Israel’s Military Risks Being Overstretched

Given all of this—and a potential hot war with Iran—some analysts are worried about Israel’s troops becoming overextended.

“Israel has a significant opportunity cost, and there’s a lot of risk of getting back into a tennis match right now with Iran,” said Jonathan Lord, a former U.S. defense official and congressional aide who is now the director of the Middle East security program at the Center for a New American Security, a Washington-based think tank. “They did just call up two IDF reserve brigades, I suspect, in preparation for continuation of combat operations in Gaza focused on Rafah. So it’s not like there isn’t anything else going on.”

...

The Israeli military is also engaged in an ongoing campaign in the occupied West Bank to root out militants from Hamas and other armed groups. “The IDF is still running a couple hundred or more operations every month in the West Bank targeting militants and terrorists there,” Lord added. “So they really have their hands full.”

Read the full story and more from Foreign Policy.