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June 14, 2025, 4:00 p.m. ET18 minutes ago
Live Updates: Israel Expands Attack to Include Iran’s Oil and Gas Industry
Both countries kept up airstrikes on each other for a second day, fueling fears of a wider conflict that could draw in the United States and other major powers.
4 new updates
Updated
June 14, 2025, 4:00 p.m. ET18 minutes ago
Aaron BoxermanFarnaz FassihiNatan OdenheimerFrancesca Regalado and Adam Rasgon
Here’s the latest.
Israel widened its targets in Iran on Saturday to strike at oil and gas installations, as leaders of both countries vowed to intensify their attacks despite international pleas for de-escalation.
In sweeping attacks that started early Friday, Israel focused on Iranian nuclear sites, air defenses and military targets. But the strikes on Saturday went a step further, targeting an energy industry that is vital to Iran’s economy, according to Iran’s oil ministry. Israeli strikes also appeared to focus on Tehran, the Iranian capital, taking out the city’s air defenses.
The Israeli strikes have killed more than 70 people, including four top security chiefs, and damaged Iran’s main nuclear site at Natanz.
Iran, in turn, has launched barrages of ballistic missiles and drones at Israel, targeting what it says are military assets, but with less apparent success. At least three people have been killed and dozens wounded in the attacks.
It is the most intense fighting in decades between the two heavily armed countries, and it has stirred anxiety over the prospect of an increasingly deadly conflict that could draw in the United States and other major powers.
Israel has conducted roughly 150 strikes on Iran over two days, while Iranian forces have fired roughly 200 ballistic missiles at Israeli territory in addition to scores of drones, according to an Israeli military official.
Fars News, an Iranian outlet affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards, reported on Saturday that Israel had struck the South Pars gas field in the Bushehr province, which was on fire, and a refinery in the city of Asalouieh. The Israeli military declined to comment.
The Iranian state news media said that the Israeli targets overnight had included a military jet hangar at Tehran’s Mehrabad airport.
Across Israel, people huddled in reinforced bomb shelters as air-raid sirens wailed outside, warning of incoming missile fire. Loud explosions reverberated overhead as Israel’s antimissile defenses intercepted many of the incoming missiles.
Here’s what else to know:
Dozens dead in Iran: Precise casualty figures in Iran could not be confirmed, but Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, Amir Saeid Iravani, told the Security Council that Israel’s strikes had killed 78 people and injured about 300.
Central Israel: On Saturday morning, at least two people were dead and about 19 injured in central Israel in the wake of an Iranian missile attack, according to Israeli health workers. Israel’s emergency service published footage from the scene showing heavily damaged homes that appeared to have been bombed. A third person was killed earlier during an Iranian missile barrage in Ramat Gan, a suburb east of Tel Aviv, the police said.
Nuclear talks scuttled: The salvos of missiles scuttled talks between the United States and Iran on the future of Iran’s nuclear program. The talks had been scheduled to resume in Oman on Sunday, but American and Omani officials said they had been canceled. Read more ›
Washington’s view: The United States’ possible role in the spiraling conflict remains unclear. While Israeli officials had hoped the Trump administration would participate in a joint attack, Secretary of State Marco Rubio denied U.S. involvement in the strikes. But President Trump also did not call for Israel to rein in its assault, and U.S. officials said they were moving warships and other military assets in the Middle East to help protect Israel and American troops in the region.
Top Iranians killed: Iran’s Armed Forces issued a statement on Saturday saying Israel had killed two additional senior military commanders, bringing to six the total number of Iran’s top military chain of command killed since Friday. Ali Shamkhani, who had been overseeing the nuclear talks with the United States, had also been killed officials said.
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Johnatan Reiss
June 14, 2025, 3:43 p.m. ET34 minutes ago
Johnatan ReissThe reporter visited impact sites in Tel Aviv and its suburbs that were hit in Iranian missile attacks on Friday night and Saturday morning.
Missiles fired by Iran destroyed residential buildings in central Tel Aviv and in its suburb of Rishon LeZion on Saturday, leaving two people dead and several wounded.
A chorus of alarms from damaged cars and buildings wailed on Saturday afternoon through the empty streets of central Tel Aviv. Iran’s missile attack the night before had left a gaping hole in one high-rise and had blown out windows for a block around.
Six miles south, residents of the quiet suburb of Rishon LeZion were piling up shattered roof tiles and glass along the sidewalks after a projectile killed two of their neighbors in a two-story home on Saturday morning. Those who lived close to the impact site were busy gathering their belongings to evacuate to temporary housing.
The Israeli government said 17 missile impact sites had been identified across the country after Iran launched hundreds of missiles and drones at Israel between Friday evening and Saturday morning. The strikes were in retaliation for Israeli attacks earlier in the day. Three civilians in Israel were killed and over 170 wounded, including seven soldiers, the authorities said.
It was not immediately clear whether the damage and deaths had been caused by the missiles themselves or interceptors sent to shoot them down, or falling fragments of both. The Israeli military said both missiles and interceptors had hit areas in Israel but declined to give details.
The damaged high-rise in central Tel Aviv was near a government quarter and the military’s headquarters. Residents who had evacuated from their high-rise complex after it was struck on Friday lined up to speak with a municipal official at a makeshift checkpoint near the impact site. Many appeared shaken.
Amit Tzur-Amrani, 26, said she and her husband were huddled in a fortified room in their apartment on Friday when the air-raid alarms went off after 9 p.m. Then there was a loud blast and smoke poured into their shelter.
“We covered our faces with towels to escape,” she said. “I was afraid I’d die in the shelter.”
Struggling to see in the dark, they ran through a hallway and found their entire floor was wrecked. “You couldn’t recognize anything,” she said. “There’s no more house.”
Like dozens of residents in the area, she will be housed in a hotel until the building can be made habitable again. Because her building was directly hit, Ms. Tzur-Amrani will not be allowed to enter it to retrieve belongings for at least a week, the municipal office said.
People from the Rishon LeZion suburb — and some curious visitors — came out to inspect the damage of a strike that had killed two people in a two-story home, one of hundreds of houses in the dense neighborhood of palm-lined streets, cul-de-sacs and alleys.
Shards of glass and plastic littered the street for at least 100 yards. Cars had shattered windshields, and many houses were missing roof tiles.
The sight was not entirely unfamiliar to residents. Rishon LeZion, like other cities in central and southern Israel, has previously been hit by some of the thousands of rockets launched from Gaza since the Oct. 7, 2023, attack that ignited the war there.
“We are already practiced,” said Tzabari Malachi, 65, who lives near the destroyed home. On Saturday, he watched the tumult on the street from his balcony.
Still, he said, the effect of the recent strikes in his neighborhood is different, both materially and emotionally.
Mr. Malachi said he was at home with his wife, sons and two of his small grandchildren when the missile hit, around 5 a.m. on Saturday. The impact shook his house and blew open the door to his fortified room. After a few minutes, he emerged onto the street to see ambulances and bloodied people rushing for help.
“It’s harrowing, beyond explanation,” Mr. Malachi said.
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Where Israel Attacked Iran
300 mi.500 km.
© Mapbox © OpenStreetMap
Iran
10 mi.20 km.
© Mapbox © OpenStreetMap
By Martín González Gómez, Julie Walton Shaver, Pablo Robles and Daniel Wood
Farnaz Fassihi
June 14, 2025, 3:33 p.m. ET44 minutes ago
Farnaz Fassihi
Iran’s Armed Forces issued a statement on Saturday saying Israel had killed two additional senior military commanders: Gen. Gholamreza Mehrabi, the deputy intelligence chief of the Armed Forces, and Gen. Mehdi Rabbani, the deputy commander of operations for the Armed Forces. The statement did not provide additional details on their deaths, but noted three more nuclear scientists, some along with their wives and children, had been killed in targeted assassinations on their homes.
Farnaz Fassihi
June 14, 2025, 3:33 p.m. ET44 minutes ago
Farnaz Fassihi
Israel has killed at least six senior commanders from Iran’s top military chain of command since Friday.
Israel Expands Attack to Include Iran’s Oil and Gas Industry
Image
A natural gas refinery at the South Pars gas field in Bushehr Province, Iran, in 2019.Credit...Vahid Salemi/Associated Press
In a widening of its military campaign against Iran, Israel targeted Iran’s critical energy infrastructure at gas and petrochemical refineries on Saturday, according to a statement from Iran’s oil ministry.
The statement said Israeli drones had targeted a section of the South Pars Gas Field in Bushehr Province. South Pars is one of the world’s largest gas fields and a critical part of Iran’s energy production. The Fajr Jam Gas Refining Company was also targeted, the ministry said.
Iran is one of the world’s major energy producers. It has the second-largest gas reserves in the world and fourth-largest crude oil reserves.
Videos posted to social media and verified by The Times showed a large fire burning at the South Pars gas refinery in Iran’s southern Bushehr Province.
The explosions took production lines at both facilities offline, the ministry statement said, even as firefighters and emergency crew had largely contained the blazes.
An Israeli military spokesman did not respond to a request for comment on the strikes.
The attacks on Iran’s energy infrastructure on the second day of the Israel-Iran conflict represented a widening of the fighting, which began on Friday with Israel launching attacks on Iran’s military and nuclear sites and assassinating its top military chain of command. Iran retaliated by firing ballistic missiles and drones on Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Both sides have said the fighting will go on despite international calls for de-escalation.
“We have entered the second phase of the war, which is extremely dangerous and destructive,” said Abdollah Babakhani, an expert on Iran’s energy sector based in Germany. Attacking Iran’s energy infrastructure, he added, “will be a disaster because repairing them will be costly and take time.”
A senior official at the oil ministry said that the ministry had previously placed its staff at refineries and energy fields on full alert and its emergency and fire crews on highest alert, anticipating that Israel might target energy infrastructure. The official said that damages were still being assessed and officials were holding a series of emergency meetings.
Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said that in light of Israel’s attacks across Iran, the country would launch a fiercer retaliation strike on Israel, Iranian news media reported.
