President Biden says Israel could target Iran’s oil facilities (Image: Getty)
President Joe Biden left the door open to Israel striking Iran’s oil reserves as he ruled out a counterattack today.
The US leader, speaking briefly as he left the White House, said Washington is “in discussions” with Tel Aviv about strikes on Tehran’s oil facilities.
But he added: “There’s nothing going to happen today. We’ll talk about that later.”
Israeli military commanders are facing an opportunity “to strike a once-in-a-generation blow against Iran” by targeting the regime’s nuclear facilities, military analysts believe.
Airstrikes have continued in Lebanon today (Image: Getty)
Israel is continuing air strikes in Beirut (Image: Getty)
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But Dr Matthew Savill, from the Royal United Services Institute, said such an operation may convince the Ayatollah’s “the threat is existential” and to accelerate efforts to build a nuclear bomb.
This is because the Defence Forces “probably can’t destroy the deepest” underground nuclear facilities without US assistance.
Some analysts have predicted Iran may have 10 nuclear weapons by next April.
Dr Matthew Savill, Director of Military Sciences at RUSI, said: “Iran has expanded its uranium enrichment volume and purity to the extent that it might only take a few weeks to have sufficient uranium enriched for a weapon.
“On the other hand, there isn’t any evidence that it has a weapon or delivery system ready.
“A strike now might encourage Iran to believe that weaponisation is its only remaining defence.
“This would also be true if the scale of any strikes against the wider military or leadership makes it think the threat is existential.”
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Dr Savill added that many in would consider “setting the Iranians back by years is a prize for which it is worth taking some risks”.
He added: “In addition, alone can inflict serious damage to Iran’s nuclear facilities, but it probably can’t destroy the deepest-buried ones without US assistance.
“Over the course of the past year, Iran and its proxies have increasingly misread ’s tolerance of risk.
“For its part, is faced with the apparent opportunity to strike a once-in-a-generation blow against Iran and its partners, although this is not guaranteed to resolve the issue.
“The scope and scale of its response are therefore hard to predict with all of these factors in play, but it is likely to be painful for the Islamic Republic nonetheless.”
Olli Heinonen, a former deputy director of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) who oversaw its efforts to monitor and contain Iran’s nuclear programme in the past, said that if Iran “rushed” it could have the arsenal ready by next April.
“You cannot wipe out a country with those missiles, but you can threaten it and be in a much stronger position in negotiations.”
Heinonen, a fellow at the Stimson Centre, Washington DC, who has held numerous meetings with the regime’s top nuclear officials, also said that the missiles fired at on Tuesday night could be used for the delivery of nuclear weapons.
“You just put something different where the payload is and design the weapons package differently so it survives the flight,” he said. “That is why the US and UK are worried,” he continued, referring to repeated calls for a de-escalation in the region.