Author: AFP

Iran said early Wednesday it fired hypersonic missiles at Israel in the latest round of overnight strikes between the archfoes, hours after Donald Trump demanded the Islamic republic’s “unconditional surrender”.

The US president insists Washington has played no part in ally Israel’s bombing campaign, but also warned Iran his patience is wearing thin as the conflict enters a sixth day.

Israeli warplanes targeted the Iranian capital before dawn Wednesday after the military issued a warning for civilians to leave one district for their safety.

The Israeli military later said it struck weapons manufacturing sites and a facility used to make centrifuges in Tehran.

Iran told residents of Tel Aviv to prepare for an attack, with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps claiming its hypersonic Fattah-1 missiles were “repeatedly shaking the shelters” in the commercial hub.

“The 11th wave of the proud Operation Honest Promise 3 using Fattah-1 missiles” was carried out, the Guards said in a statement broadcast on state television.

Hypersonic missiles travel at more than five times the speed of sound and can manoeuvre mid-flight, making them harder to track and intercept.

Iran also sent a “swarm of drones” towards Israel, where the army said it intercepted two over the Dead Sea area.

World powers have scrambled for an offramp, hoping to prevent the conflict from spiralling into a region-engulfing war.

In separate phone calls with his Iranian counterpart and US envoy Steve Witkoff on Tuesday night, Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty urged a diplomatic solution.

Trump fuelled speculation about American intervention when he made a hasty exit from the G7 summit in Canada, where the leaders of the club of wealthy democracies jointly called for a ceasefire.

Back in Washington on Tuesday, Trump demanded the Islamic republic’s “unconditional surrender”.

He also boasted that the United States could easily assassinate Iran’s supreme leader.

“We know exactly where the so-called ‘Supreme Leader’ is hiding. He is an easy target, but is safe there — We are not going to take him out (kill!), at least not for now,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

He met with his National Security Council to discuss the conflict, ending after an hour and 20 minutes with no immediate public statement.

While he has repeatedly vowed to avoid wading into the “forever wars” of the Middle East, Trump ordered the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier to the region along with a number of US military aircraft.

US officials stressed he has not yet made a decision about any intervention.

– Evacuations –

Despite international alarm, neither side has backed off from the long-range blitz that began Friday, when Israel launched an unprecedented bombing campaign targeting Iranian nuclear and military facilities.

Israel claims its attacks have killed senior Iranian commander Ali Shadmani as well as his predecessor, Gholam Ali Rashid.

Residential areas in both countries have suffered deadly strikes since the fighting broke out, and foreign governments have scrambled to evacuate their citizens.

More than 700 foreigners living in Iran have crossed into neighbouring Azerbaijan and Armenia since Israel launched its campaign, according to government figures.

Among those evacuated were citizens of Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, along with others from Germany, Spain, Italy, Serbia, Romania, Portugal, the United States, the United Arab Emirates, China and Vietnam, a government source told AFP.

The United States said it was closing its embassy in Jerusalem until Friday amid the growing conflict, but there was no announcement about helping Americans leave the “crisis area”.

Fearing violence, many residents of Tehran have fled.

On Tuesday, long queues stretched outside bakeries and petrol stations as people rushed to stock up on fuel and basic supplies.

A cyberattack on Tuesday crippled Sepah Bank, one of Iran’s main state-owned banks, the Fars news agency reported.

With air raid sirens regularly screaming over Tel Aviv, some people relocated to an underground parking lot below a shopping mall.

“We’ve decided to permanently set camp here until it’s all clear, I guess,” Mali Papirany, 30, told AFP.

– Nuclear facilities –

After decades of enmity and a prolonged shadow war, Israel said its surprise air campaign was aimed at preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons — an ambition Tehran denies.

Iranian media reported several explosions Tuesday in the central city of Isfahan, home to nuclear facilities.

The UN’s nuclear watchdog said there appeared to have been “direct impacts on the underground enrichment halls” at Iran’s Natanz facility.

Israel has maintained ambiguity regarding its own atomic activities, but the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) says it has 90 nuclear warheads.

The conflict derailed a running series of nuclear talks between Tehran and Washington, with Iran saying after the start of Israel’s campaign that it would not negotiate with the United States while under attack.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Trump had a critical role to play in restarting diplomacy with Iran, where attempts at regime change would bring “chaos”.

China accused Trump of “pouring oil” on the conflict, while Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu of being “the biggest threat to the security of the region”.

Since Friday, at least 24 people have been killed in Israel and hundreds wounded, according to Netanyahu’s office.

Iran said on Sunday that Israeli strikes had killed at least 224 people, including military commanders, nuclear scientists and civilians. It has not issued an updated toll since then.

Pro-Palestinian activists seeking to march to Gaza with the stated aim of breaking Israel’s blockade on the territory were stopped Friday in both Libya and Egypt, organisers said.

“Forty participants of the Global March to Gaza have had their passports taken at a checkpoint on the way out of Cairo,” organisers said in a statement.

