Explainer | What are Israel’s options for striking back at Iran?

Israel is vowing to retaliate against Iran for its weekend drone and missile attack, the first strike on the Jewish state from Iranian soil and which brought into the open a years-long shadow war. As the US and Europe urge restraint, Israel is weighing its choices.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the country will respond, but hasn’t given any details about how or when. His government says a failure to act would signal weakness and encourage further attacks by its arch-enemy.

Here are some options:

A strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities

This would be among the riskiest and most aggressive of the choices, and could force Iran to lash out at Israel again, potentially triggering a regional war the US, Europe and Arab states are so keen to avoid.

Israel, which bombed an Iraqi reactor in 1981 and a Syrian atomic site in 2007, has long considered Iran’s nuclear programme a threat to its existence.

Most of Tehran’s nuclear facilities – which Iran says are for peaceful purposes but Israel says are for building bombs – are hidden deep underground, making them hard to reach. In the view of many strategists, Israel would require US help.

Mark Dubowitz, head of the Foundation for Defence of Democracies, a US research group with a hawkish view on Iran, disagrees and says Israel can do it alone. “They’ve been striking targets inside Iran for years,” he said.

Another target could be Iran’s Bonab Atomic Research Centre, the closest site to Israel and 500km (310 miles) south of Azerbaijan, an Israeli ally. While it’s one of Iran’s less important nuclear facilities, hitting it would send a strong signal about Israel’s military capabilities.