Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s finance minister and a member of the political-security cabinet, threatened that if [the government] of Iran were to initiate a military operation, Israel should strongly target this country’s energy infrastructure. He said: “We will destroy all of its energy infrastructure, whether for domestic consumption or for export.”

According to Maariv, Smotrich said in the podcast “About Meaning” that increasing economic pressure could push the Iranian government to intensify military tensions, and that Israel is prepared, defensively and offensively, for such a scenario. He also said that the worsening of living conditions and bringing citizens to a situation where they have “nothing to lose” could spark a movement against the government.

Speaking about managing multiple fronts of conflict at the same time, Smotrich emphasized the need to prioritize and said: “It doesn’t have to be that all fronts catch fire right now.”