Hamid Hosseini, a member of Iran’s Chamber of Commerce energy committee, said that, in addition to the two attacks on infrastructure sites, Israel had also struck an office building in northern Tehran that belonged to the oil ministry. The building housed an engineering department involved in expanding Iran’s oil and energy fields, Mr. Hosseini said in a telephone interview.
Iran has been battling an acute energy crisis for months because of gas shortages. The country’s power plants and electricity production rely nearly completely on natural gas, and to manage the shortages, the government started scheduling widespread power cuts for residential, commercial and industrial usage.
The government has said the gas shortage is because demand outmatches production and economic sanctions have crippled Iran’s ability to upgrade and invest in its energy infrastructure.
Iranian news media reported that air defenses had been activated in several locations, including Bandar Abbas, Tabriz, Isfahan and Tehran, because of Israeli attacks late on Saturday night. Bandar Abbas is a major shipping port, and Isfahan and Tabriz both have energy refineries and military bases. Residents of Tehran said they could hear loud explosions and air defenses firing nonstop.
Tehran’s governor announced that government employees of Tehran province would work remotely until Wednesday with the exception of military, intelligence, banks, medical centers and municipal services, the state news agency IRNA reported.
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David E. Sanger
June 14, 2025, 3:17 p.m. ET1 hour ago
David E. Sanger White House reporter
President Trump gave his account of his call with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Saturday afternoon — hours after the Kremlin released its version — saying that the two men had “talked at length” about the conflict between Israel and Iran, but offering no details. “He feels, as do I, this war in Israel-Iran should end,” he wrote on social media, “to which I explained, his war should also end.” He said the initial purpose of the call was “to very nicely wish me a Happy Birthday.”
Stanley Reed
June 14, 2025, 3:16 p.m. ET1 hour ago
Stanley Reed
Iran’s vital oil industry is vulnerable in the escalating conflict.
Image
Rows of oil pipelines in the foreground leading to a hilly area with oil tanks.
Nearly all of Iran’s oil exports come from the Port of Kharg Island Oil Terminal on a small coral land mass in the northern part of the Persian Gulf off the Iranian coast.Credit...Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu Agency, via Getty Images
The conflict between Israel and Iran appeared to be spreading on Saturday to Iran’s energy infrastructure, raising fears about energy supplies from the Middle East.
Iran’s oil ministry blamed Israeli drones for attacking part of the South Pars natural gas field, one of the world’s largest, and a refinery, causing fires at both.
It is not clear how far Israel intends to go in attacking Iran’s energy facilities, a crucial source of export cash for the country as well as domestic energy that looks particularly vulnerable.
Other Iranian installations are at risk, analysts say.
“There is one clear target that would make it very easy if Israel or the United States wanted to impact Iran’s oil exports,” Homayoun Falakshahi, senior analyst for crude oil at Kpler, a research firm, said during a webinar on Friday. “And this is Kharg Island.”
Nearly all of Iran’s oil exports leave from tankers at berths around Kharg Island, a small coral land mass in the northern part of the Persian Gulf off the Iranian coast, potentially making it a target in a protracted war, analysts say.
Iran has been developing another terminal in Jask, a coastal city just outside the Strait of Hormuz on the Gulf of Oman, but its capacity appears to be limited, Mr. Falakshahi said.
Israel’s energy system also looks exposed, analysts say, which could potentially restrain its attacks.
Were the fighting to escalate to major energy installations across the region, the consequences could be serious not only for Iran and its neighbors but for their customers, especially in Asia, and world markets.
Oil prices have already jumped since the Israeli attack early Friday. Any escalation that might appear to threaten international supplies could send prices soaring.
Iran’s coastline stretches along the northern shore of the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow passageway through which tankers and other ships must pass on their way from the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean. Iran has a history of interfering with shipping in the area.
Kpler has estimated that 21 percent of the world’s liquefied natural gas, most of it from Qatar, flowed through this gauntlet in 2024. A hefty 14 million barrels of crude oil a day also moves through the strait, according to Kpler’s estimates.
The conflict with Israel comes at a delicate point for Iran’s petroleum industry, which is a crucial pillar for its economy and its ability to fund its nuclear program.
Strikes on the Iranian facilities could potentially negate years of effort to rebuild production from the low levels at the beginning of this decade when President Trump pulled out of a deal reached by President Barack Obama under which Iran agreed to curbs on its nuclear program in return for an easing of sanctions, including on its oil sales.
Oil production in Iran has increased around 75 percent to about 3.4 million barrels a day from depressed 2020 levels, while exports have roughly tripled, according to estimates from the International Energy Agency and Kpler.
FGE, an energy consulting firm, estimates that Iranian energy export revenues, including oil products and electricity, have almost quadrupled since 2020 to $78 billion in 2024.
Even before the Israeli strikes, Iran faced major handicaps. Although it has some of the world’s richest troves of oil and natural gas, it has strained to exploit them largely because of protracted political tensions with the West dating to the establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979.
“Western firms have been locked out for several decades” by sanctions, said Richard Bronze, head of geopolitics at Energy Aspects, a research firm.
Lack of capital and expertise has limited development of oil and natural gas fields and access to major investment projects like liquefied natural gas facilities that might have benefited the Iranian industry.
Qatar, whose huge gas fields in the Persian Gulf border Iran’s, has become rich through L.N.G. development with western partners like Shell and Exxon Mobil, which allow the natural gas to be exported to Europe and Asia.
Despite having large natural gas resources, Iran has recently struggled to produce enough fuel to prevent power cuts.
Much of Iran’s petroleum infrastructure, including the refineries that supply products like gasoline to local markets, are old. If these facilities suffered significant damage, Iran “might struggle more than maybe other countries” to find the spare parts and international support to repair them, Mr. Bronze said.
Sanctions also mean that few customers are willing to buy Iranian oil. Nearly all of Iran’s crude exports go to China. The main buyers are small refiners there, known as “teapots” Mr. Falakshahi said, that are able to extract a substantial discount of up to $7 a barrel from the Iranians.
If those refiners were unable to buy Iranian crude, they would need to look elsewhere, potentially tightening global markets.
Even before the current conflict, signs were emerging of pressure on Iranian oil exports. The Trump administration has been tightening sanctions that saw a de facto easing in the Biden administration. Chinese imports dropped substantially in May, according to Kpler’s estimates.
Analysts say Israel’s energy infrastructure could also prove vulnerable.
Already, the Israeli government has as a precaution ordered a production halt at two of the country’s three offshore natural gas platforms, including Leviathan, which is operated by Chevron. Gas fuels most of Israel’s electric power generation. If this stoppage continued, it could also reduce or halt gas exports to Egypt, hurting customers there.
Israel is also heavily dependent on imported oil brought through the port of Ashkelon in the south of the country. “They are also very fragile,” Mr. Falakshahi said of Israel.
The Saudis and the United Arab Emirates have worked in recent years to ease tensions with Iran and head off future incidents like the attack on a Saudi Aramco facility called Abqaiq in 2018 that temporarily knocked out about half of the kingdom’s export capacity. Those attacks were claimed by the Houthi militant group in Yemen, but the United States at the time blamed Iran for them.
Analysts have said it is conceivable that if Iran feels sufficiently threatened, it could target petroleum installations in those countries again.
The question is,” Mr. Bronze said, how would Iran respond “if it feels like its core economic interests, its energy system, have been attacked.”
Farnaz Fassihi contributed reporting.
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Malachy Browne
June 14, 2025, 1:02 p.m. ET3 hours ago
Malachy Browne
Israeli strikes collapsed a section of a 14-story residential building near Nobonyad Square in northeastern Tehran on Friday, according to videos of the aftermath and rescue efforts verified by The Times. Footage taken soon after the strike showed a section of the building shorn away, with dozens of apartments ripped open and people searching for survivors inside. Footage filmed after daybreak showed debris and personal belongings scattered in the area, and Red Crescent crews working with rescue dogs to search for survivors. Iranian state television reported that 60 people were killed in the strike, including 20 children.
June 14, 2025, 12:59 p.m. ET3 hours ago
Paul Sonne
President Trump had a 50-minute telephone call with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, in which Mr. Putin briefed Mr. Trump on his conversations with the leaders of Israel and Iran and the two agreed to the possibility of restarting negotiations on the Iranian nuclear program, a top Kremlin foreign policy aide, Yuri Ushakov, said. Mr. Putin also wished Mr. Trump a happy birthday and discussed Ukraine peace talks, Mr. Ushakov said.
Adam Rasgon
June 14, 2025, 12:55 p.m. ET3 hours ago
Adam RasgonReporting from Jerusalem
Gazans are worried that Israel-Iran conflict will shift the world’s attention from their plight.
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Dozens of people walking down a dusty road that is flanked by tents and other temporary shelters.
Palestinians displaced by the war walking through a camp in the port area of Gaza City earlier this month. Credit...Saher Alghorra for The New York Times
Palestinians in Gaza said on Saturday that they worried the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran was shifting world attention away from their urgent humanitarian crisis.
While Israeli military planes bombed Iranian nuclear sites and Iran fired barrages of ballistic missiles at Israeli cities over the past two days, Palestinians in Gaza were struggling to find food, connect to the internet and avoid strikes.
“Everyone is speaking about Iran now,” said Khalil al-Halabi, a 71-year-old retired U.N. official living in a partially destroyed home in Gaza City. “Gaza has become a secondary matter.”
Aid distribution sites in Gaza have been shuttered since Friday morning, which was shortly after the initial Israeli attacks on Iran began.
Finding flour, Mr. al-Halabi said, had become a nightmare for his family, with some street vendors selling a 55-pound sack for more than $350 dollars.
More concerning, he said, was that the Israel-Iran conflict could undermine desperately needed efforts to hammer out a cease-fire in Gaza.
Repeated efforts to clinch a deal between Israel and Hamas have failed in recent months, with Israel saying it would end the war only after dismantling Hamas, and Hamas saying it will not surrender.
Sharif al-Buheisi, 56, a resident of Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza, said he thought the war would continue regardless of the fight between Israel and Iran.
“Israel and Hamas are in agreement about the continuation of the war,” he said. “They both benefit in their own way.”
Still, Mr. al-Buheisi, who was a university administrator before the war, said that any diminished focus on Gaza would have negative consequences for Palestinians. He argued that Israel would now be able to make contentious moves “without a real response from the international community.”
