Israeli officials have given conflicting messages on whether they are looking to force a regime change in Iran with their military campaign.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told ABC News on Monday that assassinating Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei would “end the conflict,” not “escalate the conflict,” while a day earlier, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said Israel’s Security Cabinet “had decided on the objectives” and regime change “was not one of” them.

Recommended Stories

• US military bolstering Middle East presence amid Israel-Iran war
• Israel looks to US to hit Iran's Fordow nuclear facility
• US Embassy in Israel damaged in overnight Iranian strikes

Over the weekend, Netanyahu said on Fox News that regime change in Iran “could certainly be the result” of the conflict.

These considerations come after Israel successfully targeted multiple Iranian nuclear facilities, scientists, and senior Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps leaders in the opening days of the war.

Israeli military leaders have said they have destroyed one-third of Iran’s surface-to-surface missile launchers and have established air superiority over the western part of the country. Iran, for its part, has conducted several iterations of ballistic missile attacks that have resulted in the deaths of roughly two dozen people.

Barbara Leaf, a former State Department official during the Biden administration, said Monday during a briefing from the Middle East Institute that Netanyahu’s remarks “would suggest there’s … more than a whiff of regime change in the air.”

Similarly, retired Gen. Frank McKenzie, the previous commander for U.S. Central Command, warned that Israel may choose to expand its goals after its initial success, which could introduce more risk.

“I do believe that regime change is on the table in Tel Aviv, and I think that represents a thing we should be very familiar with in the United States: mission creep,” McKenzie said. “Mission creep is where you have astonishing initial success, and so your goals tend to expand as the horizon opens ahead of you. So I think perhaps when they went into this, they were looking at a more narrowly targeted campaign.”

McKenzie previously told the Washington Examiner that self-preservation is the regime’s highest priority.

Israel’s military assassinated the leaders of Hezbollah and Hamas, Hassan Nasrallah and Yahya Sinwar, respectively, last year. It also targeted the head of the Houthis, another Iranian-backed group based in Yemen, over the weekend in a separate operation.

As has been Israel’s problem in Gaza as it continues to target Hamas, it is unclear whom Israel would seek to lead Iran if the ayatollah is killed or flees.

HOW ISRAEL CHANGED ITS IRAN CALCULATION

“I think Israel is going after, not necessarily regime change because I don’t think they’ve got another regime in their pocket that they can plug in, but they’re certainly eager to topple this regime,” said Alan Eyre, another former State Department official, adding that Israel’s “best-case” scenario is that Iran “becomes a near-failed state with a government that exists in name only but is increasingly unable to run the country.”

The U.S. has resisted entering the conflict other than helping Israel intercept Iranian-fired missiles, though the president has said that could change if Iran targets U.S. troops or bases in the region.