporting oil via the Red Sea, bypassing the Houthis, who control the Bab al-Mandab, with a pipeline to the Mediterranean. Meanwhile, Gulf states inside the Strait of Hormuz are using a shuttle service by which state-owned boats bring oil to larger tankers waiting in the Gulf of Oman. The US says its navy is escorting the vessels, but at a high cost.

The rise in volumes has not lowered the price. Brent, the international benchmark, is up a whopping 43 percent since the MoU was signed with Iran. Diesel prices are up around 35 percent, while gasoline is up less than 10 percent.

No one doubts that Iran’s economy is hurting. Inflation in September was up a staggering 90 percent, but Brew said that Iran’s rulers believe they can endure another round of fighting while the Trump administration will fold.

“If the US is watching volumes in Hormuz, the Iranians are watching price. And they are pretty confident they can withstand pressure over a longer period of time than Trump can,” Brew, at Eurasia Group, said.

“In a context where the US and Israel are bombing Iran again directly, we are certain to see more aggressive Iranian strikes on energy infrastructure. The US will also have fewer resources to manage this escort system,” he said.

"Energy prices will stay elevated," he added. 

'Devastating for the Gulf'

Before the US and Israel attacked Iran in February, there was a lobbying dash from some Gulf states to stop it. During the war, Saudi Arabia and the UAE joined the US in striking Iran, but then Riyadh pivoted to supporting mediation. Reuters reported that the UAE paid Iran to stop attacking it.

In round two, experts say, the Gulf will struggle to remain strategically relevant, although it will be on the front lines of Iran’s reprisals. The Gulf states faced thousands of drone and missile attacks from Iran after the US and Israel’s February attack.

“From the Gulf perspective, this is going to be devastating,” Abdullah Baabood, an Omani academic and international relations expert, said. “Already we see serious economic problems in the Gulf.”

Asharq Bloomberg reported Bahrain is expected to receive a bailout led by the UAE to shore up its collapsing foreign currency reserves. Qatar’s economy shrank 15 percent year-on-year. The IMF expects the UAE’s economy to shrink four percent. Saudi Arabia has had to cancel a prominent investment conference because of Houthi attacks.

“The Gulf is hostage to a crisis that has no end,” Baabood said. “Qatar is trying to mediate. Oman has been pushed aside by Trump. The UAE, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia are very quiet. They just don’t know what to do. They can’t read Trump.”

“Other than Israel, no one has real interest in a serious continuation of the war,” Marwan Muasher, a former Jordanian foreign minister and vice president for studies at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told MEE.

The expectations of a return to war come against the backdrop of Israeli general elections next week. In his endorsement of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump raised the stakes of fresh strikes, saying he wanted help to “finish the job” against Iran “unless they change their ways rapidly”.

Experts say that given the war’s popularity in Israel, a return to fighting could help Netanyahu before the vote, or help him stay on as prime minister if the outcome of elections is indecisive.

Baabood said that no one doubts Israel and the US’s ability to “devastate” Iran’s infrastructure, but that the Islamic Republic can still do “significant” damage to the Gulf.

In an interview with Dropsite News this week, Major General Mohsen Rezaei, the secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, left little doubt that Iran would attack Gulf energy sites if the US resumes the war. 

“If the US strategy is to prolong the war while using neighbouring countries’ energy infrastructure to offset the pressure arising from Hormuz and maintain the blockade of Iran, those governments should not assume they can participate in economic warfare against Iran without putting themselves at risk,” he said. 

Where is the pain for Donald Trump?

One of the key questions in a second round of fighting is how well the Gulf states can defend against Iranian attacks that may spike energy prices further.

A US Inspector General’s report in September said that the US faces "strategic inventory shortfalls” in key munitions. MEE reported in March that the US was already short of interceptors. That was before weeks of high-intensity fighting in the region. The Trump administration has repeatedly denied being short of munitions.

The Gulf states' vulnerability to Iranian drones has been crystallised by strikes from the Houthis on Saudi Arabia in recent weeks.

The kingdom is reeling under the weight of Houthi attacks which have repeatedly targeted its airports and high-profile energy sites. At least 21 people have been killed in Houthi attacks on Saudi airports since the start of October, including religious pilgrims, according to the kingdom’s authorities. An attack attributed to militias in Iraq aligned with Iran hit the kingdom’s East-West Pipeline in September.

"Continuing the war will only bring more difficulties to countries in the Gulf, and it’s clear it will not result in regime change in Iran. Meanwhile, Trump is suffering domestically because of rising fuel and food prices” in the US, Muasher told MEE. 

