Tehran (AFP) – The United States and Israel launched strikes against Iran on Saturday, with Israel’s public broadcaster reporting that supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had been targeted, as the Islamic republic retaliated with barrages of missiles at Gulf states and Israel. Explosions were heard in the capitals of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and the UAE — all countries that host US forces. Blasts were also reported in the skies over Jerusalem after the Israeli military said a “barrage of missiles was launched” towards the country.
The US and Israeli attacks followed weeks of sabre-rattling and a major American military build-up in the Middle East, with Iran repeatedly threatening to react fiercely to any attack and warning of a conflict that would engulf the region. Smoke was rising over Tehran’s Pasteur district, site of the home of Khamenei, and there was a huge security deployment in the capital. “Iranian Supreme Leader Khamenei and President Masoud Pezeshkian were among the targets of the attack,” Israel’s Kan reported, citing an Israeli source.
Iranian state television said Pezeshkian was “safe and sound,” while the Fars news agency said “missile impacts were reported in the Keshvardoost and Pasteur districts” of Tehran. Witnesses told AFP correspondents they had heard at least three blasts in the area. The attacks came after US President Donald Trump expressed frustration at Iran’s stance in negotiations over its nuclear and missile programmes. Trump said Washington’s goal was “eliminating imminent threats” from Iran, and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the operation was to remove an “existential threat.”
“The United States’ military began major combat operations in Iran,” Trump said in a video message posted on his social media site while he spent the weekend at his Florida golf club. “We are going to destroy their missiles and raze their missile industry to the ground. It will be totally, again, obliterated. We’re going to annihilate their navy,” Trump said, warning of the possibility of US casualties. He offered Iranian forces, including the Revolutionary Guards, “immunity” should they surrender, or “certain death” if not, and told Iranians the “hour of your freedom is at hand,” urging them to rise up and “take over your government.” Israel’s Netanyahu echoed this call, telling Iranians that the time had come to “cast off the yoke of tyranny.”
The Israeli army warned Iranians in or around military infrastructure across Iran to evacuate after announcing it was conducting a “broad strike” on multiple military targets. Iran again vowed to “respond decisively to the aggressors,” and the Guards announced they had targeted the US Fifth Fleet in Bahrain as well as targets in Israel. “The IRGC’s missiles and drones have struck the headquarters of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet in Bahrain and other American bases in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, as well as military and security centres in the heart of the occupied territories, with severe blows,” the Guards said in a statement. “I saw with my own eyes two Tomahawk missiles flying horizontally toward targets,” an office worker told AFP on condition of anonymity. “At first, we heard a dull noise and thought it was a fighter jet.”
In Tehran, AFP journalists heard blasts and saw smoke rising over the city centre. The health ministry said ambulances had been dispatched but there was no immediate confirmation of casualties. Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, the UAE, and Israel all closed their airspaces to civilian traffic, at least in part, and a number of airlines cancelled flights to the Middle East. US embassies in the Gulf urged American citizens to take shelter.
Blasts were heard over Jerusalem after air raid sirens sounded, with sirens also heard in Bahrain, home to a US fleet, and in the Jordanian capital Amman. Jordan’s air force said it was conducting an operation “to defend the kingdom’s skies.” Explosions were also heard over central Doha and near Al-Udeid military base, the largest US military facility in the region, and an AFP journalist saw an interceptor take out one missile in a puff of white smoke, as Qatar’s defense ministry said in a statement it had “repelled a number of attacks.”
Kuwait and the UAE also reported intercepting incoming Iranian missiles, with Abu Dhabi saying it “reserves its full right to respond” and slamming the attacks as “a dangerous escalation.” A bombing that targeted an Iraqi military base housing a pro-Iran group killed at least two fighters, sources from the powerful group Kataeb Hezbollah told AFP. With the strikes underway, the exiled son of Iran’s last shah voiced confidence in victory against the Islamic republic. “We are very close to final victory. I want to be by your side as soon as possible so that together we can take back and rebuild Iran,” Reza Pahlavi, who lives in the Washington area, said in an online video address.
© 2024 AFP