In particular, he said, he worried that the international community would not put enough pressure on Israel to fix the new system for delivering aid to Palestinians, which has had a chaotic, and often deadly, roll out.
Mr. al-Buheisi, who said he has hypertension, said the system was not an option for him because he could not fight through frequently unruly crowds of people to get a box of handout food.
Since the new aid effort began in May, scores of hungry and desperate Palestinians have been killed or wounded on their way to collect parcels of food at aid distribution sites in Gaza, which is operated by American security contractors. Palestinian witnesses say at least some of them were killed by Israeli soldiers who guard the perimeters of these aid sites.
The Israeli military has said that its forces have fired warning shots toward people advancing in what was described as a threatening manner.
Mr. al-Halabi, the former U.N. official, said the world’s shifting attention was a reminder of the helpless situation of Palestinians in Gaza.
“We’re living through misery here,” he said. “But what can we do?”
June 14, 2025, 12:53 p.m. ET3 hours ago
Farnaz Fassihi
Iranian media outlets report that the country’s ancient and valuable artifacts are being transported from museums to vaults to safeguard them against Israeli attacks or possible looting if museums are attacked. Iran has several UNESCO designated sites, and its museums hold many antiquities.
Jonathan Swan
June 14, 2025, 12:50 p.m. ET3 hours ago
Jonathan Swan
A senior Trump administration official confirmed that there will be no meeting with the Iranians on Sunday. Before Israel began its offensive, Iranian and U.S. negotiators were scheduled to meet in Oman tomorrow for their sixth round of negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program. “While there will be no meeting Sunday, we remain committed to talks and hope the Iranians will come to the table soon,” the senior administration official said.
Farnaz Fassihi
June 14, 2025, 12:46 p.m. ET4 hours ago
Farnaz Fassihi
Iran’s Red Crescent Society said an Israeli strike had hit one of its ambulances in West Azarbaijan province, killing two medics. The report could not be independently confirmed.
James C. McKinley Jr.
June 14, 2025, 12:14 p.m. ET4 hours ago
James C. McKinley Jr.
The latest round of talks between the United States and Iran on curbing or halting Iran’s efforts to get a nuclear weapon have been canceled, Oman’s foreign minister, Badr Albusaidi, said in a social media post on Saturday. Oman had been mediating the talks, and the next session was supposed to take place in Muscat on Sunday. But the Israeli strikes on Iran and Iran’s counterstrikes have scuttled them. In his post, Mr. Albusaidi said “diplomacy and dialogue remain the only pathway to a lasting peace.”
Farnaz Fassihi
June 14, 2025, 11:44 a.m. ET5 hours ago
Farnaz Fassihi
There is no sign that Iran and Israel are heeding international calls for restraint. Iran’s President, Masoud Pezeshkian, said on Saturday after new rounds of Israeli strikes that Iran would respond “with more force.”
Isabel Kershner
June 14, 2025, 11:35 a.m. ET5 hours ago
Isabel KershnerReporting from Jerusalem
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said on Saturday that Israeli strikes had “paved a path to Tehran” and that the Israeli air force would soon be seen flying over the Iranian capital. Speaking to the nation in a video statement, just hours after several barrages of Iranian missiles sent millions of Israelis into bomb shelters and killed three people, Netanyahu said, “We will strike every site and every target of the ayatollahs’ regime.”
He added: “What they have felt until now is nothing compared to what they will feel from the might of our forces in the coming days.”
Farnaz Fassihi
June 14, 2025, 11:32 a.m. ET5 hours ago
Farnaz Fassihi
Fars News, an Iranian outlet affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards, said Israel was striking refineries and energy infrastructure, widening its targets. The new targets include South Pars gas field in the Bushehr province on the Persian Gulf and the Asalouieh refinery. The reports said that a fire was raging at Pars South and fire trucks are en route. The Israeli military declined to comment.
Roger Cohen
June 14, 2025, 10:33 a.m. ET6 hours ago
Roger CohenReporting from Paris
A conference on Palestinian statehood is postponed because of the fighting.
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Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia and President Emmanuel Macron of France.
President Emmanuel Macron of France, right, and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia, left, had been set to co-chair the conference.Credit...Nicolas Tucat/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
A U.N. conference set for next week to explore the creation of a Palestinian state has been postponed because of the fighting between Israel and Iran, President Emmanuel Macron of France says.
For Mr. Macron, the meeting’s co-chairman alongside Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia, the postponement delays a delicate decision on French recognition of a Palestinian state. In a move that infuriated Israel, the French president had indicated that he would formally do so at the conference.
Speaking on Friday evening, Mr. Macron said the postponement would be brief with a new date to be set in the coming days. It was needed because leaders in the region, including Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority president, would be unable to travel because of the fighting.
“For logistical, physical, security and political reasons, they could not get to New York,” Mr. Macron said. But he added that the movement toward a two-state outcome symbolized by the conference was “unstoppable.”
That view is not shared by the United States or Israel, both of which had indicated that they would not attend the conference. The United States, in a cable a few days ago that was first reported by Reuters, urged countries to shun the talks, which it said would “coerce Israel during a war, thereby supporting its enemies.”
France, like a growing number of European states, including many that have previously supported Israel, has taken the view that the most right-wing government in Israel’s history is leading the country down a destructive blind alley at devastating cost in Palestinian lives. This conviction has driven France to seek a political framework for the aftermath of the war in Gaza that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has persistently declined to outline.
“Whatever the circumstances, I have stated my determination to recognize a Palestinian state,” Mr. Macron said on Friday. “That determination is whole, and it is a sovereign decision.”
Among his many utterances on the subject, this was perhaps his most forthright, possibly reinforced by disquiet or irritation over the Israeli attack on Iran. Mr. Macron said that Iran’s uranium enrichment program “without any civilian justification” gave Israel legitimate cause to defend itself, but that France did not support Mr. Netanyahu’s decision to bomb Iran.
Turning to Gaza, Mr. Macron suggested that the decisions made by Mr. Netanyahu were bad for Israel’s security.
“When he leads a massive ground operation that kills so many civilians in Gaza, we consider that this is a betrayal of the history and identity of Israel and dangerous for the security of Israel today and tomorrow,” the French president said.
Similar statements by Mr. Macron in the run-up to the now delayed conference have angered Israel, which has accused him of leading “a crusade against the Jewish state.” Israel has also said that any decision to recognize a Palestinian state in the aftermath of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel would reward terrorism.
Tensions between France and Israel are running high, but Mr. Macron did speak to Mr. Netanyahu on Saturday.
Mr. Macron said he had told him that the Israeli strikes on Iran had created “a new era of war in the region” and should lead Israel to accept a cease-fire in Gaza, leading to the release of the Israeli hostages there and “political discussions.”
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Aaron Boxerman
Qasim Nauman
June 14, 2025, 10:13 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Aaron Boxerman and Qasim Nauman
Israel takes aim at Tehran in a second day of strikes.
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Black smoke billowing from an airstrike on Iran’s capital, Tehran, with the lights of the city in the background.
Smoke billowed from the site of an Israeli strike on Tehran on Saturday. Iran and Israel continued to trade aerial attacks for a second consecutive day.Credit...Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times
A second day of Israeli strikes on Iran targeted a major airport in the capital, Tehran, and sought to weaken air defenses around the city, the military said on Saturday. Iran fired at least three waves of ballistic missiles at Israel, sending residents rushing to bomb shelters.
Israel attacked the Mehrabad International Airport in Tehran overnight between Friday and Saturday, according to Iranian state news media. The airport is used for both military and civilian purposes and IRNA, the state news agency, said a hangar for military jets there was targeted.
Video filmed by a witness in Tehran and verified by The New York Times showed thick black smoke billowing from the part of airport where military hangars are located.
Dozens of Israeli warplanes struck sites in Tehran overnight, including surface-to-air missile systems, as part of an effort to weaken the capital’s aerial defenses, the Israeli military said.
Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin, the Israeli military’s chief spokesman, told reporters, “Tehran is no longer immune.” He said dozens of Israeli fighter jets had flown over the Iranian capital for more than two hours overnight alongside drones now stationed there on a standing basis, showing that the Israeli military had achieved “freedom of action.”
“This is the deepest we have ever operated in Iran,” General Defrin said.
An Iranian missile struck homes south of Tel Aviv, Israel’s largest metropolitan area, killing two people, according to Israeli authorities.
These attacks followed the launch of Israel’s shock assault on Iran on Friday, which began with a surprise, predawn attack on an array of targets connected to the country’s nuclear program and military.
Iran later responded with waves of ballistic missiles and drones that sent Israelis scrambling for reinforced shelters. Israel has conducted roughly 150 strikes on Iran over two days, an Israeli military official said on Saturday afternoon, while Iranian forces have fired roughly 200 ballistic missiles at Israeli territory, in addition to scores of drones.
At least four top Iranian military figures have been killed by Israel. The Israeli military also said on Saturday that it had killed nine senior scientists and experts in the country’s nuclear program.
Iran said on Friday that at least 78 people had been killed and more than 300 wounded in the Israeli attacks. An updated figure was not yet available by Saturday.
An Iranian missile landed overnight in a residential area of Rishon LeZion, a city south of Tel Aviv, killing two Israelis and wounding 19, according to the Israeli authorities.
One of those killed was Yisrael Aloni, a 73-year-old man, said Moria Malka, a city spokeswoman. The identity of the second person killed, a woman, has not been made public.
Malachy Browne and Adam Rasgon contributed reporting.
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Lynsey Chutel
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
June 14, 2025, 9:41 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Lynsey Chutel and Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
The airspace closings over Iran and Israel have affected thousands of flights.
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An empty airline concourse.
Israel’s Ben Gurion Airport remains closed, and the country’s three major airlines have moved their fleets outside the country to prevent them from being hit by Iranian airstrikes.Credit...Jack Guez/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
The airspace over Iran and Israel remained largely empty on Saturday morning, flight data from the tracking service FlightRadar24 showed, with an estimated 3,000 flights affected as neighboring countries cautiously reopened their airspace.
