Shock-and-Awe ‘Midnight Hammer’ Iran Strike Encapsulates Trump Doctrine

My young family and I were in Israel when the Israel Defense Forces and Mossad began their offensive operations against Iran on June 13, commencing what President Donald Trump has since called the “12-Day War.” Although the Mossad’s intelligence and the IDF’s rapid establishment of air superiority inside Iran proved to be nothing less than extraordinary, my wife and I lived on pins and needles for those first few days of the war. We had to be ready day or night, at a moment’s notice, to drop everything we were doing, grab our 6-month-old baby, and race to the house’s “safe room” (that is, bomb shelter).

Trust me: This is not a fun way to live — especially not with an infant. Meanwhile, too many of Iran’s ballistic missiles — considerably more lethal than the rockets typically fired into Israel from Hamas and Lebanon — were evading Israeli air defense. They were finding their targets. Too many homes were being destroyed, and too many people, tragically, were being killed. Though a proud Jew, Zionist, and even author of a recent book on the subject, I decided to do what any American father of a beautiful baby girl would do in such a situation: Get us home.

I am a Floridian, and I heard about a program the state of Florida had launched, in partnership with Grey Bull Rescue, to evacuate American citizens from the war zone. We first took a bus to the Jordanian border. We next got to Amman, where we spent the night. We then flew to Cyprus, a hub for those fleeing (and returning to) Israel, where we also spent the night. And finally, we flew from Cyprus to Tampa, where Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis surprised our group by meeting us at the airport. The governor asked me to join him for a press conference; though groggy and sleep-deprived, I of course obliged.

The day after my family got home to Florida, the world changed in an instant: Trump ordered Operation Midnight Hammer, delivering a devastating — perhaps fatal — blow to the Iranian regime’s three most prized nuclear facilities: Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan. In his brief remarks at the White House following the strikes, Trump repeatedly linked the national interests and fates of the United States and Israel. Despite months of tendentious leaks, palace intrigue, and the often-parroted media reports of a rift between Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, that bilateral relationship is clearly stronger than ever.