Given the major news out of the Middle East, we’re publishing an extra edition of The Front Page this morning. Don’t worry, TGIF’ers: Nellie will be landing in your inboxes in a few hours’ time. But first, the news:
At 5:46 p.m. yesterday we published an essay by Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the U.S., that asked if an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear program was imminent. A little more than two hours later, Israel began that strike.
We went live immediately afterward with Oren and former Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett.
You can watch that conversation here.
The conventional wisdom was that Israel could not successfully attack Iran’s highly protected nuclear program on its own, and that it would not do so without American support. But it appears to be trying exactly that.
As of press time, here’s what we know:
Israel killed three of Iran’s top generals: Hossein Salami, Mohammad Bagheri, and Gholamali Rashid, as well as top nuclear scientists in Tehran and at stealth nuclear facilities.
There were multiple strikes at Iran’s main enrichment facility in Natanz.
Israel hit a nuclear research facility in Tabriz, and two adjacent military bases.
It hit heavy water reactors in Arak and Khondab, where Iran produced plutonium.
Israel targeted defense and industrial compounds in Kermanshah and Isfahan, and radar facilities in Piranshahr.
Israel destroyed an oil refinery in Tabriz.
Iran launched over 100 drones at Israel, which the IDF were working to shoot down.
As former Pentagon official and Middle East scholar Michael Doran noted on X, the sheer geographic range of the strikes is “stunning.” He added: “Israel’s campaign against Iran is another one for the history books. As in the opening of the Six-Day War—when Israel crippled three Arab air forces in a matter of hours—Israel has struck first, deep, and hard. It hit targets across Iran, a huge country, with precision and total surprise. The scale and reach of the operation are staggering. . . . This was more than a military action. It was a demonstration of intelligence dominance and operational mastery—and total justice.”
Israel is bracing for a response. As we went to press, Israelis across the country were preparing for what Ayatollah Khamenei called “a bitter and painful fate” in retaliation for their strikes. Prime Minister Netanyahu told Israelis to prepare for extended stays in safe rooms and bomb shelters—places they have become accustomed to during onslaughts from Hamas, the Houthis, and Hezbollah in the many months since October 7, 2023.
Many, many questions hang over this unfolding operation. Among them: How involved was America in supporting this operation?
What are we to make of the varied Republican responses to Israel’s strike—and in particular, the statement from Marco Rubio, which said nothing about coming to Israel’s defense in the event of an Iranian strike on the American ally?
How exactly will Iran respond? Will Israel’s defenses thwart Iran’s promised response?
Will Iranians use this moment to rise up against the regime?
We spent the late hours last night beginning to ask these questions—and in the coming days, we’ll be reporting the answers.
The most fundamental question of all, of course, is what happened on the ground. It seems that June 13, 2025, could go down in history as a seismic event in the saga of the Middle East. Today, we offer several answers to that key question.
First up: Our Israel correspondent, Matti Friedman, writing from a bomb shelter, gave us a sense of the mood in Israel—a country bracing for Iran’s response:
Meantime, from Washington, D.C., our Eli Lake analyzes why Israel decided to strike and the extent to which the country is acting alone:
We’ll bring you much more analysis of these historic events in the coming days, but in the meantime, we texted and called and emailed some of the people in a position to understand the story better than anyone else.
We start with former secretary of state Mike Pompeo, who the Iranians have been trying to assassinate ever since he left office. He texted this:
Israel has now done the necessary. The world is safer. More work remains. Do not let the Iranian regime recover. Americans should support this mission, as should the Gulf Arab nations. We all agreed Iran could not have a nuclear weapon. Now, they don’t have a near-term way to get one. Israel’s campaign will prove pivotal more broadly—Russia and China picked a loser. These assholes are still trying to kill me. Those who don’t see that this is in America’s interest are vile idiots.
Roya Hakakian was born in Iran and wrote the phenomenal book Journey from the Land of No: A Girlhood Caught in Revolutionary Iran.
“Everywhere I go,” wrote the great Greek poet, George Seferis, “Greece wounds me.” For Seferis, the wounds were metaphorical, inflicted by longing. But for millions of Iranians, the wounds of loss have been further compounded by 47 years of literal wounds. A nation with 2,500 years of civilization has been reduced to a pariah state—its brightest minds have been executed, assassinated, or are languishing in prisons. Its women have been driven into the shadows or are routinely hauled off into vans by immoral thugs who assume themselves guardians of morality. Its youth, who have peacefully poured into the streets demanding a future other than martyrdom, have been hanged, fled the country, or are plotting their escape. In every other part of the world, the sight of a crane is the sign of new construction. In Iran, it often signals an imminent hanging. All marks of beauty, like music, or the simple joys of life, like pet dogs, are banned. And yet—and yet—a resilient people have fiercely fought on for decades. For all the wounds the regime has inflicted, it deserves this eve of bloodletting. May it stop quickly to make way for the arrival of the long-awaited season of woman, life, freedom.
