By Erika Solomon, Ronen Bergman, Adam Rasgon and Johnatan Reiss – New York Times June 27, 2025
Israel’s defense minister said he would pursue a “policy of enforcement” against Iran despite a cease-fire, aiming to prevent Tehran from rebuilding its air power, advancing nuclear projects or developing “threatening long-range missiles.”
The comments by the minister, Israel Katz, to local news channels on Thursday evening suggested that Israel was contemplating more strikes on Iran even after President Trump announced a truce between the two countries on Tuesday.
Iran’s foreign minister warned on Thursday night that his country would respond to anything it considered a breach of the cease-fire.
Mr. Katz, speaking to Israel’s Channel 12, said the Israeli military was still finalizing what he called an “enforcement policy” with Iran.
“We have the determination to implement it: preserving aerial superiority, preventing the advancement of nuclear projects and preventing the advancement of threatening long-range missiles,” he said.
Such a wide-ranging Israeli interpretation of threats from Iran could imperil the truce, which ended a 12-day war that the United States briefly joined when its war planes bombed three Iranian nuclear sites.
The war did significant damage to Iranian nuclear sites and air defenses, and Iran may seek to rebuild its strategic infrastructure.
Mr. Katz’s comments may have been directed at his local audience, particularly the hawkish government’s base of supporters. But the remarks could also lay the groundwork for a confrontation with Washington.
It is unclear whether Mr. Trump would push back against the policy that Mr. Katz outlined. Israel could also choose to wait and see the results of any future diplomacy between Tehran and Washington.
Mr. Trump was outraged when the cease-fire got off to a shaky start, and both sides fired on each other in the early hours after the truce came into effect.
He directed his strongest criticisms at Israel, even at one point posting messages on social media when he was concerned it might strike Iran again. He warned it would be a “MAJOR VIOLATION” if Israel were to bomb Iran and demanded that the country “BRING YOUR PILOTS HOME, NOW!”
Mr. Katz told Channel 12 that Israel does not need U.S. approval to attack Iran in the future.
“We are saying unequivocally, once the Iranians violate, we will strike.”
He said Israel’s policy would be similar to what it has done in the aftermath of its war against the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon. The United States brokered a truce to end that war as well after Israel killed most of the group’s leadership.
Since then, Israel has bombed targets in Lebanon frequently, even though Hezbollah has refrained from attacks on Israeli territory.
Israel has justified some of those strikes by saying that they were aimed at preventing Hezbollah’s efforts to rearm. Mr. Katz told another network, Channel 13, that Israel’s policy on Iran would be “like in Lebanon — just times 100.”
Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, warned that “Iran is not Lebanon,” in an interview with state television on Friday.
“We do not accept any cease-fire or halt in operations that implies an agreed-upon arrangement,” he said, adding that he had “serious doubts” about Israel’s commitment to the deal.
He pointed to Israel’s frequent airstrikes in Lebanon and Mr. Netanyahu’s decision to break a cease-fire with Hamas in March to restart military operations in the Gaza war.
“They declare a truce, but assume that the other side is weak, then proceed to violate it themselves and attempt to prevent any response,” he said.
Iran still has ballistic missiles and launchers, despite the damage it has sustained from Israeli and U.S. strikes. It could still inflict blows that Israel would likely need to take into account should it choose to strike again.
Mr. Araghchi vowed that Iran would “decisively respond to any breach by the Zionist regime.”
In other comments, Mr. Katz said Israel would have killed Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, had an opportunity presented itself during the war. After a city in central Israel was hit following an Iranian missile barrage, Mr. Katz insisted that Mr. Khamenei should not be allowed to live.
“If Khamenei was in the cross hairs, we would have taken him out,” he told i24NEWS on Thursday.
In a post on Truth Social on Friday, Mr. Trump said he had been aware of Mr. Khamenei’s location but did not permit Israel or the United States to kill him.
It unclear exactly what intelligence Israel had on Mr. Khamenei — and the decision making surrounding the supreme leader.
One Israeli official with knowledge of the matter said that Israel, as part of its planning for the operation, decided against targeting him on the first day when its forces killed a string of senior military officials and nuclear scientists.
After the first day, Israel explored the possibility of assassinating Mr. Khamenei, but did not have enough intelligence at that point to carry it out, according to two other Israeli officials.
The officials all spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence matters.
Steve Coogan says white working class people are being ‘ethnically cleansed’ from big cities
Breakfast TV featured Steve Coogan ( not sure who he is )
but he said it like it is, Wayne Dobbs the london black gang leader
said by 2030 they want a white free london, they have a black union jack flag
and claim they own the streets.
Steve coogan said Kier Starmer needs to adress the needs of his own people and stop cow-towing to the jewish lobby
Iran has taken delivery of its first J-10 fighter, the first of 40 J-10s with weapons packs including the long range missiles that were very effective against the French built 4.5 gen Rafale used by India, and shot down by Pakistan, another Nazi embarrassment!
Rafael Grossi, the Argentine Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency who spied for Israel against Iran, probably realises if his life is in danger the threat comes from the west not Iran. Since he’s been banned from Iran he can no longer spy for Israel so he’s near-useless to them now, but like a lot of Russian ex-pats whose murder likely by the west was blamed on Russia to provide useful headlines, so might Grossi’s murder be useful to denigrate Iran. It’s probably just a question of has he told his family if he’s murdered look first to Israel, or does he hate Iran so much he’ll be happy if they take the blame for it?
If Iran plans nuclear talks with the US that’s his cue to go underground.
Rixon:
If real, is Donmeh Iran going to allow Israel to do this without shooting down any jew jets again, or dispatching their own jets to combat them? For the last year or so we’ve been reading articles on here describing how ‘powerful’ the military of Iran is. Yet these two past Israel/USrael bombing raids revealed it to be a nothingburger.