Operation True Promise occurred when Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) launched cruise missiles and drones at Israel on 13 April 2024 in response to the assassination of Mohammad Reza Zahedi nearly two weeks earlier. The Iranian attack was calibrated to cause minimal destruction while still acting as a deterrent to further Israeli strikes on Iranian targets; Iran warned the United States of the strike through Turkey, while announcing the launch of their drones against Israel hours before they would have made impact. While the United States assessed Israel's response to the strikes to be a
Background[]
Since the start of the Israel-Hamas War in October 2023, Iran's Hezbollah proxy group in Lebanon launched near-daily bombardments of northern Israel, forcing the evacuation of several towns and villages. Iranian military advisors based in Syria helped direct these attacks, resulting in Israel embarking on a campaign of assassinations against Iranian advisors in Syria starting in December 2023. On 1 April 2024, Israel killed the IRGC-Quds Force's director of Syria-Lebanon operations, Mohammad Reza Zahedi, in an airstrike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus; under international law, embassies used for military purposes could be regarded as military targets. However, Iran protested than an attack on its diplomatic installation was essentially an attack on Iranian soil, and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei vowed that Israel would be punished.
The next two weeks saw Israel brace for retaliation from Iran and its proxies. On 4 April, Israel scrambled GPS signals over most of its northern airspace to protect from Iranian and Hezbollah missiles. By 5 April, Quds Day (the last Friday of Ramadan), US intelligence assessed that an Iranian response was imminent, and, in the days leading up to 13 April 2024, US intelligence indicated that an attack would likely occur that weekend. Israel warned Iran that its military would harm those who harmed Israelis, threatening retaliation for any Iranian attack.
History[]
On the night of 13 April 2024, over 100 drones were launched by Iran towards Israeli soil, with Israel reporting that they would take hours to arrive. At the same time, Iran launched dozens of cruise missiles and ballistic missiles, with the US predicting that they would target military sites rather than civilian targets. The American military announced that it would help intercept Iranian missiles as feasible, while Iraq and Jordan closed their airspaces. Jordan also committed to shooting down any missiles that passed over its airspace.
Within the first few minutes of the attack, Israel began intercepting Iranian drones over Syria and Jordan with help from America's aerial umbrella. Meanwhile, Iranian defense minister Mohammad-Reza Gharaei Ashtiani warned that any of Israel's neighbors that opened their airspace to Israel in order to intercept the drones would be targeted. Hezbollah concurrently fired Katyusha rockets at an Israeli air defense barracks in the Golan Heights, while the Yemeni Houthis and the Islamic Resistance in Iraq also launched missiles at Israel. American and British warplanes helped shoot down several missiles, while the French Navy was also deployed to protect Israel.
Ultimately, Israel's air defenses and the forces of the United States, United Kingdom, and Jordan (given radar coverage by the French Navy) shot down 99% of the 170 drones, 30 cruise missiles, and 120 ballistic missiles launched at Israel from Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen. Iran announced the end of its retaliation after launching all of its missiles, even before they made impact, and Iranian foreign minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said that Iran did not welcome escalation. Nevertheless, the Israeli government announced its intention to respond to the strikes in a time and manner of its choosing.
Gallery[]
