Egypt is in transition and that is dangerous. Egyptians already have issues with Israel, both historically, but also recently after the IDF attack on Egyptian security forces a few years back. That is still not forgotten. Also the new President is dividing the county and nothing unites a country like a common enemy and war. And dont forget, Egypt has been getting more military funding than Israel for many years and has a very modern military.
Now Syria aint the problem... Lebanon is... Hizbollah and other allies. Plus the Syrian government is not on the brink of collapse. They are in fact regaining control of more and more areas lost over the last few months.
Add to the Palestinians.. oppressed for 50 years and growing larger (population wise) year after year and now dwarfing the Jewish population...Do you think Israel has the manpower not only to defend against attacks from the north or/and south plus quell an internal uprising while defending against retaliatory attacks from Iran?
Point is, if Israel attacks, they will be seen as the aggressor, which never goes down well in public opinion and has a tendency to unite people. Add to that pictures of dead women and children or a nuclear cloud over an Iranian city and you have a problem. How long could Israel survive if Europe and the US suddenly pulled the plug? Not very long. Now the US might not, but Europe would if the destruction and death toll is too high. Russia and China would be utterly pissed as well, and that means something. Remember Russia has quite a few troops stationed relatively close to Israel. And lets not forget the oil price and what it would do to the US economy.... but that is a whole other discussion.
So in conclusion... Israel attacking Iran at this point in time would be beyond idiotic and quite hard at that... if you look at the logistics.
Egypt is in transition, but I disagree that it is dangerous. The Egyptian government has so far proven exceptionally unwilling to do anything close to abrogating the peace agreement, and after the deaths of dozens of Egyptian soldiers from Islamist militants coming from Gaza and in the northern Sinai they have focused their efforts, with Israeli approval and coordination, on fighting and suppressing those groups. An Israeli attack on Iran would hardly be greeted with greater anger in the Arab world than the lack-luster response to Israel's campaign in Gaza which elicited mostly muted criticism in part because of a perceived proxy link between Hamas and Iran. I find it terribly unconvincing to think that when the Iranian air defense grid goes down the Egyptian response will be to shift some divisions to the Sinai, especially as the military in Egypt is vociferously opposed to such a confrontation.
As for Syria, you're right the issue is Lebanon. Though I would strongly dispute that the Syrian government is regaining control, it is fighting for control of Aleppo and will likely succeed but its control of the countryside has been diminishing. Jeffery White has a new report out on this from WINEP, and Riab just gave a press conference in Amman basically alluding to this truth.
As for Hezbollah, yes they are a problem but not an existential one, and their position is precarious with the slow motion collapse and exhaustion of the Syrian government across the border. They cannot count on the same support of support structures and resupply corridors that they had in 2006, which despite propaganda they still suffered tremendously in.
As for the Palestinians, yes of course Israel has the manpower to fight Hezbollah and Hamas. That isn't that difficult to conclude. Neither requires extraordinary 'manpower' unless the goal is the actual suppression and destruction of large portions of Hezbollah, and even then yes obviously they have the manpower. As for fighting off an Iranian retaliation it doesn't require that much to man an ARROW, a Patriot, a THAAD, or an Iron Dome battery. I'm also pretty sure the Navy and the Airforce are well staffed.
Yes they will be seen as the aggressor, and in my opinion they will not launch an attack--yet. They are waiting for the perfect constellation. They are hoping for, and have been hoping for, the leash to be taken off Saudi Arabia and Turkey and for the US to give its aggressive assent to supplying the Syrian opposition and accelerating the collapse of the regime. If the Syrian government goes down, the last reason they have to wait disappears. They no longer need to worry about a last ditch effort for Assad to use Israel as a means to coalesce the opposition around them, or to force regional actors to shift their attentions. Once Assad is gone, they have no reason to wait except for practical considerations of whether or nor the mission is possible.
Also why would a nuclear cloud rise over an Iranian city? What are you referring to? Furthermore what Russian soldiers are stationed near Israel, and what are you implying? They have a tiny naval garrison at Tarsus but that's it.
As for logistics, yes an attack on Iran is difficult but this is the first time people have seriously proposed an Israeli strike that involves ballistic and cruise missiles degrading Iranian defensive infrastructure. If Israel can remove that threat remotely with a Jericho and Popeye-Turbo missile offensive then they have no real obstacle to hitting their targets safely except for inflight refueling and securing permission from flyover states like Saudi Arabia, which it has been rumored before may already be secured.