Major airlines in the region canceled flights, while others diverted their routes, adding travel time and fuel costs to their journeys.
Israel and Iran have closed their airspace since they began exchanging fire on Friday and Saturday, and neighboring Iraq, Jordan and Syria followed suit.
On Saturday, Iran’s state news media reported that Iran’s airspace would remain closed until 2 a.m. the next morning. And in Israel, Ben Gurion Airport remains closed until further notice. Israel’s three major airlines have also moved their fleets outside the country to prevent them from being damaged in Iranian airstrikes, the Israeli news media reported.
Jordan reopened its airspace at 7:30 a.m. on Saturday, and Syria’s Civil Aviation Authority also announced the full reopening of Syrian airspace to civilian air traffic. The Iraqi Civil Aviation Authority said that Iraq’s airspace would remain largely closed “in light of rising regional tensions”; on Saturday, it partly opened the country’s airspace to allow daylight flights in and out of Basra International Airport.
Some airlines canceled flights, while others altered their routes to avoid the conflict. Many carriers opted to fly over Saudi Arabia, while others flew over Turkey and Azerbaijan to avoid Iranian airspace, flight tracking data showed.
Emirates, a major carrier and Dubai’s flagship airline, canceled all flights to and connections via Iran, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon until Sunday. FlyDubai, a budget carrier, suspended flights to 16 destinations.
In Lebanon, Middle East Airlines, the national carrier, suspended its flights on Friday, sending rumors swirling through the country that something terrible was looming, given that the airline had continued flying throughout the conflict with Israel last year. By Saturday afternoon, the airline said its flights would resume.
Lufthansa, Germany’s largest commercial airline, said it was canceling all flights to Tehran and Tel Aviv until July 31, while all flights to Amman, Beirut and Iraq’s Erbil airport were canceled until June 20. United Airlines has paused all flights to and from Tel Aviv until July 31, and Delta Air Lines has canceled all flights from Tel Aviv to New York until Aug. 31.
On Friday, Air India, which flies over the Middle East to reach destinations in Europe and North America, canceled or diverted more than a dozen flights. In some cases, it was operating alternative extended routes in a bid to avoid further cancellations, the carrier said on Saturday. Two days earlier, Air India suffered its own unrelated deadly disaster when one of its commercial flights crashed in Ahmedabad, India, killing more than 270 people.
Falih Hassan contributed reporting.
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Leily Nikounazar
June 14, 2025, 9:35 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Leily Nikounazar
Iran said that negotiations with the United States over the Iranian nuclear program would be suspended until Israel ends its attacks on Iran and blamed Washington for supporting the attacks. Iran and the U.S. were scheduled to meet on Sunday in Oman.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman, Esmail Baghaei, told a news conference in Tehran, “It is obvious that in such circumstances and until the Zionist regime’s aggression against the Iranian nation stops, it will be meaningless to participate in dialogue with the party that is the biggest supporter and accomplice of the aggressor.”
Adam Rasgon
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
June 14, 2025, 9:00 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Adam Rasgon and Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
The West Bank is in the firing line without shelters or air-raid sirens.
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People carry bags of supplies while crossing a road near a red barrier.
Palestinian residents in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on Saturday. Few Palestinians in the West Bank have safe rooms or shelters to protect them from incoming Iranian missile attacks on nearby Israel.Credit...Hazem Bader/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
As Israel and Iran exchange military barrages, air-raid sirens across Israel warn residents to seek safety in reinforced bomb shelters.
But in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, which lies on the flight path between the two countries, few, if any, Palestinians have safe rooms or communal shelters to protect them from incoming Iranian ballistic missile attacks on Israel. And no air-raid early warning system is in place, though Palestinians living near Jewish settlements can hear their sirens and others use Israeli applications that provide alerts.
The civil defense of the Palestinian Authority, which administers parts of the West Bank, said that its teams had responded to 40 reports of injuries and property damage from shrapnel falling in the West Bank on Friday. Seven children were among the injured, the civil defense said.
The latest escalation of violence in the region is adding to the fear and insecurity that many of the almost three million Palestinian residents in the West Bank already face living under Israeli military rule and a poorly managed Palestinian administration.
“It’s a terrifying experience,” said Yaqoub al-Rabi, 57, a resident of Biddya, a village near the border between the West Bank and Israel.
He was able to hear sirens at a nearby Israeli settlement in the West Bank blare late Friday, and he and six of his children and grandchildren crowded into his living room, crouching against a wall away from the windows.
But they did not feel safe, Mr. Rabi said. The most difficult part was seeing the fearful faces of his grandchildren as they heard powerful booms in the distance, he said.
While many Palestinians said they were fearful of the missiles, others said they had gone up to their rooftops to witness the spectacle of them flying overhead.
Maj. Gen. Anwar Rajab, the spokesman of the Palestinian Authority security forces, said Palestinians in the territory were encouraged to stay in their homes during missile attacks. The authority, he said, could not afford to build public shelters, noting that the governing body was facing a steep financial crisis.
Mohammed Abu al-Rub, the director of the Palestinian Government Communications Center, said that the West Bank lacked the technological infrastructure needed for the type of advance warning systems used in Israel.
“There are no sirens in the West Bank, because they require technologies and systems we simply don’t have,” he said.
Ala al-Khabass, 37, a resident of village outside Jenin in the northern West Bank, said the missiles were “frightening,” recalling a fragment of an Iranian missile that killed a Palestinian man in the West Bank town of Jericho in October when Iran fired a barrage of missiles at Israel.
“It’s horrifying, but what can we do?” he said. “The only thing we can do is accept we can’t do anything.”
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Neil MacFarquhar
June 14, 2025, 7:45 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Neil MacFarquhar
The next round of nuclear talks between the United States and Iran is off.
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Ali Shamkhani walks past a large map of the Middle East.
Ali Shamkhani, who was overseeing the nuclear talks between Iran and the United States, was among those killed by Israeli strikes on Friday.Credit...Vahid Salemi/Associated Press
The latest round of talks between the United States and Iran on the future of Iran’s nuclear program has been canceled, officials said on Saturday.
The two countries had been scheduled to meet for a sixth round of negotiations on Sunday in Muscat, the capital of Oman. But that diplomacy has been scuttled by the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran, which began with Israeli airstrikes on Friday. Israel’s attacks have targeted Iran’s nuclear facilities, top military commanders and senior nuclear program officials.
Badr Albusaidi, the foreign minister of Oman, which had been mediating the talks, announced the cancellation in a social media post on Saturday, and a senior Trump administration official confirmed that there would be no meeting with the Iranians on Sunday.
In his post, Mr. Albusaidi said “diplomacy and dialogue remain the only pathway to a lasting peace.”
Earlier Saturday, Iran had appeared to adopt a slightly ambiguous stance on further negotiations, calling the talks “meaningless” while also suggesting that a final decision on whether to participate was still pending.
But Iran’s stance hardened as the day went on, with Ismail Baghaei, a spokesman for Iran’s Foreign Ministry, telling reporters at a news conference in Tehran that Iranian participation would be suspended until Israel halts its attacks.
“It is obvious that in such circumstances and until the Zionist regime’s aggression against the Iranian nation stops,” he said, “it will be meaningless to participate in dialogue with the party that is the biggest supporter and accomplice of the aggressor.”
The senior Iranian figures killed by Israel included Ali Shamkhani, a former secretary of the Supreme National Council, who was overseeing the talks as part of a committee named by Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Iranian officials described the killing of Mr. Shamkhani as targeting nuclear diplomacy.
On Saturday, Mr. Baghaei, the foreign ministry spokesman, had also accused Washington of undermining the talks. The United States “acted in a way that makes dialogue meaningless,” he was quoted by Iran’s state news media as saying, accusing Washington of claiming to want to negotiate while also giving Israel its consent to attack.
Although Washington has denied direct involvement, Mr. Baghaei said it was “unimaginable” for Israel to have carried out such “adventurous aggression” without a green light from the Americans.
Israel had a constant desire to entangle Western nations in the region’s conflicts, he said. “It seems that it has succeeded this time as well and has somehow influenced a diplomatic process with this adventure,” he added. “This actually shows that American policymakers are still heavily affected and influenced by this regime.”
President Trump and his administration have repeatedly urged Iran to continue with the dialogue as a means to halt further attacks.
“Iran’s leadership will be wise to negotiate at this time,” McCoy Pitt, a senior State Department official, said in a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Friday focused on the crisis.
The senior U.S. administration official echoed that sentiment again on Saturday, saying, “While there will be no meeting Sunday, we remain committed to talks and hope the Iranians will come to the table soon.”
Mr. Trump has written on social media that even more brutal attacks are in store for Iran if it does not make a deal. Iran has denied seeking to develop nuclear weapons.
Leily Nikounazar contributed reporting.
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Leily Nikounazar
June 14, 2025, 7:11 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Leily Nikounazar
The semiofficial Mehr news agency in Iran reports that Iran has notified the U.S., Britain and France that any country that participates in repelling Iranian attacks on Israel will be targeted, including ships and naval vessels in Persian Gulf and Red Sea.
Adam Rasgon
June 14, 2025, 6:38 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Adam RasgonReporting from Jerusalem
The Israeli military said that its strikes on Iran had killed nine scientists who were working in the Iranian nuclear program. In a statement, the military shared the names of the nine scientists, who it said had “played a central part of the progress toward nuclear weapons.”
Adam Rasgon
June 14, 2025, 5:07 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Adam RasgonReporting from Jerusalem
Video from Rishon LeZion in central Israel shows extensive damage to homes as security forces comb through the rubble. The Israeli authorities said the strike had killed two people and wounded 19 others.
Associated Press
Neil MacFarquhar
June 14, 2025, 4:44 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Neil MacFarquhar
Some air traffic resumed around the Middle East on Saturday, with Syria, Lebanon and Jordan announcing that they would reopen their airspace to commercial flights.
In Lebanon, Middle East Airlines, the national carrier, better known as MEA, said that flights would begin arriving and departing from Beirut’s international airport starting this afternoon. The announcement yesterday that flights would be suspended sent rumors swirling through Lebanon that something terrible was looming, since the carrier continued flying throughout the conflict with Israel last year. But various international carriers had already said they were stopping flights to Iran, Israel and other nearby destinations for longer periods.
