Iran warned not to respond to Israeli airstrikes — follow live

The country’s foreign ministry on Saturday said the attack was a serious threat to regional and international peace and security.

Egypt’s foreign ministry said it was gravely concerned over the escalation in the Middle East, as the country’s national carrier EgyptAir cancelled flights to Iraq’s capital Baghdad and northern city of Erbil.

The foreign ministry said it condemns all measures that threaten regional security and stability in a statement on Saturday.

Qatar’s foreign ministry has also condemned the airstrikes on Iran and urged restraint and dialogue.

One of the Israeli overnight airstrikes targeted the S-300 air defence system of Imam Khomeini International Airport, Tehran’s main hub, according to The New York Times.

The paper quoted two Iranian officials, who said at least three Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps missile bases were attacked near the capital.

The unnamed officials, one a member of the Revolutionary Guards, claimed a barrage of Israeli drone strikes were aimed at the Parchin military base in the outskirts of the city with one drone hitting the base while others were shot down.

At least three Revolutionary Guards missile bases were also targeted in the strikes, according to the officials.

The fact Iran is playing down the damage done by Israel will help it justify not retaliating, Ali Ansari, professor of Iranian history at St Andrews, told Times Radio.

“Given that they’re now arguing that the Israeli strike was pretty inconsequential, there’s no real justification for them to retaliate in response to this,” Ansari said.

With the truth of how badly Iran was hit still unclear, Ansari says the regime has said anyone who posts videos of strike sites or damage would be jailed for ten years.

He said: “The way they’ve been presenting it, they put out every possible measure to say that everything is normal, that the currency has regained a little bit of strength this morning. They’ve been showing videos of people out, living their lives normally, exercising in the morning, so on and so forth.

“I think it will be clearer over the next few days as to the sort of damage that’s been done.”

Iran has misread Israel’s tolerance for threat, Matthew Savill, director of military sciences at Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) has said.

Savill told Times Radio: “I think they have been misreading the Israeli tolerance for threat ever since October 7, which is that they have assumed that the rules of the game that they had been using remained in place, that they could effectively have their proxies launch kind of harassing attacks, and that the Israelis would tolerate that and that has been shown not to be true.”

He added that the ballistic missile threat from Iran is “significant” and the fact the US is providing a second battery of the THAAD air defence system to Israel is down to a “re-evaluation” of the attack earlier this month showing “more (ballistic missiles) got through than we originally suspected”.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said three health workers were injured, and dozens were detained at northern Gaza’s last functioning hospital in the Jabalia camp.

Kamal Adwan hospital “is still under siege, but we managed to get in touch with the staff”, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X.

“Three health workers and another employee have been injured, 44 health workers have been detained and four ambulances damaged,” he said.

On Friday Gaza’s health ministry accused Israeli forces of storming the hospital in a raid that left two children dead and hundreds of staff detained.

The Israeli military said its forces were operating around Kamal Adwan, but was “not aware of live fire and strikes in the area of the hospital”.

For weeks, since Iran launched a ballistic missile attack on Israel, the region has been waiting for the response.

Yet as ever, it is in the Iranian regime’s interests to downplay the severity of the strikes on its soil so that it does not look weak to its people, to its allies and to its enemies abroad. And it is in Israel’s interests to remain tight-lipped on exact targets and plans for further attacks.

What was not immediately clear was what the precise targets were; who, if anyone, was killed; and the extent of further strikes.

• Read in full: Why did Israel attack Iran and what happens next?

Zach Anders, reporting from Tel Aviv, told Times Radio he thinks Iran will take its time assessing how to respond to Israel’s strikes and the fact they were limited to military targets means they may decide not to.

“You got to also ask and question how deep does the Iranian desire go to involve itself in a full-scale conflict with Israel?” he said.

“Iran has a pretty robust Russian-made air defence system all throughout the country. If that was just exposed this morning and Israel was able to send all of its planes over — no damage to any of their aircraft Israel reporting, no pilots killed or wounded in this attack, but pretty widespread damage to more than a dozen military sites all across Iran — then we’ll probably see Iran sit out for at least a couple of days, assess, before they start to ramp up their public rhetoric again.”

Iran is “entitled and obligated to defend itself against external aggressive acts”, its foreign ministry said following pre-dawn airstrikes by Israel on Iranian military targets.

In a statement, Tehran called the Israeli attack a violation of international law. The ministry added that Iran “recognises its responsibilities towards regional peace and security”

Iraq has warned against global “silence” over “blatant” Israeli attacks in the Middle East.

Baghdad denounced what it sees as global inaction and accused Israel of expanding conflict after the strikes targeting Iran.

“The occupying Zionist entity continues its aggressive policies and widening the conflict in the region through blatant attacks that it carries out with impunity,” government spokesman Basim Alawadi said in a statement condemning “the international community’s silence” on Israeli actions.

By Gabriel Pogrund

As prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer’s dichotomy over the Middle East has not actually changed dramatically. Nor his ability to bring an end to the conflict.

His response to the strikes on Friday night speaks to that. By calling for restraint, he is adopting the least controversial course, and amplifying America’s own language. He appears to have learned, to deploy a Starmerish phrase, not to “over-steer” in response to events.

For now, his best stance — or at least the least divisive and the least likely to bind him to a given course or position — is to urge everyone to press pause. It incidentally costs him nothing to say that starts with Iran.

