Netanyahu's remarks, reported by Al Jazeera, come nearly 30 years after he first labelled Iran a primary threat in a 1996 address to the US Congress. US participation in a June 2025 war and a campaign launched on February 28 this year delivered the military intervention he had long sought, but the overthrow of Iran's government did not follow.
Analysts are sceptical that air strikes alone can achieve regime change. Urban Coningham, a research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, told Al Jazeera that while Israel has the firepower to establish air superiority and strike targets, it lacks a clear strategy for translating military gains into political change. Caglar Kurc, an assistant professor at Abdullah Gul University, said bombing can degrade military capabilities but cannot fully destroy offensive capabilities, and overthrowing the government would require a willingness to deploy troops and remain on the ground for years.
The question of US backing remains pivotal. The Financial Times reported this week that an Israeli proposal for renewed strikes failed to secure Trump's approval, though it suggested disagreement over timing rather than a flat rejection. Without US participation, Israel would lack the 30,000-pound GBU-57 bunker-busting bombs that US B-2 bombers used on Iran's Fordow and Natanz nuclear facilities in June 2025.
Iran, meanwhile, retains the capacity to retaliate. Sidharth Kaushal, a senior research fellow at RUSI, said Iran likely still has sizeable stocks of missiles, and its antiship missile stockpiles remain large because they are comparatively easy to make and Iran's southern mountains provide natural shelter. Coningham noted that Israel's interceptor stocks have been drawn down in previous exchanges, and repeated attacks impose a financial burden as the country intercepts inexpensive Iranian drones with far more costly defensive weapons.
Analysts also dismissed the prospect that Kurdish or Baloch armed groups could provide the ground force needed to challenge the state. Coningham said Kurdish groups lacked the military capabilities to take on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Netanyahu himself acknowledged the limits of airpower in March, saying, 'You can't do it only from the air. There has to be a ground component, as well,' without explaining what that would involve.