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
June 14, 2025, 4:36 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
Iran’s state television reported that an Israeli strike had killed 60 people, including 20 children, in one residential building in Tehran on Friday, with 10 other children still believed to be trapped under the rubble.
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
June 14, 2025, 3:26 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
The U.S. Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, said Saturday that he had to head to a shelter five times overnight. “It’s now Shabbat here. Should be quiet. Probably won’t be,” he wrote on social media.
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
June 14, 2025, 2:53 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
Jordan reopened its airspace at 7:30 a.m. local time on Saturday, the country’s civil aviation authority said. Jordan had closed its airspace on Friday after the fighting started, and its military said later that day that it had intercepted drones and missiles that posed a threat to populated areas in the country.
Qasim Nauman
June 14, 2025, 2:21 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Qasim Nauman
The Israeli military struck sections of Tehran’s Mehrabad International Airport overnight, the Iranian state news media reported Saturday. Mehrabad is the main airport in Iran’s capital, and it is also used by the military. IRNA, Iran’s state news agency, said a hangar for military jets was targeted.
Malachy Browne
June 14, 2025, 3:09 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Malachy Browne
Video filmed by a witness in Tehran and verified by The Times showed pillars of thick black smoke billowing from the part of Mehrabad airport where military hangars are positioned. The hangars appeared to be ablaze.
Video
CreditCredit...The New York Times
Aaron Boxerman
June 14, 2025, 2:14 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Aaron BoxermanReporting from Jerusalem
The Israeli military said Saturday that it had conducted a wave of airstrikes overnight in Tehran, Iran’s capital. The targets included surface-to-air missile sites in an effort to weaken Iranian air defenses around the city, the military said.
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
June 14, 2025, 2:08 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
Israel’s defense minister, Israel Katz, said Saturday morning that Israeli forces were continuing to strike strategic sites in Iran. Katz added that Iran had “crossed red lines by deliberately targeting Israel’s civilian population and it will pay a heavy price.”
Aaron Boxerman
June 14, 2025, 1:57 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Aaron BoxermanReporting from Jerusalem
The death toll from Iranian strikes in Israel has risen to three. At least two people were killed and 19 others wounded in central Israel on Saturday morning when a missile struck near them, according to Magen David Atom, the Israeli emergency service. Several homes were heavily damaged in the strike, which the Israeli military said happened in Rishon LeZion, a city south of Tel Aviv.
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
June 14, 2025, 1:36 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Rawan Sheikh Ahmad
The Israeli military said it had intercepted a number of drones launched from Iran on Saturday morning. The drones triggered sirens in multiple areas, including the Dead Sea region and the West Bank.
Aaron Boxerman
June 14, 2025, 12:30 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Aaron BoxermanReporting from Jerusalem
One of the 21 people wounded in an Iranian missile strike in central Israel has died, according to the Shamir Medical Center, south of Tel Aviv. It did not identify the victim. At least two people in Israel have now been killed since Iran began launching scores of ballistic missiles in response to Israel’s attack on its nuclear sites and military leadership.
Aaron Boxerman
June 14, 2025, 12:05 a.m. ETJune 14, 2025
Aaron BoxermanReporting from Jerusalem
Israeli forces are continuing to strike targets in Iran, the military said in a brief statement, more than 24 hours after it began attacking Iran’s nuclear sites and military leadership.
Aaron Boxerman
June 13, 2025, 11:22 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Aaron BoxermanReporting from Jerusalem
Israeli paramedics now say they are treating at least 21 people who were wounded, one of them critically, in central Israel during an Iranian missile barrage, according to the Magen David Adom emergency service. It released a video from the scene, without specifying the location, that shows the rubble of heavily damaged buildings and at least one wrecked car.
Image
Credit...Ronen Zvulun/Reuters
Aaron Boxerman
June 13, 2025, 10:49 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Aaron BoxermanReporting from Jerusalem
About 10 people were wounded after a projectile landed near them during the latest Iranian missile barrage, Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency service said. Some were in “moderate” condition while others were lightly injured according to an initial assessment, it said, without identifying the precise location of the incident.
Farnaz Fassihi
June 13, 2025, 10:36 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Farnaz Fassihi
A miscalculation by Iran led to Israeli strikes’ extensive toll, officials say.
Image
A building with windows blown out and its roof collapsed.
A building damaged after Israel hit multiple structures early Friday in Tehran.Credit...Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times
Iran’s senior leaders had been planning for more than a week for an Israeli attack should nuclear talks with the United States fail. But they made one enormous miscalculation.
They never expected Israel to strike before another round of talks that had been scheduled for this coming Sunday in Oman, officials close to Iran’s leadership said on Friday. They dismissed reports that an attack was imminent as Israeli propaganda meant to pressure Iran to make concessions on its nuclear program in those talks.
Perhaps because of that complacency, precautions that had been planned were ignored, the officials said.
This account of how Iranian officials were preparing before Israel conducted widespread attacks across their country on Friday, and how they reacted in the aftermath, is based on interviews with half a dozen senior Iranian officials and two members of the Revolutionary Guards. They all asked not to be named to discuss sensitive information.
Officials said that the night of Israel’s attack, senior military commanders did not shelter in safe houses and instead stayed in their own homes, a fateful decision. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards’ aerospace unit, and his senior staff ignored a directive against congregating in one location. They held an emergency war meeting at a military base in Tehran and were killed when Israel struck the base.
By Friday evening, the government was just beginning to grasp the extent of damage from Israel’s military campaign that began in the early hours of the day and struck at least 15 locations across Iran, including in Isfahan, Tabriz, Ilam, Lorestan, Borujerd, Qom, Arak, Urmia, Ghasre Shirin, Kermanshah, Hamedan and Shiraz, four Iranian officials said.
Israel had taken out much of Iran’s defense capability, destroying radars and air defenses; crippled its access to its arsenal of ballistic missiles; and wiped out senior figures in the military chain of command. In addition, the aboveground part of a major nuclear enrichment plant at Natanz was severely damaged.
In private text messages shared with The New York Times, some officials were angrily asking one another, “Where is our air defense?” and “How can Israel come and attack anything it wants, kill our top commanders, and we are incapable of stopping it?” They also questioned the major intelligence and defense failures that had led to Iran’s inability to see the attacks coming, and the resulting damage.
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People looking out over Tehran during Israel’s attack.
After the sound of multiple explosions, people gathered on top of a hill watching the smoke in Tehran.Credit...Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times
“Israel’s attack completely caught the leadership by surprise, especially the killing of the top military figures and nuclear scientists. It also exposed our lack of proper air defense and their ability to bombard our critical sites and military bases with no resistance,” Hamid Hosseini, a member of the country’s Chamber of Commerce’s energy committee, said in a telephone interview from Tehran.
Mr. Hosseini, who is close to the government, said Israel’s apparent infiltration of Iran’s security and military apparatus had also shocked officials. Israel has conducted covert operations in Iran against military and nuclear targets and carried out targeted assassinations against nuclear scientists for decades as part of its shadow war with Iran, but Friday’s multipronged and complex attack involving fighter jets and covert operatives who had smuggled missile parts and drones into the country suggested a new level of access and capability.
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has been moved to an undisclosed safe location where he remained in contact with remaining top military officials, said in a televised speech that Israel had, with its attacks, declared war on Iran. As he spoke, vowing revenge and punishment, Iran launched several waves of missile attacks on Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
“They should not think they attacked and it is over,” Mr. Khamenei said. “No, they started it. They started the war. We will not allow them to escape from this crime unharmed.”
Earlier Friday morning, Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, a 23-person council responsible for national security decisions, held an emergency meeting to discuss how the country should respond. In the meeting, Mr. Khamenei said he wanted revenge but did not want to act hastily, according to two officials familiar with the discussions.
Divisions emerged on when and how Iran should respond, and whether it could sustain a prolonged war with Israel that could also drag in the United States, given how badly its defense and missile capabilities were damaged. One official said in the meeting that if Israel responded by attacking Iran’s infrastructure or water and energy plants, it could lead to protests or riots.
A member of the Revolutionary Guards briefed on the meeting said that officials understood that Mr. Khamenei faced a pivotal moment in his nearly 40 years in power: He had to decide between acting, and risking an all-out war that could end his rule, or retreating, which would be interpreted domestically and internationally as defeat.
“Khamanei faces no good options,” said Ali Vaez, the Iran project director of the International Crisis Group. “If he escalates, he risks inviting a more devastating Israeli attack that the U.S. could join. If he doesn’t, he risks hollowing out his regime or losing power.”
Ultimately, Mr. Khamenei ordered Iran’s military to fire on Israel. Initially, the plan was to launch up to 1,000 ballistic missiles on Israel to overwhelm its air defense and ensure maximum damage, according to two members of the Guards. But Israel’s strikes on missile bases had made it impossible to move missiles quickly from storage and place them on launchpads, they added.
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The Iron Dome defense system lights up a dark sky.
A projectile hit buildings as the Israeli Iron Dome air-defense system intercepted missiles over Tel Aviv.Credit...Leo Correa/Associated Press
In the end, Iran could only muster about 100 missiles in its first waves of attacks. At least seven sites were struck around Tel Aviv, killing one person and injuring at least 20 more, and damaging residential buildings.
On Friday, after Israeli attacks had somewhat subsided for part of the day, Iran’s military hurried to repair some of its damaged air defenses and install new ones, according to officials. Iran’s airspace remained closed with flights grounded and airports closed.
Some residents of Tehran spent Friday, a holiday, waiting in gas station lines to fill up their vehicles’ tanks and flocking to grocery stores to stock up on essentials like bread, canned food and bottled water. Many families gathered in parks late into the night, spreading blankets and picnics on the grass, and said in telephone interviews they feared remaining indoors after Israel had struck residential buildings in various neighborhoods targeting scientists and military and government officials.
Mehrdad, 35, who did not want his last name used because of fears for his safety, shared a video of his kitchen wall and windows destroyed when an Israeli missile struck the high-rise next door in his upscale neighborhood in northern Tehran. He said that he had been lucky to have been in the bedroom when the attack occurred, but some civilians in the neighborhood, including children, had been injured.
