Committee Chairman Yuli Edelstein leads a Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee meeting at the Knesset, the Israeli parliament in Jerusalem on February 12, 2023.(photo credit: YONATAN SINDEL/FLASH90)
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“I don’t think that we can pretend that nothing really happened because we managed to defend ourselves,” Yuli Edelstein said.
Israel has to respond to prevent Iran from normalizing missile and drone attacks on Israel, Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Chairman Yuli Edelstein (Likud) told The Jerusalem Post as the country’s war cabinet debated a retaliation plan.
“There will be a response,” Edelstein said, in the aftermath of the dramatic actions of a newly forged defensive coalition of five armies — Israel, the US, Jordan, France, and Great Britain — that repelled over 300 drones and missiles Iran had launched at Israel early Sunday morning.
“I don’t think that we can pretend that nothing really happened because we managed to defend ourselves and [didn’t] let all these ground missiles and ballistic missiles and the drones kill thousands of Israelis,” Edelstein said.
IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi has similarly sworn that Israel will retaliate.
Edelstein said that this time around, “it worked out fine,” and Israel weathered that attack.
Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein on the night the 22nd Knesset voted to disperse (credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)
The IDF and US officials have touted the success of the defensive operation, which downed 99% of the projectiles so that Israel didn’t suffer any substantive damage.
‘Iran could be emboldened to repeat its attacks’
But, Edelstein said, if “there’s no retaliation,” Iran “can decide that this is something they can do every week.”
“There are different ways and different means to react,” Edelstein said. When Israel does act against Iran, it will be very clear to Tehran that the IDF was behind it.
“Let’s put it this way, the Iranians would know for a fact that their improper deeds didn’t pass unnoticed,” Edelstein said.
He spoke as Israel’s major allies, including the US, France, and Great Britain, have urged it not to directly attack Iran.
Should Israel decide to retaliate, its allies want it to choose a more indirect response that would not escalate the situation or lead to an all-out war.
US National Security Communications Adviser John Kirby told reporters in Washington that Iran’s attack was a failure and that Israel has restored deterrence through the IDF’s successful defense of the country.
Iran had said that it attacked Israel early Sunday morning in retaliation for an IDF strike on its embassy compound that killed seven military officers.
Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri warned that his country would respond immediately to any Israeli attack.
According to Press TV, he said.“In case of repetition of another mistake, they should expect a harsher, faster, and more immediate response rather than waiting close to two weeks.
“This time, the Zionists should know that they will not have a 12-day-long time frame,” Bagheri noted. “The response that they are going to receive [this time around] cannot be measured by [such time standards as] days or hours, but [will come in a matter of] seconds.”
