As previously covered by RedState, explosions occurred in Iran early Friday morning local time, and Israel quickly confirmed their involvement. These strikes occurred after months of efforts by the Trump administration to offer diplomatic solutions to Iran’s leadership, which were consistently refused. 

While early reports suggested a targeted strike focused on Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities, updated information indicates a significantly larger operation.

Israel not only targeted over a dozen of Iran’s nuclear sites but also struck at key military figures, including Hossein Salami, the supreme leader of the IRGC, who was confirmed killed in a precision strike. Additionally, reports suggest the entire IRGC headquarters is ablaze, with numerous officials eliminated. 

Iran’s top nuclear scientists are also dead, representing a major blow to the nation’s ability to restart enrichment at some point. 

As dawn broke, some of the damage from the strikes on Iranian leadership became apparent. 

Lastly, I want to address the idea of whether President Trump blessed these attacks or not. In my opinion, there is no chance this happened without the administration agreeing to it. Much of what we’ve seen over the last week from the White House was likely misdirection to throw Iran off the scent, and it worked. There are already reports that U.S. intelligence was key in these strikes. 

You can expect the next few days to get very spicy. Iran will attempt to retaliate at some point, though I’ve long questioned their capacity to truly project power. The real threat won’t come from ballistic missiles, which would mostly be intercepted, but from proxies like Hezbollah. We’ll see how this develops.