“They are being held in the heat and not allowed to move,” the statement said, adding that another “15 are being held at hotels”. The activists are from France, Spain, Canada, Turkey and the United Kingdom, it said.

“We are a peaceful movement and we are complying with Egyptian law.”

The group urged embassies to help secure their release so they could complete their voyage.

It later sent video footage to AFP showing Egyptian security forces intervening to break up impromptu sit-ins.

Women were “molested and carried like cattle onto the bus”, according to a message from Florence Heskia, one of the protesters stuck on the road.

At least six nuclear scientists were killed Friday in Israel’s attacks on Iran, media outlets in the Islamic republic reported.

Tasnim news agency named the six scientists including Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi, who was the president of the Islamic Azad University of Iran.

Fereydoun Abbasi, a former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, was also among the scientists killed, it added.

Friday’s strikes hit multiple targets across Iran including residential buildings in Tehran as well as key nuclear enrichment facility in Iran’s centre.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards chief Hossein Salami and armed forces chief of staff Mohammad Bagheri were killed in the Israeli operation.

Israel pounded Iran in a series of air raids on Friday, striking 100 targets including Tehran’s nuclear and military sites, and killing the armed forces’ chief of staff, the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and top nuclear scientists.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned Israel it faced a “bitter and painful” fate over the attack, which also killed a senior Guards commander according to Iranian media.

Iran had launched 100 drones in response towards Israel whose defences were working to intercept, the Israeli military said.

US President Donald Trump told Fox News he had advance notice of the Israeli strikes which Israel’s military said involved 200 fighter jets. Trump also stressed that Tehran “cannot have a nuclear bomb”.

The United States also underlined that it was not involved in the Israeli action, warning Tehran not to attack its personnel or interests.

But Tehran said the United States would be “responsible for consequences” as Israel’s operation “cannot have been carried out without the coordination and permission of the United States”.

Israel’s operation struck at the “heart of Iran’s nuclear enrichment programme”, taking aim at the atomic facility in Natanz and nuclear scientists, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.

The operation against Iran will “continue as many days as it takes,” Netanyahu said, adding in a later video statement that the initial strikes were “very successful”.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards leader Hossein Salami and armed forces Chief of Staff Mohammad Bagheri were killed in the Israeli operation, said Iranian media.

Iranian state media said residential buildings in Tehran were hit as well, killing a number of civilians including women and children.

Air traffic was halted at Tehran’s main international airport Imam Khomeini, while neighbouring Iraq has also closed its airspace and suspended all flights at all airports, state media reported.

Israel declared a state of emergency, likewise closing its airspace, with Defence Minister Israel Katz anticipating retaliatory action from Tehran.

“Following the State of Israel’s preemptive strike against Iran, a missile and drone attack against the State of Israel and its civilian population is expected in the immediate future,” Katz said.

An Israeli military official added that the Israeli army believed that Iran had the ability to strike Israel “any minute”.

– ‘Might blow’ deal –

Oil prices surged 12 percent while stocks sank on the Israeli strikes, which came after Trump’s warning of a “massive conflict” in the region.

Trump had also said the United States was drawing down staff in the Middle East, after Iran threatened to target US military bases in the region if conflict breaks out.

Trump said he believed a “pretty good” deal on Iran’s nuclear programme was “fairly close”, but said that an Israeli attack on its arch foe could wreck the chances of an agreement.

The US leader did not disclose the details of a conversation on Monday with Netanyahu, but said: “I don’t want them going in, because I think it would blow it.”

Trump quickly added: “Might help it actually, but it also could blow it.”

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned Iran not respond to Israeli strikes by hitting US bases, saying Washington was not involved.

“Let me be clear: Iran should not target US interests or personnel,” Rubio said in a statement.

Prior to Friday’s attack, Iran had threatened to hit US bases in the Middle East if conflict were to erupt.

“All its bases are within our reach, we have access to them, and without hesitation we will target all of them in the host countries,” Iran’s Defence Minister Aziz Nasirzadeh said this week.

With the violence raising questions on whether a sixth round of talks planned between the US and Iran will still take place on Sunday in Oman, Trump said however that Washington is still “hoping to get back to the negotiating table”.

Confirming Natanz among targets, the UN’s nuclear watchdog said it was “closely monitoring” the situation.

“The agency is in contact with Iranian authorities regarding radiation levels. We are also in contact with our inspectors in the country,” International Atomic Energy Agency head Rafael Grossi said.

Air India said that the 242 passengers and crew on board the London-bound passenger plane that crashed on Thursday included 169 Indian passengers, as well as British, Canadian and Portuguese nationals.

“The flight… was carrying 242 passengers and crew members on board the Boeing 787-8 aircraft”, it said in a statement. Among the 230 passengers, “169 are Indian nationals, 53 are British nationals, one Canadian national and seven Portuguese nationals”, it said.

“The injured are being taken to the nearest hospitals,” it said, adding that “Air India is giving its full cooperation to the authorities investigating this incident”.

