Israel’s “Operation House of Cards” Reveals Iran’s Miscalculation in the Golan Heights

On Wednesday night, on orders from its commander, Qassem Soleimani, an Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps-Quds Force (IRGC-QF) detachment fired rockets at Israeli positions in the Golan Heights.  The attack was Iran’s promised retaliation to Israel’s mid-April strike on the Syrian regime’s T-4 airbase in Homs, which killed 7 Iranians. Despite Iran’s threats, the attack was largely symbolic. Nonetheless, it appears Tehran miscalculated, and underestimated the magnitude of an Israeli response. Israel launched a furious response against Iran’s military infrastructure in Syria – dubbed “Operation House of Cards” – causing considerable damage, with no gains whatsoever for Tehran.

What Did the Iranians Hit?

Pro-Iranian media outlets immediately went into action after the rocket strike in the Golan. The Arabic-language Al-Mayadeen, which is connected to Hezbollah, took the lead, claiming the IRGC fired “over 50 rockets” and scored direct hits on 10 sensitive Israeli military positions. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) later denied Al-Mayadeen’s claims as exaggerations, saying Iran’s attack had in fact failed. According to the IDF, Iranian forces fired 20 missiles – a combination of Grad and Fajr-5s – at Israeli forward positions in the Golan Heights from 30-40 km away.  Sixteen of the missiles landed in Syria, and Iron Dome intercepting the remainder, causing no damage to the targeted positions or Israeli casualties.

Iran’s Objectives

Iran was trying to draw a red line for the Israelis at killing its fighters in Syria, while avoiding the outbreak of a war or larger clash. Tehran may attach considerable importance to the lives of its soldiers, but its entrenchment in Syria remains its strategic priority. Therefore, avenging the deaths of its 7 soldiers killed at T-4 was not worth the risk of sparking a conflagration with Israel’s vastly superior military, let alone a war, that could permanently roll back its gains in Syria. The IRGC therefore fired only a handful of missiles at the IDF, and of a type that it likely knew would be easily intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome, particularly given the defense system’s success against the same type of projectiles fired by Hamas from Gaza. This Iranians response appears almost calculated to avoid exacting a heavy price from the Israelis, and a resulting escalation. 

In fact, Iran’s retaliation was reminiscent of Hezbollah’s response to Israel’s assassination of Samir Quntar in December of 2015, and the messaging of pro-Iran media outlets seems largely intended to mollify the pro-“Resistance Axis” base’s desire for revenge against the Israelis over the T-4 strike. Similarly, in 2015, Hezbollah falsely claimed to have killed four Israeli soldiers – including a high-ranking IDF officer – and destroyed two of the Israeli army’s vehicles in its retaliatory strike over Quntar’s death. However, the group’s attack and its inflated claims were meant to lay Quntar’s assassination to rest without causing an escalation. After all, his importance to the group was largely symbolic, and – like the 7 Iranian soldiers to Tehran – hardly worth a larger conflagration with the Israelis.

Israel’s Response Reveals Iran’s Miscalculation

Yet, Israel’s response revealed the depth of Iran’s miscalculation. The Israelis were never going to accept an Iranian-imposed redline on their freedom of action in Syria and – apparently after notifying the Russians – immediately responded with overwhelming force, as its defense establishment had promised. Despite Iran’s seemingly clear intentions to avoid an escalation, Israel had a different calculus. Jerusalem has been warning for years that it considered Iran’s military entrenchment in Syria an unacceptable threat to its national security, and has likely been looking for any excuse to roll it back.

In fact, in an apparent attempt to goad the Iranians into providing such an excuse, the IAF had carried out five strikes in Syria since the mid-April attack on T-4. Just the day before the IRGC’s rockets landed in the Golan Heights, the Israelis struck targets in Damascus, reportedly killing 15 people, including 8 Iranians. When the Quds Force finally retaliated on Wednesday night, it misread the situation and inadvertently gave Israel just the justification it had been seeking.

Israel spared little time in launching “House of Cards,” reportedly one of the Israel Air Force’s (IAF) largest operations in decades. In an attack reminiscent of Israel’s 34-minute blitz against Hezbollah’s long and mid-range missiles in the 2006 war, Israeli jets hammered Iranian military positions in various parts of Syria, allegedly destroying over 50 Quds Force targets in a few hours. Targets included intelligence positions, logistical command centers, a military and logistical complex in al-Kiswah south of Damascus, Iranian barracks north of Damascus, IRGC-QF arms warehouses at Damascus International Airport, several Quds Force positions in the Golan Heights, and the launching pad for Iran’s missile attack in the Golan Heights. In a demonstration of its continued aerial superiority in Syrian airspace, the IAF also destroyed several of the Assad regime’s Russian-supplied aerial defense systems, after they ignored Israel’s warning against interfering with its strikes.

According to the IDF’s final assessment, the strikes damaged most of Iran’s military infrastructure – considerably setting back its ability to threaten Israel from within Syria – and would take months for Tehran to rebuild.

Conclusions

The strikes last night demonstrated several things. The first was that Iran is completely exposed to Israeli standoff firepower in Syria, and that Russia won’t – and the Syrian regime’s air defenses can’t – cover for Iran in Syria. The second was Iran’s limited ability to seriously harm the Israelis and – for now – an equally limited desire to do so. Despite threats to carry out, “stronger and heavier attacks [lit. operations] in the depth of the Israeli entity,” Iran’s forces largely stood idly during the IAF’s attack, and Israel’s north resumed normal life almost immediately afterwards. Tehran’s leadership even signaled its desire for calm the next day.

However, Israel – by focusing primarily on destroying Iran’s hardware and largely avoiding its personnel – also signaled its lack of desire for a larger confrontation or to dislodge Iran from Syria by force. Israel may have greater means and – for the time being – more willingness to ensure its lines in Syria are not crossed. However, it has no desire to forcibly dislodge Iran from Syria or enter into a ground war with the IRGC that would require a massive IDF ground invasion of vast swathes of Syrian territory, a prolonged occupation, and entanglement in Syria’s civil war.

David Daoud is a research analyst at United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) focusing on Hezbollah and Lebanon.