That would make Tuesday’s attack less deadly than two militant gunmen who opened fire shortly beforehand at a light railway stop in Jaffa in central Israel, killing eight. The gunmen were “neutralized” by Israeli police.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps said it had launched the attack in response to Israel’s assassination last week of longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and of the Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran in July.
“If the Zionist regime responds to Iran’s operations, it will face devastating attacks,” the Guards said in a statement. The corps said they fired more than 200 missiles, while Israel put the number at 180.
Iran’s Mission to the UN insisted the missile attack was “legal, rational and legitimate.” In a statement on X, it also warned of a “crushing response,” if the Israelis “commit further acts of malevolence.”
In the southern Hezbollah-stronghold suburbs of Beirut, the Shiite militant group’s supporters fired celebratory gunfire from their AK-47s, Lebanese state media reported.
There were also Israeli media reports, as yet unconfirmed, of rockets not being intercepted and striking property in Tel Sheva, Dimona, Nabatim, Hora, Hod Hasharon, Be’er Sheva, and Rishon Lezion.