Spain, which has strongly criticised Israel’s offensive in Gaza, has cancelled a contract to buy 168 firing posts and 1,680 anti-tank missiles from Israeli defence company Rafael, Spanish media reported Wednesday.

The deal was worth 287.5 million euros ($327 million), according to top-selling daily Spanish newspaper El País, which cited unnamed government sources.

The equipment was to be manufactured in Spain under licence from Rafael.

Spanish defence ministry sources told AFP that the government “has begun a process to revoke licences of Israeli origin” and was working to redirect its procurement programmes “with the goal of achieving greater technological independence and autonomy”.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s criticisms of the offensive in Gaza infuriated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government last year by recognising a Palestinian state.

In late April, Spain cancelled a contract to buy bullets from another Israeli company, IMI Systems, following pressure from the Socialist-led government’s far-left coalition partner Sumar — a move swiftly condemned by Israel.

Labour Minister Yolanda Diaz, the founder of Sumar, said at the time that Spain could not engage in “business with a genocidal government… that is massacring the Palestinian people”.

Sanchez’s government said it halted weapons transactions with Israel after the start of the war following Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

But according to Centre Delas, a Barcelona-based think tank specialising in security and defence, the government has granted 46 contracts worth more than 1 billion euros to Israeli companies based on data published on a public tenders platform.

A US and Israeli-backed group operating aid sites in the Gaza Strip announced the temporary closure of the facilities on Wednesday, with the Israeli army warning that roads leading to distribution centres were “considered combat zones”.

The announcement by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) follows a string of deadly incidents near the distribution sites it operates that have sparked condemnation from the United Nations.

Israeli bombardment on Wednesday killed at least 16 people in the Gaza Strip, including 12 in a single strike on a tent housing displaced people, the Palestinian territory’s civil defence agency told AFP.

On Tuesday, 27 people were killed in southern Gaza when Israeli troops opened fire near a GHF aid site, with the military saying the incident was under investigation.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the deaths of people seeking food aid as “unacceptable”, and the world body’s rights chief condemned attacks on civilians as “a war crime” following a similar incident near the same site on Sunday.

Israel recently eased its blockade of Gaza, but the UN says the territory’s entire population remains at risk of famine.

– UN vote –

The GHF said its “distribution centres will be closed for renovation, reorganisation and efficiency improvement work” on Wednesday and would resume operations on Thursday.

The Israeli army, which confirmed the temporary closure, warned against travelling “on roads leading to the distribution centres, which are considered combat zones”.

The GHF, officially a private effort with opaque funding, began operations a week ago but the UN and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with it over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives.

Israeli authorities and the GHF, which uses contracted US security, have denied allegations that the Israeli army shot at civilians rushing to pick up aid packages.

Food shortages in Gaza have propelled fresh international calls for an end to the war, but a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas remains elusive.

The UN Security Council will vote Wednesday on a resolution calling for a ceasefire and humanitarian access to Gaza, a measure expected to be vetoed by key Israel backer the United States.

– ‘A trap’ –

At a hospital in southern Gaza, the family of Reem al-Akhras, who was killed in Tuesday’s shooting near GHF’s facility, were beside themselves with grief.

“She went to bring us some food, and this is what happened to her,” her son Zain Zidan said, his face streaked with tears.

Akhras’s husband, Mohamed Zidan, said “every day unarmed people” were being killed.

“This is not humanitarian aid — it’s a trap.”

The Israeli military maintains that its forces do not prevent Gazans from collecting aid.

Army spokesperson Effie Defrin said the Israeli soldiers had fired towards suspects who “were approaching in a way that endangered” the troops, adding that the “incident is being investigated”.

UN human rights chief Volker Turk called attacks against civilians “unconscionable” and said they “constitute a grave breach of international law and a war crime”.

The International Committee of the Red Cross meanwhile said “Gazans face an “unprecedented scale and frequency of recent mass casualty incidents”.

– Activists’ boat –

Scenes of hunger in Gaza have also sparked fresh solidarity with Palestinians, and a boat organised by an international activist coalition was sailing toward Gaza, aiming to deliver aid.

The boat from the Freedom Flotilla Coalition departed Sicily Sunday carrying a dozen people, including environmental activist Greta Thunberg, along with fruit juices, milk, tinned food and protein bars.

“Together, we can open a people’s sea corridor to Gaza,” the coalition said.

But Israel’s military said Tuesday it was ready to “protect” the country’s maritime space.

When asked about the Freedom Flotilla vessel, army spokesman Defrin said “for this case as well, we are prepared”, declining to go into detail.

Israel has stepped up its offensive in Gaza in what it says is a renewed push to defeat the Palestinian group Hamas, whose October 2023 attack sparked the war.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said at least 4,240 people have been killed since Israel resumed its offensive on March 18, taking the war’s overall toll to 54,510, mostly civilians.

Hamas’s 2023 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, also mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

The army said three of its soldiers had been killed in northern Gaza, bringing the number of Israeli troops killed in the territory since the start of the war to 424.