By Agency Report
In retaliation for Israel’s campaign against Tehran’s Hezbollah allies in Lebanon, Iran fired a salvo of ballistic missiles at Israel on Tuesday.
Israel vowed to retaliate the attacks and the United States pledged to support Israel against any aggression, thus fuelling fears of probable World War 111.
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.
Also read
- World Rues over surprise attack of Israel by Hamas
- Israel-Hamas War: 5,000 Die in Gaza, declares Health Ministry
- Hamas defends Israeli attacks claiming 25,000 deaths
Since Israel activated the Iron Dome in 2011, the cutting-edge rocket-defense system has intercepted thousands of rockets fired into Israel,
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 per cent of its missiles successfully hit their targets in Israel, the Revolutionary Guards said.
No injuries were reported in Israel, but one man was killed in the occupied West Bank, authorities there said.
Israeli officials promised consequences for the onslaught. Israeli Major General Herzi Halevi said in a statement: “We will choose when to collect the price, and prove our precise and surprising attack capabilities, in accordance with the guidance of the political leadership.”
Washington backed up its longtime ally. “We have made clear that there will be consequences, severe consequences, for this attack, and we will work with Israel to make that the case,” spokesman Jake Sullivan said at a White House briefing.
Sullivan did not specify what those consequences might be, but he stopped short of urging restraint by Israel as the U.S. did in April when Iran carried out a drone and missile attack on Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a few other ministers were meeting in a bunker near Jerusalem, where the security cabinet was due to convene shortly, two Israeli officials said.
Iran said if Israel retaliated Tehran’s response would be “more crushing and ruinous”. Tehran targeted three Israeli military bases in its attack, Iran’s state news agency said.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in a social media post: “This is just part of our capability. Do not get into a confrontation with Iran.”
A senior Iranian official told Reuters the order to launch missiles at Israel had been made by the country’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Khamenei remains in a secure location, the senior official added.
Oil prices shot up 5 per cent on the news of the Iranian missile strikes, which raise the prospect of a wider war between the two arch enemies.
The previous round of Iranian missiles fired at Israel in April – the first ever – were shot down with the help of the U.S. military and other allies. Israel responded at the time with airstrikes in Iran, but wider escalation was averted.
The Pentagon said the scope of Tuesday’s airstrikes was about twice the size of April’s assault.
Escalation in Lebanon
Iran had vowed to retaliate following Israeli strikes that killed the top leadership of its ally Hezbollah in Lebanon, including the group’s leader Hassan Nasrallah, a towering figure in Iran’s network of fighters across the region.
Hamas, the Iran-backed militant group in Gaza, praised the Iranian missile strikes, saying they avenged Israeli assassinations of three militant leaders, including Nasrallah.
In Washington, U.S. President Joe Biden said the United States was prepared to help Israel defend itself from Iranian missile attacks, and Sullivan said the president was tracking developments “minute by minute.”
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned what he called “escalation after escalation”, saying: “This must stop. We absolutely need a ceasefire.”
Israel in a post on X criticised Guterres for not holding “Iran responsible for firing 181 ballistic missiles at 10 million Israeli civilians.”
Israel said overnight that its troops had launched ground raids into Lebanon, though it described the forays as limited.
In Beirut, Israeli strikes killed the commander of the Imam Hussein division, Israel’s military said, referring to a Hezbollah-linked group based in Syria.
Nearly 1,900 people have been killed and more than 9,000 wounded in Lebanon in nearly a year of cross-border fighting, most in the past two weeks, according to Lebanese government statistics on Tuesday.
But a ground campaign into Lebanon for the first time in 18 years pitting Israeli soldiers against Hezbollah, Iran’s best-armed proxy force in the Middle East, would be a major regional escalation.
World reacts
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader
Quoting verses from the Quran, Khamenei seemingly predicted an “imminent divine victory”.
In two separate posts on X, Khamenei said that “righteous people” may have to make sacrifices “but they will not be defeated at the end of the day”.
“They are the victors in the field,” he said in a video showing footage of Iranian missiles being launched.
Masoud Pezeshkian, president of Iran
In a social media post, Pezeshkian said that this attack “was in defence of the interests and citizens of Iran”.
“Let Netanyahu know that Iran is not a belligerent, but it stands firmly against any threat. This is only a corner of our power. Do not enter into a conflict with Iran.”
Hamas
The Palestinian group Hamas praised the Iranian missile strikes.
“We congratulate the heroic rocket launch carried out by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran, on large areas of our occupied territories, in response to the occupation’s continuing crimes against the peoples of the region, and in retaliation for the blood of our nation’s heroic martyrs,” the group said.
Mohammed Abdulsalam, spokesperson for Yemen’s Houthis
Abdulsalam welcomed the Iranian military operation, which he said shows support for Palestine and challenges Israel’s hegemony in the region.
“Deterring the Zionist entity and confronting it is the only way to reign it in and prevent it from escalating its barbaric crime against the Lebanese and Palestinian people and the rest of the region,” he said in a social media post.
Iraqi Resistance Coordination Committee
The group, comprised of Iran-backed Iraqi armed groups, said US bases in Iraq will be targeted if Washington decides to support Israel in attacking Iran.
“If the Americans intervene in any hostile action against the Islamic Republic or if the Zionist enemy uses Iraqi airspace to carry out any bombing operations on its territory, then all American bases and interests in Iraq and the region will be our target,” the group said on the Telegram messaging app.
Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli prime minister
Netanyahu has vowed retaliation, saying Iran “will pay” for its actions.
“Iran made a big mistake tonight – and it will pay for it,” he said at the outset of a political-security meeting.
“The regime in Iran does not understand our determination to defend ourselves and our determination to retaliate against our enemies.
“We will adhere to the principle we have set: Whoever attacks us, we will attack them. This is true in every region we fight the Axis of Evil and it is true for Iran as well.”
Danny Danon, Israel’s representative at the United Nations
In a post on X, Danon said Israel is “ready and prepared defensively and offensively”.
“We will take all necessary measures to protect the citizens of Israel,” he wrote. “As we have previously made clear to the international community, any enemy that attacks Israel should expect a severe response.”
Antonio Guterres, United Nations secretary-general
Guterres condemned the “broadening of the Middle East conflict with escalation after escalation” and called again for a ceasefire.
“This must stop,” he said in a post on X.
Antony Blinken, US secretary of state
Iran’s missile attack on Israel was “totally unacceptable” and should be condemned by the entire world, Blinken told reporters.
“Initial reports suggest that Israel, with the active support of the United States and other partners, effectively defeated this attack,” he added.
Keir Starmer, UK prime minister
Starmer condemned Iran’s ballistic missile attack on Israel “in the strongest terms”, his office said.
During a call with his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu, Starmer also “expressed the UK’s steadfast commitment to Israeli security and the protection of civilians”, according to a readout of the call from Starmer’s office.