In the early hours of Saturday, Israel resumed its attacks on Tehran. Some residents, including Fatemeh Hassani, who lives in the Mirdamad neighborhood, said they heard drones buzzing overhead and nonstop explosion sounds followed by the rat-tat-tat of air defenses firing in eastern and central Tehran.
Mahsa, a 42-year-old computer engineer who lives in the capital’s north and similarly did not want to give her last name out of fear of her safety, said she and her family were unable to sleep. They not only could hear the booms but also could see traces of fire and smoke from their window.
“We are in the middle of a war, this much is clear to all of us, and we don’t know where it will go or how it will end,” she said.
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Aaron Boxerman
June 13, 2025, 10:25 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Aaron BoxermanReporting from Jerusalem
Another wave of Iranian missiles has set off air-raid sirens across Israel, including in Tel Aviv, according to the Israeli military. In Jerusalem, booms were heard overhead, rattling windows.
Aaron Boxerman
June 13, 2025, 9:45 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Aaron BoxermanReporting from Jerusalem
Iran has launched another barrage of missiles at Israeli territory, the Israeli military just announced. Air-raid sirens blared out in communities in northern Israel and in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights, warning Israelis to rush to fortified bomb shelters.
Natan Odenheimer
June 13, 2025, 9:28 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Natan OdenheimerReporting from Jerusalem
In one underground bomb shelter, Israelis huddle, and wait.
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Two people lie on a sleeping mat on the flood, while two others sit nearby next to a wall.
People in a Jerusalem bomb shelter early Saturday morning.Credit...Natan Odenheimer/The New York Times
A father hurried into a bomb shelter, carrying his sleepy 4-year-old daughter in his arms as sirens wailed in the background. A young couple, slightly tipsy, curled up on a slim mattress pad. A woman, squeezing her partner’s hand, tried to calm herself by taking deep breaths.
This scene, at a communal bomb shelter in central Jerusalem, played out in cities across Israel on Saturday morning, when a retaliatory barrage of missiles from Iran sent residents rushing to safety. Although some Israelis have access to safe rooms in their homes, many do not, and during wartime they — particularly those living in older structures — run to one of the underground bomb shelters that are so prevalent in Israeli cities.
“It was frightening,” said Noa Shekel, 23, who was taken out of a deep sleep when the sirens blared across Jerusalem.
Iran fired three waves of missiles at Israel on Friday night and Saturday morning, wounding dozens of people, including some seriously. The Iranian attacks came after Israeli strikes that targeted Iran’s nuclear sites and killed senior commanders.
In the shelter, signs of exhaustion were apparent: families lying on the floor, teenagers sleeping upright on the stairs, a pregnant woman slouching on a wooden bench.
Dozens of people — secular and religious Jews — were huddling in the shelter, which young people use as a community center on normal days.
For some, there was frustration that special weekend plans had been interrupted.
“We decided to spend Shabbat in Jerusalem to celebrate my daughter’s bat mitzvah,” said Rivkah Sharabi, 40, who was sitting beside her husband and their five children. “Instead, we’re spending it in a shelter.”
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Talya Minsberg
June 13, 2025, 8:42 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Talya Minsberg
An Israeli police spokeswoman confirmed that one woman was pronounced dead at the scene after an Iranian missile barrage on Friday night struck Ramat Gan, a suburb east of Tel Aviv.
Farnaz Fassihi
June 13, 2025, 8:06 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Farnaz Fassihi
Video from The Associated Press shows explosions rattling the sky above Tehran early Saturday.
Associated Press Iran
Farnaz Fassihi
June 13, 2025, 7:54 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Farnaz Fassihi
Residents of Tehran, the Iranian capital, say they are hearing drones buzz nonstop in the sky above them. Fatemeh Hassani, who lives in the Mirdamad neighborhood, was speaking during a live town hall discussion on the social media app Clubhouse, and shared the sounds she was hearing of sirens and explosions with the audience.
Parin Behrooz
June 13, 2025, 7:46 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Parin Behrooz
Iranians describe Israel’s attacks in voice memos and calls.
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People looking up at a building with blown out windows and floors exposed to the daylight.
Outside a damaged building in Tehran on Friday following attacks by Israel.Credit...Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times
Iranians have not experienced anything like this in almost 40 years.
More than 200 Israeli warplanes dropped hundreds of bombs across Iran early Friday, rocking cities with explosions and jolting people out of their beds. They looked out windows onto columns of smoke, ran onto rooftops for a better view and made phone calls to their loved ones.
In the aftermath of the attack, some also spoke to The New York Times, sending voice notes amid flickering internet service and offering a glimpse of people’s experiences in a country where many don’t feel comfortable speaking to international news outlets. They described confusion, fear and anger against Israel, whose widespread attacks drew comparisons to the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s.
‘We were not ready’
Shakiba, a 37-year-old occupational therapist based in Tehran, was only comfortable using her first name because of the heightened security situation in the country. She had been getting ready for bed at home with her two cats when the bombing began.
She looked outside and saw neighbors gathering on balconies and roofs, everyone trying to see what was happening. She added:
“The first sound was really shocking, because we were not ready, we were not expecting it. And it wasn’t just one sound — we heard a couple of sounds at the first. And I know all the people around the country and around the city were following the news, but we were not expecting it to happen.”
She later called two of her patients, an elderly couple who live alone, their children out of the country like many other Iranian families. They were near an area that came under attack, but their health conditions prevented them from leaving their home.
“The woman just cried by the phone, and she said that ‘I was really afraid because we can’t move’,” Shakiba recalled. She tried to reassure them, stuck in their home.
Listen to Shakiba’s Voice Note
‘I just try to make her sure that it will not happen again, but I was not sure about this myself.’
She also called another patient, a man with a neurological condition. He told her, “I’m OK now, but the sounds were so loud and so terrifying and I just felt that I am near to heart attack,” Shakiba said.
Describing the bombardment, Shakiba said that people like her patients — children with special needs, the elderly, frail and ill — had few resources to help them. “They are in shock,” she said.
Listen to Shakiba’s Voice Note
“We are not aware of what we can do in these situations.”
Nor did she feel confident about her own plans. “I have two cats and they’re both heavy,” she said. “It sounds silly with everything going on, but I keep thinking about how I can evacuate with them if the need comes.”
‘Scenes of blood and flesh and burned feet’
Jila Baniyaghoob, a journalist and women’s rights activist in Tehran, said that there had been a large focus on Israel’s military targets, but that civilians had been harmed in the attacks as well.
She had a close friend at an apartment complex in the Saadat Abad district of Tehran, where residents include many faculty members from Tehran’s various universities, and which was struck during the attack early Friday.
Fire rages at a residential building as residents gather outside.
A building in Saadat Abad was hit after Israel’s attack on Tehran.Credit...Arash Khamooshi for The New York Times
A major fire spread after the attack, according to Ms. Baniyaghoob and photos of the scene.
Ms. Baniyaghoob said that she had heard most of the people killed in the strike were not members of the military or involved in Iran’s nuclear program. The exact toll of the attacks remained unclear on Friday night, although Iran’s Fars news agency, citing unofficial figures, said that dozens had been killed and more than 300 others injured.
Ms. Baniyaghoob said that her friend’s family had grabbed their young children and raced down stairwells to escape the complex. They passed “really awful scenes of blood and flesh and burned feet,” she said. “Most of the people who lived near the strike sites are feeling a collective fear, especially their children.”
‘The people are paying the price’
Bahman Ahmadi Amouee, an economic journalist, said he, along with many others, had been feeling optimistic before the attacks, noting that Iran was engaged in diplomatic talks with the United States and that there were hopeful economic signs within Iran.
But he believes the West and Israel took advantage of the circumstances, calling Israel’s leadership extremist and far right. “We’re seeing the same policy in Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria — policies that contradict with what the West says it values, like democracy and human rights.”
Mr. Ahmadi Amouee has written for newspapers that call for change within Iran and spent five years in Evin prison in 2009 amid a government crackdown on journalists.
In conflict with Israel, “the people are paying the price,” he said. “Once the stores open on Sunday, the prices will have undoubtedly gone up. There’s long lines of gas everywhere, people are nervous.”
He added:
“Whenever there’s war, or earthquake, or famine, people start feeling unstable, and the most vulnerable people in these situations are usually women, children and impoverished people. As soon as the markets open after the two day holiday, we’ll see the price of dollar going up, and the instability and lack of security will only multiply.”
Aaron Boxerman
June 13, 2025, 6:57 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Aaron BoxermanReporting from Jerusalem
The Israeli military just said in a statement that Iran had launched “dozens of missiles” at Israel over the past hour, overnight Saturday. While some from the lastest barrage were intercepted, others were not, the military said. Search-and-rescue teams were operating where projectiles had reportedly fallen, it added.
William J. Broad
June 13, 2025, 6:33 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
William J. Broad
The radiation risk from Israel’s strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites is low, for now.
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Three people in hard hats walk along a road next to tall towers of a heavy water facility against a row of distant mountains.
Iran’s Arak heavy water production facility in 2004.Credit...Majid Saeedi/Getty Images
Strikes on any nuclear facilities could, in theory, release clouds of deadly radiation that endanger human lives and health. But in the case of Israel’s attacks on Iran overnight on Friday, that appears so far to not have been the case.
The earliest attacks and targets seem for the moment to rule out the most dangerous outcomes, limiting possible radiation threats to the realm of the relatively minor.
The most dangerous kind of threat would arise from successful attacks on nuclear reactors. Over time, the splitting of atoms in reactor fuel results in buildups of highly radioactive spinoffs. Among the worst are Cesium 137, Strontium 90 and Iodine 131.
If Iodine 131 is inhaled or ingested, it ends up in a person’s thyroid gland. There, its intense radioactivity raises dramatically the risk of thyroid cancer, particularly in children. The other isotopes can also result in cancers.
But so far, no reports or evidence suggest that Iran’s nuclear reactors were hit in the Israeli attacks. Apparently spared were a power plant on the Persian Gulf, a research reactor in Tehran and a heavily guarded site ringed by antiaircraft weapons and miles of barbed wire.
