The issue is no longer whether the strike will occur, but rather that we are effectively speaking about the final hours or days preceding a major explosion. The region has officially entered the phase of radio silence that precedes the storm. All field and logistical indicators suggest that the decision to break bones has already been taken in closed rooms between Tel Aviv and Washington, and that zero hour is now imminent. What is unfolding behind the scenes goes beyond routine diplomatic threats. We are witnessing unprecedented military movements, as radar systems and maritime tracking platforms have detected an intensive military air bridge moving from US bases in Europe and Britain toward the Middle East and the occupied territories. This pattern of mobilisation exactly mirrors what occurred prior to major operations last June. This coincides with open source intelligence indicators from around the Pentagon, known as the pizza index, which recorded a dramatic surge in late-night activity, confirming that US operations rooms are working at full capacity to finalise target banks.
In Tel Aviv, the scene is no less volatile. Benjamin Netanyahu concluded a marathon six-hour meeting with senior security and military leaders, and leaks indicate that the green light has already been given to determine the execution hour, which could come at any moment or within the coming days. This is reinforced by hints from Naftali Bennett referring to an hourglass signalling the proximity of the strike. This comes at a time when Iran’s internal situation is experiencing unprecedented boiling, with reports indicating the expansion of unrest across eighteen provinces. Washington and Tel Aviv are betting on this internal pressure to trigger a collapse from within in parallel with an external strike.
Militarily, Tehran understands that manoeuvring this time may be its last option. It has therefore pushed naval assets into large-scale exercises in the Strait of Hormuz, brandishing the Samson Option by threatening to close the world’s primary energy artery. Such a move would completely halt Gulf oil supplies, which explains the intensive US training to secure alternative energy routes through Venezuelan oil in anticipation of this catastrophic scenario. In parallel, Tehran seeks to impose a new balance of terror by announcing possession of hypersonic missiles with a range of three thousand kilometres, theoretically capable of penetrating THAAD systems and Israel’s multi-layered air defences. This is a desperate attempt to deter the impending attack or at least make its cost unbearable, although Western reports cast doubt on the ability of these missiles to alter the course of the coming aerial battle.
What stands out most in this scene is the psychological warfare and strategic deception practised by Netanyahu. While he leaks reassuring messages through Russian channels claiming that he does not want war, field realities confirm that preparations in reinforced shelters in Tel Aviv and Haifa are proceeding at full speed, and that the Israeli home front has been placed on maximum alert. This recalls the deception scenarios that preceded the setback of 1967 as well as the period before the most recent strike. It appears that the American Israeli bet on executing a swift surgical operation through elite forces or concentrated air strikes may collide with a different reality. The military history of US Delta Force is filled with failures when operating in hostile environments without strong local cover, as seen in Operation Eagle Claw in Iran in 1980 and later in Somalia and Gaza. This makes reliance on aerial and missile bombardment the most likely scenario in order to avoid a ground quagmire.
In summary, we now stand before a final dance of death on the edge of the abyss. The most likely scenario no longer concerns avoiding war, but managing catastrophe. The battle would begin with a cyber and aerial decapitation strike by the United States and Israel to paralyse Iran’s nuclear, ballistic, and command structures within the first minutes. Yet this rapid tactical victory would immediately collide with a wall of retaliatory response through a scorched-earth strategy. Hypersonic missiles and drones would rain down to flood the skies of Tel Aviv and Haifa and destroy vital infrastructure across Israel, in a scene that appears entirely different from anything witnessed in the previous war. Simultaneously, the fire would expand to include US bases in the Gulf and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz through mines and fast boats. This would mean that countries across the region would find themselves in a full storm, striking oil refineries, desalination plants, and severing the global energy artery. We may awaken to a new Middle East in ruins, its maps drawn in blood and fire, facing a zero-sum confrontation that ends the era of deterrence and opens the gates of hell from which no one will emerge unscathed, neither attacker, nor defender, nor even spectator.
We are therefore facing a year of settling major scores, where internal destabilisation within Iran intersects with the fan of external targeting. As both sides exchange messages of threat, the only fixed truth remains that naval and air forces across the region have taken their combat positions, and that any miscalculation or single wrong step could ignite the fuse, turning the entire region into an open mass of flame, in a war that may begin with a sudden strike but for which no one possesses a clear vision of how it will end.
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