U.S. sending dozens of refueling planes to Israel as Iran escalation looms

The Trump administration notified Israel it is sending dozens more refueling planes to the country ahead of a potential expansion of military operations against Iran, three U.S. and Israeli officials said.

After he was presented with several new military plans in a Situation Room meeting Tuesday, President Trump is considering a massive offensive in Iran that would be wider in scope than the current strikes around the Strait of Hormuz.
Among the options being considered are bombing Iranian infrastructure facilities like power plants, conducting more attacks on Iran's nuclear facilities in order to bury Iran's enriched uranium even deeper, and bombing the Pickaxe Mountain underground site that is suspected to be a facility in the making.

Trump hasn't made a final decision yet, but he appears willing to escalate the war to cause enough damage that the Iranian regime will open the Strait of Hormuz and accept Trump's nuclear demands.
Trump could order an escalation in the coming days, U.S. and Israeli officials say.
The U.S. currently has about 30 military refueling planes at Ben Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv and around the same number in Ramon Airport in southern Israel.

Israeli officials say the U.S. wants to send several dozen more refueling planes in the coming days, bringing the number of planes to the same level it had at the beginning of the war.
Israeli officials say the U.S. military prefers operating the refueling planes from Ben Gurion Airport, because other air bases in the region are more exposed to Iranian attacks and less safe for U.S. planes.