Following Iran’s Tuesday-night attack on Israel – which saw the Islamic Republic launch nearly 200 missiles at Israeli territory – the question is not whether Israel will retaliate but how.

Calls to militarily target the Iranian nuclear programme are neither new nor surprising.

But while strikes may be able to roll back parts of the nuclear programme in the short term, they could ultimately exacerbate the threat and limit options to deal with it in future.

Iran does not currently possess a nuclear weapon and there has so far been no indication that Tehran has made a decision to weaponise the programme.

Nevertheless, the country possesses a near-threshold nuclear capability – meaning that it likely has much of the necessary know-how, technology and materials to develop a nuclear weapon on short notice.

Should Tehran decide to rush towards a nuclear weapon, experts have assessed that it could produce sufficient weapons-grade enriched uranium for a single weapon in under a week.

Actually developing a nuclear weapon would take months. Mounting it on warheads capable of striking an enemy like Israel may take even longer – and not guaranteed to succeed.

Over the past year, Iran’s non-state partners and proxies, as well as its missile capabilities, have either been significantly degraded or proven ineffective in deterring attacks on Iranian assets across the region and even its territory.

Israeli strikes on Iran in April of this year – in response to an Iranian attack on Israeli territory – made that clear.

It raises questions over whether Iran may be increasingly looking to its nuclear programme to backfill a perceived weaknesses in its other deterrent capabilities. As Israel continues to degrade Hezbollah in Lebanon, that logic could solidify further.

Pre-empting an Iranian decision to weaponise its nuclear programme by carrying out military strikes on its nuclear facilities may therefore seem tempting.

Yet such a course of action would be practically challenging and could ultimately exacerbate, not resolve the threat.

The Iranian nuclear programme is not concentrated at a single site – Iranian facilities are numerous and dispersed across the country.

A number of the sites – including enrichment facilities – are underground. Causing meaningful damage to the programme would require a significant military operation, likely necessitating some US involvement.

The advanced state of the programme and Iranian nuclear expertise also means that damaged facilities and materials could be reconstituted. And – if past efforts to sabotage the programme are any indication – rebuilt facilities would be hardened and dispersed further.

Israel may nevertheless decide that short-term considerations justify a strike on Iran’s nuclear sites.

Israeli retaliatory strikes against non-nuclear infrastructure inside Iran may also lead Iran to advance its nuclear programme.

This may include a decision to start enriching uranium to weapons-grade levels, further limiting International Atomic Energy Agency access to its facilities or withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Iran is very likely already weighing the option of weaponising its nuclear capabilities.

Israel’s next steps will either convince Tehran that there is still some security value in maintaining no more than a near-threshold nuclear capability – buying time for further efforts to address the nuclear issue through non-military means.

Or they will lead Iran to conclude that nothing short of a fully fledged nuclear weapons capability will be enough.

By all accounts, Iran is not in a place to produce a nuclear weapon overnight. Any efforts to that end are likely to be detected by US, Israeli or other intelligence agencies with sufficient time to respond.

Carrying out limited strikes now could complicate that possibility and options to respond to it in the future.

It also risks definitively convincing Iran that it needs to arm itself with a nuclear weapon.