Report: Israeli strikes on Iran were designed to minimize casualties, prevent escalation

Israel’s overnight retaliatory strikes on Iran were a larger scale of the response it carried out on Isfahan in April, according to an informed source quoted by The Washington Post.

The source says that the strike was designed to minimize casualties and to prevent an escalation between Israel and Iran.

Israel launched its long-awaited retaliatory strike against Iran early this morning, weeks after the Islamic Republic’s massive ballistic missile barrage on the country, with the military saying the “precise strikes” by the Israeli Air Force targeted strategic military sites — specifically drone and ballistic missile manufacturing and launch sites, as well as air defense batteries.

Iran confirmed the attack had targeted military sites in the capital Tehran and other parts of the country, but said it had caused “limited damage” and that air defense systems had successfully countered much of the attacks — an assertion dismissed in Israel.

The Washington Post reports that the Israeli strikes this morning aimed to keep the impact at a level that Iran would be able to downplay.

Israel is believed to have carried out a drone strike in April on a radar system for an air defense battery in Iran’s central city of Isfahan, in response to Tehran’s massive drone-and-missile attack against Israel on April 13. Iran downplayed that alleged Israeli strike and did not retaliate.