But Miller, now a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said that Trump may feel less restraint than he is given credit for, particularly given his anger at Iran for stymying his plans for a quick victory earlier this year. 

“There is no cost-benefit analysis because Donald Trump is going to be OK. He may lose the House and maybe the Senate in midterms, but he will be OK. His family will be OK. He will build his presidential library,” Miller said.

“Trump's urgency to end this thing is not evident. There is no accountability. Where is the pain for Donald Trump?”

Iran bolsters defenses along Iraqi Kurdistan border amid threat of attacks by US-backed separatists

Iran is facing attacks from Kurdish and Baloch separatists fighting as part of Washington's effort to topple the government of the Islamic Republic

News Desk

OCT 22, 2026

https://thecradle.co/articles/iran-bolsters-defenses-along-iraqi-kurdistan-border-amid-threat-of-attacks-by-us-backed-separatists

Iran has deployed artillery and heavy weaponry to Kurdish areas in the west of the country amid growing fears of a renewed US-Israeli assault and ongoing attacks on Iranian security forces by Kurdish and Baloch separatist groups.

The Kurdistan Human Rights Network (KHRN) reported Wednesday that Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has dispatched military convoys carrying heavy and semi-heavy weapons to several cities in the Kurdish region in Iran's northwest, including Sanandaj, Kamyaran, Sarvabad, Marivan, and Baneh.

An informed source told KHRN that “hundreds of IRGC special forces, believed to be members of the entity's Saberin Unit, have been dispatched over the past few weeks in military convoys to areas surrounding villages on the slopes of Mount Shaho in Kamyaran County.”

The military buildup comes amid reports that the US and Israel have drafted plans for a renewed assault on Iran's nuclear, energy, and defense infrastructure after the November midterm elections in a new bid to force Tehran to negotiate on less favorable terms.

The US continues to impose a naval blockade on Iran, straining the country's economy and harming its ability to export oil.

Washington has dispatched the USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group, the USS Makin Island amphibious group, and some 9,000 additional troops to West Asia, US officials revealed on 1 October, reinforcing roughly 50,000 US troops already stationed across the region.

For its part, Iran continues to exert control over the Strait of Hormuz, limiting Gulf oil exports to world markets and driving up energy prices.

In addition to deploying heavy weapons, the IRGC has mobilized thousands of Kurdish fighters to the northwest regions to counter potential cross-border attacks by Kurdish opposition groups based in the Kurdish autonomous region of Iraq.

Numerous reports have emerged since the start of the war on Iran in February that the US and Israel wish to use Iranian Kurdish separatists as part of their broader effort at regime change in Tehran.

On Monday, the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK), an Iranian Kurdish separatist group, announced that the IRGC had targeted its bases in the mountainous and forested areas of Marivan in Kurdistan Province the previous day with suicide drones, mortar shells, and heavy weapons.

On Wednesday, the IRGC targeted PJAK bases near Mount Harir in the Iraqi Kurdistan region with Hadid-110 drones.

Iran is also facing attacks from Baloch separatist groups in Sistan-Baluchistan Province in the country's southeast.  

Iranian security forces clashed with members of the Jaish al-Adl group in Zahedan County on 13 October, killing several militants following the launch of an operation in the area.

The day before, gunmen attacked a police station in Sistan and Baluchistan province, resulting in heavy fighting.

Days earlier, over a dozen Iranian military and law enforcement personnel were killed in a series of attacks in the province, which borders Pakistan and Afghanistan and is populated mainly by Iran's ethnic Baloch and Sunni Muslim communities. 

Jaish al-Adl was heavily involved in the violent attacks against security forces during the Mossad-backed riots early this year.

Another militant Baloch group, the People's Fighters Front (PFF), has claimed responsibility for recent attacks that took place in Nikshahr, Nusratabad, and Jalaq.

PFF forces attacked a police headquarters using mines, RPG rockets, and various weapons, according to Haalvsh, a monitoring group. Many of these separatist groups are said to receive direct backing from the US as well as from Israel.

The War Tehran Believes Is Coming

Iran believes the U.S. and Israel may strike before the midterms. Top security official Gen. Mohsen Rezaei tells Drop Site Iran has new targets in its sights.

Jeremy Scahill, Peiman Salehi, and Ryan Grim

https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/iran-war-israel-netanyahu-trump-hormuz-mohsen-rezaei

The U.S. and Israel are preparing to resume attacks on Iran, according to senior Iranian officials and a U.S. official, and may even launch operations before next week’s Israeli elections. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is fighting for his political life, and the Israeli press is rife with reports that he is looking for a way to exploit the Iran standoff to his advantage. In the U.S., President Donald Trump’s approval ratings are at historic lows, and the midterm elections are less than two weeks away.

