Israel on high alert for possibility of US intervention in Iran, sources say
January 11 (Reuters) – Israel is on high alert for any possibility of U.S. intervention in Iran as authorities there face the largest anti-government protests in years, according to three Israeli sources with knowledge of the matter.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to intervene in recent days and warned Iran’s rulers not to use force against demonstrators. On Saturday, Trump said the United States was “ready to help.”
Sources who attended Israeli security consultations over the weekend did not provide details on what Israel’s high alert status means in practice. Israel and Iran fought a 12-day war in June, and the United States joined Israel in airstrikes.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio discussed the possibility of US intervention in Iran in a phone call on Saturday, according to an Israeli source who attended the call. A US official confirmed that the two men spoke but did not say what topics they discussed.
Israel has not signaled a willingness to intervene in Iran at a time when tensions between the two arch-enemies are high and protests have gripped the country over concerns about Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
Netanyahu said in an interview published in the Economist magazine on Friday that there would be dire consequences if Iran attacked Israel. Referring to the protests, he said: “With everything else, I think we need to see what’s going on in Iran.”
(Reporting by Rami Ayyub and Maayan Lubell; Editing by William Mallard)
