WarSclerotic

TEL AVIV (JTA) — When war broke out on Israel’s northern border in 2006, Avigdor Guy remained calm. He lived in the northern port city of Haifa, but he didn’t think the war would hit home — until, that is, it did.

“Twelve years ago, they asked me if I was worried, and I said no, of course I’m not worried,” Guy said. “And then missiles began to fall in Haifa, and it felt really bad.”

Now, as fears of a war on Israel’s northern border heat up once more, Guy, again feels fine. But this time, he says his confidence is justified. Guy, 50, thinks that Israel is better prepared on its northern front than it was in 2006, when the month-long conflict with Hezbollah ended in a draw that was seen as a failure by most Israelis. Recently, he says, Israel has been appropriately focused on threats coming from Syria.

“I’m pretty optimistic that everything will be calm,” he said. “I think that all in all, our government is taking Iran’s deepening presence in Syria seriously.”

(The Israelis spoke before a barrage of 20 missiles was fired at Israel just after midnight on Thursday. There were no injuries in the attack, which Israel attributed to Iranian forces in Syria. The volley sent Golan residents to bomb shelters).

As Trump was preparing on Tuesday to withdraw from the deal, which rolls back Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief, Israel alerted residents of the Golan Heights to open their bomb shelters. The Golan, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Six-Day War, has endured fire from forces in Syria, and could be vulnerable if Iran or its proxies attacked Israel.

“I believe in our army, our strength,” said Gracia, who declined to give her last name, a 52-year-old resident of the northern city of Nahariya, which was hit hard in 2006. “We’re stronger. Even if it comes to war, everything will be all right. We’ll get along. We’re not weak and we’ll be OK.”

On Wednesday, Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Gadi Eizenkot visited Israel’s north for a situation assessment. The front page of Yediot Aharonot, one of Israel’s leading papers, had a split headline: Above a picture of Trump, it read: “Shut the door.” Next to that, above a picture of a bomb shelter, it read: “Opening the shelters.”

The front page of Yediot Aharonot, one of Israel’s leading papers, on May 9, 2018 juxtaposed pictures of President Donald Trump withdrawing from the Iran deal and a family sitting in a bomb shelter. (Ben Sales/JTA)

But the government has urged Israelis to keep calm and carry on. Schools in the Golan opened as normal on Wednesday. And in Tel Aviv, far from the threats up north, there was no sign of impending conflict: People strolled the boulevards, sipped their coffee and rode their bikes.

Fears of conflict have been building here for months. Iran is a principal ally of the Syrian government, and as it has entrenched its forces in that country, it has reached the brink of clashes with Israel. In February, an Iranian drone was shot down over Israeli territory. And Israel has allegedly conducted countless airstrikes in Syria, including a reported one Tuesday night. Israeli leaders have vowed to prevent Iran from establishing a military base across the Golan border.

An anti-rocket missile battery seen on a mountain in northern Israel on May 9, 2018. (David Cohen/Flash90)

“It feels like something is about to happen,” said Amit Hagin, 30, a native of Haifa who has lived in Berlin for the past three years. “Obviously it’s not yet at this point [of the Lebanon War] but it can definitely get to this point. If it’s a war against Iran it means it’s going to get quite crazy.”

Despite the tensions, most of the Israelis who spoke with JTA said they supported Trump’s decision. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made opposing the deal — and Iran’s nuclear ambitions — the centerpiece of his tenure. When the deal was passed in 2015, both the Israeli governing coalition and its opposition came out against it.

“Even if there are tensions, it’s important for us to have security,” said Yogev Yosef, 56, of Tel Aviv. “In general I think we needed to cancel the agreement. I don’t trust Bibi at all, but Bibi isn’t relevant to whether there should be an agreement.”

Israelis also said that threats of war are nothing new. Terror groups have existed on Israel’s border for decades, so the possibility of conflict is always there. This, they said, was just another one of those times.

“We’re already used to tension, so it hasn’t crossed the line where I really start to worry,” said Moria, 34, a Tel Aviv resident who declined to give her last name. “Every so often there’s something it seems like we need to be worried about, and we’ve already become jaded. So in some ways, yes, it’s troubling, but I don’t feel existential angst.”

Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.

Some 20 rockets were fired at Israeli military bases by Iranian forces from southern Syria just after midnight on Thursday, sparking the largest ever direct clash between Jerusalem and Tehran, with Israeli jets targeting numerous Iranian-controlled sites across Syria.

The Israeli army said the initial missile barrage was carried out by members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Forces. This appeared to be the first time that Israel attributed an attack directly to Iran, which generally operates through proxies.

The extensive retaliatory campaign, striking suspected Iranian bases throughout Syria for hours following the initial Iranian bombardment, an Israeli military spokesperson said, warning Syrian dictator Bashar Assad not to get involved.

The Israeli military would not immediately comment on its specific targets.

Syria’s state news agency, after initially reporting that the country’s air defenses were intercepting dozens of “hostile Israeli missiles,” later said Israeli jets hit military bases, as well as an arms depot and military radar, without specifying the locations.

Syrian rebels said these strikes targeted three airfields: the Shayrat air base, which was targeted by the United States last year for its role in an alleged chemical attack in the Syrian town of Khan Shaykhun; the Tha’lah air base, in southwest Syria, which has been tied to Hezbollah; and the Mezzeh military air field outside Damascus, which is reportedly home to Assad’s elite republican guard.

A large Israeli bombing raid was reported near the northwestern Syrian town of Qusayr near the Lebanese border, a known Hezbollah stronghold.

