Iran is reeling from Israel’s unprecedented attack – and it is only the start

Israel’s “Operation Rising Lion”, as it calls its attack on Iran, is unprecedented. It is vastly more extensive and ambitious than anything that has come before, including the two missile and drone exchanges it had with Iran last year. For Iran, this is the biggest assault on its territory since the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-1988. In the darkest hours before dawn the Israeli Air Force targeted not just sites linked to Iran’s nuclear programme but also the country’s air defences and ballistic missile bases, thereby reducing Iran’s ability to retaliate.