Operation Roaring Lion Day 32: The IDF's Accidental Game Changer
Also, the absolute failure of Ben Gvir's execution law, the Palestinian Authority celebrates violence, and more.
The strike on Isfahan posted by Donald Trump last night.
It’s Tuesday, March 31, and the thirty-second day of Operation Roaring Lion. The global price of oil has reached $113, up less than one percent since yesterday. Here are the latest developments while you were asleep:
Last night, Donald Trump shared a clip of a massive strike on Isfahan on social media. According to Ynet’s Ron Ben-Yishai, what initially appeared to be a strike on ballistic missiles may have in fact been the burial of enriched uranium deep underground in a way that will prevent the Iranians from accessing it. The U.S., it seems, has given up on prolonged ground action that would also entail many casualties.
According to the AP Lebanon has requested that Ukraine’s embassy in Beirut hand over a Syrian-Palestinian man with Ukrainian citizenship suspected of working for the Mossad. The man was originally detained by Hezbollah in September after allegedly parking a motorbike rigged with an explosive device near Beirut airport. He escaped to the Ukrainian embassy on March 6 after an Israeli airstrike on an adjacent building gave him an avenue of escape.
Four soldiers from the Nahal Reconnaissance Unit were killed yesterday evening after their force engaged terrorist cells in close-range combat in southern Lebanon. Capt. Noam Madmoni, 22, from Sderot, was the team commander. Sgt. Maj. Ben Cohen, 21, was from Lehavim; Sgt. Maj. Maksim Antis, 21, was from Bat Yam; and Staff Sgt. Gilad Harel, 21, was from Modi’in-Maccabim-Re’ut all fell in the engagement. IDF fatalities rise to 11.
Internal Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir’s law supposedly mandating the death penalty for terrorists convicted of deadly attacks passed the Knesset 62–48 last night. In reality, the law achieves little and is more a political stunt than a meaningful step toward the implementation of capital punishment.
Now, on to the details.
Heavy machinery demolishes a building damaged by a ballistic missile during the war with Iran at Soroka Medical Center in Be’er Sheva yesterday. (Yossi Aloni/Flash90)
“If you had a time machine,” I ask the senior Israeli minister, “and you knew a month ago that this is what would happen, would you still vote in favor of war?”
“First of all, yes,” he replies. “You have to understand, this was a cold and calculated gamble. The Iranians were planning to move their entire nuclear and missile industry underground, in a way that would have made it nearly impenetrable. In any case, we would have attacked this year—but with the Americans by our side, there was no dilemma.”
“The main achievements of the war are the severe damage to ballistic missiles and their production. This time, after hitting the entire production chain, it will be much harder for them to recover.”
“It’s also worth remembering,” the official added, “that for years, the nightmare scenario in Israel was a multi-front war with hundreds of casualties on the home front. Last year, in ‘Rising Lion,’ in 12 days of war against Iran alone, there were 30 fatalities. Now, in a war with three times as many fronts and three times as many enemies, there are 20. What is that if not proof that ‘Rising Lion’ was not in vain—and neither was ‘Roaring Lion’?”
The mission to destroy Iran’s ballistic missiles was a game changer, but not in the way Israel expected. Last Friday afternoon, Israel struck a critical part of Iran’s ballistic missile industry—its two largest steel production plants—but to their surprise, found the strike affected far more than their military.
Steel facilities sit in a gray area, somewhere between military targets—like missile factories or nuclear sites—and civilian targets, such as water desalination facilities. The Iranian industry is even grayer; there is no part of the economy that the regime has not penetrated. One of the factories was sanctioned by the U.S. in 2018, described as a critical source of funding for the Basij militia. Yet its targeting by Israel was to stop it from producing the metals used in ballistic missiles, not its cashflow.
Iran is the largest steel producer in the Middle East and ranks among the top 10 globally. Those two factories alone account for billions of dollars in revenue and about three percent of Iranian GDP. The impact on the economy was a side effect Israel accepted.
It now seems that the side effect may have been more powerful than the primary one. According to IDF intelligence, the regime’s political leadership now believes there is no way to repair the war damage; Iran simply lacks sufficient funds.
It reportedly has broken the spirit of many in the regime. The assessment is that, given a prolonged economic recovery after the war that will inevitably consume the vast majority of state budgets, massive protests will erupt.
It appears that Trump is reading the same intelligence, which may explain why the threats in his ultimatums have shifted from military targets to the gray area of civilian/military infrastructure, specifically Iran’s energy and oil facilities.
Still, as the minister told me regarding regime change at the outset of the war, “there were more optimistic and less optimistic assessments, but no one could guarantee that while bombs were falling on Tehran, the masses would take to the streets. There is no doubt that the war has brought the regime closer to its end—but I cannot tell you whether that will happen before Trump finishes his term, or before Netanyahu finishes his.”
Internal Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir at the vote on the death penalty for terrorists who murder Israeli civilians in the Knesset last night. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)
Last night, Internal Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir’s law mandating the execution of terrorists convicted of murder passed 62–48. Ben-Gvir attempted to propose a toast, but before he could pop the cork on his champagne, the Knesset speaker demanded he stop, and the ushers confiscated the bottle. The stunt was much like the law itself: all style, no substance.