Hamas has strongly condemned the Israeli strikes on military targets in Iran calling it a “flagrant violation of Iranian sovereignty.”

The Palestinian Islamist movement, which is at war with Israel, described the attack as “Zionist aggression”.

“We consider this a flagrant violation of Iranian sovereignty and an escalation that threatens the security of the region and the safety of its people, placing full responsibility on the occupation for the consequences of this aggression, supported by the United States of America.”

By Gabriel Pogrund

Since October 7 transformed the Middle East and with it politics across the West, Keir Starmer has found himself in a thankless position.

For all its complexity, the conflict has repeatedly forced him to pick between two camps: one calling for the Jewish state’s right to defend against its adversaries, Hamas and Hezbollah, and their ultimate sponsor Iran; the other calling for empathy with Palestinians, accountability for Israel, and a halt to a conflict which has led to tens of thousands of deaths and continues to threaten to destabilise the region.

The problem for Starmer is he has been buffeted by events. Back in February, after months of pain and protest, he finally caved to his critics and called for a ceasefire in Gaza, departing from both Israel and America’s position. Weeks later, Iran sent cruise missiles, ballistic missiles and a swarm of drones to Israel. In an instant, Starmer condemned Tehran and supported Netanyahu’s government’s right to respond, underscoring the zigging and zagging he has been forced to do.

Iran said two of its soldiers were killed in the pre-dawn strikes on military installations inside the Islamic Republic, according to state television.

“The army of the Islamic Republic of Iran lost two of its fighters during the night when they faced projectiles from the criminal Zionist regime in defence of its territory,” the statement said.

The overnight strikes on Iran were designed to minimise casualties and to allow Iran to downplay the damage, according to the Washington Post.

The retaliation by the Israeli Air Force targeting strategic military sites were a larger-scale version of the response Israel launched in April following a drone and missile attack by Tehran, a person briefed on Israel’s plans told the paper on condition of anonymity.

Iraq is reopening its airspace and the resumption of flights following a brief suspension during Israeli strikes, according to state news agency INA.

Elsewhere, Emirati airline flydubai cancelled flights to Jordan, Iran, Iraq and Israel and diverted others on Saturday, a company spokesperson said.

Israeli opposition Leader Yair Lapid congratulated his country’s air force on the airstrikes, before saying Israel “should have exacted a much heavier price from Iran.”

“The decision not to attack strategic and economic targets in Iran was wrong,” Lapid wrote on X.

Lapid added that “Iran is the head of the axis of evil, and must pay a heavy price for its aggression”.

He praised the air force saying it “once again demonstrated operational capabilities at the highest level in the world and its air superiority”.

“Israel’s enemies know this morning that the IDF [Israel Defence Forces] is strong and can attack powerfully and reach anywhere.”

Malaysia denounced the Israeli strikes as a “clear violation of international law” that would further destabilise an already tense Middle East.

Malaysia’s foreign ministry urged an “immediate cessation of hostilities” to end what it called a “cycle of violence”.

The ministry cautioned that Israel’s ongoing attacks against its neighbours risked pushing the region nearer to an expanded conflict. “Israel’s actions seriously undermine regional security.”

The Israeli military said it intercepted two drones targeting Israel from Lebanon on Saturday following its strike on several military targets inside Iran.

“Following the sirens that sounded between 08.39 am (05.39 GMT) and 08.41 am in the Upper Galilee area, the IAF [Israeli Air Force] intercepted a UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] that crossed into Israel from Lebanon,” the military said in a statement.

It later added that a second drone had also crossed into Israel and been intercepted.

Keir Starmer said Iran should not respond to a wave of Israeli strikes and urged restraint on all sides.

“I am clear that Israel has the right to defend itself against Iranian aggression and I am equally clear that we need to avoid further regional escalation and urge all sides to show restraint,” the prime minister said at a press conference from the Commonwealth summit in Samoa.

“Iran should not respond. We will continue to work with allies to de-escalate the situation across the region.”

A senior official in President Biden’s administration said the US had pushed Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, for a “targeted and proportional” response and said it appears that was “precisely what transpired”.

“Should Iran choose to respond, we are fully prepared to once again defend against any attack,” the White House official said in a briefing with reporters. “This should be the end of this direct exchange of fire between Israel and Iran. Israel has made clear to the world that its response is now complete.”

Israel claims it successfully destroyed several key military targets in the Islamic Republic whilst refraining from hitting Iran’s nuclear and oil facilities.

The strikes on Iran started around 2.15am and continued into the early hours of the morning. An intelligence source with knowledge of the Israeli operations told the Times that “Israel completely neutralised Iran’s air defence systems.”

Iran said the attack had only caused “slight damage” and it had “successfully” intercepted airstrikes on military sites in Tehran, Khuzestan, and Ilam.

Saudi Arabia has condemned the military targeting of Iran as a “violation of its sovereignty” and international laws.

It urged all parties to exercise maximum restraint and called on the international community to take action towards de-escalation and ending conflicts in the region.

“The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia expresses its condemnation and denunciation” its foreign ministry said on X, adding the Israeli strikes “threatens the security and the stability of countries and peoples” in the Middle East.

Iran has announced the resumption of flights after a brief suspension following the Israeli attack that targeted several military sites in the country.

“Flights will return to normal from 9.00 am (0530 GMT) on Saturday,” the spokesperson of the Civil Aviation Organisation said, according to the official IRNA news agency.