Israel missed a perfect opportunity to cripple Iran’s nuclear weapons program during his attack against Iran this week.

The targets actually selected, air defense and missile production facilities, were entirely legitimate. To be sure, both Iran’s defensive and offensive capabilities suffered significant damage.

But it wasn’t enough.

Under enormous pressure from the Biden administration, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government failed to attack Iran’s most serious threat: Existential danger of a nuclear holocaust. against Israel.

And the mullahs’ nuclear aspirations – including the threat that Tehran will transfer nuclear devices to international terrorist groups – also pose serious dangers to the United States, Arab Gulf countries and many others.

However, that threat remains.

This mistake should weigh heavily on the conscience of President Biden and his advisors.

Instead, they continue focusing on Gazawhich is nothing more than a front in the “Ring of Fire” strategy that Iran is developing against the Jewish State. Biden has never understood, much less addressed, the situation in Iran. strategic threat, not only to Israel but to the United States, and our interest in preventing Iran from having weapons of mass destruction.

However, since the Hamas attack in 2023, the White House has focused on the symptoms of the danger, not its cause: the ayatollahs’ regime in Tehran.

But after election day, Israel will have another chance.

Biden can no longer warn Israel not to interfere in US policy by decisively attacking Iran’s nuclear targets. Determining the winner may take a long time, but the votes themselves will have already been cast.

Of course, Israel will not be free from vindictive post-election retaliation by an embittered, outgoing president. Barack Obama demonstrated this in late 2016 by refusing to veto a Security Council resolution on Israel’s borders. But at least the fear of electoral consequences in the United States will no longer be an obstacle.

Iran, however, will still have the right to vote. He could also be waiting to take further action against Israel after November 5.

Nobody knows who will win or when we will know the result. Even the winner’s policies are not obvious.

Kamala Harris is likely even less friendly to Israel than Biden, and Donald Trump’s stance is murky. To those who think Trump will support Israel as he did in his first term, I simply say: think again. Trump’s dislike of Netanyahu is palpable, and since the Constitution prohibits him from winning another term, the importance of American electoral politics for Trump will be much less than before. Trump almost met Javad Zarif, Iran’s former foreign minister, in 2019. He could easily do so in a second term, always looking for a deal, any deal he thinks makes him look good.

In any case, the decision is ultimately Israel’s. Having failed to act against Iran’s nuclear weapons activities before Nov. 5, it must decide whether to act afterward.

Some observers believe Israel should attack Iran’s oil and gas infrastructure, which is very vulnerable. Devastating Iran’s Kharg Island export facilities, for example, could deprive Iran of almost all of its international revenue. Doing so would dramatically affect the domestic economy, but it could also make Iran’s population, increasingly opposed to the mullahs’ regime, more sympathetic to their oppressors.

And the Gulf Arab states have warned, with considerable justification, that if Iran’s facilities were damaged, Tehran would likely retaliate against its oil infrastructure. This mutually assured destruction of hydrocarbon exports is obviously something the Gulf Arabs wish to avoid.

Of course, attacking Iran’s nuclear program would not cause global economic damage. And there would be no small reaction from Iranian public opinion.

Indeed, eliminating the regime’s long-standing program to acquire nuclear weapons could be a conclusive blow against its credibility within Iran. The ayatollahs have spent untold billions on nuclear and conventional warfare capabilities, but Israel’s attack demonstrated them to be completely inadequate. The loss of the nuclear program could expose the mullahs to even greater internal dissent, threatening the regime itself.

Israel bowed to pressure from Biden after Iran’s missile and drone attacks in April. As a reward, Israel was subjected to Iran’s second attack in October.

Although Jerusalem responded forcefully, it was not enough.

Remember this after November 5, because Israel will have to live with it: Iran’s third attempt could be nuclear.

John Bolton was national security adviser to President Donald Trump, 2018-19, and US ambassador to the United Nations, 2005-06.