Daily Kickoff
Good Monday morning.
In today’s Daily Kickoff, we look at how Iran’s weekend strike against Israel is playing out from Jerusalem to Washington, as House Republicans face pressure to expedite aid to Israel and the Israeli government mulls a response. Also in today’s Daily Kickoff: Israeli President Isaac Herzog, Salman Rushdie and Cameron Hamilton.
The unnerving countdown to an Iranian retaliation against Israel’s strike in Damascus reached its climax on Saturday night after the Islamic republic launched hundreds of drones and missiles at Israel, Jewish Insider’s Tamara Zieve reports. Security analysts swiftly explained that the drones would take around eight hours to reach their targets and gave Israelis an ETA for the attack to begin (2:30-5 a.m.)
The sound of the heavy iron windows of the safe rooms being pulled closed by neighbors in our Tel Aviv apartment building followed the announcement as the country braced for the night ahead — the window in our safe room was already closed, as it has been every night since Oct. 7 to ensure that our two young children are sleeping in the safest possible conditions.
Earlier in the evening, IDF Spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari addressed the country and announced changes to the Home Front Command’s defensive guidelines, starting from 11 p.m. on Saturday until 11 p.m. on Monday: All educational activities were canceled and gatherings were restricted by numbers that varied according to different color-coded areas of the country — drawing tongue-in-cheek comparisons to Israel’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. (Some of the restrictions were lifted at midnight on Sunday following a situational assessment).
Many Israelis, as they often do, turned to black humor in response to the unprecedented situation. WhatsApp groups sprang to life with memes galore and parents grumbling about the cancellation of educational activities.
Even with plenty of Israeli resilience, there was also panic and anxiety. Friends and family checked in with each other; questions flew regarding the safety guidelines and Home Front Command officials sat in news studios clarifying that the public should adhere to the same rules that had already been in place for rocket attacks; some stores extended their hours to allow last-minute shoppers to stock up on essentials to put in their safe rooms; and many Israelis stayed up for the better part of the night following the unfolding situation.
The attack began shortly before 2 a.m., with the first sirens blaring in Israel’s southern district, then in the West Bank, Jerusalem and northern Israel. Tel Aviv was quiet, other than the sound of Israeli fighter jets in the early morning hours. I watched on my TV screen as the IDF and allies intercepted hundreds of drones and cruise missiles — what looked like blazing shooting stars — until it became apparent that the attack was over, at least for the night. Read more here for additional first-person accounts from JI’s Ruth Marks Eglash and Lahav Harkov.
In the aftermath of the weekend attack, Israelis were left to reflect on the absence of major damage and destruction — save for the injuries sustained by a 10-year-old Bedouin girl who was injured by shrapnel — that was largely a result of the joint efforts of a multinational coalition that intercepted the hundreds of missiles. Read more on that effort below.
The cover of the March 23 edition of The Economist featured an Israeli flag blowing in the wind, with the text “ISRAEL ALONE” above. But that assumption could not have been further from the truth when Israel was joined by a coordinated military effort alongside the U.S., U.K. and others to intercept more than 300 attack drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles fired by Iran.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog was quick to praise the coordinated efforts — and the assistance of the Biden administration. “Bless you dear soldiers and commanders of the IDF and IAF,” Herzog wrote on X. “Bless the coalition of nations led by the US and @POTUS. Bless my sisters and brothers, the people of Israel, for their exceptional show of resilience. Together, the forces of good will overcome the forces of evil.”
Among those aiding Israel was Jordan, whose leaders have repeatedly publicly criticized Jerusalem over the Israel-Hamas war in recent months — rhetoric meant to mollify Jordanians, who overwhelmingly side with the Palestinians.
But Amman’s assistance was met with pushback among the Jordanian populace and Arab news commentators, including AJ+’s managing director, who said Jordan’s support for Israel over the weekend was “shocking.”
Jordanian officials took to the airwaves to do damage control for their home audience — Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi told CNN’s Becky Anderson that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is “invoking a fight with Iran” in an effort to “dilute” the pressure Israel faces to wind down its war with Hamas.
Israel now faces a choice of what to do next. Iran’s failure to cause serious damage with its attack led the Biden administration and other allies to urge Israel not to immediately respond, with some commentators saying that this moment would be a good time for Israel to build up international goodwill, and get back at Iran at a time and place of its own choosing.
But the scope of Iran’s attack was unprecedented, leading many analysts to conclude that Israel will need to powerfully showcase its deterrence to prevent Iran and its proxies from letting such behavior become normalized. One top U.S. military official told JI’s Gabby Deutch that the attack was “designed to cause significant casualties.”
As Tablet’s Armin Rosen wrote: “The attack itself was a tactical failure, and Israeli aerial defenses are spectacular, and Israel’s partners and allies, including the US, will come to the country’s aid in real emergencies like this one. But [Iran] successfully tested the limits of what it’s allowed to do.”
This week, all attention will be on Washington as Iran’s attack is expediting efforts to ensure Israel receives long-delayed aid. But divisions within the Republican Party over Ukraine aid — along with pockets of anti-Israel opposition among left-wing Democrats — make any such efforts uncertain.
To help build momentum for securing Israeli aid, Christians United for Israel, the Christian pro-Israel lobbying group, is hosting an “emergency fly-in” in Washington this week, only the group’s third such event in 18 years, the group said in a statement, responding to the ongoing delays in sending additional aid to Israel. It said that “a small but loud group in the House” is the “primary impediment” to that aid.
CUFI Action Fund’s chairwoman, Sandra Parker, said in a statement, “There is widespread bipartisan support for aid to Israel in the House of Representatives, yet this legislative branch is being held hostage from within, undermining both American and Israeli national security. Our members are compelled by their faith to act on this issue, and act we shall.”
thwarting tehran
How Israel blocked most of Iran’s rockets from reaching its borders

The Israel Defense Forces remained on high alert Monday, one day after Iran’s unprecedented drone and missile attack put the country on lockdown and sent fighter jets – and advanced missile-defense systems – roaring into action. While some of the civilian restrictions put in place by the army’s Home Front Command on Saturday were eased early on Monday morning, including the resumption of children’s activities during the Passover vacation, the Israeli army reported additional UAV infiltration attempts from the east and the south overnight as the country’s leaders met to debate how to respond to Tehran, Jewish Insider’s Ruth Marks Eglash reports.
Seamless cooperation: In Israel, the defensive operation against the first attack by another regional country since Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s attempts during the first Gulf War in 1991 was seen as a huge success, not only for the effectiveness of Israeli-designed military defense systems but also because of seamless cooperation and support that came from Israel’s close allies – the U.S., Britain and France, as well as from neighboring countries, most notably Jordan.
CENTCOM action: The combined effort, which is believed to have included fighter jets and defensive systems deployed by Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, came under the umbrella of the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), whose mandate is to coordinate military operations and activities between its allies in the Middle East. CENTCOM also aims to bolster regional security and support U.S. interests, including pushing back against Iranian aggression.
Army briefing: “Last night, a defensive coalition of Israel and its international partners successfully thwarted a large-scale attack from Iran,” IDF Spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said during a briefing on Sunday. “The threat from Iran was met with the aerial, operational, technological, and intelligence superiority of a united defensive coalition of international allies led by the United States, together with Great Britain, France, and other partners.”