Tehran/Jerusalem/New Delhi: The Iran-Israel battle entered its seventh and most harmful day but on Thursday (June 19), with each nations exchanging their most devastating strikes to date. Tehran launched a large missile and drone barrage focusing on Israeli cities and army services, whereas Tel Aviv intensified its assaults on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, together with a strike on the Arak heavy water reactor. There are reviews of a potential hit close to Iran’s Bushehr nuclear energy plant.
The Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) stated in a press release that Thursday marked the fifteenth section of its ongoing Operation True Promise III. The most recent strike, it stated, used over 100 drones and numerous ballistic missiles aimed toward army and industrial websites in Tel Aviv and Haifa. The IRGC stated the assault was designed to particularly goal missile protection techniques and Israeli army factories.
Iranian officers stated new-generation ballistic missiles, together with the Khaibar-Shekan, Fattah and Sejjil, had been used on this spherical. The IRGC added that extra exact and harmful strikes are deliberate within the coming phases.
The aerial assault got here simply hours after Iran reportedly destroyed an Israeli command and intelligence publish close to a hospital in an earlier drone strike. Israel has imposed tight media controls, banning all dwell broadcasts and publication of damage-related photos because the assaults started.
Israeli forces responded the assaults by finishing up airstrikes on Iran’s Arak heavy water reactor, a necessary web site within the nation’s nuclear program. An Israeli army spokesperson had additionally initially stated the Bushehr nuclear energy plant, Iran’s solely operational reactor, had been hit.
Nonetheless, a senior Israeli official later retracted that – calling it a “mistake” and declined to substantiate or deny the strike on the Bushehr web site.
Russia, which constructed and continues to work on Bushehr’s nuclear reactors, warned of catastrophic penalties if the positioning had been to be focused once more. Alexey Likhachev, head of Russia’s nuclear power company, stated any additional injury to Bushehr may set off a “Chernobyl-style disaster”.
Russian President Vladimir Putin stated Moscow had obtained assurances from Israel that Russian personnel working on the web site wouldn’t be harmed.
Talking in Beersheba, the place a hospital was hit on Thursday by an Iranian missile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that Israel is “dedicated to destroying the nuclear risk”.
He said that Israel’s purpose was to “take away each the nuclear and ballistic missile risk” posed by Iran and confirmed that operations to attain this goal had been already underway.
Netanyahu’s feedback got here amid ongoing Israeli air raids which have struck a number of Iranian cities and important infrastructure. The battle started final Friday (June 14) with a shock wave of Israeli strikes that focused Iranian army compounds, senior IRGC officers and nuclear scientists.
The violence has taken a heavy human toll. A Washington-based Iranian human rights group reported that at the very least 639 individuals have been killed in Iran, together with 263 civilians, with over 1,300 wounded since Israeli operations started.
Iran’s Ministry of Well being has confirmed many of those deaths, together with girls and kids.
Iran, in retaliation, has launched roughly 400 missiles and a whole lot of drones, resulting in the deaths of at the very least 24 individuals in Israel and injuring a whole lot extra. Missile protection techniques in Israeli cities have struggled to intercept lots of the latest assaults, particularly as Iranian forces use subtle strategies to bypass U.S.-backed Israeli interceptors.
Because the change of fireplace intensifies, world leaders are voicing pressing issues concerning the danger of a broader regional battle. The UN Safety Council is about to carry an emergency session on Friday at Iran’s request, which is being supported by Russia, China, Pakistan and Algeria.
Iranian officers have warned that any American intervention would escalate the conflict additional. Supreme Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reiterated in a televised handle that Iran would “stand firmly towards any imposed conflict” and wouldn’t yield below exterior stress.
The continued back-and-forth strikes, the focusing on of nuclear services and the rising civilian loss of life toll are pushing the battle towards uncharted and doubtlessly catastrophic territory. With no diplomatic breakthrough in sight, the approaching days are anticipated to deliver much more harmful escalation.