WASHINGTON (NewsNation) — The Biden administration on Sunday praised Israel for their “extraordinary defeat” of an “unprecedented” Iranian attack after intercepting 99% of the more than 300 munitions launched at them.
“Israel demonstrated military superiority … It was a spectacular success,” a senior U.S. official said on the condition of anonymity, adding that Iran intended to “destroy and cause casualties.”
President Joe Biden and his team are now urging Israel to proceed with caution in any counterattacks, with hopes to thwart the hostilities from spiraling into a wider war in the Middle East. However, one thing is clear: If Israel chooses reprisals against Iran, the United States will not take part.
“While we believe Israel has the right to defend itself, we will not participate,” the senior U.S. official said. “Our aim is to de-escalate. … Israel has to think through carefully what it does next.”
Tehran’s barrage against Israel came two weeks after an Israeli airstrike on an Iranian consulate building in Damascus, Syria, which killed two Iranian generals and five others. Following the incident, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei vowed revenge.
Iran had hurled approximately 300 munitions — ballistic missiles. cruise missiles and UAVs — from locations in Iran, Iraq, Syria and Yemen over the weekend. It was the first-ever direct attack on Israel from Iranian soil.
U.S. forces engaged and destroyed over 80 drones and at least six ballistic missiles headed for Israel from Iran and Yemen, according to U.S. Central Command. At one point, at least 100 ballistic missiles were in the sky with just minutes of flight time to Israel, a senior military official said. “It was a tense moment.”
The majority of the remaining missiles were engaged by Israel’s Arrow missile defense system, Arrow 2 and Arrow 3.
Roughly 50% of the ballistic missiles fired by Iran failed to launch or crashed before reaching their target, a U.S. official told NewsNation.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement after the Iranian airborne attack concluded that American forces will remain postured in the Middle East region to “protect U.S. troops and partners in the region, provide further support for Israel's defense, and enhance regional stability.”
On Sunday night, Biden spoke with members of the 494th and 335th fighter squadrons to commend them for defending Israel against Iran.
“You guys are the best in the whole damn world,” Biden said in a video released by the White House on the social platform X. “You made an enormous difference, potentially saving a lot of lives. Thanks to extraordinary skill, the United States helped Israel take down nearly all those incoming missiles. You’re remarkable.”
Iran’s assault on Israel faced resounding condemnation by leaders of the Group of Seven nations, which they said “risks provoking an uncontrollable regional escalation.”
“We demand that Iran and its proxies cease their attacks, and we stand ready to take further measures now and in response to further destabilizing initiatives,” a statement issued by the G7 said.
The G7 leaders, who spoke on a video conference Sunday, discussed potential consequences for Iran, including designating the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist group and a coordinated effort on sanctions, the senior official said.
Biden hosted a bilateral meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani on Monday at the White House. The previously scheduled meeting comes after Iran used locations in Iraq to launch its attack.
"The United States is committed to Israel's security. We're committed to a cease-fire that will bring the hostages home and prevent conflict from spreading beyond what it already has. We're also committed to the security of our personnel and partners in the region, including Iraq," Biden said.
The White House said during a briefing that the decision to respond to the Iran attack is Israel's.
NewsNation asked John Kirby, the National Security Council coordinator, how Biden is working to de-escalate the situation.
"Every move the president has been doing since the 7th of October has been designed to try to de-escalate and to try to keep the conflict from widening and deepening. And that includes the moves that he made in the last 1012 days, to add resources to the region so that we could help Israel better defend itself and my goodness, it all paid off. I mean, instead of having 100 ballistic missiles land inside of Israel and cause untold damage to infrastructure and to human lives, none of that occurred. And the reason none of that occurred was because the President was ahead of the problems," Kirby said.
NewsNation's Damita Menezes contributed to this report.