Former IDF intelligence official Yossi Kuperwasser said Iran now views the conflict as an existential war, warning the regime is likely to escalate and use all military and proxy capabilities.
The current conflict with Iran will only become more severe as the Islamic regime now understands that it is in an “existential war” threatening its continued rule, Brig.-Gen. (res.) Yossi Kuperwasser, head of the Jerusalem Institute of Strategy and Security and former head of IDF military intelligence research, told The Jerusalem Post on Saturday.
“This is the beginning. I expect more attacks on the leadership of the Islamic regime, its ballistic missile capabilities, nuclear and military industry facilities, and security forces, mainly thy IRGC,” he warned the Post.
“Iran is going to use all its capabilities, as this is an existential war for it. In addition to Israel, they are trying to hit American targets.”
While other experts had initially predicted in discussions with the Post that the US would conduct a limited strike as a means to pressure Iran into signing a nuclear agreement, Kuperwasser told the Post that this operation is “to help pave the road for the Iranian people to topple the regime and take over.”
Protests have broken out in recent months across Iran over the country’s financial crisis, and the regime’s brutal human rights violations against demonstrators have led to renewed calls for regime change from both outside and within the country.
Thousands have been killed and detained, with Human Rights Watch warning last week that many more have “disappeared” to secret facilities where they face torture, extrajudicial killings, sexual violence, and starvation.
“What the people of Iran do now will be an important indicator of their success,” he said, noting that now is an opportune time for the Iranian people to dismantle the regime.
While the Iranian people may now continue their push for new governance, Kuperwasser warned that there are those who will use diplomatic or terrorist influence to try to protect the Islamic regime.
“China and Russia are going to exert a diplomatic effort to allow the Islamic regime to stay in power,” he predicted, “but [they] are not expected to get involved militarily.”
‘Possible’ Iran’s proxies could join the war
On the military side, Kuperwasser said it was “possible” that Iran’s proxies in Lebanon and Yemen would join the war.
“Iran is doing what it can to encourage them to,” he shared. “We, of course, hope that’s not the case and are doing whatever we can to ensure this doesn’t happen.”
Hezbollah announced on Wednesday night that the terror organization would refrain from joining a war or attack on Former Israeli deputy national security adviser Prof. Chuck Freilich, now an adjunct professor at Tel Aviv University and Columbia University, told the Post last week that the Lebanese terror group – founded on the ideology of velayat-e faqih (Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist) – is loyal to Khamenei, binding his position as the authority on the group’s future role.
While Iran may have pressed to see Hezbollah join the conflict, two years of war, a Lebanese disarmament campaign, and the fall of the Assad regime in Syria have left the terror group significantly weakened and thus somewhat reluctant to rush into another battle against the Jewish state unless absolutely necessary.
While Bahraini analyst Dr. Ahmed Alkhuzaie earlier told the Post that he suspected the Islamic regime would only give a proportional response to the Saturday morning American and Israeli strikes, when reapproached by the paper, he confirmed his assessment had changed significantly over the past few hours.
“It’ll be a hell of a fight that [will] affect everyone in this part of the world,” he warned, in a noticeably different tone than earlier.
“Iran will utilize its proxies in the region, that is for sure. The impact will vary since, to the Islamic Republic, this war is existential. That’s why we see Hezbollah, Islamic militias in Iraq and Yemen are on full alert.”
Iran – must not be equated with Syria or Lebanon
Alkhuzaie warned that Iran “must not be simplistically equated with Syria or Lebanon, because its infrastructure and state apparatus are far more developed and resilient.”
While the Assad regime fell quickly, he explained that this was the result of years of civil war that fractured its institutions, whereas the Islamic Republic has maintained a “relatively intact and functioning system of governance, with nationwide networks of transportation, energy, and industry.”
The regime is “less vulnerable to collapse under external pressure,” as its financial systems are more robust than Syria’s, even with Western sanctions.
Similarly, the Iranian political landscape is not politically fragmented like Lebanon’s, which has meant that it is not “paralyzed by [the same] sectarian divisions and weak state institutions.”
“Iran operates through a centralized, hierarchical bureaucracy that enforces policy across its territory. Ministries, agencies, and provincial administrations in Iran are tightly integrated into the state structure, ensuring continuity even during crises,” he explained.
“This bureaucratic depth gives Iran the ability to mobilize resources, coordinate responses, and sustain long-term strategies in ways Lebanon cannot. Misreading this capacity could lead to catstrophic miscalculations in policy or intervention.”
The blend of ideological authority with institutional control in Iran’s political hierarchy will also help the regime maintain “cohesion and discipline across the state,” he continued.
“This is fundamentally different from the fragmented militias and external dependencies that characterize Syria and Lebanon. Iran’s system allows it to project power regionally while maintaining internal stability.
“Any attempt to treat Iran as if it were a weak or fractured state risks provoking escalations that could destabilize the wider region, because Iran has both the institutional resilience and strategic depth to respond forcefully.”