Iran’s top security official, Gen. Mohsen Rezaei, the Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council and personal representative of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, told Drop Site that, in the event of an attack, Iran still has capacity to continue launching missiles and drones at various U.S. assets across the region in retaliation and that it would expand its range of targets.

“If the question is whether Iran still has the ability to continue missile and drone operations, the answer is yes,” Rezaei said in an exclusive written interview. “The United States has valuable assets in the region. In the event of war, cables, data centers and artificial intelligence facilities could also come within range. If the conflict begins again, we will have a broader plan.”

“Everyone must understand that action against Iran carries a cost,” he added. “If diplomacy can bring about that understanding, we prefer diplomacy. But if the war continues, Iran has the tools it needs to keep responding.”

A senior Iranian official told Drop Site that Tehran’s current internal intelligence assessment indicates a high likelihood that large-scale bombing may even begin before Tuesday’s Israeli elections. “Trump has sat on Iran’s proposed package for ending the war, and negotiations have stalled,” said the official, who is not authorized to speak publicly. “Contrary to the show he is putting on, Trump has no clear or actionable plan for [ending] the war with Iran. This has been the cause of a diplomatic deadlock.” He warned that Iran should not be underestimated, claiming, “Should another war against Iran begin, given our knowledge of the patterns of American force deployment in the countries of the region, their casualty figures will be ten times higher.”

The White House denied it was planning to strike Iran in the next two weeks. “The United States will not be attacking Iran at any time prior to the midterm elections,” White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly said in a statement to Drop Site.

Tehran believes Israel would be tasked with firing the first shots, the senior Iranian official said, aimed at “destroying Iran’s newly deployed air defense systems, in order to open the path for American bombers.” The U.S., he said, would likely focus on attacking Iran’s southern defense systems along the Strait of Hormuz and potentially attempt to seize one of the islands off the Iranian mainland after heavy bombing. Trump, he said, is continuing his quest for a notable action that he can use to proclaim victory, adding that Iran believes he may seek to launch a “token” attack on one of Iran’s underground nuclear sites, such as Pickaxe Mountain, and subsequently portray it as a definitive blow. “Trump is flat-out lying about Iran’s nuclear program,” the official said.

A U.S. official confirmed to Drop Site that military assets are being moved rapidly into place in preparation for an expected green light from Trump. Among the American officials pushing for renewed attacks is U.S. Central Command chief Gen. Bradley Cooper, the official said. “CENTCOM is putting all the pieces into place to renew major combat operations,” added the official, who is not authorized to discuss war plans. He was skeptical the war would resume before the Israeli elections, but conceded, “We did start Epic Fury without all our assets in place.”

The USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier and the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit are heading to the Middle East, bringing approximately 10,000 additional sailors and Marines to the region. The Roosevelt, which departed Japan on Monday, could reach the region by the end of next week ahead of its initially expected deployment slated for late November. It will join the USS George H.W. Bush and USS George Washington, both currently in the Arabian Sea.

While the U.S. official said the likelihood of new U.S.-Israeli attacks was high, he acknowledged that Trump has gone to the brink of military action and pulled back more times than is publicly known. “Trump has backed off major combat operations against Iran or the Houthis seven times since July,” the U.S. official said, referring to Ansarallah, who launched a major offensive against Saudi-backed groups in Yemen. “At the last minute, he calls it off.”

Netanyahu, who is behind in the polls, claimed Wednesday without evidence that Iran was actively working on the development of a nuclear weapon and said he had ordered the Israeli military to prepare for preemptive action. “The Iranian regime still has not learned its lesson. Mojtaba Khamenei decided to follow in his father’s footsteps. He has taken off the safety, and Iran is once again trying to develop its weapons of death,” Netanyahu said. “There is only one way to remove this threat once and for all, to topple the regime in Iran, and that is my directive to the IDF, the Mossad and the security agencies.”

Analysts say that Trump is continuing to pursue an elusive clean victory narrative, while Netanyahu understands this may be his last chance at continuing the war he has agitated for his entire political career.

“This is Netanyahu’s last chance to do so. And he’s not going to leave until he turns every stone to be able to achieve it. Particularly knowing that either his career is going to end or the United States is going to go in a direction in which this no longer will be an option,” said Trita Parsi, a leading Iran expert and the executive Vice President of the Quincy Institute. “Trump, I suspect, has already made a decision that he’s going to go to war,” he added. “The Israelis have been very successful playing to his psychology, which is that he’s willing to take massive risks as long as he has the belief that it can get him a victory so that he avoids accepting defeat, which is so crucial for him. But it is a massive miscalculation that will make the situation 100 times worse.”

