Aljazeera : The Israeli military has carried out several waves of airstrikes targeting nuclear facilities and military sites across Iran, killing senior Iranian military officials and nuclear scientists.
In a prerecorded video message posted early Friday morning, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the strikes were aimed at hurting Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and ballistic missile factories.
“This operation will take as long as is needed to complete the task of fending off the threat of annihilation against us,” Netanyahu said.
The Israeli military confirmed to The Times of Israel newspaper it had “launched an aerial campaign against Iran’s nuclear programme” in an operation dubbed “Nation of Lions”.
Israel’s chief of staff, Eyal Zamir, said Israel had reached a “point of no return” with respect to Iran’s nuclear facilities, and could not “wait for another moment to act” in the “fight to preserve our existence”.
An unnamed Israeli military official told reporters on condition of anonymity that it carried out five waves of attacks – with hundreds of strikes in total – hitting targets across Iran.
At least eight locations have been attacked, including the capital Tehran, Iran’s main uranium enrichment site in Natanz, and a nuclear research centre in Tabriz.
Iranian state-run media outlets have reported several casualties as a result of the strikes, with civilians and senior Iranian officials among the dead.
Among those confirmed killed are Hossein Salami, commander-in-chief of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Mohammad Bagheri, the chief of staff of Iran’s Armed Forces, and nuclear scientists Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi and Fereydoun Abbasi.
In a statement, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said “several commanders and scientists were martyred”, as he told Israel to prepare for a “bitter and painful fate”.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry said Tehran has a “legal and legitimate” right to respond under the UN Charter, as it vowed to involve the US as Israel’s attacks could not have taken place without its “coordination and authorisation”.
In a statement early on Friday, Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz described the attacks as “preemptive” and said Israel was preparing for Iran’s response.
“A missile and UAV [drone] attack against the State of Israel and its civilian population is expected in the immediate timeframe,” Katz said.
Sirens have sounded across Israel as a warning to people, while the Israeli military announced in a post on X that Israel’s civil and public security guidelines had been changed to “essential activity” as of 3am local time (00:00 GMT).