Known as Arak, that isolated complex was long suspected of being built to produce plutonium, one of the two main fuels for atom bombs. But the Obama administration’s 2015 deal with Iran turned the complex into a nuclear relic unusable for that purpose. The Arak reactor never came to life.
A lesser threat to human health revolves around uranium, the other fuel of atom bombs. In recent years, Iran has focused on it with great intensity, building an increasingly wide array of industrial plants and complexes to refine the fissile element.
Uranium ore that miners dig up is relatively harmless. But it contains tiny amounts of a rare radioactive isotope, Uranium 235, that can be used to power nuclear reactors at low levels of enrichment, and to fuel atom bombs at higher levels. The percentage of U-235 in mined uranium is less than 1 percent.
The goal of uranium enrichment is to raise the percentage, which is often done through the use of centrifuges — machines that spin at extremely high speeds. Iran started with low percentages and, over decades, has increasingly raised its enrichment levels. The highest now stand at 60 percent, which is just short of bomb grade.
For human health, the higher the level of U-235 enrichment, the greater the danger. The isotope and its decay products emit three types of radiation: alpha particles, beta particles and gamma rays. The first two are relatively weak. Alphas cannot penetrate skin. Betas can be stopped by a layer of clothing.
But gamma rays are highly energetic and can penetrate the human body, damaging DNA and sowing the seeds of cancer. It takes thick concrete or lead to stop the penetrating rays.
Satellite images and expert analyses show that a main target of the Israeli strikes was the Natanz complex, the largest of Iran’s enrichment sites. Fully destroyed was the Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant, where Iran was producing uranium enriched to near 60 percent. The images show a dark craterlike scar. And videos from a distance show clouds of dark smoke.
It’s possible that some of that smoke contained U-235 particles, which may pose a regional health hazard. But the International Atomic Energy Agency, which monitors the Iranian site, said it had so far detected no such danger.
“The level of radioactivity outside the Natanz site has remained unchanged and at normal levels indicating no external radiological impact to the population or the environment from this event,” Rafael Mariano Grossi, the agency’s director general, said Friday before the U.N. Security Council.
He mentioned concerns about alpha particles inside the Natanz facility, but called them “manageable” with appropriate radiation protection measures
Acknowledging reports of attacks at Fordo and Isfahan, two other nuclear fuel sites in Iran, he said “we do not have enough information.”
Aside from the radiation danger, a complicating factor in the health calculus is that uranium in all its forms is a toxic heavy metal, similar to lead. If ingested it can produce a cascade of adverse health effects, with the kidneys a main target. Acute exposure can lead to renal failure. The main routes of exposure are ingestion of contaminated food and water, inhalation of airborne dust, and, to a lesser extent, contact with the skin.
The inhalation of uranium dust — a common hazard in mining and milling — is also a hazard. Inhaled particles can lodge in the lungs, leading to respiratory irritation, inflammation, and, over time, such lung diseases such as fibrosis.
A number of diplomats expressed their worries before the Council about the radiation threats from Israel’s strikes.
“We are particularly concerned by the potential radiological consequences,” said Vasily Nebenzya, Russia’s permanent representative to the U.N. They can lead, he added, “to the most dire consequences not just for the Middle East region, but for the world as a whole.”
Mr. Nebenzya said Russia was following closely the status of the inspectors in Iran of the I.A.E.A.
“The life and health of its personnel has been threatened,” he said. “And we expect that the director general of the agency is going to provide us with objective assessment and analysis of the developing situation, including from the viewpoint of radiological consequences.”
Aric Toler and Riley Mellen
June 13, 2025, 6:26 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Aric Toler and Riley MellenReporting from New York
Videos posted on social media on Friday and verified by The Times show a strike hitting a part of central Tel Aviv where a number of military facilities are located, including the headquarters of the Israeli Defense Forces. The videos indicate that at least one of Iran’s missiles reached a sensitive command site inside Israel.
Prominent in footage of the strike was the Marganit Tower in the Kirya area of Tel Aviv, a landmark in the center of the city that is close to the Israeli military’s headquarters.
The clips initially show outgoing projectiles, likely missile defense interceptors. Then a streak of light, a loud boom and a bright flash from the explosion of the incoming missile.
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Credit...Newsil2022
Tyler Pager
Luke Broadwater
June 13, 2025, 6:00 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Tyler Pager and Luke BroadwaterReporting from Washington
News Analysis
Trump navigates conflicting currents in the G.O.P. over U.S. involvement in another foreign conflict.
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President Trump had several times this year dissuaded Israel from launching an attack, but afterward he called the strikes “excellent.”Credit...Tierney L. Cross for The New York Times
As Israel pummels Iran with waves of airstrikes, President Trump is navigating the divides within the Republican Party over whether the United States should get involved in another foreign conflict.
On one side are the isolationists who fear that Israel could pull the United States into another Middle East war. And on the other are the Iran hawks and Israel supporters who have been calling for just this sort of military action for years.
Mr. Trump appears caught between the two sides, veering back and forth as he tries to distance the United States from Israel’s assault while celebrating the success of the attacks and warning Iran that more is coming.
“This, right now, is going to cause, I think, a major schism in the MAGA online community,” Charlie Kirk, the right-wing activist and podcaster, said Thursday on his podcast.
Mr. Trump had several times this year dissuaded Israel from launching an attack, saying he wanted to pursue a negotiated settlement with Iran. Shortly after the assault began, the White House sent out a statement from Secretary of State Marco Rubio, emphasizing that the United States was not involved in the initial military operation.
“Israel took unilateral action against Iran,” Mr. Rubio said. “We are not involved in strikes against Iran, and our top priority is protecting American forces in the region.”
But in subsequent interviews, the president said he spoke with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel on Thursday, knew the attacks were planned and called the strikes “excellent.” In a post on Truth Social, he wrote Israel has “already planned attacks” that would be “even more brutal.” And the U.S. military helped Israel intercept some of the ballistic missiles Iran fired in retaliation, an American official said.
While running for president, Mr. Trump promised to end wars around the world, and in his inaugural address, he said he wanted to be remembered as a peacemaking president. So far, Mr. Trump’s diplomatic efforts have failed to end the war between Russia and Ukraine, which he had promised to do within 24 hours, or the war between Israel and Hamas.
Over the past several months, the Trump administration had been trying to strike a new nuclear deal with Iran, and the president had urged Mr. Netanyahu to hold off any military actions as the talks continued.
“I don’t want them going in because that would blow it,” Mr. Trump told reporters at the White House just hours before the attacks.
After Israel launched the missiles, Mr. Trump put the blame on Iran, faulting its leaders for refusing to accept a proposal that would have stopped it from enriching uranium.
“I gave Iran chance after chance to make a deal,” he wrote on Truth Social on Friday morning. “I told them, in the strongest of words, to ‘just do it,’ but no matter how hard they tried, no matter how close they got, they just couldn’t get it done.”
Elliott Abrams, a senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, noted that Mr. Trump had flipped his position on whether Israel should strike Iran. But he said Israel made a calculated gamble that Mr. Trump would go along with the idea.
“They made a bet on President Trump,” he said, adding: “Trump, for a long time — most of the time he’s been in office — has been saying ‘no, we’re negotiating, no, don’t do it.’ The Israelis strike, and today Trump called it excellent.”
For many Republicans, Israel’s military strikes were long overdue amid growing fears that Iran was moving closer to full nuclear capabilities.
“The number of Republicans who do not see a nuclear-armed Iran as a threat to Israel and the world is exceedingly small,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina and a close ally of the president. “The overwhelming majority of Republicans back Israel’s use of military force to neuter the Iranian nuclear threat.”
Another faction of Mr. Trump’s most ardent supporters see it differently. Israel’s strikes and the prospect of U.S. involvement in the conflict, they argue, run counter to Mr. Trump’s “America First” foreign policy agenda.
“The emails are so largely overwhelmingly against Israel doing this, I’d say it’s probably a 99 to one,” Mr. Kirk said on Thursday night of feedback he was receiving from his listeners.
Some MAGA supporters argued that Israel’s targeted strikes of both nuclear sites and top military commanders were part of an effort to ignite a bigger conflict and draw the United States into it. U.S. officials said on Friday that the Pentagon was positioning warships and other military assets in the Middle East to help protect Israel and U.S. troops in the region from any further Iranian retaliation.
“The bottom line is we cannot be dragged into, inexorably dragged into, a war on the Eurasian land mass in the Middle East or in Eastern Europe,” Stephen K. Bannon, a former top adviser to Mr. Trump who remains close to the president, said on Friday on his “War Room” podcast.
On Israel, he said: “Hey, you guys did it. You’re putting your country first. Your country’s defense first. That’s fine, but we’ve got to put our defense first.”
But Michael Rubin, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, said the Trump administration was just “shouting from the sidelines.”
“Trump will likely keep the U.S. out of conflict and offer mediation, but at this point, he’s just basically treading water,” he wrote in an email. “The big issue will play out in Congress during debates about Israel aid and replenishing Israeli stockpiles.”
Eric Schmitt and Helene Cooper contributed reporting.
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Pranav Baskar
June 13, 2025, 5:24 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Pranav Baskar
Israel destroyed part of Iran’s premier weapons facility, the head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog said.
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Members of the U.N. Security Council listening to a briefing by Rafael Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency.Credit...Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
Israel’s strikes against Iran’s premier nuclear enrichment site at Natanz destroyed the facility’s aboveground enrichment plant, Rafael Grossi, the head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog, told the Security Council on Friday.
Natanz was among the first targets hit by Israel in its initial attack early Friday morning. But in later strikes, Mr. Grossi said, Israel appeared to have also hit two other facilities, in Isfahan and Fordo, at which Iran has been working to produce weapons-grade uranium.
The damage to Natanz, a facility roughly 140 miles south of Tehran, appeared to be severe. The site, which hosts a range of advanced centrifuges, is mainly underground.
As a result of Friday’s attack, Mr. Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said there had been “radiological and chemical contamination” within the facility. But he said the leak was “manageable” with appropriate protection measures. Electricity infrastructure, main power supplies and generators at the facility have been destroyed, he added.
