TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Iran fired a new wave of missile attacks at Israel early Monday, killing at least eight people, while Israel warned hundreds of thousands of people in the middle of Tehran to evacuate ahead of new strikes.
The warning came on the fourth day of the conflict, when the Israeli military claimed it had achieved air superiority above the Iranian capital and could fly over the city without facing major threats. The military has issued similar evacuation warnings for civilians in parts of Gaza and Lebanon ahead of strikes.
The warning affected up to 330,000 people in a part of central Tehran that includes the country’s state TV and police headquarters.
Iran’s state-run news agency reported that state-run television abruptly stopped a live broadcast after an Israeli strike.
During the broadcast, an Iranian state television reporter said the studio was filling with dust after “the sound of aggression against the homeland.” Suddenly, an explosion occurred, cutting the screen behind her as she hurried off camera. The broadcast quickly switched to prerecorded programs.
“At this time, we can say that we have achieved full aerial superiority over Tehran’s skies,” said Israeli military spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin. The military said it had destroyed more than 120 surface-to-surface missile launchers in central Iran, a third of Iran’s total.
Israeli military officials also said fighter jets had struck 10 command centers in Tehran belonging to Iran’s Quds Force, an elite arm of its Revolutionary Guard that conducts military and intelligence operations outside Iran.
The Israeli strikes “amount to a deep and comprehensive blow to the Iranian threat,” Defrin said.
Iran, meanwhile, announced it had launched some 100 missiles and vowed further retaliation for sweeping attacks on its military and nuclear infrastructure that have killed at least 224 people in the country since Friday.
So far, 24 people have been killed in Israel and more than 500 injured, Israeli officials said, after Iran launched more than 370 missiles and hundreds of drones.
One missile fell near the American consulate in Tel Aviv, with its blast waves causing minor damage, U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee said on X. He added that no American personnel were injured.
The latest conflict began when Israel launched an assault on Iran’s top military leaders, uranium enrichment sites and nuclear scientists that it said was necessary to prevent its longtime adversary from getting any closer to building an atomic weapon.
Iran maintains that its nuclear program is peaceful, and the U.S. and others have assessed that Tehran has not pursued a nuclear weapon since 2003. But the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency has repeatedly warned that the country has enough enriched uranium to make several nuclear bombs if it chooses to do so.
Iran has retaliated by firing waves of ballistic missiles at Israel. The back-and-forth has raised concerns about all-out war between the countries and propelled the region, already on edge, into even greater upheaval.
Explosions rock Tel Aviv, Petah Tikva, and Haifa oil refinery
Powerful explosions, likely from Israel’s air-defense systems intercepting Iranian missiles, rocked Tel Aviv shortly before dawn Monday, sending plumes of black smoke into the sky over the coastal city.
Authorities in the central Israeli city of Petah Tikva said Iranian missiles hit a residential building there, charring concrete walls, shattering windows and ripping the walls off multiple apartments.
