Damages caused by Iranian attack to strategic installations forced Israel to ceasefire

The ceasefire Israel reluctantly embraced did not emerge from any humanitarian awakening. It was triggered by the sobering reality that Iranian ballistic missiles had successfully targeted some of Israel’s most sensitive strategic installations. A fresh State Comptroller report details how institutional negligence allowed these vulnerabilities to fester until they exploded into national exposure.

During the June conflict, Iran managed to breach Israel’s sophisticated air-defense systems and strike core facilities: Beersheba’s medical center, the Bazan oil refinery in Haifa, and crucial laboratories at the Weizmann Institute. These were not incidental targets—they were pillars of Israel’s medical, energy, and scientific infrastructure. Their exposure underscored a deeper structural failure.

Comptroller Matanyahu Englman’s report shows that warnings about these vulnerabilities date back to 2011. A detailed assessment issued in 2020 was also ignored. Despite years of alerts, the Defense Ministry, IDF, National Security Council, and Finance Ministry never created a coherent legal or operational framework to physically protect these sites. Instead, bureaucratic turf wars and funding disputes ensured that little to nothing was done.

Englman stressed a fundamental distinction: Israel’s air-defense umbrella—Iron Dome, David’s Sling, Arrow—may intercept threats, but no system is airtight. Once a missile breaks through, physical defenses must protect critical installations. Yet these were virtually nonexistent. Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iran all managed to exploit this weakness during the war.

Even after large-scale attacks began, the Defense Ministry continued to delay decisions. Committees met without purpose, deadlines were missed, and responsibility was shuffled between agencies. It was only in late 2024—when senior officials were preparing to depart—that any meaningful action started.

Once Iranian missiles struck strategic sites, Israeli leaders recognized that further escalation risked even more damaging hits. The country could not afford to expose additional “underdeclared” facilities, nor could its leadership sustain the political and economic fallout of deeper infrastructure disruption.

Israel did not choose ceasefire out of compassion for Gaza. It chose it because Iranian pressure exposed vulnerabilities its leadership could no longer hide.