Two people reported dead in Israel after Iranian strikes; Tehran says 78, mostly civilians, killed in Friday’s surprise Israeli attack and confirms new wave of retaliatory strikes on Israel
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the Middle East, where Iran has launched a wave of retaliatory attacks after Israel killed scores of people and injured hundreds in a surprise attack on Friday morning that it claimed was aimed at preventing its arch enemy from developing a nuclear weapon.
Explosions were heard over Jerusalem and Tel Aviv early on Saturday. Two people were reported to have been killed, one in Tel Aviv in an attack on Friday night and one in central Israel on Saturday morning. In Iran, fresh explosions were reported at an airport in Tehran that houses an air force base, and across the Hakimiyeh and Tehranpars neighbourhoods in the east of the capital.
Iran’s envoy to the UN security council, Amir Saeid Iravani, said 78 people including senior officials had been killed in the Israeli attacks on Friday, and that more than 320 were injured, most of them civilians. He said the US was complicit in the attacks and accused Israel of seeking “to kill diplomacy, to sabotage negotiations and to drag the region into wider conflict”.
The US role in the attack remained murky with President Donald Trump giving conflicting accounts as to his approval and foreknowledge. In the run-up to the Israeli 200-plane attack, Trump had publicly urged Israel to give diplomacy more of a chance, before US-Iranian talks that were planned for Sunday. But on Friday, the US president insisted he had been well informed of Israel’s plans and described the Israeli attack as “excellent”.
Iran launched a fresh wave of attacks on Israel early on Saturday, state media said, after Israel’s military reported it detected inbound missiles from Iran. “New round of Honest Promise 3 attacks,” state television reported, referring to the name of the Iranian military operation against Israel.
Israel’s ambulance service said 34 people were injured on Friday night in the Tel Aviv area, most with minor injuries. Police later said one person had died. On Saturday Israeli media quoted emergency services as saying one person had been killed and 19 injured by a direct Iranian strike on an area in central Israel.
A top-level UN conference on a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians scheduled for next week has been postponed, French president Emmanuel Macron said on Friday. France and Saudi Arabia had been due to co-chair the conference hosted by the UN general assembly in New York on 17-20 June, and Macron had been among leaders scheduled to attend.
Dozens of Palestinians were killed and injured after Israeli forces opened fire on people waiting to receive aid near a checkpoint north of Nuseirat, Al Jazeera reporter Anas al-Sharif and Drop Site News reported, in the latest such massacre. More Palestinians were killed when Israeli gunboats targets the tents of displaced people on a beach north-west of Gaza City, al-Sharif reported. It was impossible to independently verify the reports as Israel has barred foreign journalists from entering the territory. It has also cut off internet to Gaza since Thursday.
Israel closed all checkpoints to the Israeli-occupied West Bank as the country attacked Iran, a military official said Friday. The move sealed off entry and exit to the territory, meaning that Palestinians could not leave without special coordination.