Iran targeted Tel Aviv, the Israeli capital, with missiles carrying cluster warheads in what it said was retaliation for Israel’s assassination of Iran’s security chief Ali Larijani, Iranian state television reported on Wednesday.
Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, was considered one of the most powerful figures in the country since Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in an airstrike on the first day of the war. Gen. Gholam Reza Soleimani was the head of the Revolutionary Guard’s all-volunteer Basij.
The attack overnight on Tuesday killed two people in a neighborhood close to densely populated Tel Aviv, where there are also key military facilities, bringing the death toll in Israel from the war to at least 14.
A statement by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) read on state TV said weapons used included Khorramshahr 4 and Qadr missiles, both with multi-warheads.
Israel has said that Iran has repeatedly used cluster warheads, which disperse into multiple smaller explosives mid-air and spread over a wide area, making them difficult to intercept.
In Iran, a projectile hit an area near the Bushehr nuclear power plant on Tuesday evening but caused no damage or injuries, Iran told the International Atomic Energy Agency. IAEA chief Rafael Grossi reiterated his call for maximum restraint during the conflict to avoid the risk of a nuclear accident.
Israel and the US have said preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapons program was one of the goals of the attacks they launched more than two weeks ago, which killed the country’s supreme leader and many other top officials.
The Iranian government on Tuesday confirmed the killing of Larijani, the most senior figure targeted since the US-Israeli war’s first day, when an Israeli strike killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, which Larijani led as secretary, said Larijani’s son and his deputy, Alireza Bayat, were also killed in an Israeli attack on Monday night.
The targeted killings took place as the US-Israeli war on Iran shows no signs of de-escalation.
Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, has rejected proposals conveyed to Iran’s Foreign Ministry for “reducing tensions or ceasefire with the United States,” according to a senior Iranian official who asked not to be identified.
Khamenei, attending his first foreign-policy meeting since his appointment, said it was not “the right time for peace until the United States and Israel are brought to their knees, accept defeat, and pay compensation,” according to the official.
The official did not clarify whether the younger Khamenei, who has not yet appeared in photos or on TV since being named last week to replace his slain father, had attended the meeting in person or remotely.
Iran had executed a man convicted of spying for Israel, the Iranian judiciary’s media outlet Mizan said on Wednesday.
The man, identified as Kurosh Keyvani, had been convicted of providing Israel’s spy agency Mossad with pictures and information about sensitive locations in Iran, it said.
Also, Iran launched a barrage of missiles toward Israel on Wednesday as sirens sounded across the central part of the country and loud explosions were heard in Tel Aviv. Israel’s medical service, Magen David Adom, said two people were killed in Ramat Gan, a district east of Tel Aviv.
Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and other Arab states also faced barrages of Iranian-fired missiles and drones Wednesday that were intercepted by air defense systems.
With concerns growing about a global energy crisis, an Iranian official said Tehran had no intention of relinquishing its tight grip on shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway for oil.
President Donald Trump said NATO and most other allies have rejected his calls to help secure the strait.
Israel says killings are to undermine Iranian regime
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said Tuesday that Larijani and Soleimani “were eliminated” in strikes overnight. The Israeli military said it also struck more than 10 Basij posts across Tehran.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the killings were aimed at “undermining this regime to give the Iranian people the opportunity to remove it.” But there have been no signs of anti-government protests since the war began, as many Iranians shelter from the American and Israeli strikes.
US targets Iran coastline near Strait of Hormuz
The United States military said on Tuesday it had targeted sites along Iran’s coastline near the Strait of Hormuz with powerful “bunker buster” bombs because Iranian anti-ship missiles posed a risk to international shipping there.
The strait, a transit point for a fifth of the global oil trade, remains largely closed as Iran threatens to attack tankers linked to the US and Israel. Oil prices have soared.
US President Donald Trump has repeatedly castigated allied countries in recent days for their cool response to his requests for military help to restore the passage of oil tankers through the waterway.
Most US allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization have told Trump they don’t want to get involved in the conflict, he said on Tuesday, describing their position as “a very foolish mistake.”
The US has given shifting rationales for joining Israel to attack Iran and struggled to explain the legal basis for starting a new war, underscored by the Tuesday resignation of the head of the US National Counterterrorism Center, Joseph Kent.
Kent wrote in his resignation letter to Trump that Iran “posed no imminent threat to our nation.” Iran has responded to the Israeli-US attacks with wide-ranging strikes on its Gulf neighbors.
Saudi Arabia will host a consultative meeting of foreign ministers from a number of Arab and Islamic countries in Riyadh on Wednesday evening to discuss ways to support regional security and stability, the Kingdom’s foreign ministry said.
The International Energy Agency has said the war in the Middle East has caused the worst oil crisis since the 1970s.
Oil prices fell more than $2 per barrel on Wednesday to pare back some of Tuesday’s sharp gains after the Iraqi government and Kurdish authorities reached a deal to resume oil exports via Turkey’s Ceyhan port, providing modest relief to concerns about supplies.
But with no signs of a de-escalation in fighting, Brent futures prices have settled above $100 per barrel for the prior four consecutive sessions.
Oil prices are up around 45 percent since the start of the war on February 28, raising concerns of a renewed spike in global inflation. The World Food Program said tens of millions of people will face acute hunger if the war continues through June.
Global airlines sounded the alarm on Tuesday over soaring jet fuel prices, warning of hundreds of millions of extra costs, higher fares and cuts to some routes. Global aviation has been thrown into turmoil, with flights cancelled, rescheduled or rerouted as most Middle East airspace remains closed amid fears of missile and drone attacks.
Written with reports from news agencies
