Netanyahu says Israel hit Iran hard; Khamenei says damage should not be exaggerated

JERUSALEM/CAIRO - Israel’s air strikes “hit hard” Iran’s defences and missile production, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Oct 27, as Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said the country was considering its response.

With war raging in Gaza and Lebanon, direct confrontation between Israel and Iran risks spiralling into a regional conflagration. But a day after the air strikes, there was no sign they would spark another round of escalation.

However,

heavy fighting in Lebanon between Israeli forces and Iran-backed Hezbollah,

which sharply intensified over recent weeks, continued on Oct 27, with an Israeli air strike killing eight people in a residential block in Sidon, medics said.

“The air force attacked throughout Iran. We hit hard Iran’s defence capabilities and its ability to produce missiles that are aimed at us,” Mr Netanyahu said in a speech, calling the attack “precise and powerful” and saying it met all its objectives.

The Islamic Republic has not signalled how it will respond to Oct 26’s long-anticipated strikes, which involved scores of fighter jets bombing targets near the capital Tehran and in the western provinces of Ilam and Khuzestan.

The UN Security Council will likely meet to discuss the attack on Oct 28, diplomats said.

The heavily armed arch-enemies have engaged in a cycle of retaliatory moves against each other for months, with Oct 26’s strike coming after an Iranian missile barrage on Oct 1, much of which Israel said was downed by its air defences.

Ayatollah Khamenei said Israel’s calculations “should be disrupted”. The attack on Iran, which killed four soldiers and caused some damage, “should neither be downplayed nor exaggerated”, he said.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Iran was not looking for war but would give an “appropriate response”.

US President Joe Biden called for a halt to escalation that has raised fears of a wider Middle East war arising from the year-old Israeli-Hamas conflict in Gaza, and Israel’s thrust into south Lebanon to stop Hezbollah rocketing northern Israel.

Separately, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said Iran was no longer able to use its allies Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon against Israel. The two groups “are no longer an effective tool” of Tehran, he said in a speech.

Gallant added that Hamas was no longer functioning as a military network in Gaza, and that Hezbollah’s senior command and most of its missile capabilities had been eliminated.

Hamas has repeatedly said it is still able to function militarily, and Israel has recently conducted major new operations in devastated north Gaza against what it calls regrouping Hamas militants.

Hezbollah has said its command structure remains intact and that it retains significant missile capabilities.

Lebanon fighting

On Oct 27, the Israeli military urged residents of 14 villages in southern Lebanon to evacuate immediately and move north of the Awali river.

An Israeli strike on Sidon, a city in coastal south Lebanon, killed at least eight people and wounded 25 on Oct 27, the country's Health Ministry said.

Elsewhere in the south, a strike on Zawtar al-Sharkiya killed three people and an Oct 26 bombing of Marjayoun killed five, it said.

In all, Israeli strikes killed 19 people in Lebanon on Oct 26, the Health Ministry said. At least 2,672 people have been killed and 12,468 injured in the year since Israel and Hezbollah began exchanging rocket fire, it said late on Oct 27.

Israel said four of its soldiers were killed in south Lebanon fighting.

Hezbollah also said it had fired a large missile salvo at the Zevulon military industries facility north of Haifa in northern Israel. Hezbollah rockets hit a house and cars, and rescue crews responded to put out the fire.

One woman was seriously injured, according to Israel’s ambulance service. REUTERS