In the days and weeks before the Iranian barrage, defense officials repeatedly warned that Israel would respond aggressively to any attack from Syria.

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with Russian President Vladmir Putin in Moscow about Iran’s “explicit goal of attacking the State of Israel as part of their strategy to destroy the State of Israel,” he said. Netanyahu told reporters after the meeting that Putin was receptive to Israel’s demand that it be allowed to operate freely in Syria’s skies in order to defend itself.

The late-night Iranian rocket barrage and Israeli counterattack appeared to be the largest exchange in Syria since the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

In light of the aerial battles, numerous cities and towns in northern Israel decided to open their public bomb shelters, though the army did not require all of them to do so. In one case, residents of the northern Israeli town of Metula, along the Lebanese border, were instructed to take shelter after a loud explosion was heard in the area. They were later cleared to leave as no signs of impact were found.

Shortly before 3 a.m., a loud blast was also heard in the northern city of Safed, prompting its mayor to release a statement to residents reassuring them that the explosion was “not a missile strike or anything else, but rather an IDF launch from our area.”

Residents of central Israel reported hearing fighter jets flying overhead.

Tehran has repeatedly vowed revenge after the T-4 army base in Syria was struck in an air raid — widely attributed to Israel — on April 9, killing at least seven members of the IRGC, including a senior officer responsible for the group’s drone program.It apparently attempted to exact that revenge at 12:10 a.m. on Thursday, with its bombardment on Israeli military bases on the Golan Heights.

Sirens blared across the Golan Heights throughout the exchange, sending residents into bomb shelters. The IDF Home Front Command called on residents to adhere to security instructions as needed. Residents of the Golan Heights were told they could leave the bomb shelters around 2 a.m., but were instructed to remain near the fortified areas until further notice.

The pro-Syrian government Al-Mayadeen TV said more than 50 missiles — not 20, as the IDF said — had been fired from Syria toward Israeli forces on the Golan Heights. A Syrian parliamentarian claimed on Twitter that Damascus, not Tehran, had launched the attack.

Immediately following the barrage, Syrian state media reported that Israeli artillery fire targeted a military post near the city of Baath in the Quneitra border region, where Syrian regime forces were stationed.

An Israeli artillery unit takes position near the Syrian border on the Golan Heights on May 9, 2018. (Jalaa Marey/AFP)

In the hours that followed, this Israeli retaliation expanded to include more artillery strikes and aerial bombings, according to Syrian reports.

Following the initial exchange, IDF spokesperson Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus said the army was still sorting out many of the specific details related to the missile attack, such as which army bases were targeted, what types of projectiles were used, how many rockets were fired, from where they were launched, and how many were intercepted.

A video shared on social media shortly after midnight on Thursday appeared to show the barrage of missiles apparently being fired by a  multiple launch rocket systems, or MLRS, from Syria toward Israel.

Residents of both the Israeli and Syrian Golan Heights reported hearing loud, repeated explosions.

A man inside a bomb shelter in the northern Israeli city of Safed, May 8, 2018. (David Cohen/Flash90)

The attack came a day after the military called on local governments on the Golan Heights to open bomb shelters, in light of “abnormal” activities by Iranian forces in Syria. The barrage also followed US President Donald Trump’s announcement on Tuesday night that he was pulling the United States out of the Iran nuclear deal and reimposing sanctions on Tehran.

On Tuesday, eight Iranians were among 15 foreign pro-regime fighters killed in a suspected Israeli strike in Syria on a weapons depot of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards, a monitor said. The raid struck the area of Kisweh south of Damascus late Tuesday, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said on Wednesday.

This frame grab from video provided on Wednesday, May, 9, 2018 by Syria News, shows people standing in front of flames rising after an attack on an area known to have numerous Syrian army military bases, in Kisweh, south of Damascus, Syria on Tuesday. (Syria News, via AP)

Syria’s official news agency SANA said on Tuesday the army had intercepted two Israeli missiles fired toward Kisweh, with state television broadcasting images of fires in the nearby area.

Since the start of Syria’s civil war in 2011, Israel has repeatedly targeted positions of the Syrian army and the Lebanese Hezbollah terror group backing it inside the country.

On April 29, missile strikes — “probably Israeli” — fired on regime military positions near the cities of Hama and Aleppo in northern Syria killed at least 26 mostly Iranian fighters, according to the Observatory.

On April 9, missiles targeted the T-4 air base in the central province of Homs, killing up to 14 fighters, including seven Iranians, two days after an alleged chemical attack carried out by the Syrian regime.

Russia, Iran and Syria accused Israel of carrying out the strike.

In light of both the general tension and specific intelligence, the IDF went on high alert this week, deploying additional missile defense batteries in northern Israel. “There is high preparedness of IDF troops for an attack,” the army said on Tuesday.

A number of army reservists were called upon Tuesday night, the army said. An IDF spokesperson would not elaborate on which units they came from, but media reports indicated they served in air defense, intelligence and Home Front Command units.

Earlier on Tuesday, the US embassy in Israel also prohibited American government employees from visiting the Golan Heights without approval in light of the security situation on the border.

“The IDF is ready and prepared for a variety of scenarios and warns that any action against Israel will be answered with a fierce retaliation,” the army said.

On Sunday night, Israeli defense officials warned that Iran was planning to retaliate for recent deadly airstrikes in Syria, which have been attributed to the Jewish state, by having its proxies fire missiles at military targets in northern Israel sometime in the near future.

Security forces were also preparing for the possibility of attempted infiltrations of military bases and communities in the north, Hadashot TV news reported on Monday.

Agencies contributed to this report.