Our friend and CNN contributor Scott Jennings was in Israel and wrote this to us:
Well, my first visit to Israel was made even more memorable last night. From the banks of the Sea of Galilee I watched jets stream across the sky from west to east and monitored the news for updates on what steps Israel took to, once again, defend Western civilization against the worst people in the world.
I’ve traveled the country this week. Listened to stories from the victims of October 7. Looked into homes destroyed by Hezbollah rockets in the north. Peered through Hamas-made bullet holes in a kibbutz in the south, along the Gaza Strip.
So what does Israel’s strike against Iran mean?
The usual suspects will find fault in Israel doing what’s necessary (looking at you, Ben Rhodes). But most people, and most world leaders, will be thankful that someone is doing the work of defending all of us against the barbarians who are literally at the gate.
For Americans, most military action and terrorism happens far, far away. For the Israelis, it happened in their homes on October 7 and in their skies numerous days each week. As of this writing, drones are headed our way from Iran.
Their fight is our fight. But they are the ones that bear the brunt of it. They deserve our thanks.
Naftali Bennett, who served as Israeli prime minister from 2021–2022, told us via livestream:
The plan first and foremost is to neutralize Iran’s ability to destroy my country. That’s the plan.
We were foolishly fighting the tactical battles instead of hitting the octopus on its head. I’m pleased that we’re doing it right now. We have no other choice, because Iran is really on the cusp of acquiring roughly 10 bombs. They have enough enriched uranium for that. . . . If Iran did acquire nuclear weapons, the whole region would cascade into a nuclear race, and that would be hell for the world and for the United States.
We’re looking at tough days ahead. But we have to do this. The world will be safer. Israel will be safer. Millions of people’s lives will be saved by what’s happening now.
Our friend, the brilliant Middle East analyst Haviv Rettig Gur, emailed to say:
On October 7, Israelis discovered that they had totally misjudged and misunderstood their enemy, the redemptionist Islamist ideology that faced them, whether in its Sunni or Shia form, on a half-dozen fronts. They had believed this enemy could be deterred by the usual means. They learned the hard way that it couldn’t.
What’s true for Hamas, Israelis soon concluded, was also true for Hezbollah, the Houthis, Iranian proxies in Syria and Iraq, and the Iranian regime itself. The 200,000 missiles and rockets Hezbollah had buried under 300 villages in south Lebanon were not there for decoration or for deterrence. They were there, Israelis now believe, to be used. The only question was when.
A fundamental change in Israeli thinking took hold. Its basic premise is simple. Indeed, simplicity is the point.
If a threat cannot be deterred, it must be removed.
This new Israel, intellectually humbled and no longer leaving anything to chance, will not let Iran develop nukes. It’s as simple as that.
The historian Michael Oren, who served as Israel’s ambassador to the United States between 2009–2013, said this:
Some time ago, I wrote a book about the Six-Day War.
Well, there’s a new book to be written. The book is the Middle East War of 2023–2025 and the utter transformation of the Middle East.
What can happen as a result tonight? We were facing a situation where there might have been a new Iranian nuclear deal similar to the JCPOA of 2015. Sanctions would have been lifted on Iran. Iran would have been enriched. And with that money, Iran would rebuild Hezbollah, rebuild Hamas. And very quickly, we’d find ourselves in a situation very similar to that which existed on the eve of October 7, 2023.
Instead, we have a situation where Iran will be cowered, will be defanged, and Syria will be independent, and Syria could possibly make peace with Israel and join the Abraham Accords under discussion. And Lebanon, free of Hezbollah, would regain its sovereignty and could make peace with Israel. Saudi Arabia would make peace with Israel and the Middle East. I don’t want to be Pollyannaish. But the Middle East would be unrecognizable from the Middle East we have known during our lifetimes.
Mark Dubowitz is the head of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and has been sanctioned by the Iranian foreign ministry:
Last night was historic.
For years, the Islamic Republic has raced toward a nuclear weapon while exporting terror and brutalizing its own people. It gambled that the world wouldn’t stop it. It lost.
This operation shattered the myth of regime invincibility. It exposed deep vulnerabilities in both Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and its leadership. And it opened a window—Iranian protesters now have a chance to rise against a regime shaken to its foundations.
But this is also a moment of real danger. Iran still has 3,000 ballistic missiles, global terror networks, and possibly undeclared nuclear assets. It will look to retaliate—against Israelis, Jews, Americans, and Iranians who stand in its way.
What matters now is U.S. resolve. President Trump must send an unmistakable message: that any Iranian retaliation will be met with overwhelming American force. The regime must understand that what was hit tonight is only the beginning—and that the full weight of American and Israeli power can, and will, be brought to finish the job if necessary.
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