The Iranian government confirmed Khamenei\u2019s death.<\/p>\n
The attacks began with Israeli strikes Saturday morning \u2014 a workday in Iran \u2014 on Tehran, the capital, with residents speaking of attacks near Khamenei\u2019s compound, the presidential palace, Iran\u2019s National Security Council, the ministries of defense and intelligence, the Atomic Energy Organization and a military complex. <\/p>\n
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In Tehran there were scenes of panic, with residents racing to stock up on supplies, leaving shelves bare in grocery stores across the city. Others, heeding warnings from authorities of further strikes, decided to leave the capital. Images on social media showed highways leading out of Tehran choked with traffic. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s going to take 10 hours at least, but it doesn\u2019t matter,\u201d said Zainab, who was loading her car with whatever she could stuff inside for the drive to her sister\u2019s home in Iran\u2019s northeast. <\/p>\n
By the end of the day, the streets of Tehran appeared all but abandoned, with residents hunkering down for a night punctuated by the sounds of blasts reverberating across the capital.<\/p>\n
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a vociferous advocate for attacking Iran \u2014 and who has spent years urging Washington to do so \u2014 said the campaign would continue \u201cas long as needed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump, who long insisted Iran cannot have nuclear weapons, also addressed Iran\u2019s efforts in the Middle East in his video message. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe are going to ensure that the region\u2019s terrorist proxies can no longer destabilize the region or the world, and attack our forces,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd we will ensure that Iran does not obtain a nuclear weapon.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump also said U.S. military forces \u201cmay have casualties,\u201d adding, \u201cThat often happens in war.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Iranian Foreign Ministry, in a statement, said that \u201cIranians have never surrendered to aggression.\u201d <\/p>\n
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who was leading Iran\u2019s delegation in Oman-brokered negotiations, said the war on Iran was \u201cwholly unprovoked, illegal and illegitimate.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOur powerful armed forces are prepared for this day and will teach the aggressors the lesson they deserve,\u201d he wrote on X.<\/p>\n
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Iranians protest on Saturday in Tehran against attacks on Iran by Israel and the United States.<\/p>\n
(Majid Saeedi \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Israel\u2019s military said its attacks were the largest military flyover in its history, with some 200 warplanes dropping hundreds of munitions on about 500 objectives. <\/p>\n
Outside of Tehran, explosions could be heard in other cities, including Isfahan, Karaj, Kermanshah, Qom and Urmia, according to Iranian state media. An attack on the city of Minab struck a girls\u2019 school, killing at least 85 students and injuring dozens of others, state-run media said. <\/p>\n
Iran\u2019s Red Crescent later said 201 people were killed in attacks across the country, and that 24 out of Iran\u2019s 32 provinces were hit. More than 700 people were injured.<\/p>\n
Cellphone and internet communications were disrupted shortly after the attacks began but have since been restored.<\/p>\n
Iran struck back across the Middle East, with barrages reported on U.S. bases in the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. Debris from one of those missiles killed one person in the UAE; another struck a hotel in Dubai. A Kuwaiti airport was hit, but no injuries were reported.<\/p>\n
Iran also dispatched multiple waves of missiles to Israel, with residents in Jordan, Syria and Lebanon seeing vapor trails crisscrossing the skies above and the explosive sounds of interceptions. <\/p>\n
The waves of ordnance spurred airspace closures across the region, with many airlines suspending service to affected countries and leaving tens of thousands of people stranded. <\/p>\n
Araghchi informed his Iraqi counterpart, Fuad Hussein, on Saturday that Tehran will limit its response to U.S. military bases in the region, and that Iran was acting in self-defense.<\/p>\n
But the attacks nevertheless infuriated Arab governments. Many came out with statements excoriating Iran for what they described as an unprovoked attack on their sovereignty. <\/p>\n
Russia, whose ties with Iran have deepened in recent years, demanded Israel and the U.S. halt military operations. According to the Associated Press, U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said, \u201cWe insist on the immediate resumption of political and diplomatic settlement efforts \u2026 based on international law, mutual respect and a balance of interests.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a sign of the rapidly expanding impact of the war, messages purporting to be from Iran\u2019s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps were sent to ships ordering them to stay away from the Strait of Hormuz with \u201cimmediate effect.\u201d <\/p>\n
Shutting the strait, a strategic passageway through which one-fifth of global oil supplies pass, would probably lead to an immediate spike in energy prices and disrupt other shipping. <\/p>\n
The opening salvos of what promises to be a lengthy campaign come two days after the U.S. and Iran concluded a third round of Oman-brokered negotiations in Geneva aimed at reducing tensions and stopping the prospect of war.<\/p>\n
On Friday, Trump expressed displeasure with the pace of the talks, saying the Iranian side was not negotiating in \u201cgood faith\u201d or giving in to U.S. demands. But Oman\u2019s Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi said a deal was \u201cwithin reach.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Saturday, Albusaidi expressed dismay that \u201cactive and serious negotiations have yet again been undermined.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cNeither the interests of the United States nor the cause of global peace are well served by this. And I pray for the innocents who will suffer,\u201d he said in a statement on X. <\/p>\n
The American strikes on Iran drew immediate reaction on Capitol Hill as Democrats and a small bloc of Republicans accused the White House of sidelining Congress on actions they fear will trigger a broader conflict in the Middle East.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy the president\u2019s own words, \u2018American heroes may be lost.\u2019 That alone should have demanded the highest level of scrutiny, deliberation, and accountability, yet the president moved forward without seeking congressional authorization,\u201d Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), the vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a statement.<\/p>\n
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Fremont) called on lawmakers to back a measure he is co-sponsoring with Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) that would compel the administration to seek congressional approval before engaging in any further activity in Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe American people are tired of regime change wars that cost us billions of dollars and risk our lives,\u201d Khanna said in a video posted on X.<\/p>\n
As Democrats warned of constitutional overreach, other lawmakers rallied behind the president. <\/p>\n
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), the Senate Armed Services Committee chairman, said in a statement that Trump had taken \u201cdecisive action against the threat posed by the world\u2019s leading proliferator of terrorism, the Iranian regime.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a pivotal and necessary operation to protect Americans and American interests,\u201d Wicker said.<\/p>\n
Secretary of State Marco Rubio notified some members of Congress\u2019 Gang of Eight, which are the top four leaders in the House and Senate and top Democrats and Republicans on the House and Senate intelligence committees, according to CBS News.<\/p>\n
Bulos reported from El Obeid, Sudan, Ceballos from Washington, D.C., and special correspondent Mostaghim from Tehran.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TEHRAN\u00a0\u2014\u00a0The U.S. and Israel pummeled Iran early Saturday in an attack aimed at razing the Islamic Republic\u2019s nuclear…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":496824,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[227105,23,227106,8212,46584,16470,12530,1919,801,803,227104,3,212088,16178,22191,2830,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":{"0":"post-496823","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-86-year-old-khamenei","9":"tag-america","10":"tag-armed-group","11":"tag-attack","12":"tag-capital","13":"tag-country","14":"tag-deal","15":"tag-explosion","16":"tag-iran","17":"tag-israel","18":"tag-israeli-strike","19":"tag-news","20":"tag-nuclear-program","21":"tag-office","22":"tag-region","23":"tag-u-s","24":"tag-united-states","25":"tag-united-states-of-america","26":"tag-unitedstates","27":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","28":"tag-us","29":"tag-usa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=496823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496823\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/496824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=496823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=496823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=496823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}