The intersection of Trump’s and Netanyahu’s political interests increases the chances that the war will resume, argues former senior U.S. Iran negotiator Robert Malley. “Netanyahu may want a longer campaign with broader objectives. Trump may want something shorter that he could quickly get out of. The overlap between the two might well be an intensive campaign that doesn’t last too long,” said Malley, a key figure in brokering the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. “President Trump may want a victory lap and an exit ramp. But as has been proven time and time again, the exit is not decided by him alone,” said Malley, who currently directs the Middle East Program at the International Crisis Group. “There is every reason to believe the Iranians are preparing all kinds of steps, whether by them or by their regional partners, whether in or out of theater, to ensure that however much he wants a victory lap and an exit ramp, he is deprived of both.”

Gen. Rezaei is one of the most prominent military figures in modern Iranian history. A former commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, he was tapped to serve as the top military advisor to Khamenei in August. His comments are often viewed as reflecting the consensus at the top of Iran’s power structure. He told Drop Site that despite U.S. claims to have “obliterated” or “decimated” Iran’s military infrastructure, Iran spent decades preparing for a broader war waged by the U.S.

“Iran has invested for years in building redundancy into these capabilities: dispersed production, underground facilities, different launch systems and the ability to repair damage and replace losses,” Rezaei told Drop Site. “More importantly, you should not assess our capacity solely by asking how many missiles remain in storage. In a prolonged war, the central question is whether a country can sustain a continuous cycle of production, deployment and response. We have shown that, even months after the war began, we can still impose costs on the other side.”

Rezaei also indicated that Tehran would deploy new capabilities in its retaliatory response. “We did not deploy all our capabilities in the previous stages. We brought more capabilities into operation in proportion to the intensity of the war, and we are also prepared for the next stage,” Rezaei said.

During the war, Iran carried out at least 135 drone and missile strikes on 84 critical infrastructure sites across seven countries—Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Iraq, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, and Bahrain, according to a Reuters investigation. While Gulf governments repeatedly attributed the damage to falling debris from intercepted Iranian missiles and drones, the investigation found evidence of deliberate, precision strikes targeting critical equipment. The attacks demonstrated “precision, targeting expertise, and patience,” Ryan Stevens, a former U.S. Marine Corps special operations airstrike coordinator, told Reuters.

Echoing Rezaei’s warning about communications infrastructure, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps spokesperson, Hossein Mohebi, also threatened to target internet cables passing through the Strait of Hormuz if the U.S. launched renewed attacks. Mohebi further warned Monday that another U.S. military operation would trigger a global energy crisis. “If America takes a new action—even a limited one—the world will face a serious energy crisis,” he told the Tehran Times.

Rezaei did not rule out targeting energy infrastructure in Gulf states as a retaliatory measure. “If the U.S. strategy is to prolong the war while using neighboring countries’ energy infrastructure to offset the pressure arising from Hormuz and maintain the blockade of Iran, those governments should not assume they can participate in economic warfare against Iran without putting themselves at risk,” he said. “The message is not that Iran wants to destroy the Persian Gulf’s energy system. The message is that there can be no arrangement in which Iran’s economic lifelines come under attack while the economic architecture enabling those attacks is considered untouched and immune.”

The senior Iranian official said Trump’s approach to Iran has been focused on short-term objectives that are often disconnected from geopolitical realities or core U.S. interests, likening him to a day trader. “The wartime secrecy surrounding military operations has given him and his family exclusive and extraordinary access to information regarding forthcoming actions and the state of the markets—access that benefits only those closest to him,” he said. “Perpetuating the current situation will carry strategic consequences, not least that the energy markets will not find calm for the next three years. The continuation of this war has shifted the dynamics of relations in Iran’s favor, as the littoral states of the Persian Gulf are rapidly redefining their relationship with Iran, having become convinced that the U.S. military is incapable of defending its own bases, this at a time when those same states had expected America to defend their countries.”

Iranian officials have said repeatedly that Iran will not back away from its red lines in any negotiations, consistently pointing to Tehran’s acceptance of the June 17 Memorandum of Understanding, which was swiftly violated by the U.S., leading to a breakdown in the diplomatic process in early July.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said he presented a “Seven-Day Plan” to the U.S. through mediators at last month’s UN General Assembly, outlining steps for an end to the war and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. “Under this proposal, the U.S. would not be expected to do anything that it has not already agreed to,” Araghchi wrote in an op-ed for the Financial Times on Wednesday. He said the framework’s steps and outcome were clear: “The Strait would reopen on Day 6, with the resumption of talks for a final deal commencing on Day 7.” Araghchi claimed in an interview with Iraqi television that the U.S. had accepted the seven-day proposal but requested the addition of a “few more clauses,” adding that diplomatic contacts through mediators remain ongoing.

