Biden’s Top National Security Advisers Reportedly Don’t Know How Iran-Israel Standoff Will Go Down

President Joe Biden’s top national security advisers told him on Monday they don’t exactly know how the looming Israel-Iran standoff will play out, according to Axios.

Iran has vowed to retaliate after a top Hamas commander, Ismail Haniyeh, was assassinated inside the country’s capital last week, an operation Israel is suspected of carrying out. The U.S. has made posture changes to military forces in the Middle East region in preparation for an attack, but members of the White House National Security Council (NSC) told Biden during a briefing on Monday that they aren’t completely sure what might come next, three U.S. officials told Axios.

Iran and Hezbollah — the latter of which is also seeking retaliation against Israel after the country assassinated one of the terror group’s top commanders last week — are reportedly expected to launch some sort of attack in the coming hours or days, though the exact timing is still unclear, according to Axios. NSC officials told Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris during the briefing on Monday that the likely scenario is that Iran will attack Israel first, followed by a second wave attack by Hezbollah, officials told Axios.

But it still wasn’t clear from U.S. intelligence which adversary would strike first or what the attack would look like, officials told Axios. Iran and Hezbollah’s plan to retaliate against Israel is still “a work in progress,” and both sides haven’t made any final decisions, one official told Axios.

The Biden administration has been vocal that it will come to Israel’s defense in a scenario where Iran or Hezbollah launch an attack. Administration officials have also pursued diplomatic methods with their Arab counterparts in the region to try and find an off-ramp before the region spirals further into conflict.