Gamblers Overwhelmingly Believe Israel Response Against Iran By Friday
75% of those at Polymarket believe Israel will respond to an attack on that nation that took place on Tuesday. Just over $42,000 have wagered on this betting market, released just hours after the attack.
Iran fired ballistic missiles at Israel for Israel's campaign against Tehran's Hezbollah allies in Lebanon, drawing vows of a sharp response from both Israel and the United States.
Alarms sounded across Israel and explosions could be heard in Jerusalem and the Jordan River valley. Israelis piled into bomb shelters and reporters on state television lay flat on the ground during live broadcasts.
Israel said more than 180 missiles were launched into Israel from Iran and Israeli air defences were activated to intercept them. U.S. Navy warships fired about a dozen interceptors against Iranian missiles headed toward Israel, the Pentagon said.
Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps said the assault was in retaliation for recent Israeli killings of militant leaders and aggression in Lebanon and Gaza. Its forces used hypersonic Fattah missiles for the first time, and 90% of its missiles successfully hit their targets in Israel, the Revolutionary Guards said.
Nobody was believed to have been injured in the attacks.
Polymarket writes of its Middle Eastern markets: "The promise of prediction markets is to harness the wisdom of the crowd to create accurate, unbiased forecasts for the most important events to society. That ability is particularly invaluable in gut-wrenching times like today. After discussing with those directly affected by the attacks, who had dozens of questions, we realized that prediction markets could give them the answers they needed in ways TV news and Twitter could not."