“As President Trump stated, Iran is in very bad condition, both economically and militarily, and the blockade will remain in full force and effect, with oil flowing in record numbers of barrels through the Hormuz Strait,” Kelly told Drop Site in a statement.

Rezaei told Drop Site that Iran’s negotiating strategy has evolved as a result of Trump’s unreliability. “We will not return to our previous approach to diplomacy, but we will not abandon diplomacy either. We have presented seven new conditions through intermediaries. Until those conditions are fulfilled, Iran will neither reopen the strait nor return to negotiations,” Rezaei said. “The first memorandum failed because the commitments were implemented in the wrong order. We opened the strait and maritime traffic resumed, but the other side’s political and economic commitments were not implemented in a way that could sustain the agreement. Once the United States obtained what it immediately needed, the balance of leverage shifted. That experience matters to us.

“If Washington honors its commitments, there is a path to reopening the Strait of Hormuz and continuing diplomacy,” he continued. “But Iran will not first give up the leverage that brought the other side to the negotiating table and then wait to see whether its promises are fulfilled.”

Parsi said that Iran is not eager to resume the war but has recognized that the diplomatic track has been treated by the U.S. as an ultimatum operation masquerading as negotiations. “Their conclusion—based on extensive experience with Trump now—is that he simply won’t back off unless his policy is reaching a cost to him that is intolerable. And that it’s not concessions or face-saving exits that will get Trump to back off, but simply that the policy becomes too costly.”

Attacks on ships in and around the Strait of Hormuz have surged to a record high in recent weeks, with more than two dozen vessels reporting attacks so far in October, according to data released Friday by the UK Maritime Trade Operations agency. The agency said the actual number was likely far higher, as the “majority of vessels attacked” were refusing to report incidents.

The IRGC reported further attacks over the weekend and into Tuesday, including a supertanker carrying two million barrels of oil struck Saturday, another tanker hit Sunday, and two tankers that it said caught fire Tuesday after striking naval mines south of the Strait. Iran says it is targeting vessels violating its maritime restrictions or using unauthorized shipping routes.

“Over the past two or three months, we have struck an average of five vessels belonging to these smugglers every night,” Rezaei said. “Smuggling is taking place along the southern edge of the strait at enormous cost and with considerable risk. Trump then says the Strait of Hormuz is open.”

Despite the escalating attacks, oil exports from the Middle East appear to have rebounded past prewar levels, primarily through tanker-to-tanker transfers in the Gulf of Oman, and expanded use of Saudi and Emirati pipelines bypassing the Strait of Hormuz. However, oil prices remain high, hovering well above $100 per barrel of Brent crude amid fears of the ongoing attacks and diminishing U.S. fuel stockpiles. “The current price of oil reflects the reality,” Rezaei said.

“The management of Hormuz is a national asset for us, and this is not simply about collecting tolls. The main issue is security,” he continued. “Charges can also be collected for security, insurance and environmental costs, but the importance of managing the strait goes far beyond the revenue it generates,” he said. “We will continue managing it to maintain peace and security in the region, and we will not back down from this position.”

The senior Iranian official said that the standoff over the Strait of Hormuz “has become the new pretext—the nuclear issue, previously, was a lie upon which the war was launched—for the United States to prolong the war.” Trump, he charged, “has fallen into the trap of prolonging what was advertised as the shortest of wars.” A “war of attrition,” he said, “will work to Iran’s advantage and to America’s detriment.”

The war has had a devastating impact on Iran’s economy. As part of its escalation over the summer, the U.S. reimposed a blockade on Iran’s southern ports and launched a new campaign of sanctions dubbed Operation Economic Outcast. The Iranian rial subsequently collapsed, falling to record lows, making imports dramatically more expensive and imposing even more scarcity on people in Iran.

“Iran will suffer from a prolonged blockade; anyone who says otherwise is not being realistic. Families will bear the costs, investment will suffer, and sustaining some sectors of the economy will become more difficult. But economic pain and strategic collapse are not the same thing,” Rezaei said. “Washington has repeatedly made the mistake of assuming that, if it can make life inside Iran difficult enough, Iran’s political system will consequently accept America’s strategic demands. These are two different calculations.”

“Our goal is not to make it to 2029. Our goal is to end the war on terms that reduce the likelihood of another war.”