Natanz had been targeted in the past, with a computer virus, Stuxnet, some 15 years ago, and with sabotage and explosions as recently as 2021. After previous attacks, Iran has always repaired the damage and increased the sophistication of its centrifuges.
Mr. Grossi also said that Iran had informed the nuclear agency that its facilities at Isfahan and Fordo had also come under attack. The extent of the damage, he said, was unknown.
“We do not have enough information beyond indicating that military activity has been taking place around these facilities as well,” he told members of the Security Council.
Israel has indicated it would attack the site at Fordo, Iran’s second-largest but most heavily fortified nuclear enrichment installation, which is buried beneath a mountain.
Experts said that without disabling Fordo, where Iran possesses enough centrifuges to quickly produce weapons-grade uranium, Israel’s operation would fail to destroy Iran’s nuclear program.
On Thursday, the I.A.E.A. said Iran had not complied with its nuclear nonproliferation obligations and passed a vote of censure against the country for the first time in 20 years.
Steven Erlanger contributed reporting.
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Michael D. Shear
June 13, 2025, 5:21 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Michael D. ShearReporting from Washington
In a diplomatic scramble, world leaders urge restraint between Israel and Iran.
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A man with dark gray hair wearing a dark suit holding binders in front of another man wearing a dark suit as they walk outside.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Britain had separate calls Friday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and President Trump.Credit...Henry Nicholls/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
The Israeli attack on Iran and Tehran’s retaliatory strikes inside Israel have prompted a flurry of diplomatic conversations among world leaders, many of whom urged restraint from both countries.
A White House official said that President Trump talked with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel on Friday afternoon after the attacks were underway, the second time in two days that the two leaders had spoken. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing conflict, said the two men discussed the ongoing situation in Iran and Israel.
Mr. Netanyahu also discussed Israel’s decision to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities and top military officials with the leaders of Britain, France, Germany, India and Russia, according to officials in Israel and several of the other countries.
In Britain, a Downing Street spokesman said that Prime Minister Keir Starmer told Mr. Netanyahu that Israel had a right to self-defense, but he “reiterated the need for de-escalation and a diplomatic resolution, in the interests of stability in the region.”
Mr. Starmer also spoke with Mr. Trump, according to the prime minister’s office, which said that Mr. Starmer “reiterated the U.K.’s grave concerns about Iran’s nuclear programs” and told the president that they “agreed on the importance of diplomacy and dialogue.”
The calls between world leaders underscored the anxiety in global capitals about another Middle East war that could further destabilize the region, hike oil prices and increase the possibility of global terror attacks.
Mr. Netanyahu’s office focused on expressions of support for Israel, saying in a statement that “the leaders showed understanding of Israel’s need to defend itself from Iran’s threat of annihilation.”
But President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia condemned the Israeli strikes after speaking with Mr. Netanayhu and President Masoud Pezeshkian of Iran.
“Russia condemns Israel’s actions, which contravene the United Nations’ statute and the international law,” the Kremlin said in a statement on Friday.
Mr. Putin offered to mediate the conflict, claiming that Russia offered “concrete initiatives” to Iran and Israel to achieve peace.
Axios reported that Mr. Trump had also talked with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia to discuss the need to stop the escalation between Iran and Israel.
Abbas Araqchi, the Iranian foreign minister, rejected calls for restraint from Iran in a call with David Lammy, the British foreign secretary, Reuters reported.
Lara Jakes
Aaron Boxerman
June 13, 2025, 4:20 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Lara Jakes and Aaron Boxerman
How Israel defends against Iran’s missiles.
A view of light streaking against a dark sky over Ashkelon, Israel.
Israel’s Iron Dome defense system over Ashkelon, Israel, in October, following a launch of missiles from Iran.Credit...Amir Cohen/Reuters
Iran launched retaliatory strikes against Israel on Friday, less than a day after Israel’s military carried out a mass attack targeting Tehran’s nuclear program and top commanders.
With billions of dollars worth of sophisticated and multilayered aerial defenses, Israel has long been prepared for a full-scale assault by Iranian missiles and drones.
Those layers of protection are now being put to the test, with Israeli authorities confirming that missiles hit multiple sites. In previous exchanges between the two countries, Iran mostly targeted Israeli military bases. But the scope of Israel’s assault, which devastated Iran’s military chain of command, could prompt a much wider Iranian counterstrike.
“One of the most effective tactics to inflict maximum damage on the Israeli home front would be to overwhelm its air defense systems,” said Joe Truzman, a senior analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Long War Journal.
He said Israel will have “only a brief window to detect, assess, and respond to this looming threat.”
Here’s what to know about Israel’s defenses against Iranian attack.
What are Israel’s air defense systems?
Israel’s anti-missile systems include:
Iron Dome: Israel’s best-known air defense system fires interceptors to take down short-range rockets.
David’s Sling: This stationary weapon can shoot down short- and medium-range ballistic and cruise missiles. It has a range of about 185 miles. Like the Iron Dome, it is a “hit-to-kill” weapon that takes down targets by flying into them.
Arrow 2 and 3: These ground-based mobile launchers fire fragmentation warheads packed with explosives that blow up near incoming missiles. The Arrow 2 can intercept targets high in the atmosphere, at an altitude of about 30 miles and a range of about 60 miles. The Arrow 3 can go beyond the atmosphere into space, with a range of up to 1,500 miles. It is one of Israel’s most advanced defenses.
Iron Beam: This high-powered laser was developed to intercept rockets, drones and anti-tank missiles. It was first deployed in the field after Hamas’s 2023 attack on southern Israel, which prompted wars in Gaza and Lebanon.
What are the biggest threats to Israel’s defenses?
One of the most serious threats posed by Iran comes from its heavyweight ballistic missiles, which fly at the edge of space at many times the speed of sound. They can cross the roughly 1,000 miles between Iran and Israel in just a few minutes.
Antimissile systems like Arrow 3, which have a limited supply of expensive interceptors, do not always hit their ballistic missile targets.
Last October, analysts at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, in California, concluded that Israel had run low on interceptors, after about 30 Iranian ballistic missiles landed near a military base in southern Israel unscathed. Last month, a Houthi missile launched from Yemen evaded Israeli and American air defense systems to strike near Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv.
It can take years to produce enough missile interceptors to keep them reliably stockpiled, and Israel “has been expending them,” said Tom Karako, a missile defense expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
Another problem for Israel will be tracking and destroying unmanned drones, which fly low and slow, making them much harder to detect. In the past, Israel has scrambled fighter jets to shoot down drones beyond Israel’s borders; failing that, Israeli forces have used the Iron Dome system, which is most effective against short-range rockets
What about Israel’s allies?
The United States is also helping to defend Israel’s skies.
Days after Iran fired a barrage of about 180 ballistic missiles at Israel in October, the United States sent a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD, to bolster Israeli defenses. The THAAD is a mobile surface-to-air interceptor designed to shoot down incoming ballistic missiles, which its radar can detect from more than 1,800 miles away. THAAD can strike incoming targets both within the Earth’s atmosphere and above it.
The Trump administration sent Israel a second THAAD battery earlier this spring, said Yehoshua Kalisky, a military technology expert at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Navy has deployed the aircraft carrier Carl Vinson to the Arabian Sea; there are more than 60 aircraft aboard the Vinson, including advanced F-35 stealth strike fighters. The American military also has several dozen attack and fighter jets deployed in the Middle East, which were used extensively to defend Israel from Iranian strikes last year.
Neighboring Jordan has said it is continuing to intercept hostile missiles and aircraft entering its airspace, protecting not only its own territory but also serving as a de facto layer of security for Israel.
What’s in Iran’s arsenal?
Iran keeps its military stockpiles and capabilities secret, so experts said it is impossible to know how extended or powerful its airstrikes could be.
Mr. Truzman said Iran could also amass support from its regional proxy militias, in Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen. On Friday, sirens were triggered in Israel after an incoming ballistic missile was detected from Yemen, but it reportedly landed in an uninhabited area in the West Bank.
Mr. Karako and Mr. Kalisky said Israel likely destroyed many of Iran’s weapons systems with its strikes on Friday.
“It will take the Iranians sometimes to organize the missile force again,” Mr. Kalisky said. “We have several layers of defense, so I don’t worry.”
Isabel Kershner
June 13, 2025, 3:21 p.m. ETJune 13, 2025
Isabel KershnerReporting from Jerusalem
How is Israel protecting its critical sites from Iranian retaliation?
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The dome of a nuclear reactor in the distance.
A partial view of the Dimona nuclear reactor in Israel’s southern Negev desert, in 2014.Credit...Jack Guez/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Iran fired its first barrage of dozens of missiles at Israel on Friday night, about 18 hours after Israel’s attacks on Iran began. Israel’s emergency services said they were searching seven sites where missiles or debris hit in the greater Tel Aviv area, the military said.
As Israel braces for further retaliation for its attack on Iran’s nuclear program, here are some of the most critical sites, which are likely to be heavily protected:
Israel’s nuclear reactor in Dimona, in the southern Negev desert. Israel has long maintained ambiguity about its nuclear capabilities but is widely believed to have nuclear weapons. A recently declassified U.S. intelligence report from December 1960, by the Joint Atomic Energy Intelligence Committee, stated that the Dimona project included a reprocessing plant for plutonium production. The report concluded then that the project was related to nuclear weapons. Israel has not signed the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
The country’s main ports, Haifa and Ashdod, on the Mediterranean coast. Israel also has offshore natural gas platforms, part of its energy infrastructure. In a statement on Friday, Israel’s Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure said it could order the temporary closure of some of the offshore gas fields, citing security concerns given the escalating tensions in the region.
Ben Gurion, Israel’s international airport. The airport was shut down on Friday morning, and all incoming and departing flights were canceled as Israel closed its airspace to civilian traffic. Last month, a ballistic missile launched from Yemen by the Iranian-backed Houthi militia struck near Ben Gurion’s main terminal, close to Tel Aviv, after the military failed to intercept the projectile.
Military bases. The Israeli military is also likely to take measures to protect its headquarters and air bases around the country.
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