Contrary to much of the rhetoric, Israel has had the death penalty for nearly 70 years. The original law was designed to execute Nazi war criminals but can technically apply to anyone who commits similarly genocidal crimes. Every prosecutor can request the death penalty, and under certain circumstances, judges may grant it. That’s why Ben-Gvir advertised his law as forcing left-wing prosecutors to request the penalty and left-wing judges to grant it for terrorists—particularly the Nukhba forces, who invaded Israel on October 7.
In reality, it does neither. The law explicitly excludes Nukhba terrorists from receiving the death penalty and provides no evidentiary infrastructure or procedural framework to secure convictions. Its wording actually helps judges avoid the penalty, mandating only “death penalty or life imprisonment” for convicted terrorists.
Those hoping this law would change the calculus of hostage deals should think again. Not only does it fail to reduce the number of terrorists in Israeli prisons, it does not abolish the president’s power of pardon—the primary mechanism for releasing terrorists in deals. Even if Ben-Gvir somehow manages to secure a death penalty, the law does nothing to prevent the conviction from being overturned or the terrorist from being handed over.
The law does more than fail in its objectives—it actively backfires. Despite being marketed as targeting Palestinian terrorists (raising its own legal problem of discrimination), it explicitly allows for the death penalty for Jews. The law defines terrorism as acts “to negate the existence of the state,” a definition that could apply to groups such as extremist Haredi factions and violent members of the “Hilltop Youth” (which Ben-Gvir supports).
Its most glaring flaw is that it mandates carrying out a sentence within 90 days—an explicit violation of the Geneva Convention’s mandatory 180-day waiting period. As a signatory, Israel could expose IDF officers to international lawsuits, with no tangible benefit. The IDF warned Ben-Gvir, but he disregarded their advice.
Its blatant illegality gives the Supreme Court clear grounds to strike it down, returning Israel to square one while damaging the country’s international reputation.
Had Ben-Gvir managed to keep his champagne, I would have proposed a toast—to a self-destructive law that makes Israel look terrible, benefiting no one but Ben-Gvir himself. L’chaim.
That said, while Ben-Gvir’s law is essentially a campaign stunt, a more responsible law is making its way through the system. Proposed by MKs Simcha Rothman and Yulia Malinovsky, the law establishes the practical mechanisms—procedural and evidentiary—to secure convictions of Nukhba terrorists, after which the death penalty could be imposed.
The Rothman–Malinovsky law was developed in consultation with all relevant authorities. The Shin Bet, IDF, and National Security Council have expressed similar concerns about Ben-Gvir’s law and consulted on this alternative.
The death penalty is a complex issue. Personally, I support executing terrorists who attempt to murder civilians—especially the monsters of October 7. Currently, these terrorists face one of two outcomes: spend the rest of their lives in prison at Israel’s expense, or eventually be released in a hostage deal and likely return to terrorism. Neither option is good for Israel.
What we can all agree on is that this issue demands a serious, responsible approach—one that prioritizes the security and best interests of the country over personal electoral ambitions.
Governor of Ramallah Dr. Laila Ghannam meeting with Fatah member and convicted terrorist Fahri Barghouti and his fellow terrorist and son Shadi Barghouti. (Dr.Laila Ghannam/Facebook)
Israel is currently grappling with a wave of extremist nationalist violence; the Palestinian Authority faces no comparable challenge. Don’t get me wrong—there is plenty of violence—but they don’t struggle with it, they celebrate it.
A recently published report from the Yesha Council reveals that the governor of Ramallah, Dr. Laila Ghannam, consistently visits convicted terrorists—many of whom were released in hostage deals—with the approval and funding of the Palestinian Authority.
In the past month alone, the governor met with Dalaisha, a senior Fatah member and one of the main planners of a shooting attack in which two children were seriously wounded.
Other notable visitors include:
Mazen Qadi, transported the terrorist who carried out the attack at the Sea Food Market in Tel Aviv in 2002, in which three were murdered and 35 injured.
Saad Eldin Gaber, placed an explosive in a Jerusalem pub (no casualties) and carried out many shooting attacks during the Second Intifada.
Amir Abu Redha, arrested in the 1990s for murdering a minor. A military Tanzim activist, he was involved in multiple shooting attacks against Israeli forces and provided a car for attackers who murdered a Jew.
Fahri Barghouti, a member of Fatah, was involved in the murder of bus driver Mordechai Yekuel, who was killed while transporting Arab workers in January 1978.
His son, Shadi Barghouti, was sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in a deadly shooting attack in Binyamin, in which soldiers Roy Jacob Solomon, Erez Idan and Elad Folk were killed.
All of these individuals received official state visits.
And that’s not all. The notorious “pay-for-slay” program continues, providing convicted terrorists with salaries for decades. Despite repeated promises to abolish the blatantly pro-terror policy, it persists.
Imagine if the state of Israel were paying violent settlers in proportion to their damage, providing their families with special benefits when they are arrested and venerating them when they are released. One would correctly call them supporters of terror and would rightly not demand they be seen as a “moderate” partner for peace.
Terrorism is morally unacceptable, whether committed by Jews or Palestinians. Yet, for some reason, the international community views only one side as having a responsibility to stop it.
English Editor: Ari Tatarka
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BenGvir is a blight upon the Jewish People. You can believe that terrorists deserve the death penalty, but there is nothing to celebrate. Trying to pop champagne is so vile.
Amit, thank you for your thoughtful analysis. It is appreciated.