Iran Targets Israeli Civilians: 13 Killed, 200 Injured

Iranian missiles have murdered 13 people in Israel. Three were killed during Shabbat, while at least ten were killed overnight.

In Bat Yam, six people were killed overnight when a missile struck a residential building, including an 8-year-old girl, a 1o-year-old boy, and an 18-year-old boy. Another four—a mother, her two daughters, and another relative—were killed when an Iranian missile struck their home in Tamra.

Over 200 others have been injured.

The IDF, which is still searching the scene in Bat Yam for others who may have been trapped under the rubble, said it will likely take at least a day to fully clear through the site. As of writing, three people are still missing.

May the memories of those killed forever be a blessing, and may those injured have full and speedy recoveries.

While Iran has been targeting Israeli civilians, Israel has continued carrying out devastating strikes on Iranian military and strategic facilities.

• Overnight, the IDF struck Shahran, Tehran’s main gas depot, as well as one of Iran’s biggest oil refineries in Shahr Rey.

• Israel also bombed two vital Iranian energy sites, including one of the world’s largest—South Pars gas field.

• Around 50 fighter jets struck infrastructure related to Iran’s nuclear project, including Tehran’s nuclear headquarters.

• Israel struck Iran’s Defense Ministry headquarters, as well as the “headquarters of the SPND nuclear project, and additional targets,” the military said, adding that it carried out “an extensive series of strikes on targets in Tehran related to the Iranian regime’s nuclear weapons project.”

• Ali Shamkhani, one of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s top advisers, died after being severely injured in Israel’s initial strikes on Friday. In addition to advising Khamenei, Shamkhani was Iran’s national security chief for a decade.

But perhaps even more important than what Israel struck is the IDF’s announcement yesterday that it achieved full operational freedom in the air space around Tehran. In other words, Israeli jets can fly over the Iranian capital as they wish, without fearing Iran’s anti-aircraft systems.

Iran still has air defense systems outside of Tehran that it can move to the nation’s capital.

Slowly but surely, Israel is getting closer to its military goal, defined by Netanyahu yesterday as eliminating Tehran’s nuclear and ballistic missile program—what he called the “double threat from Iran to destroy the State of Israel.”

First, Israel took out much of Iran’s air defense systems, while also destroying missiles before they could be launched at Israel. At the same time, it eliminated senior military leadership and targeted Iranian nuclear facilities. Now, Israel is going after strategic sites and military headquarters.

In other words, Israel is slowly but surely grinding down Iran’s offensive and defensive capabilities on an unprecedented scale.

Yesterday, Netanyahu was blunt: “We will hit every site, every target belonging to the ayatollahs’ regime—everything that they’ve experienced until now will be nothing compared to what they will feel.”

Israel, however, has one major problem: It needs Washington to finish the job in Fordow.

Built deep underground in a mountain, Iran has produced most of its uranium in recent years in Fordow. If Fordow remains standing, the operation is incomplete. Israel, however, doesn’t have the bunker buster bombs needed to destroy it, nor does it have the aircraft that carry them.

Washington has both.

But even if the U.S. chooses to not attack Iran, it has another tool up its sleeve. Everything Israel has destroyed in Iran can be rebuilt, but if the White House follows up with an unequivocal message that Tehran cannot rebuild any of the destroyed infrastructure, that can help cement the damage—at least until the end of Trump’s term.

There’s also another possibility. According to Yedioth Ahronoth’s Yoav Zeitoun, Jerusalem and Washington, fully cognisant of the difficulty of destroying Iran’s nuclear program in its entirety, may use this war to bring Iran back to nuclear negotiations from a severely weakened position, forcing it to sign a far stronger deal—one with no expiration and real enforcement.

The IDF might even opt for another path, according to Zeitoun: A months-long Air Force campaign to wear down Iran’s defenses for its nuclear sites.

Either way, there is enormous uncertainty ahead, and there are likely many more surprises in store. This afternoon, the IDF Spokesperson said Iran’s attacks are set to continue, and that there may well be more missile impacts on Israeli cities in the coming days.